Viva Italia - Day 3 - Sistine Chapel and David's European Premiere

It's 2:30 a.m. in Rome and I've been trying since midnight to convert our video files in order to post the performance of David's song. Obviously, it has not gone well. The concert, however, was AMAZING. The San Gabriel Valley Choir is a volunteer choir from the Los Angeles area made up primarily of singers originally from the Philippines. They sing with so much emotion. They did a beautiful job with David's song. I cried through the whole thing.

Note David's name on the poster.

We have been telling people that the performance would be at the Vatican. That was incorrect. This particular concert was at the Basilica di San Ignazio, a beautiful basilica just a couple blocks from Trevi Fountain. It was attended by the Philippine Ambassador as well as the Consul General and Vice Consul. CNN World was also there. We took some pictures of the basilica, but as with all our pictures, they are not great.

Front of the basilica

Organ

This is a picture of the rehearsal. The song is called "Creation" and the text is from Genesis, telling the story of the creation. It is timed to last seven minutes, symbolic of the seven days of creation. The acoustics in the cathedral made the song even more powerful and the organ was beautiful, even though the organist only had a few minutes to get ready. In the past, it had been performed with piano as an organ was not available. The entire choir does not perform David's piece because it is very difficult.

David was so excited with the results. This was truly a great moment for him and I'm so grateful we could be here for this.

HERE is a video of the performance and HERE is a video of the basilica.

Earlier in the day, we visited the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter's. I think this was my fourth time to see the Sistine Chapel. It is such a beautiful place. I always imagine Michelangelo on his back, painting for four years on scaffolding stretching so high. Incredible. Because tour guides are asked not to speak in the chapel, they have set up displays around a courtyard outside the Vatican Museum where guides can give information on the chapel. When our guide (who is fantastic) started to talk about the creation portion of the ceiling, the members of the choir in our group (about 15 or 20 members of the choir) broke into singing David's song - just on the spur of the moment. It was so sweet and beautiful, and of course I cried then too.

View of St. Peters from the Vatican Museum courtyard.

People sometimes ask why Mormons do not let non-recommend holding people into our temples once they are dedicated. From now on, I'm going to tell them that if they want to understand, they just need to visit the Sistine Chapel. People are asked not to speak loudly and told not to take photographs. Many people completely disregard that and do not show any kind of reverence for this special place (I'm not speaking of our tour group; they were respectful.)

Tourists

One of my favorite sculptures

Mosaic floor from the 5th Century - it was moved tile by tile from it's original location.

Tomb of Constantine's daughter.

Flemish tapestry depicting the slaying of the innocents.

Ceiling detail (following three pictures - I love the ceilings in the Vatican  Museum)

 

Ancient map of Sicily - where David served his mission.

Michelangelo's Pieta was curtained off during the mass on Sunday, but we got to see it today. It was his first major sculpture and he was only 23 or 24 when he created it. Nothing compares to it.

Swiss Guard

Mailing postcards with the Vatican stamp

Standing in the very center of Vatican City

Filling our water bottles

 

We did get to talk to the kids today and it was so great to see them. They were bored with talking to us after about 10 minutes. They spent the day at the zoo.

We are completely amazed at how perfectly this trip is going. We are having such a wonderful time. Our 10th anniversary was in June, so this is like an anniversary trip for us. We're just enjoying being together in this beautiful place.

Viva Italia - Day 2 - Papal Mass and Christian Rome

We had a fantastic day today. It was a very busy, very full day. Unfortunately, while we had a great day, our camera did not. Our normal camera does not take good pictures indoors. We took pictures with the video camera which looked great on the camera, but looked out of focus after being downloaded. Sigh. The first thing I'm buying when David has a job is a good camera!

The day started very early as we had to get to St. Peter's in time for the choir to sing some prelude before the mass. There were a few choirs there and they took turns singing. We were seated right behind the papal altar, so we were very close to Pope Benedict XVI. We mostly saw the back of him, but we did get some of his face during the Eucarist. Five new bishops were ordained today, so we got to see that ceremony.

The mass was in Latin and lasted for three hours! The music was very beautiful. I especially liked the very end where everyone sang "Adeste Fidelis" (Oh Come All Ye Faithful) since it was the Mass for the Ephiphany. We were able to follow along with little books they distributed. David sang the entire Mass. I couldn't understand how to read the chants.

Vatican guard wearing the uniforms designed by Michaelangelo.

Crowd outside waiting to see the Pope speak from his balcony.

Pope blessing the public from the balcony. It is actually very high up and he appears very small. We were able to zoom in to get a closer view. He addressed the crowd in Latin, Italian, French, English, Spanish and German. The crowd clapped and cheered for him. If I can get the video to download, I'll link to it here.

We are not Catholic, but we were really grateful for this amazing opportunity. Very few people get to be inside St. Peter's Cathedral for a Papal Mass and for us to be in such close proximity to the Pope was  something we did not take for granted.

If you'd like to see a video, HERE is some of the mass, the courtyard and the audience on Wednesday. (The volumn changes abruptly.)

Later in the day we visited the other three churches (in addition to St. Peters) that are considered part of an official pilgrimage to Rome: Santa Maria Maggiore (St. Mary Major), San Giovanni in Laterano (Cathedral of Rome or the Pope's Cathedral - Laterano comes from the name of a family in Rome), and San Paulo in Vincoli (St. Paul in Chains). While we have visited St. Peter's several times, we had never visited the other three churches. All three were built by Constantine.

Santa Maria Maggiore is famous for it's beautiful mosaics dating back to the 5th century. Also, the ceiling is made from real 24-carat gold excavated in Peru rather than from the gold leaf paint found in most cathedrals. The church is said to contain relics from the manger and the cross. The mosaics on the floor are original and from the medieval period. The church also contains work from the Renaissance and Baroque periods. It is one of the oldest church's in Rome and one of the few that never had to be rebuilt.

