Siena and San Gimignano (Day Five)
This morning I awoke much too early thanks to the help of God's angels bowling in heaven...or at least that is what I called it as a child. The thunder this morning was terrific. I got up at about 7 (a grand total of 4.5 hours of sleep) and showered using some new Polmagranate/Blueberry soap I bought at a local supermarket. It was enjoyable, but it was a little bit too fragrant for me. After breakfast, the whole villa all loading up the double decker bus and headed toward Siena.
Siena was beutiful! It is amazing me how every different city can be so similar in many ways and then different in many others. Florentines and Siennites (I think that's what they're called) are at conflict quite often because both believe their dialects in Italian represent the more pure pronunciation of certain words. Furthermore, I learned that in Siena there is a great sense of community. Twice a year in the summer, the city has a fantastic horse race that is put on by the city's seventeen "contratas" or sections. Each contrata has it's own flag, animal symbol (my favorite was the snail...I think it's an inside joke), and people take the contrata so seriously that if someone married outside of his or her contrata into another contrata, he or she must live with his or her parents and family for the week during the races. It is very seldom that this happens though. It's funny to think that in such a small town with contratas the size of a high school's campus, people can fall in love and marry within their own contrata.
Anywho, enough with the history lesson...Siena was great. The group started together and walked to the Duomo del Siena which I learned today is Italian for cathedral...duomo is Italian for cathedral that is. Basically, it was very similar to St. Patrick's cathedral in New York except it must have been much larger. There were so many statues and candles and large, tall columns made of black and teal granite everywhere. It was gorgeous. My favorite part was the very, very furthest place from the entrance. I'm not sure what this area is called, but it's right behind the pulpit and it you can imagine a cathedral as shaped like a cross (because...well...they all are...the is a north, south, east, and west wing joining to form a large cross) this area I'm talking about was at the very end of the north tip. There was a painting on the wall that reminded me of Paradisio because it was very similar to the very end of the book when Dante is able to look directly at God. The painting depicted this pretty much with angels and saints all around a huge light similar to the sun's rays; however, in the center of the rays was a lightly painted triangle and inside this triangle was the tetragrammaton which was why I loved this painting so much. Sorry, but I'm going into a religious lesson now. If it weren't for my religion 101 class, I wouldn't know what the tetragramaton was so--basically, it's God's name. It is four hebrew letters that directly translate to YHWH. Interesting enough, translated into German is JHVH...pronounced Jehova. So...it is the actually name that God has...as in my name is Chad. I loved that about the painting because it was a unity between the Catholic church and the Jewish doctrine in the early books of the old testament that prove that painting was made with Truth in mind, not religious tensions. After the Duomo del Siena, I was able to travel around with a few friends through some local shops and eventually ended up at the actual center of town - Il Campo. This is where the horse races take place every year and apparently it get packed which is insane considering the size of Il Campo. I was able to spend a rare moment with the Novaks and Elizabeth Whatley and ate lunch with them and had the best pizza I've ever had (it actually had pears in it) and then headed to the gelatoria (I'm addicted) and got some mandarin gelato. Needless to say, it was pretty sour and I ended up not eating all of it. Leaving Siena was beautiful as many cities in Italy I'm finding are built on top of hills in stead on in valleys like many American cities. Thus, this makes for great views of the country side from any outskirt, and Siena had some amazing photo opportunities.
Leaving Siena, the group headed next to San Gimignano (I still can't pronounce that). The first thing we did in this city, known internationally as the city of towers, was head to the D'uomo del San Gimignano. Elizabeth informed the group that the towers stood as financial emblems of the rich families that lived in San Gimignano during the middle ages. At one time there were about seventy towers, but today only about seventeen remian intact. Basically, the richer the family...the larger the tower. The D'uomo (I'm not sure why it's spelled differently than in Siena) del San Gimignano was a lot smaller than St. Patrick's Cathedral. It had only paintings on every wall surface depicting many, many bible stories. My favorite was a few different pictures that showed the creation in Genesis. God is drawn with red angels forming a chariot in these paintings and at first I could not tell what they were. I thought it was the devil (they're red...come on), not a chariot of angels. Again, in this town I walked the streets and saw some neat soveneirs and actually was finally able to buy some post cards. They are expensive in Italy...nearly always 50 Euro cent per card; but, I found a few for 25 Euro cent. That's right...I'm a bargain shopper. Once again, I bought some more gelato (I swear...I'm addicted...I'm going broke on gelato) this time flavored as coconut. It was very good. The time finally came and the group boarded the bus and left San Gimignano.
At the villa, after a quick dinner, there was a short church service in the villa's music room with the Avante group in Florence which serve basically as Church of Christ missionaries in the area. We sang songs, took of the Lord's Supper, and praised the Lord with song. It was a genuinely peaceful and spiritually stimulating hour. Especially since there was a visiting couple from Germany who were in Florence for their honeymoon. I talked with them after the service and they had wanted to come to a protestant English-speaking church while in Italy because they don't speak Italian and are (nondenominational?) Christian. They were very kind and were surprised that we were a Christian university from America. Apparantly, there are very few if only a couple Christian universities in Germany. Anywho, after the service a few of us went to sing some more worship songs when a very long debate (it was almost like being in student government) turned into a discussion forming a comittee to plan and lead Tuesday convocations and Wednesday night worship nights/fellowship meetings/Bible studies. I was actually very surprised because I became in charge of setting up and leading a villa prayer team. Basically, between only four people we are setting up a nondenominational church plant on Wednesday nights in the Florence house. It's awesome. Furthermore, I'm singing on our small "worship team" of three people on Wednesday night and the songs are all turning out to be some of my favorites. Luckily, I think all those in charge have very similar tastes in music. It's going to be great. After this, I leisurely relaxed and was able to get in this entry.
