25 November 2016, David's family came, part A

On our P-day, Saturday, we got ready for David's family visit.  We took the train to Malpensa, the big airport north of Milano to be there when they arrived.

While we were waiting I took this pix of the reader board.  They were coming on the plane from Newark.  It was interesting to see where other planes were coming in from.

They were safe and fairly sound. They rented a 9 passenger Fiat van, which was comfortable to ride in, although it was standard shift, which they didn't mind. actually liked.

We came back to our apartment and had my 70th birthday dinner. We had cotoletta alla milanese (which, when Empress Maria Theresa's cooks took it to Vienna, it became wiener schnitzel), risotto alla milanese (rice grown within 3 miles of where we live with saffron and parmesian cheese), and chocolate cake alla Italiana. It was all very good. Then we headed for Venezia (Venice).

We stopped off at Sirminone on Lake Garda, to see the castle, etc.

And arrived in Venice just at dark, and took the boat-city bus to our hotel, near St Mark's. We had packed a picnic lunch, which we ate in our hotel.so we would not break the Sabbath buying food.

And took a stroll over to St, Mark's square, which was very pleasant, although it sprinkled a little.

We slept well and had a nice breakfast in the old hotel, which, in the 1800s, had been a home for orphans, so the history they gave us said.  The rooms were quite nice, but I didn't think to take a pix of them.

Then we went out to explore Venice.

The ancient city was charming, as usual, especially in in the early morning, without so many tourists this time of year.

St. Mark's duomo, the largest and most famous in Venice, wasn't very busy, and we got in without having to pay anything.  They still didn't allow picture taking, however.

David wanted the perfect picture of his family on an old bridge, of which there are thousands to choose from. Gondolas passed by, but not at the right time for the pix.

After touring Venice a while, we took the boat, which is like the city bus, for which we bought a €20 all day pass, out to the island of Murano, where they blow glass.  We went on a tour of a glass blowing factory, of which there are many.

I was fascinating to watch them work with molten glass to make beautiful things, from little objects tourists buy to very large vases and lamps, which are adorned with crystal they get from Austria, as they have done for centuries.

Josh bought a dip pen with blown glass and a little bottle of ink for €5.

Then, we started checking out places for lunch.  In front is an old well for drinking water. The hole in the bottom is for water for cats, which were prized in ancient times, because they ate the rats that came in on the ships.  The water comes from sisterns on the roofs, because this is an island which cannot support an acquifer.

Their first real Italian pizza they had, delicious.

Ben had a calzone, a folded over pizza, with tomato sauce in a bowl, sometimes they put it on top.

David had a seafood salad.

More of Venice, this time with a gondaleer

Until evening, when we took the boat to the car parking garage and headed back to our apartment in Opera for the night.

Where Ben was able to have what he had been waiting for, his carne equina (horse) hamburger.

It tasted sort of like beef, and if you would have had it on a bun with condiments, I doubt you could tell it from beef, although it is more expensive than beef, so why bother.

The next morning we went to Pisa, about 2 hours south, where we went to the piazza with the baptistry (closest round building), the duomo, (cathedral, middle) and on the end, the bell tower, which happened to lean, quite famously.  I am sure it was an embarrassment, at first, but if, in the 1100s, they would have known how many billions in tourist money it would have brought to Pisa, they would have been quite proud.

This map shows the layout of the piazza, which is quite beautiful, with its green grass, which is not too common in Italy.

David wanted the perfect pictures of his family, and worked hard to get them.

There was a new (from the 1990s) statue of a fallen angel out on the lawn.

The cathedral, in which Gallelleo watched the swinging lamps to learn about the mechanics of pendulims, or is it penduli.

And, of course, the torre pendente, or leaning tower.

With silly tourists all trying get that perfect picture of them holding up the tower.

It really does lean, the vase on the pedestal is straight up and down.

There was a good shot through a gate in the old city wall.  All ancient Italian cities had walls around them for protection.