San Giovanni in Leterano used to be the official cathedral of the Pope prior to St. Peter's. Prior to the papacy moving to Avignon, France in 1309, the building just to the right of the cathedral was the official papal residence. When the papacy returned from France, the church was in great disrepair and the pope's residence was moved to St. Peter's. The church features bronze doors from the Forum, making them over 2,000 years old. There are only three sets of doors like this remaining. The others are on the Pantheon and in the Forum.

Ancient Roman wall

San Paulo in Vincoli was completely different from the other churches and much more Renaissance in style.

It is said to hold the chains with which St. John was chained while imprisoned. It also houses his remains.

Beautiful sunset

cool floors

 

Peter and his keys

This fresco is original (much of the Church was rebuilt in the 1500's after a fire) and is from the 5th Century.

David and I had been fasting all day so we were super excited to finish the day by eating real Italian pizza - hardly any cheese and sauce exploding with flavor - and gelato (I always get pistacchio). Such an awesome day! (The kids didn't even miss us enough to want to Skype today - I guess that's a good thing!)

Tomorrow we visit the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter's (we didn't get to see the Pieta, etc. today). The highlight for us tomorrow will be that the choir will perform David's song. I can't wait to hear it in a cathedral with an organ and the amazing acoustics. 

Viva Italia - Day 1 - Rome

Almost a year ago David was approached by a fellow doctoral student - Nove Deypalan, a very talented conductor - and asked to write a choir piece to be performed at the Vatican. David wrote a beautiful piece that we later realized was very evocative of the creation. The choir debuted the number in Los Angeles in December and David was able to be at the premier. They treated him like a rock star, asking for his autograph and photos. It was a great moment for him. The choir invited us to accompany them to Italy for the tour and performance. We used my flight benefits to get to Italy and then our hotels, transportation and most of our meals are all paid for by the choir. How awesome is that?

I've often been asked which of all the places I've visited is my favorite, and while I love traveling and have loved several places, without a doubt, Italy is my favorite. It's beautiful, the food is good, there is history and art everywhere, and now that I'm married to an Italian speaking man - it's even better! David and I haven't traveled internationally for about 3 1/2 years. This is amazing when you take into consideration the fact that the last passport I had required extra pages to be inserted because I ran out of space for visa stamps. Our current passports are two years old and have never been used. 

We had quite the adventure getting here. We got to the airport early in Columbia because I knew there might be some complications. Well, the girl at the airport was really nice, but didn't really know what she was doing. It took her FOREVER, but we were there early, so there wasn't a problem. We checked our bags all the way to Italy, got our boarding passes and went to the gate where we waited for over an hour. At the very end of the boarding process, they called up David, but not me. We went to the desk and the lady said she had cleared all standbys and I wasn't on the list. We couldn't believe it. I showed her my boarding pass and my bag tag and she said there was nothing she could do. I told her we had been on the same reservation and she needed to call a supervisor. She said she wouldn't hold the flight and didn't have time to get a supervisor. I kept my cool, but told her it was unacceptable. I couldn't believe it! She ended up telling us to just get on and she would figure it out afterwards. Hugh sigh of relief!

Well, our flight ended up being delayed because of an issue with the oxygen masks and so when we got to our gate in Washington, everyone was boarded. We knew the flight was overbooked and I was worried that my reservation might have problems. I was hoping that at least David could go. Well when we got to the gate they said they had one first class or we could sit together in BusinessFirst (United uses three cabins). We couldn't believe it! We ended up sitting together in BusinessFirst. It was heaven!! We figured out it has been at least six years since we have flown BusinessFirst and the seats are waaaay better than they used to be, plus they lay flat like a bed. We had warm nuts, hot towels, appetizer, main course, cheese and fruit, hot fudge sundaes and later cheeses and cold cuts for breakfast accompanied by croissants. The t.v. screens are much bigger now and are like oversized computer monitors, plus they run on demand so you can pause, rewind, etc. These tickets start at $6,000.00 each. I was so excited, I didn't sleep. I watched three movies and probably five sitcoms on the 10-hour flight. (Sometimes I do miss my airline job...)

When we got to Italy, we discovered that our camera battery was dead. We were fortunate enough to find a computer/cell phone store that had the right battery, but now we can't get the pictures to download, so we may have to add photos later. We've already had Arranchata - David's favorite soft drink - and potato pizza. We mostly just sat on public benches and people watched since we've already done the touristy things and will be doing them again soon.

Some observations:

• Italians are not ashamed of making eye contact and looking you up and down.
• Italians sound like they are arguing even when they aren't.
• Italians are the most fashionable people on Earth which is made easier by the fact that you can buy amazing clothes from vendors on the street.
• If pasta makes you fat, why aren't there any fat Italians?

Tomorrow we are going to a Papal Mass. I'm pretty excited to participate in this unique experience. (We also have a Papal audience on Wednesday.) We found out where the local LDS church meets, but we won't have a chance to make it there and back because we have to stay with our group. That would have been great. In the afternoon, we'll be touring the Coliseum and the Roman Forum. Everything is taken care of by the group, so we just have to tag along. We will be here until Tuesday, then we spend a day in Assisi and a day in Florence. After that we leave the group and head to Milan to fly home. (They go on to Venice. We love Venice and are bummed to miss it this time, but David has to get back to start teaching on Monday.)

Our hotel in Rome - nicer than where we usually stay.

We were able to Skype with Jalen and Baylie today and I only got a little teary at the beginning. I'm so grateful that my sister was willing to come and watch them. I'm not sure I could have left them this long with anyone else.

We truly feel so blessed to be in Italy and know that Heavenly Father has helped us in so many ways to be here.