More photos from Assisi

Less snark, more pretty:

Breakfast

View on the way to breakfast

One of the Assisi felines going about his business, outside the language school.

Calendimaggio is the big local festival in the town of Assisi. It's sort of a celebration of spring. Residents dress up in medieval costume and events are held all over  town.

The woman on the right just helped her granddaughter with a little
last minute fussing over her costume. I'm sure the grandmother
wore a similar costume when she was younger.

Getting ready to start one of the first parades.
These activities go on for a week and a half.

The residents from the lower part of Assisi wear mostly red costumes.
I love all the different reactions going on here. 

I was thrilled to see that she was looking right at me when I took this photo.

Possibly my favorite photo of the bunch because he really looked
as if he had just stepped out of a time machine. I was impressed with
what good condition the costumes were in. They all look new.

A few non-red costumes.

Did they have hair product in the 12th century?

Earlier in the day, I took a walk up to Rocca Maggiore after class. It's the 12th century fort overlooking the town.

Some beautiful views along the way. This church is San Ruffino.

Here's the Rocca Maggiore from the approach. It was built around 1174.
Rocca means fort or castle in Italian. (No, there's no Almond Rocca here.)

This location was used in the Franco Zeffirelli film about that guy from San Francisco
 "Brother Sun, Sister Moon."

This tunnel along the top of one of the walls is more than 100 meters long.
At the very end, you go up a loooong spiral staircase to step out and see the following:

Looking back at the fort, from the Polygonal Tower

Looking down onto Basilica San Francesco (sic) :-)

The town of Assisi

And this photo was taken from my window. This is a "Propitiation Feast" for the lower part of town.
Notice all the red. The setting sun helped provide a nice little backdrop, don't you think?

Today (May 1) is a national holiday, so I have no class. (Insert joke here.) This will give me a chance to explore more of this beautiful town.

I see Assisi as easy

Well, Assisi is easy on the eyes, at least, but not the legs. More on that later.

I arrived in Assisi on Sunday, after the uneventful train ride from Rome (the best kind). Lots of scenes like this on the way:

Shot from a quickly moving train. (I didn't catch the name of this town.)

Here in Assisi they are really crazy about this hippy from San Francisco who passed through the area. Apparently he had no name, or at least I haven't been able to find out what it was.
All the paintings just say he's from San Francisco.
The funny thing is that they keep misspelling San Francisco. 

The apartment I'm staying in is the second floor
of the two buildings with the raggedy flags.

This is the paper towel pattern in the kitchen. It frightens me
and I am uncomfortable turning my back on it.

I'm here in Assisi for two weeks at a language academy.
This is the front door of the academy based on the address
found on their website and all correspondence.
You can see the brass plaque with the name of the school,
so this must be the place, right?

This is the door you have to use if you actually want to get into the building.
It's on a different street, on the opposite side of the building,
around a hairpin turn about 20 yards from the door with the plaque.
The only way you can know of the existence of this door is if someone tells you.
It's part of the charm. 

Very good food here in the region of Umbria.
This is pasta with black truffles and a half bottle of a local wine.

Strips of beef on arugula with shaved parmigiano cheese.
Roasted potatoes on the side. All I'm missing is my hubby. And dessert.

Here's one view of the church they built in honor of the hippy from SF.

Assisi is just ridiculously photogenic, as is so much of this country. Some examples:

This photo gives you an idea of the hills in Assisi. The whole town is like this.
My quads are killing me.

This cat at one of the museums reminded me so much of our Mimi that she gets a double feature.

She was an absolute sweetheart but would not hold still for a proper photo.
Kept wanting to be petted. She accompanied us for the first part of the tour.

Speaking of the museum, here are some random photos from there, with some random thoughts:

You should have somebody look at those.

 This is why you should never serve deviled eggs in a monastery.

Here the baby Jesus demonstrates how to do one of the most Italian of gestures -
the shoulder shrug.

No clever comment. There are several of these at the bottom of various columns.
Sculpted in the 14th century, probably. I just thought it was a fascinating concept.

And, last but not least, Our Lady of the Baseball Bat.

Ciao, tutti.

Arrivederci, Roma!

In the immortal words of Dean Martin, I have to say "Arrivederci" to Rome today, as I head to Assisi this afternoon.

But first I'll be going to noon mass today at Santa Maria Degli Angeli e Martiri because they're supposed to have an amazing choir and organist. This is the organ:

I imagine the person who donated the money for this is constantly explaining
"No, not that kind of organ donor"

Graffiti removers. The really expensive stores stay on top of this. The others can't afford to.
(I was disappointed that they weren't open yet. I'll have to buy that Rolex some other time.)

Yesterday morning, I went on a Context Tours guided tour of "Underground Rome," which focused mainly on this church, San Lorenzo in Lucina:

There's been a church here for 1500 years.

I was really hoping that one of the restaurants in this Piazza San Lorenzo in Lucina would be named "San Lorenzo in Cucina." They could specialize in grilled Spanish meats. (If you google this saint, you'll find out just how horrible that comment was.)

While waiting for the tour to start, this little cutie out in front of the church caught my eye. 

Awww.

Our tour guide, Philip. He's a Byzantinist (I'm a Methodist), and he's lived here for 22 years.
This photo is underneath the church, where there are levels corresponding to a 1st century Roman mansion,
a 3rd century Roman apartment, a 5th century church, and a 12th century church. Like a lasagna.

We got to peek through a recently opened hole into a room that hasn't had a human
inside it for over 1000 years. Not the most impressive room, but still. 

All of the historic center of Rome has something like this under it.
Whether it's been discovered and dug out is another story.

Philip pointed out this sign as being one that always cracks him up.
"A break with taste." Like a break with reality.

The ceiling in San Ignazio. It's a barrel vault that's been painted using trompe l'oeuil techniques.
The angle of the columns changes dramatically as you move from one side of the church to the other.
It's not an optical illusion. It just looks like one.

There are places like this all over Rome. It's fenced in, but that's it. No explanation of what it is.
You'll be walking along and glance to your side and see this.

That evening I went to a Chopin concert in the Methodist Church in Rome, near Ponte Sant'Angelo (Bridge of Angels).

And for my fellow WUMCers, check out the name of the B&B above the Methodist church.

The location made for some good photo ops after the concert.

Upon reflection, I'd like to thank the Tiber for being so still.
If you look closely at the top of Castel Sant'Angelo, you can almost see Tosca about to jump. 

Saint Peter's Basilica sneaking up

It's a shame Italy isn't more photogenic, isn't it?

I walked back to my room in Monti, which led me past Trajan's Market.
Some really nice modern pieces in white in front of the market.

This is next to Trajan's Market. They were projecting images onto it of Augustan era Rome.
(There's a huge celebration commemorating the 2000 year anniversary of the death of Augustus.)

It was really cool to watch this animation projected onto these 1700+ year old buildings.
(The foreground was actually much darker, but my camera adjusted for that.)  

According to our guide Philip, almost all the statues of Augustus display a much more
handsome man than he actually was. The statues make him look like an underwear model
for Calvin Klein. You can call him Augustud.

And here's the last one for today. It's the area in front of Trajan's column,
with the Vittoriano Monument in the background.
(To give a sense of scale, these columns are probably 20 feet tall.)
The whole area was full of people (tourists and Romans) out for a late evening stroll.
Quite magical,with all these monuments lit up.

That's it for now. Off to mass, then off to Assisi.