Then we went to Firenze (Florence), about an hour east.  Megan found a three room, two bathroom apartment in the center of the city, where we comfortably spent the night.  This is  the ceiling in our living room, which must have been a home for a wealthy family in the not so distant past.

David took us to an ostaria (little restaurant, which wasn't really so little), to eat dinner.  We had appetizers, which were salami, cheese, etc.  For some the excitement of the day was catching up with us, e.g. Josh on the end waiting for his calzone.

Myrna and Abby had Tuscan bean with kale soup, served on bread (underneath). Tuscan bread is interesting, it has no salt and sort of needs it.

David had a seafood plate, with big homemade pasta, called tortellone, underneath.

I had grilled chicken, with oven baked potatoes.

Josh had a calzone.

Outside of the ostaria where we had dinner, the name was Ostaria Pizzeria di Centopoveri (one hundred poor people), but it wasn't really that expensive.

We walked a couple of blocks after dinner to the river, and saw Ponte Vecchio, the famous old bridge, which my Dad said was the only bridge (there are many) which wasn't bombed out during the war, because it wasn't wide enough to drive a tank across.  He said the Germans were on the north side and the Americans on the south, and during the day they shot at each other.  At night all the electricity went out, and so my dad went into the homes of Italians to have dinner and spend the evening in pleasant conversation.  It was during those times he tried to teach them about the gospel. The kids may remember the big print we had in our home of this famous old bridge.

Walking the streets of Florence in the evening is very pleasant.  There are lots of beautiful store windows, from world famous shops.

Selling things like ladies shoes and purses.

And jewelry, like this for Christmas.

In the morning we headed over to the Academy, getting there as soon as it opened at 8:30 am. There there wasn't a line and we got right in.  Here is Michaelangelo's David, in all his glory

He has had a bath since I last saw him our honeymoon in 1972.

He is still absolutely amazing in every detail.

I hadn't remembered there is so much art in that museum, other than David.  It took about an hour to see the Academy Gallery, and it would have taken about 2 to 3 to see the Uffizzi, so we did well to just see this one.  The kids were arted out after we finished.

There was an entire room full of plaster casts of marble statues.

And a bunch of real ones

Including this Pietà attributed to Michaelangelo.  The most famous Pietà that Michaelangelo did is in St. Peters in the Vatican in Rome

The pianoforte was also invented in Firenze, and so this gallery has a special exhibit of old musical instruments, including many harpsichords and stringed instruments, including those by the famous Italians, including Stradivarius.

There were lots of other rooms with paintings and statues in the Academia, for which the entry fee is €12.50 per person, no discounts due to old age, but children were free.

After doing our Christmas shopping we walked a few blocks over to the piazza duomo.  The octagon shaped building in the foreground is the baptistry, with the cathedral (duomo) to the left and the impressive bell tower, which does not lean, to the right.

The ceiling of the dome is frescoed to the max, but hard to take pix of because it is fairly dark and a long, long way up.

But we strained our necks trying to take it all in.

The best piece in the duomo is, of course, the organo, with two divisions of pipework on either side, for wonderful stereo effect.

Dante is shown in a famous painting in the duomo, and I don't think the cardinals even liked him all that much.

In the back of the duomo is an interesting, and very large, clock, but I wasn't sure I could tell what time it showed. Actually, I just Googled it and it said it still works and tells 24 hour time.

The bell tower from the bottom, which one could climb, for a nominal fee.

The happy grandparents about ready to leave their grandkids, who were going on to Rome (out of our mission), and we went back to Opera on the train (Freccarosa, the red arrow), which is very quiet, comfortable and fast (great for sleeping), for only €33 each.

The Rogeredo train station where we changed trains to go to Locate, which is within walking distance (we have done it, in the rain, uphill both ways), but the APs came to pick us up.

