Feast of St. Lucia, the MOSE, the Port, and Paolo

Pictures: Christmas trees for sale on the side of the canal; the outdoor sale; inside the Miracoli; the cruise ship in progress; one of the massive cranes at the port; the MOSE-not much to see, that's a boat with a crane in the middle there, but under the water is a row of twenty gates that stretch from the bit of land you can see at the left side of the picture to the bit of land you can see at the right side of the picture; us with Paolo, from the left that's Natalie, Stephanie, Lizzie, Paolo, Audrey, Shannon, me, Dane, and Elyse.

Hi guys,

Sunday was the Feast of St. Lucia, or St. Lucy, who is the patron saint of eye problems. A feast day is just simply a day specially dedicated to a certain saint. In this case, the feast day of St. Lucia was important because her tomb is in Venice, in the church of San Geremia, which means St. Jeremiah. So for Mass on Sunday, Lizzie, Shannon, Audrey, and I went to San Geremia. The church was much more crowded than San Marco normally is for Mass, I’m not sure whether it was just because of the feast day or because more normal parishioners attend this church. Either way, it was packed and we ended up having to sit in the very front row. It was a little weird at communion, because the pews were set up so that there was a group in front of the altar, one off to the left side of the altar, and one off to the right side of the altar (we were in the front row of the left side) and at first there was only one priest handing out communion. And instead of lining up neatly as people do in American churches, everyone just stood up in no particular order and started forming a crowd around the priest handing out communion. It was a little crazy and we weren’t quite sure what to do, but luckily a second priest came up fairly quickly and started handing out communion, too, which made things a little less hectic. It was like at the McDonalds in Florence, and so many other places, though, because for whatever reason, Italians just don’t know how to form lines. The music for the Mass was awesome, they had two people playing guitars and singing and all the songs were really pretty. After Mass, we joined the line of people in the church and got to go around and touch St. Lucy’s tomb, which was pretty awesome.

After leaving the church, we wandered down Strada Nuova, which is one of the main shopping streets in Venice. We eventually came to this great outdoor sale, almost like a rummage sale or a really, really nice garage sale, going on and we did some looking around and shopping there. There were some cool things, including a lot of antiques, such as these neat opera glasses that Audrey was interested in until she asked the guy what the price was and he told her they were 100 euros, which is about $150 (quite a bit more than she was looking to spend on them) and then some more modern stuff too; for example, I saw DVDs of the original Star Wars trilogy in Italian.

On our way back to the boat stop from this sale, Shannon and I stopped and went into the church of Santa Maria dei Miracoli (which means St. Mary of Miracles), which is a very pretty, quite small church that is almost hidden down a street. The inside was beautiful, though, my second favorite after Saint Anastasia’s church in Verona. The marble on the outside is continued on the inside and so instead of the frescoes or mosaics in many other churches, you can just see the beautiful marble, it’s not even covered up by paintings. The ceiling was also neat because it looked like big, carved wooden blocks with gold around them. I liked the Miracoli because the church was simple but elegant, a rarity in Venice, and in Italy in general.

Monday was really enjoyable. We took a boat tour of the port of Venice and then went out to where the MOSE project is being built. The MOSE project is supposed to keep the acqua altas, the high waters that flood Venice, from happening. It’s really cool how it’s designed: basically, there are these massive metal doors under the water and when the water level is dangerously high, the doors are inflated with air and they rise up to the surface, holding the water back. Then, when the water level drops, the doors are filled up with water and they sink back down again. Unfortunately, because all the good stuff is underwater, there wasn’t much to see when we went out to where they’re building the MOSE, but there were still cranes and things and it was still great to learn about the project. Plus, the water was much choppier out there and since our boat had picked up some speed because we were outside of the city, we were actually airborne over the waves a couple of times, which was awesome.

