Tuscany

Tuscany is beautiful. It's glorious.

As long as you keep that in your head for the rest of this post, we're good. :)

Assisi blew my mind. It was such a nice and small town. We walked inside San Francesco and just...I don't know. We were all down by his tomb and people just started to kneel and...pray? Meditate? I don't know what they were doing, but it was clear that a sense of peace had come over us in Assisi. We saw the relics of his life and learned about how he started the Franciscans. He really was trying to get back to old school and live the way Jesus did, a very poverty-laden life, doing good works and adhering very strictly to this poor life.

Antonia and I climbed a mountain at night and looked at a castle and at the stars. It was quite peaceful, and I loved climbing by sunset. We hung out by Santa Chiara (where there was a party in the street).

Something that I noticed while I was in the church there was that there were a lot of portrayals of Jesus and God holding the ball. The ball, held by the Roman goddess Fortuna, is a symbol of fate and its instability (the ball rolls) as well as its everlasting qualities (fate always exists because there's a circle). I talked to some people in our class about it, and Jacob suggested that it just signified the universe. Which I suppose has the same kind of universal quality as fate. It gave me something to think about.

In Siena, we learned about the horse race and how that's actually the first scene of Quantum of Solace. We visited the Museo di Civico and the town square equivalent (it's a lot like the Forum in Rome). There was a map of the world on the wall that replaced frescos that had been there before. We also saw Mary in Majesty, Christ holding a scroll made of actual parchment because artists back then were awesome. IN the Citizen Center in Museo Civico, we found St. Catherine of Siena on the wall holding a lily. The picture also featured two faces, representing the Old and New Testament.

The most mind-blowing thing about the picture was that it was made out of fresh plaster, meaning that it had to be done in a very short time. Several people worked on the incredibly detailed picture, and a head per person was considered a day's work.

After that, we headed into Sala del Pace, which portrayed the Allegory of Good and Bad Government. I looked out the window while I was there and saw boys flag twirling in the street! That appears to be a Siena thing. :) Back to the picture though. The picture's main idea was that a city built on justice is peaceful. You walked in under the figure representing Justice and sat under it. The good government contained temperance, providence, prudence, fortitude, magnanimity, and then justice again. Ropes came down from Justice's hands to Concord to the people and finally the string ended at the ruler. The government kept in peace had a peaceful city and countryside. People were happy and trading and working and it was all good.

The bad government side had figures that all had like, demon ears or something. The government was led by a tyrant surrounded by avarice, vain glory, and pride. The city was full of war.

Also, there was a picture on the wall of Nero, showing that Nero was a tyrant.

Well, it implied it.

Anyway, we also found some pointy hats in the pictures referring to the Chinese that may have been in Siena at the time.

We had a party for Jeff that night, because it was his birthday. Also, in Assisi and Siena, I had bathtubs and took the first two baths I'd taken in a long time.

I didn't take too many notes in Florence just because I recognized that it was time to sit down and just enjoy life. Good sites I saw were a tour guide carrying a mop (awesome!)

We saw the Vasari picture of the six Tuscan poets. And then we went to the Uffizi and saw so many things that I can't even put them here. I did, however, see my buddy Jean-Marc Nattier and some of his pictures as well as more female deities holding balls, just like Fortuna that I identified as Fortuna. Also, I was absolutely in love with Spring. I just sat there and stared at it.

Beautiful Views!