It is now Friday evening and we are waiting for David's family to arrive from Rome.  We will post more about our adventures with them, and look forward to the other kids coming.  They found black Friday sales and are actually coming.

Ciao for now.

13 Nov 2016, Monza again, training and baptisms

Yesterday, our P-day, it was sunny and nice outside, so we decided to go back to Monza, to see the first floor of the royal palace, which, as I wrote before, and verified this week, has 700 rooms in it, although they are not all restored.  We had seen the second and third floors, which were impressive, but did not get to see the floor where the royalty actually lived.  I wish I could remember their names better, although I could Google it.  The palace was built in the 1700s by the queen from Vienna, Austria, which was ruling Lombardia at that time (this part of Italy, where we live, was ruled by many different kings from different countries). Maria Theresa began thinking it would only be a summer residence, sort of a hunting lodge, because they loved to hunt, and it was close to the castle in Milano, but they sort of overdid it.

We got a couple, who were visiting from Brazil, to take our picture as we were leaving the palace.  Pictures don't do it justice, it is really a large residence. Although they let us take pix on the second and third floors, there were signs that said we shouldn't take them on the first floor, although everyone in our guided tour was taking them after the guide went to the next room.  Again, as on the upper floors, we had headsets which told us what we were going to see as we went from room to room.  This floor had period furniture and same art work, but certainly not how much it originally had, and the floors and walls had been restored.

While we were waiting for the tour, I snapped a shot in the modern kitchen area of a cook slicing meat and putting it on panini (rolls), which they sell in their restaurant. Italians love their food slicers and slice up everything very fine, and  then put many slices, meat and cheese, on a piece of very fresh, crisp on the outside relatively soft on the inside, white bread.

Across the hall was the coffee bar, with fresh baked items.  Italians really like to drink coffee, which they make with live steam, from tiny cups and eat these croissants, etc. It costs about €1.50 for a coffee and a morning roll. I suspect many Italians buy them from one of these bars in the morning, instead of making them at home.  They usually also sell hot chocolate, but we didn't have any.

This was the "back door" to the palace, which we explored while we were waiting for our tour, which cost €10 each, to begin.

One side was for smokers and the other for dogs.  Italians do a good job of keeping smoking,which it seems a greater percent of the population, including young teenagers, do than in the US. It is so sad to see young kids smoking. We saw one beggar man going through cigarette butts to find the longest ones for himself.
 
Again, in the palace we walked through many, many rooms with furniture, etc. and were told what happened in each room, but it was hard to take pictures.

So, when you did get an audience with the king, this is the chair he sat on.

This is the bed King Umberto I, slept on. (The queen had her own room and bed.)  The last king to live in this palace was assissinated in 1900, and they laid him out on his bed, and took pictures of him on the bed. This is how they know that this was the very bed, because they have a picture to prove it.  Again, this palace was used from the middle of the 1700s until a little after 1900, and all the furniture has been replaced, except this bed.

This is the back end of the bedroom of the king.  The large picture above the fireplace is the first Umberto, the one who was shot by an assassin when he attended a sporting event in Trento and was congratulating the winners. That day he forgot to wear his specially made wool undershirt, which may have prevented his death from three bullets, the guide said. He did have a wonderful room filled with cabinets for his firearms, of which he was fond. I thought of Mark when I saw those beautiful wooden closets, although there were no firearms left.

This is the king's bath tub and toilet.  I was able to look down into the toilet hole, there was no plumbing.  They just put a large chamber pot down the hole and some poor servant had to empty it. There was no indication they used toilet paper, nor did I see a bidet or washing bowl in the toilet room, which was plumbed with hot and cold running water.

This is from a room with many of these wardrobes, where the king's clothing was kept.  The queen also had her own (many) wardrobe rooms, which were much more elegant. She even had a sauna for her beauty treatments.

This was a library.  After the royals left, all of their books were taken to a library in Rome, and some of their china was put on display here.

