To the Forum!! AWAY!!!!!!
Day 34
Salvete omnes! I'm currently sitting in the JFK airport on my way back to the wonderful land of...no, not OZ, but ND! :D So I'm taking these ridiculous layovers I've been forced to endure to type up the last two days of my wonderful experience in the Paideia program. I already miss everyone so much and wish all of you best travels and bona fortuna!
Now to go back in time to July 13th, a fated Friday the 13th on which we recited our memorized Cicero passages. Let the games, begin!!
So the day started out normal like every day. Waking up and walking to school in the hot, hot Italian sun to get to class on time at SJU. Our last class :( So sad!! We did a free for all grammar review with Anna and then headed downstairs to fill out the "end of the program" evaluation form. Jason and Eric were really funny in how they described the form and what it will do and then Leah passed them out for us to get to work. I filled out mine with honesty, which is "the best policy," and spoke about how Bollo was a wonderful place to live and everyone on the program was a treat to study with and learn from.
After that, I went with Alice and Tim to St. Peter's square to go into the basillica, the last part of my St. Peter experience. It was totally worth standing in line to see! Everything was SO IMPRESSIVE!! The dome was my favorite part, I think. It was sad that so much of it was blocked off for restoration, but the cleaning is needed and well welcomed. The sad thing though is that in these old basilicas, the high ceilings let in a strange light that really exaggerates the dust in the air, making it hard to get good, clear photos. So some of mine didn't turn out like I had hoped, but I think I got enough good ones to be happy :)
With our fill of St. Peter's and the bookshop that we perused after, Alice had mentioned about finding a church, called San Luigi dei Francesi, where Caravaggio had painted an alcove for (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Luigi_dei_Francesi). It was somewhere around Piazza Navona so we wandered around until we came upon it and holy....it was worth wandering around and being lost for. Three MASSIVE Caravaggio paintings, all in one area. Heaven for any art nerd!!
4pm was almost upon us and we needed to be at the top of the Capitoline (which Eric mentioned when we had all congregated was the first place that we met up for MWF class site visits and will be the last, which I thought was really clever!). From the Capitoline, we made the trek down into the Roman Forum. Everything, just everything was beautiful. All the old stones, the foundations, the corner stones, the pillars!! Everything! And this was the center of Roman life! The life I've been studying since 9th grade and I was standing THERE! My feet covered in Forum dust, baking in the hot sun, going over my part of Cicero's speech like a mantra in my head. I wonder if that's how Cicero felt before he gave an oration in the Forum? It's neat to think that he did, haha!
From our shady spot where we listened to the history of the Forum, we migrated up the hill and to the remains of the Temple of Concord, where Cicero gave his famous Third Catilinarian speech. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Forum and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catiline_Orations#Oratio_in_Catilinam_Tertia_ad_Populum)
And then we orated! Standing in a huge circle, we drew the eyes of many as we each took the floor, one by one, and recited the speech (in Latin of course) and embodied the spirit of the "pater patriae" himself.
It was, needless to say, the coolest thing EVER. Being a Cicero nerd and all, haha!
The only problem that we ran into was this lady speaking over the intercom over and over again at random times. And of course it had to happen during mine, throwing me off and making me lose my grove :( But I fought through it and gave the best damn speech I could! So it was still really fun.
And the fun was not yet over. After our Ciceronian adventure, a large group of us went to this delicious restaurant that we'd been populating over the past few weeks (with the cook that looks like Dante!) and had a great dinner together before heading over to Campo for a final drink together and some light-hearted conversation with lots of hugging. Will got me a drink since we'd bonded over being fans of MLP together with Fana and Ahna and I, ironically, got an appletini. The irony in this is that I cosplay (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosplay) and I have cosplayed as the apple-orchard owning pony, Applyjack. So, Applejack drinking an appletini is only going to bring a bunch of giggles from those who saw it and understood. I'm seriously going to miss everyone.
Lots. Bunches. ALL the words that mean "SO MUCH!"
Thus ended the day of Cicero.
And then there was one.
