January 24

went to Pisa and Lucca on a trip organized by school. At Pisa we got to see the leaning tower and take all the requisite touristy pictures. We also got to go in the church and the baptistry. While we were in the baptistry, a singer came in to demonstrate the acoustics. He sang several notes into the main dome. It was really cool to hear, almost like an organ playing. In Lucca we were supposed to ride bikes around the city, but it was raining too hard. We were there during the time that most of the shops and attractions are closed for lunch and siesta, so we thought we weren't going to have anything to do. Luckily we found a few things that were open. We got to climb this tower in the middle of the city. It was several stories higher than anything around it, so we had a great view of the whole city. There are trees growing on top of the tower which is pretty cool. Of course, it was super rainy so the view is probably even better in good weather. When we got down from the tower, it was late enough that the church our guide had wanted to take us to was open. In the church we got to see the 700-year-old body of a 13-year-old saint that was miraculously preserved. The trip was a little bit miserable because it was so cold and rainy but we did get to see some really cool things.



January 25, 2009

went to mass at Santa Croce with Pat. I really liked Santa Croce. The interior felt even more impressive than Il Duomo for some reason. The mass was all in Italian again, but it's really cool to try to understand it anyway. Since we know what's supposed to be said during mass anyway, Pat and I were saying we'll probably learn more Italian from going to mass each Sunday than from going to restaurants and bars where people tends to speak English to us.
walked around a new part of Florence with Nikul to find sites for a project we have to do for Architecture in Context.