This is one of many rooms that were used for meeting guests and conducting other state business. These rooms have all been painstakenly restored, including the wooden floors.  They put down the red carpet so we wouldn't walk on the wood floor.

This is a ballroom.  We were told we could take pictures in this room.

When these lights were first made in the 1700s, they used candles, then they were outfitted to use gas, then electricity when the rooms were restored within the last 20 years.

They obviously had music played in this room, for the dances, but there was nothing there now.  All of the furnishings had been taken away to other palaces and museums, including the Hearst Castle in California.  They are currently working to get it all back. The rooms are still pretty impressive.

These walls show the Austrian family emblems.

Even the palace parking lot, which is part of a large city park, was beautiful.

We then drove to the nearby center of Monza, and parked in an underground parking lot, asking the attendant which way led to the duomo, to which he pointed.

This is the duomo of Monza, which is obviously being worked on.  Unfortunately, we got there at 12:10 pm, ten minutes after it closed until 3 pm, so we couldn't go in.  We saw that they have a museum of the "treasures" which, according to pictures, has crown jewels, including the iron crown, with which Napoleon was crowned.  We would like to go back sometime to see them.

Since it was lunch time and we were hungry, we stopped in a kebab place in Monza, which was busy at noon, and we each had a nice panino with Doner (a brnad name) Kebab.  The boys behind us were arm wrestling, as you can see.  Boys will be boys, where ever they are, even in the mission office.

This is what kebab pannini look like. The bread is hot and is generally made from pizza-like dough.  The meat, which I have described before, is a combination of turkey and veal. cooked like Greek gyro.  They also put lettuce, tomato, red cabbage, onions and two sauces, one white, apparently with yoghurt, and red, a mild chili.  They cost €4 each and are very filling.  This is what Jan, Ginger and Brian had for their first meal in Italy, when they thought they were getting authentic Italian food--it is actually from Turkey (the country) and is Halal (Muslim kosher), although Brian had a pizza, which these places also make. There seems to be one on almost every corner in the cities of Italy.

We attended a baptism on Saturday evening, of an older guy, Davide, who is married and has a daughter, to whom I gave music books last week, and took a keyboard.  She was delighted and I believe she will learn to play well, she seems to have a lot of interest as well as talent.

We came back after the baptism and were able to attend a concert of a choir in the old church (Madonna del' Aiuto) here in Opera.  It started at 9 pm, and got out about 11:30.  It was wonderful to hear that old (like from the 1500s-1700s) music in that ancient church, where, while you listened you could see actual paintings from the school of Leonardo da Vinci, etc.  There were perhaps 60 people at the concert.

Unfortunately, the antique pipe organ in the back of the church is broken, so they had to use a Yamaha musical keyboard when they needed accompaniment.

To access this organ you have to climb up these metal rungs in the side of the wall, which I have not yet been able to do, because they said the floor under the organ may give way.

At sacrament meeting the mission was in charge of the program.  I played the piano and arranged the speakers and special musical numbers.  Everyone did well, although it went over a bit because I had the three missionaries who are "dying" (to use missionary language) or going home, speak, and they did well.  They also confirmed Davide who was baptized last evening. Directly after church we went with President and Sister Allen to the Cano's home for dinner.  She cleans the mission home and used to clean the office. They made Colombian food, which was interesting.

Sorella and Fratella Cano with their daughter, Melina, who is a returned missionary, from the Rome Mission, at lunch in their kitchen.  Melina made the dessert, "tre leches," or three milks, which is a cake with sweetened condensed milk, whole milk, and whipping cream (three milks), which they make in Columbia, where they are from.  We are going to Melina's wedding, about which I will write more after it happens.
 
We made lunch for all the office workers on Friday, to welcome our new office anziano, Simmons, from California, left.

We also fed the new missionaries at their orientation, held in the Cimiano chapel.  This was fairly time-consuming this week, to buy, make, transport and serve 60 hungry missionaries.

