It's Fresh, It's new, it's....My daily post 6/16 (Sorry it's sooooooooo long)

(Giusi's color of the day.....GREEN! We totally called it)

So today started off with going to rehearsal at an Anglican church, which obviously is outside of ancient Rome (because it’s protestant). It seats I think 280 or so. Try stuffing over 300 of us in there, with no air conditioning, and singing our hearts out, which gets very hot. Yeah….let’s just say I got a little warm (A LOT!). Rehearsal actually went really well. Everything sounded really good. The only thing that was wrong is that we NEED to watch the conductor (Paul Leddington Wright). We are all sooooo worried about getting the notes right, the rhythms right, and the words right, that we are not taking our faces out of the scores. So that was the main problem today. He would slow down, those who were watching would slow down, and those who weren’t, fell right off the train tracks, and it would sound terrible. But all in all, it was good.
After that we had to go find lunch. It is semi-hard to find a take out restaurant around here. Everywhere you go they have tables. The Italians are big on taking their time about meals (I think I might have mentioned that before). But we found this sandwich and bar place where I got a club sandwich and who knows what Jenni got. It looked gross. She ate half of it and than asked the question “……what am I eating?” I honestly couldn’t tell you what she was. It looked like meat, but it looked like liver or something. It was nasty! Oh, we ate lunch on the Spanish steps which was really cool.
After lunch we bussed over the Vatican City where we went in the Vatican Museum, the Sistine Chapel, and the Basilica.

(Mrs. Bauchspies and Angela waiting to go back to the bus to go to Vatican city ----------------------------------------------------->)

The museum (the part we saw) was really cool. Tons of artifacts and they had these HUGE tapestries that depicted different scenes from the Bible. A few were really kind of depressing. Some depicted when the Pharaoh ordered that al the baby boy’s to be killed, and they showed the guards like killing these babies, and it was pretty graphic. It was…..interesting. One thing that was really interesting was that Giusi had to explain all the paintings and such that are in the Sistine Chapel before we got in there, because you are not supposed to talk in the actual Chapel. Once you walk in there, it is breathtaking. The room is pretty empty but the walls are massive and the paintings are soooo elaborate. Everything is soooo detailed and soooo well done. It took Michelangelo four years to do the ceiling, and six years to do the Last Judgment (I don’t think that that is the actual title) painting. I learned a lot in the museum, too much to write.
Next was the Basilica. It was GINORMOUS! You walk in and you feel like an ant. It was really cool to see Michelangelo’s Pieta. It is really detailed and gorgeous.

(<- Eddie, John, and I in the Sistene Chapel)

Everything is really elaborate. Gold and marble, and precious stones. Sheesh. Although it was very impressive, I think it might have been a little overdone. No offense to the architects (which included Michelangelo) or the artists, but it’s…very ostentatious. I was creped out a little by the “incorruptible” saints or popes. There they are lying there in glass, dead, for a long time, and they don’t decay. It’s a little weird. Well we heard you could go up in the main dome of the Basilica and most of us wanted to do it. So we went to but tickets and it was 5 euros if you walked the whole way and 7 if you took the elevator the first half of the way (you have to walk to the roof of the Basilica and than enter the dome and walk up another couple hundred stairs. Well, not knowing how far it went up, I got to the first ring of the dome (it’s at the base of the dome) and was a little intimidated by the height of it. If you don’t know, I have a thing against heights.

(<- Sarah stood in the light that came throught the huge dome, and this is what happened, I thought this picture was really cool!)

I’m fine if you put me on a roller coaster, but if I am standing still high up, with just a small gate thing holding me from falling over the edge, noooooo thank you. So than everyone is like “Come on! Let’s go to the top!” My heart sank. “The top?” I thought to myself. Than I remembered this lady talking about going up the dome and apparently it’s a tight squeeze. And to be even high up the dome than where I was……….NOOOO SIR-EEEEE” So I walked, by myself, back down. I felt a little lame for not going to the top, but you put me in a tight space up really high, I don’t think so.

(<- Resting after a lot of walking around Vatican City)

So yadi yadi ya, if I keep on expounding on stuff you guys are going to be reading a freaking novel.
So we came back to the hotel, we got diner, which was a little frustrating, amazing lasagna but poor and slow service. Than after dinner (which took three hours!) we went to the Trevia Fountain. It was really pretty. It was about a twenty minute walk from our hotel, but it was worth it. I threw two coins in and apparently since I threw two, I am going to find my true love…..YEAH!!!!!! hahahahaha. I told dad not to be surprised if I came home with and Italian girl. Than he cracked a joke saying it would be Giusi…..ewww. No offense to her, she is a really sweet and knowledgeable lady, but she is like forty years older than I am. Hahahahaha. (I will put pictures of the fountain on tomorrow, I don’t have jenni’s camera which is the only way to get my pictures on the computer!)
Well I better get off. It is like late and Adam is asleep and I don’t want to wake him up. Love yall and see you soon.

P.S. Apparently there are a lot of people reading this.
WARNING: My spelling and grammar isn’t top notch…hahahahahahahaha! Some of it I do on purpose, but some of it is just my lack of grammatical and spelling skill.