Ciao!
Siena was beutiful! It is amazing me how every different city can be so similar in many ways and then different in many others. Florentines and Siennites (I think that's what they're called) are at conflict quite often because both believe their dialects in Italian represent the more pure pronunciation of certain words. Furthermore, I learned that in Siena there is a great sense of community. Twice a year in the summer, the city has a fantastic horse race that is put on by the city's seventeen "contratas" or sections. Each contrata has it's own flag, animal symbol (my favorite was the snail...I think it's an inside joke), and people take the contrata so seriously that if someone married outside of his or her contrata into another contrata, he or she must live with his or her parents and family for the week during the races. It is very seldom that this happens though. It's funny to think that in such a small town with contratas the size of a high school's campus, people can fall in love and marry within their own contrata.
Anywho, enough with the history lesson...Siena was great. The group started together and walked to the Duomo del Siena which I learned today is Italian for cathedral...duomo is Italian for cathedral that is. Basically, it was very similar to St. Patrick's cathedral in New York except it must have been much larger. There were so many statues and candles and large, tall columns made of black and teal granite everywhere. It was gorgeous. My favorite part was the very, very furthest place from the entrance. I'm not sure what this area is called, but it's right behind the pulpit and it you can imagine a cathedral as shaped like a cross (because...well...they all are...the is a north, south, east, and west wing joining to form a large cross) this area I'm talking about was at the very end of the north tip. There was a painting on the wall that reminded me of Paradisio because it was very similar to the very end of the book when Dante is able to look directly at God. The painting depicted this pretty much with angels and saints all around a huge light similar to the sun's rays; however, in the center of the rays was a lightly painted triangle and inside this triangle was the tetragrammaton which was why I loved this painting so much. Sorry, but I'm going into a religious lesson now. If it weren't for my religion 101 class, I wouldn't know what the tetragramaton was so--basically, it's God's name. It is four hebrew letters that directly translate to YHWH. Interesting enough, translated into German is JHVH...pronounced Jehova. So...it is the actually name that God has...as in my name is Chad. I loved that about the painting because it was a unity between the Catholic church and the Jewish doctrine in the early books of the old testament that prove that painting was made with Truth in mind, not religious tensions. After the Duomo del Siena, I was able to travel around with a few friends through some local shops and eventually ended up at the actual center of town - Il Campo. This is where the horse races take place every year and apparently it get packed which is insane considering the size of Il Campo. I was able to spend a rare moment with the Novaks and Elizabeth Whatley and ate lunch with them and had the best pizza I've ever had (it actually had pears in it) and then headed to the gelatoria (I'm addicted) and got some mandarin gelato. Needless to say, it was pretty sour and I ended up not eating all of it. Leaving Siena was beautiful as many cities in Italy I'm finding are built on top of hills in stead on in valleys like many American cities. Thus, this makes for great views of the country side from any outskirt, and Siena had some amazing photo opportunities.
Leaving Siena, the group headed next to San Gimignano (I still can't pronounce that). The first thing we did in this city, known internationally as the city of towers, was head to the D'uomo del San Gimignano. Elizabeth informed the group that the towers stood as financial emblems of the rich families that lived in San Gimignano during the middle ages. At one time there were about seventy towers, but today only about seventeen remian intact. Basically, the richer the family...the larger the tower. The D'uomo (I'm not sure why it's spelled differently than in Siena) del San Gimignano was a lot smaller than St. Patrick's Cathedral. It had only paintings on every wall surface depicting many, many bible stories. My favorite was a few different pictures that showed the creation in Genesis. God is drawn with red angels forming a chariot in these paintings and at first I could not tell what they were. I thought it was the devil (they're red...come on), not a chariot of angels. Again, in this town I walked the streets and saw some neat soveneirs and actually was finally able to buy some post cards. They are expensive in Italy...nearly always 50 Euro cent per card; but, I found a few for 25 Euro cent. That's right...I'm a bargain shopper. Once again, I bought some more gelato (I swear...I'm addicted...I'm going broke on gelato) this time flavored as coconut. It was very good. The time finally came and the group boarded the bus and left San Gimignano.
At the villa, after a quick dinner, there was a short church service in the villa's music room with the Avante group in Florence which serve basically as Church of Christ missionaries in the area. We sang songs, took of the Lord's Supper, and praised the Lord with song. It was a genuinely peaceful and spiritually stimulating hour. Especially since there was a visiting couple from Germany who were in Florence for their honeymoon. I talked with them after the service and they had wanted to come to a protestant English-speaking church while in Italy because they don't speak Italian and are (nondenominational?) Christian. They were very kind and were surprised that we were a Christian university from America. Apparantly, there are very few if only a couple Christian universities in Germany. Anywho, after the service a few of us went to sing some more worship songs when a very long debate (it was almost like being in student government) turned into a discussion forming a comittee to plan and lead Tuesday convocations and Wednesday night worship nights/fellowship meetings/Bible studies. I was actually very surprised because I became in charge of setting up and leading a villa prayer team. Basically, between only four people we are setting up a nondenominational church plant on Wednesday nights in the Florence house. It's awesome. Furthermore, I'm singing on our small "worship team" of three people on Wednesday night and the songs are all turning out to be some of my favorites. Luckily, I think all those in charge have very similar tastes in music. It's going to be great. After this, I leisurely relaxed and was able to get in this entry.
Ciao!