Myrna made chicken barbecue, served on large hamburger buns with a piece of cheese, and potato salad, with apple cake for dessert. An American lunch, which they enjoyed.

A team building exercise, using ribbon, notice the haircut on the left.

Above I mentioned that boys will be boys.  These are our "boys," who at 11:30 pm on Sunday evening, after we went over to the mission home for a snack of smoothies, cookies and an interesting concoction*, came back to the office and challenged each other to eat a piece of the hottest chili on earth. At least one of them said he had a bad belly ache all night. We watched only long enough to warn them not to and take pix before going up to bed.

*Someone (we think sister missionaries) gave the president a large, fairly sweet jelly roll, beautifully made, and filled with tuna fish.  Yes, canned tuna, which Italians eat a lot of, at least by how much they sell in the stores.  At first you think this is weird, sweet taste with tuna, but it was actually not all that bad, although certainly an acquired taste combination. Maybe it made a good base for the chili, although our vegetarian anziano (who does not eat tuna either) ate lots of yoghurt with honey to warn his stomach the chili was on its way. He did not complain this morning.  

6 Nov 2016, Dentist, Halloween, Flu, Frioli, New Shopping Center & Opera

This week was sort of foggy and with light rain.  We went to Milano twice, taking the metro (subway) both times. Myrna had her molar, on which she had root canal operations performed, sealed and was fitted for a porcelain crown, which she gets the end of the month, we hope. The pain has subsided. It took many visits to an endodontist, Dr. Gorny, which David found for us.  Gorny is a university professor and always had students observing him. One of his associates actually finished the work. Our mission president, who is a dentist, said that what Myrna had was indeed a very difficult procedure, although he generally does them in two visits.  I believe she had good quality care here.


This week was Halloween. A few Italian member families stopped by the mission office to trick-or-treet, and we had American candy (thanks to Fred).  Italians do not generally celebrate Halloween, but Monday was a national holiday, All Saints Day.  I guess after the spooks come out on Oct 31, you are supposed to worship all the saints on Nov 1.

I also cooked and ate the trout which Adrianna gave us at church on Sunday.  It was pretty good.

Then, because we haven't had our flu shots, which I believe in, we went to the "mission doctor," William S. Freilich, M.D, FACEP, also in Milano, to get them.  He has certificates from Chicago on his wall, and I believe he is American. He had several framed thank you certificates from the US Consulate, so I suppose he is also their doctor.  He sort of reminded me of a "mad scientist," about my age, with white messy hair (think Einstein), horn rim glasses, a bow tie, white lab coat, stethoscope around his neck.  He also reviewed our list of medications and wrote prescriptions for refills on his Italian pad, saying we could probably get them at a pharmacy without prescription. They are all generic, although we both take one med that perhaps isn't available in Italy, we will see. Before we left for our noon appointment, Myrna spoke with a missionary, who is in Milano (President and Sister Allen were in Hungary this week at a mission president conference) who said he had bloody diarrhea.  He asked her to tell Sister Allen (all missionaries are to tell her about their health issues), because he didn't want to talk with her about it.  Anyway, because of the blood, she told him to go to Dr. Freilich, which he did.  He gave him an antibiotic, although said it was most likely caused by their (another missionary) eating under cooked chicken. While we were there, the other missionary, from Como (an hour away) called Myrna and I had Freilich speak with him on my phone.  The doctor told him to go to a pharmacy, buy a stool collection kit and come ASAP to Milano.  He, with his comp, came on the train and also received an antibiotic, so this must have been a nasty (lasted more than a week) bug.

