Last night we did our second "night tour of the churches of Firenze" Two nights ago as we were walking across our piazza and we noticed the doors were open to Santa Croce. Since Jonathan still hasn't been in it we thought we would find out what was going on. We were directed to the side doors. We were promptly led into the church and joined a little tour group that was being conducted in English. A wonderful, kind older Italian man was our guide. What luck to get a detailed tour of the church was see ten times a day. We picked up a brochure they had there and realized there were going to be tours of churches for the rest of the week. Last night was the church Ognissanti, most famous for the fact that Amerigo Vespucci was a member. Again, we had a wonderful, spunky guide. This time an older woman of about 75-80. She was so excited about everything as she told the stories of the artwork that filled the church. Sometimes, she would look at a painting and say "There are just too many paintings, I don't know anything about this one!" We also met an American lady on our tour who has been living in Firenze for six months a year since 1961. After the tour she invited us to go to a small village of Fiosole (I think that is the name of it.) in the hills overlooking Firenze. We are going to have the famous Florintine beef steak. She is going to drive us there. Can't wait! We arranged to meet her next Tuesday at 12:30 at the Europa Garage Parking.

Then to make a very interesting evening more interesting we ran into a HUGE religious procession coming out of the il Duomo. We have no idea what it was all about. It seemed that all the important religious people were there as long as just members of the congregation. It took

half an hour for everyone to pass. We then got a beer at a club near my school and met a nice American proffessor. All in all, a lovely evening and one that is making us like our new town more and more.

Here is a little information about the church we visited:

The Church of Ognissanti, on the North bank of the Arno just to the West of the city centre, dates from 1249, and owes its origins to a group of Umiliati monks from Lombardy (North Italy) who set up Florence's first wool mills there, powered by water diverted from the Arno by a weir. Wool was to become the powerhouse of the first phase of Florence'c wealth.

Ognissanti became the parish church of several wealthy merchant families, including the Vespucci, one of whose members (Amerigo) gave his name to the Americas. Sandro Botecelli(1444 - 1510) and Domenico Ghirlandaio (1449 - 1494) were also members of the congregation, and the latter left behind one of his best "Last Suppers" in the convent (equals monastery) refectory.

In 1561 the Umiliati, now on the verge of suppression (this happened in 1571), vacated the premises and were replaced by Franciscan Spiritual Minors. The church was reconstructed in 1582, and again in 1748. During the eighteen hundreds there were two suppressions (1810 and 1866) and by 1923 the place was in use as a store and Carabinieri base (which it still partly is). More recently the Franciscans (who had regained possession earlier in the nineteen hundreds) handed over to the Benedictines for the next watch!

It's 5:45 pm Friday. I just woke up from a three hour nap. It was a late night last night so I needed to catch up on my sleep. I woke up this morning with all intentions of going to school. I got up late so I dashed to a little restaurant that has pastries set out. I also ordered an American coffee. I suppose it sounds bad that I order American coffee and not Italian coffee. Well, Italian coffee-espresso, machiato etc. is served in the smallest cup you have ever seen and on top of that it is only half full! It's literally a shot of coffee. Of course, I drink coffee partly to wake up but also to sit for a while and sip away at my large coffee. The only coffee you can do that with is American coffee. This is served in a bigger cup (still not big enough) It's only a fourth filled but it comes with hot water that you pour in yourself. I haven't figured out exactly why they can't just put the hot water in. Anyway, this morning I ordered my pastry and my coffee and went outside to their little area they have on the street to have my quick breakfast. My coffee never came so finally I went back to the counter and asked again. The bells of Santa Croce then began to ring and I realized it was 9 am. I was late for school. It was such a beautiful day I decided to take advantage of it and went to a little park about a 15 minute walk away and studied on my own all morning. It was so nice sitting in a park that actually has trees and watching the moms and dads and kids playing on the playgound equipment. The best thing about it was the fact that there are no tourists in this area. I really feel like I'm in Italy when I'm there. I missed everyone at school but I had a really good study session. Italian is NOT an easy language. I can't imagine that I'll ever be able to speak without out slowly thinking of all the grammar points. I guess, I thought that way about Japanese as well...we'll see. In the mean time I do enjoy studying it so that is what is important. I'll continue studying hard to learn to speak the language but I may never learn to drink the coffee.