The port was much more interesting than I’d expected it to be. We got to see where all of the goods get unloaded from the ships that bring them in and saw coal being unloaded from a ship, plus we saw the massive cranes that are used to unload the ships. The port also has the largest silos in Europe, which are used for storing various goods. The best bit, though, was getting to see where they actually build cruise ships, two are being built there right now, our boat went right around them so we could see. One looked pretty much finished, but the other was clearly still in the process of being constructed, there were workers on it who looked like they were welding and doing other jobs. That was exciting to see, especially because apparently the port of Venice is one of the very few places in Europe where cruise ships are constructed. So the boat tour was definitely a good time.

Then, Monday night, we met Paolo, our Italian professor, for drinks and to get our certificates saying that we successfully completed our Italian course. It was very nice to get to chat with Paolo again; we haven’t seen him in a few weeks since we finished Italian class. He told us that he had really enjoyed our class, and that he didn’t tell everyone that, and then, as surprises for us, he gave each of us a special coin that the Dante Alighieri Institute made. The coin is actually based on one that the doge used to have minted and apparently the Dante Alighieri Institute “borrowed” a replica stamp which made doge coins from the Venetian library and, without anyone knowing, made a bunch of these coins and then returned the stamp to the library. So our coins are actually pretty rare, because the Dante Alighieri Institute only made so many of them; it’s a really awesome gift. Drinks with Paolo was a nice way to finish the day.

Oh, I almost forgot to add that there was actually snow in the air yesterday! Yesterday morning, as we were waiting for our boat for the tour to pick us up, it was flurrying just a little bit. Apparently snow in Venice is a really rare thing, so I was excited that we got to see it.

Sunday and Monday were a good way to start off my last week in Venice...just three more days left in Venice, I can’t even believe it, and then early Saturday morning I’ll be leaving to fly home!

Ciao,
Maria

Naples and Pompeii

Pictures: Group picture when we first got to Pompeii, from left, me, Shannon, Sara, Natalie, Audrey, Caylen, and Dane. Then the main open square with ruins and Mount Vesuvius. One of the bodies. Some of the napping dogs. One of the roads through Pompeii. Some more ruins with Vesuvius in the background again. A random shot of the ruins. One of the frescoes. Pompeii with the mountains behind it. Sara, Audrey, and me in the amphitheater in Pompeii.
Hi all,

First of all, thank you everyone for my card! I finally got it yesterday and it completely made my day, it was awesome! Also, some business, for whatever reason Blogger has stopped letting me put up videos on my blog, so I’ve put some up on YouTube instead. If you just search “mariasteinmetz” on YouTube it should bring up all my videos. Right now there are four, “Naples Castle”, “The Bells of St. Francis”, “Across the Salute Bridge”, and “The Salute”. So check them out if you get a chance! Also, I have added a countdown clock to the bottom of the blog, right below the new and final poll, “Which is your favorite holiday?” The choices are Christmas, Thanksgiving, Halloween, Easter, and Fourth of July. The results from the previous poll, “What’s your favorite book series?” showed that most people prefer the Twilight series, which won with 63%, while Harry Potter came in second with 45%.

Now, moving on, this past weekend I went with Shannon, Sara, Audrey, Caylen, Natalie, and Dane to Naples, Italy, which is in southern Italy, about a ten hour train ride from Venice. We had been warned by several people to be very careful in Naples and not to take anything with us that we really didn’t want stolen. Apparently, the Mafia is big in the city, too, so I was sufficiently nervous about going. However, the city was actually fine, not really any different than any other big city. I’m sure there probably were bad parts, like in any big city, but as we stayed mostly in the historic district, it wasn’t that bad. I was actually more concerned about someone being hit by a car because the drivers were crazy and in many places there weren’t crosswalks. However, we all managed to get out unscathed, and we saw some pretty cool sites. We got completely drenched trying to go to this one castle because it was pouring rain, but the rain had stopped by the time we went to a second castle, so we got some really good pictures of the view and I even took a video, which is now on YouTube. Our hostel, Hostel of the Sun, was cool, too, much nicer than our one in Brindisi; apparently this Naples hostel was voted second in the world in 2006, so that was exciting. Naples is famous for its pizza, so we had to try some of that and it was excellent. Overall, Naples was fun.

