September 27, 2011

September 27, 2011

This morning I had Weaving the Tale at 9:00 so woke up earlier, took a shower, made my lunch, had breakfast and caught the bus around 8:20. In class, we discussed the book we had read for the day-Castle of Crossed Destinies, which was very interesting and I really enjoyed. We have to read the other story within the book for tomorrow and I look forward to reading it after dinner. Our class only has eight people in it so it is a lot more manageable than some of my other classes and I really love the intimacy of the class. It is much more discussion based simply because there is time for everyone to share their thoughts, which I really love. That class went until 10:30 and then I was free until 1:30. Because I had so much time, I headed out into the city and did a little gift shopping and exploring. I returned after a couple hours to eat lunch and do some homework. From 1:30-2:45 I had Italian, during which we reviewed reflexive verbs and their conjugations. After Italian, I had a fifteen-minute break and then I had my first Medici class.

We started off in the classroom with a presentation on Cosimo de’ Medici and who he was and where the Medici came from. After about half an hour, we headed to the Baptistery and the Opera del Duomo or, rather, the museum for the Duomo and Baptistery. I had not yet been inside the Baptistery so it was really incredible to see the glass, mosaic ceiling and lavish tomb of Pope John XXIII for the first time. We talked a lot about both the ceiling and the tomb, focusing on the history behind each as well as the specifics of their construction and how they factored both into the lives of the Medici family, as well as the life and works of Dante. After spending a little time in the Baptistery (we did not look at the doors today as it was ridiculously crowded), we headed over to the museum. In the museum, we worked on guessing which sculptures had been sculpted by which artists, according to their other works we have seen so far. I was pleasantly surprised by how well I was able to do this already. We saw many works by Donatello and other very famous Florentine artists of the time. We talked about the past and the new construction of the Duomo as well. We had an extended class today so we weren’t done until 5:30, when we headed back to Linguaviva and I met with my Dante discussion group. We discussed the cantos we had to read for tomorrow and came up with three discussion questions to bring to class tomorrow, as we must do together before every time our class meets. A little after six, we headed home and started on some homework.

When we got home, Massimo and Marco were over but Marco was sleeping. When he woke up, Daniella called me in and I got to play with him for a little while! I’m sorry, but I still haven’t gotten a photo of him…I will soon! He really is the cutest little thing and I really love getting to play with him so often; I am so lucky that there are kids in our house so often—there aren’t any in any of the other houses, even grandchildren. After playing with Marco for a bit, I got back to work on my homework and managed to finish my homework for Dante and Italian. I needed a break, though, so I decided to blog for a little bit. Dinner smells delicious! I think we are having pizza and my favorite light and fluffy bread things that you put cheese and salami inside! I am very hungry so it’s the PERFECT dinner for tonight. I’d better do few more things before dinner so I will write more after.

For dinner we did, indeed, have the rolls with cheese and salami and they were DELICIOUS—I had four…(they aren’t that big, I promise). For our main dish, we had pizza, as I had guessed, with a little bit of sausage that was delicious as well! For dessert, we had fruit and tried a new type of fruit called jugele (that is NOT spelled right…) that we thought tasted like a cross between an apple and a kiwi, but are the size of a grape. They weren’t bad but not my favorite either; fun to try something new though!

Now that dinner is over, Franzi and I are doing some laundry and I am going to do my reading for Weaving the Tale. If I finish that quickly, I have a few other homework assignments for other classes that I would love to finish up so we’ll see what time allows. My Dante class is meeting at Santa Maria Novella tomorrow morning at 9:30, which should be interesting. Then I have a break from about 11:00-1:00 for lunch and then I have Weaving the Tale until 2:30. I am glad I will have most of the afternoon off tomorrow so I can get a little more homework done and relax a little bit. Then, Daniella is preparing me dinner early at 6:30 because our group is going to the Wayne Marshall concert tomorrow night at 8:30, which features works by Bernstein and many other famous composers—I am VERY excited for that! Anyway, I’d better sign off now and get to my homework and to bed; I don’t want to be too tired for the concert tomorrow night!

All my love,

Kari