This weekend we are planning a little trip to Assisi famous, of course, for being the home of
St. Francis. Again, another trip outside of Tuscany. We will see Tuscany on the way. We are going with a friend of ours from school, Juliana and possibly a young man from the Netherlands.

If we take the long way to school, we can see almost everything that is famous in Firenze. One beautiful, sunny morning I took pictures on the way to school.

Yes, we have a room with a view (just barely)

the bridge we come out on when we leave our piazza

the view across the bridge
looking back at the bridge

the famous ponte vecchio

piazza della signoria

the campanile

il duomo

il duomo (our school is just behind this)

the street of the school

arriving at school

I'd like to introduce you to our neighbor. We say buongiorno to him every morning and buona notte every night. He stands just outside our door waiting for us to greet him. He's a nice man even though he always looks angry.

His name:

Dante Alighieri

April 18th, 2008
We finally left Firenze after being in Tuscany for over two weeks. Some of you probably think we are crazy for not being out in sunny Toscana more. I'm sure you will think we are even crazier when I tell you our first trip outside of Florence isn't even in Tuscany. We decided to make our first trip out of Florence to Venice. I, of course, have a bad cold and shouldn't go at all. Everything in my body was telling me to stay home in bed. A sunny, warm day at least could have saved me a bit but NO we had to have a cold rainy day. And for some stupid reason I left the house in a short sleeve shirt. Yes, I was cold all day! I am brilliant. Sure hope I get smarter on my sabbatical! We decided to not to be too adventurous and take a tour through my school. We had a guide who actually guided us so we didn't have to think. That was nice for a change-not having to think. Maybe that was my problem. We met at the station at 8 am next to the McDonalds. Yes, FIRENZE has a McDonalds-in fact I have seen three of them. So what did Jonathan and I do? Of course, we had breakfast at the golden arches. (We had no food at home.) Kathy, an older woman on the tour and our friend from school, gave us a a bad time in very broken Italian. I was just happy to have some coffee. I wasn't feeling too well, I was already cold. I bought some more medicine at a pharmacy there before we left. Jumped on the train. My goal was to sleep but that was not to be as a very nice but talkative British woman talked the entire way. She was brilliant, interesting and lovely and all I wanted to say was SHUT UP!! We changed trains in Bologna. It's amazing just nonchalantly changing trains in such TERRIBLY famous places as towns that have food named after them. Again, tried to sleep-no such luck. Arrived in Venice. Ate lunch at a tacky cafeteria in the station. Had lasagne and Jonathan had a sandwitch. We finally get outside the station and our sweet, very relaxed Italian guide announces that the streets are liquid! How shocked we all were. (It's after 11 pm. I have to put myself to bed now. My cold will be gone tomorrow! My cold will be gone to tomorrow. My cold will be gone tomorrow!...)

Very nice looking newly weds! We thought of Wendela and Yuuirchiro

who were married that same day! CONGRATULATIONS!!

I get distracted sometimes and ignore the beautiful buildings when I see such beautiful...

This is not a James Bond movie. These three priests (?) were walking right toward me!

And how did I REALLY feel about the day?

AAAACHEWWWW!!!

Different faces of Santa Croce.

Two or three days ago the sky was completly dark but then the sun snuck out from behind a cloud and lit up Santa Croce. It was breathtaking. I didn't have my camera so I dashed upstairs as fast as I could. I grapped Jonathan and told him to come down and see. The first two shots are that. Literally two seconds after I took these shots the sun went back under a cloud.


Maybe two days ago I woke up caughing. (I have a bad sinus infection. I think it's fianlly getting better now! ) It was 5 am. I looked out the window which looks out on a beautiful inner court yard. The sky was as pink as I have ever seen the sky. Again, I dashed down with my camera. There was no pink in the sky what so ever. The courtyard faces the opposite direction. Anyway, it was great being completley alone on the square which usually has thousands of people on it at any given time. This is what my front yard looks like with nobody in it. I wish it were like that more often.