However, the main event came the next day because to be perfectly honest, while I’m glad that I enjoyed Naples, I was really just using it (and I think the others were too) as a jumping off point to get to Pompeii. In 79 AD, Mount Vesuvius erupted and the city of Pompeii was covered almost immediately in layers of ash and rock. This ash and rock unfortunately very quickly killed all the citizens of Pompeii, but it also perfectly preserved the city exactly as it was that day. So when Pompeii was finally uncovered, it was the best example of what life was like back in the first century AD. I had always wanted to go to Pompeii, but never actually expected that I would get the chance, so I was thrilled when we planned this trip.

We caught a bus in Naples and it ended up being our own private tour bus from Naples to Pompeii because no one else got on, which was pretty sweet. The day was beautiful, the weather was perfect, sunny and warm, but with a bit of wind to keep it from getting hot. We drove along the Mediterranean coast, with Mount Vesuvius on our left. The drive itself was fantastic, up until the driver let us off in what we thought was the middle of nowhere, and he told us to walk two minutes up the road to get to Pompeii. Luckily, his directions were accurate and within a few minutes we walked through the entrance to Pompeii and got our first look at the ruins on the hillside. These were just the tip of the iceberg, though, as we quickly found out after we bought our tickets and went inside. I had always imagined that Pompeii was a pretty small city and I couldn’t understand why Dane’s guidebook said that it would take four hours just to take a cursory look at the city. However, within a few minutes, I understood. The city was massive. We got there at ten in the morning and had to leave at 3:30 to get back to Naples to catch our train back to Venice, so we had a good five hours in Pompeii but it wasn’t nearly enough time to see even half of what was there. We saw a ton of stuff though, including the Roman baths, the amphitheatre, 2000 year old frescoes that are still in great condition, actual bodies of people who died when Vesuvius erupted, and many houses, temples, and shrines. It was, beyond a doubt, my favorite day of this entire trip, which is really saying something. One of the best parts was when Shannon and I went through this gate into this part of the ruins that I’m not entirely sure we were supposed to be in and we were the only people back there. The ruins in that part were almost clichéd because they were overgrown with trees and bushes, they didn’t even have floors anymore, just grass, and they were fantastic. We were running around taking pictures like a couple of little kids in a really awesome playground.

The whole day was pretty much like that. A lot of the time we were literally just lost in the ruins and it was great. The weather was perfect, the view outside of Pompeii was gorgeous, too, because not only was Mount Vesuvius towering over the city, there were mountains all around, and you could also see the Mediterranean Sea from some of the higher parts of the city. The ruins themselves were incredible, too, because they were so well-preserved, and it was amazing to think that I was walking along the same roads that people walked across 2000 years ago. It was just an awesome day.

One cool fact about Pompeii that I didn’t know before I got there was that there are a lot of stray dogs that live in the ruins, we probably saw about twenty while we were there. People can adopt them and pay for them to be taken care of. All the dogs seemed pretty happy, people petted them and brought them food, we saw several just napping in the sun, they seem to have a pretty good life.

Overall, Pompeii was excellent, it was a great last weekend trip. Now it’s all about finishing up my final projects for class and enjoying this last week in Venice. So far, this week in class we went to a night concert Monday in the prisons in the Doge’s Palace, which was really good, then on Tuesday we went to the Ca’ Pesaro modern art museum, which was neat, and today we went to the Peggy Guggenheim modern art museum, which was really cool, there were paintings in there by a lot of famous artists, like Jackson Pollock and Salvador Dali, even a couple of paintings by Picasso, which were of course strange but still awesome. Also, on Monday night, the ten of us went to the Hard Rock Café, partly for Natalie’s birthday and partly just because we are all craving American food. We weren’t disappointed, the food was great, and, naturally, so was the music. Then, last night, since it was the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, Lizzie and I went to a night Mass at San Marco, which was really beautiful.

So, that’s what I’ve been up to lately. I can’t believe there’s only one week left of this program, it feels like it went by so fast. However, as much as I do love Venice and Italy, I will be glad to be home, too. But there’s still a week left to enjoy Venice and that’s what I’m planning to do. Hope everyone is doing well! It’s almost Christmas!

Ciao,
Maria