Friday

Friday morning was a little bit brutal. I had slept for the grand total of an hour and a half in that half-dawn between Thursday and Friday before stumbling out of bed and to the school to leave for Assisi. The sky looked forbidding on my walk over, and it opened up properly once the buses left. Nevertheless, I was really looking forward to returning to Assisi. The last time I was there was during the Latin class trip, summer after junior year in high school, where we actually stayed the night in this cute little convent ho(s)tel and spent the day exploring the city.

Assisi is a very typical Tuscan town, which means that it's built directly into the hills that are actually the fringes of the Appennine mountains, which split the Italian peninsula in twain east-west. From the bus parking lot, our group took a series of escalators up to the first level of the city, near the church of Santa Chiara. All of Assisi is clad in this beautiful rose-tinged stone, remnants from ancient iron deposits in the area. Even in the rain, you could easily see the beauty of the architecture. But unfortunately, the breathtaking views from the piazza in front of Santa Chiara and later San Francesco were obscured but the fog. A small consolation was the beauty of the olive trees in the mist - you can really see the kind of venerable silver cast of the leaves and the silhouettes of thousands of trees planted on the hillside.

After taking a moment to appreciate Santa Chiara, our group continued walking up to the Cathedral of San Francesco, St. Francis himself. The building is huge and unique in its design: it's technically a double-decker basilica, along with a 'basement' crypt level that houses the tomb of St. Francis. The upper church is always open to pilgrims and tourists, and completely covered in beautiful frescoes of scenes from the life of St. Francis. Quick art history lesson: until very recently everyone (including myself!) thought that the main cycle of frescoes had been done by Giotto. Vasari said that was so, and the entire art community believed it for the next half-millenium. But recently art historians have examined the work of the frescoes there, and have decided that due to dating issues and comparing it with the confirmed work of Giotto in the Scrovegni Chapel, that the frescoes at Assisi are definitely not Giotto. They also definitely don't know who did paint them either, though. Quote our awesome docent-lady, "If you want to be famous in the art history world, which means you'll be poor but famous, figure out who frescoed the upper church at San Francesco."

Mass and churchy things all happen at the lower church, which is also covered in fresco. Unfortunately, due to some technical difficulties in my little touristy radio transmitter, I couldn't really hear any of what our docent was saying, which is all the more regrettable because I did find her very engaging. As we were filing out of the church, we could here a mass going, which was really quite excellent. I really like hearing the chants in unison of the hymns, sung by the parishioners. It's a very peaceful feeling.

Finally, we descended another level to the subterranean crypt of St. Francis. It... looked like a tomb. We weren't allowed to take any pictures inside the entire church, and I can't really describe the feeling inside the crypt/mausoleum thing besides uh, crowded? We did get to see the changing of the candles that burn directly in front of his tomb, though. An Asian (!) friar exchanged the half-burned tapers for fresh ones, taking care not to let any of the flames go out during the entire process. It was intriguing, but in that way of rituals you witness without necessarily understanding the true motivations behind.

I kind of regret not taking any pictures in Assisi, but it did rain all day, and I just felt like whatever pictures I took wouldn't do the beauty of the city justice. I was also kind of really upset that we didn't spend the entire day in Assisi, and instead after lunch, they herded us back on the bus for an excursion to Gubbio. Where's Gubbio, you ask. I don't rightly know either. It's another Umbrian hill town that we got hauled to, slightly against our wills? It is even more steeply built into the hills than Assisi, but is otherwise not much to write home about. Perhaps out of guilt for not taking pictures in Assisi, I took some of Gubbio, which will be up shortly. But yeah, Gubbio, not that impressive at all. Whatever.

After sleeping for the aforementioned hour and a half the previou night/morning, I did not do anything of note on Friday night besides eat four different types of whole grains/legumes for dinner that night. Actually, this is kind of an interesting story (yeah, that great): I have a feeling, much like Thursday aperitivi, that I will have a well-developed Friday tradition of buying 'sconto' (discounted) prepared salads and side dishes from the Esselunga (that's the Italian supermercato) on the way back from school on the Fridays after site visits. This Friday night's dinner of farina (barley) salad with roasted vegetables (grain #1) and cannellini beans all'uccellino (with tomato sauce) (legume #1) was augmented by warmed-over, leftover coucous dressed in tomato sauce (grain #2) and lentil soup (legume #2). Oh yeah, I am so living the life. Then I did the dishes and fell asleep without brushing my teeth. I still had another site visit to Ravenna the next day.