An Eventful Weekend

This has been a weekend full of events and adventures!

Friday was one of the most beautiful days I’ve seen in Italy. We took the bus to the nearby town of Fiesole (which according to E.M. Forster in A Room With a View) is a must-see destination for the first glorious day of spring. The No. 7 bus takes you right up to the top of the hill to the north of Florence, where the tiny town of Fiesole rests overlooking the entire river valley in a gorgeous panorama.

We ate lunch at a little café with an open-air terrace looking over Florence. Good pizza. After that we explored the cathedral up there…there were monks and nuns wandering around…something important was happening that day, but who knows what. There’s a strong German influence in Fiesole, for some reason…lots of the signs are in German. There are also Roman ruins there on the hill, but we didn’t want to pay to go in…so we just looked through the fence.

If you follow this steep, narrow, cobble-stone hill you climb up to this park with an absolutely stunning view of what feels like must be the entirety of Tuscany. We stopped and took lots of pictures. There was a fairly large group of us…8 or so. Climbing higher, you reach the old San Francesco Monastery with a museum of lots of old religious artifacts. Very interesting. There was a place where you could climb up and see what the monk quarters were like. Basically they were tiny stone cells with a desk and a cot (if you were lucky). And a window (or rather a small square hole in the wall). Nothing like vows of poverty!

My nose got a little color that day, and I couldn’t be more happy about it. I am glad to be soaking in rays when I know friends and family at home are either having snow or rain…

Friday night I saw a magnificent concert at the beautiful Teatro della Pergola. Argentinean pianist Martha Argerich and her young protégé Lilya Zilberstein gave a concert entirely of two-piano works. For those who care to know, they played:

• Mozart: Fantasia in F minor (KV 608) AND Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major (KV 448)
• Schumann: something…(I didn’t get a program because you have to pay for them…)
• Shostakovitch: Concertino in A minor, op 94
• Brahms: Variations on a Theme by Haydn, op. 56b
• Rachmaninoff: Suite No. 1, op. 5 “Fantaisie-Tableaux”

Martha Algerich is one of the fiercest, aggressive piano players I’ve ever seen. It’s incredible. And she’s 68!!! I can’t believe it. I read her wikipedia article and now I'm even more enthralled with her. Basically, we decided that she’s the Meryl Streep of the piano world, and she needs to be played in a movie by Meryl Streep someday, who I’m sure could master the German/Argentinean mix of an accent with no problem…

Italian audiences are funny. As I said, there were three encores. They wouldn’t stop clapping. Flowers were literally thrown from the box seats closest to the stage! I’ve never seen that in real life! People also stamp they’re feet during the applause. Many people around us were also conducting the concert as it went along…haha. They’re really into it. The theater itself was beautiful as well. I felt like I was in a time warp.

Saturday we took a field trip with our Italian class to the town of Pontassieve (literally “Bridge Sieve”) to see where the Italian high school students who visit US for “tandem” go to school. That was interesting. They go to a technical high school, so we saw a lot of math and science classrooms. Also their gym. And students taking a smoke break between classes.

We left the school and went up to an old castle (Castello del Trebbio) where they make some of the best wine in Tuscany. Barrels upon barrels deep under the castle and old bottles of wine that haven't been opened since the 1800s! They make olive oil as well, and we got to try some. It was delicious. At the castle there was another panoramic view of miles and miles of Tuscan countryside and vineyards surrounding the castle.

We explored briefly the town of Pontassieve which is a modest little town along the Sieve River (hence the name).

Saturday evening included an English mass at the Duomo for Palm Sunday (well, Saturday) and some homework (working on the Italian opera scenes I’m writing…)

Today I did more work, and relaxed. I got to skype with my parents for the first time in a couple of weeks. And that’s always nice, of course. A connection to the outside world, and to home…which I feel like I haven’t had enough of, lately…

I really only have 4 more of these, you know.

Weekends, that is.

I can’t decide if I’m happy or sad about that.

There’s still so much to see!