Valete omnes! Until tomorrow!
Salvete omnes! I'm currently sitting in the JFK airport on my way back to the wonderful land of...no, not OZ, but ND! :D So I'm taking these ridiculous layovers I've been forced to endure to type up the last two days of my wonderful experience in the Paideia program. I already miss everyone so much and wish all of you best travels and bona fortuna!
Now to go back in time to July 13th, a fated Friday the 13th on which we recited our memorized Cicero passages. Let the games, begin!!
So the day started out normal like every day. Waking up and walking to school in the hot, hot Italian sun to get to class on time at SJU. Our last class :( So sad!! We did a free for all grammar review with Anna and then headed downstairs to fill out the "end of the program" evaluation form. Jason and Eric were really funny in how they described the form and what it will do and then Leah passed them out for us to get to work. I filled out mine with honesty, which is "the best policy," and spoke about how Bollo was a wonderful place to live and everyone on the program was a treat to study with and learn from.
After that, I went with Alice and Tim to St. Peter's square to go into the basillica, the last part of my St. Peter experience. It was totally worth standing in line to see! Everything was SO IMPRESSIVE!! The dome was my favorite part, I think. It was sad that so much of it was blocked off for restoration, but the cleaning is needed and well welcomed. The sad thing though is that in these old basilicas, the high ceilings let in a strange light that really exaggerates the dust in the air, making it hard to get good, clear photos. So some of mine didn't turn out like I had hoped, but I think I got enough good ones to be happy :)
With our fill of St. Peter's and the bookshop that we perused after, Alice had mentioned about finding a church, called San Luigi dei Francesi, where Caravaggio had painted an alcove for (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Luigi_dei_Francesi). It was somewhere around Piazza Navona so we wandered around until we came upon it and holy....it was worth wandering around and being lost for. Three MASSIVE Caravaggio paintings, all in one area. Heaven for any art nerd!!
4pm was almost upon us and we needed to be at the top of the Capitoline (which Eric mentioned when we had all congregated was the first place that we met up for MWF class site visits and will be the last, which I thought was really clever!). From the Capitoline, we made the trek down into the Roman Forum. Everything, just everything was beautiful. All the old stones, the foundations, the corner stones, the pillars!! Everything! And this was the center of Roman life! The life I've been studying since 9th grade and I was standing THERE! My feet covered in Forum dust, baking in the hot sun, going over my part of Cicero's speech like a mantra in my head. I wonder if that's how Cicero felt before he gave an oration in the Forum? It's neat to think that he did, haha!
From our shady spot where we listened to the history of the Forum, we migrated up the hill and to the remains of the Temple of Concord, where Cicero gave his famous Third Catilinarian speech. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Forum and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catiline_Orations#Oratio_in_Catilinam_Tertia_ad_Populum)
And then we orated! Standing in a huge circle, we drew the eyes of many as we each took the floor, one by one, and recited the speech (in Latin of course) and embodied the spirit of the "pater patriae" himself.
It was, needless to say, the coolest thing EVER. Being a Cicero nerd and all, haha!
The only problem that we ran into was this lady speaking over the intercom over and over again at random times. And of course it had to happen during mine, throwing me off and making me lose my grove :( But I fought through it and gave the best damn speech I could! So it was still really fun.
And the fun was not yet over. After our Ciceronian adventure, a large group of us went to this delicious restaurant that we'd been populating over the past few weeks (with the cook that looks like Dante!) and had a great dinner together before heading over to Campo for a final drink together and some light-hearted conversation with lots of hugging. Will got me a drink since we'd bonded over being fans of MLP together with Fana and Ahna and I, ironically, got an appletini. The irony in this is that I cosplay (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosplay) and I have cosplayed as the apple-orchard owning pony, Applyjack. So, Applejack drinking an appletini is only going to bring a bunch of giggles from those who saw it and understood. I'm seriously going to miss everyone.
Lots. Bunches. ALL the words that mean "SO MUCH!"
Thus ended the day of Cicero.
And then there was one.
Valete omnes! Until tomorrow!