After Dr. Freilich gave us our shots, I also spoke with him about flu immunizations, and he gave me an Rx, which I took to a pharmacy here in Opera.  They said we could just buy a box, Fluad, which contains a filled syringe and needle (like which the doctor used), for €11.45, and give it to ourselves.  Anyway, I also called Aetna and got the name of the Church's provider, which is in Russia, and they are going to send a doctor to all eight of our upcoming zone conferences to give flu shots.  The APs sent an email to all missionaries, asking them if they want a shot, and many, including a senior couple, have responded that they don't want and/or need one.  I find it interesting that all missionaries, whose applications I have seen, said they would have immunizations on their mission, but some are now refusing flu shots, probably because of misconceptions (they will get the flu from it, it will cause other diseases, made by evil men, etc.)  I have been thinking this is like the gospel. In the pre-existence (pre-mission) we all said we would keep the commandments (signed the forms), but when we get here we become blinded by the "world" and find reasons not to do what is really best for us (go to church or have a flu shot). Anyway, it is certainly not doctrinal, and I won't use it in any talk or even harass any missionary who does not want a shot, but I have thought a lot about the similarities.

On Friday evening Myrna and I rode with the APs to the church for the final going-away "party" for the Friolo family, who are immigrating to California (tomorrow). Myrna made a big plate of cookies and muffins, as we thought it was just a pot luck dinner.  It was actually like a sacrament meeting, in the chapel.  In fact, we got there a little late, but I played the piano (they must have sung the opening hymn without accompaniment). There were many moving testimonies and the family spoke last.  All of the missionaries, present and past, in the ward came up and sang "Called to Serve" (I also accompanied), and then we all sang "God be with you..." at the end.  It was, as you can imagine, very emotional. Again, I thought of what it was like in the late 1800s when saints migrated to Zion. I hugged and told Fratello Friolo that I hope to see him at General Conference in Salt Lake next October. (Their daughter is gong on a mission to Lyon, France, leaving Jan, 2017.)

On Saturday I went to play the organ in the church at Locate, but when I got there, at 2:45 pm, there was a funeral about to start, so I didn't go in.  They rang the bells for at least 15 minutes.

So I went to a new shopping center in Locate, by myself (Myrna was home making muffins). When we got here 9 months ago there were rice and corn fields between Opera and Locate, and we walked by them.  However, they have constructed and  just opened up a new shopping center this week, called Scalo Milano.  It is an outdoor mall, but very big and has "high end" stores like Calvin Klein, Guess,Nike, Levis, etc.  It does not have large grocery anchor store, but it has a food court, 17 stores, including a McDonalds, Roadhouse, Lindt chocolate, etc.  I only walked around, in the mist, but had a very hard time finding where I parked the car.  I almost called the office missionaries to ask them to rescue me, it would have been embarrassing, but I looked harder and finally found the car.  This week the office elders had an accident on a round-about, and when the Italian was yelling at them, they called one of the APs, a native Italian, to come to save them, which he did.

Then, last evening, the Salatini came about 5 pm and took us to Alessandria, to attend a concert, which included one of their Pathway students (Pathway is what we were supposed to do).  We rode with Salatini the hour, on freeway, to Alesandria and found a nice osteria-pizzaria, and had a good dinner together. Myrna had risotto with asparagus and shrimp, I ate the shrimp, which she doesn't like, and had a pizza. Then we went to a large piazza (Garibaldi) and had a dolce (fancy pastry) from shop where they are made.  The person who served us was a cute girl who had been a foreign exchange student in Michigan, and spoke good English.  There was a light drizzle, but it was a pleasant evening.  We were met by the husband of Erika Lovell, who served a mission in Rome, met an Italian missionary and they were married a year ago.  She is now pursuing a master's degree in opera singing in Alessandria and was asked to sing in a concert with three other soprani.

Erika is on the right. They sang famous, and very demanding, arias from Verde and Puccini operas, e.g., from Verdi's Machbeth "Nel di della vittoria" (Google it).  The performance started a 9 pm, and went until 11:30 pm, which is typical in Italy.  Sister Lovell's parents came all the way from Salt Lake City to attend her performance.  He was a mission president in Jeff's mission in Argentina. When I asked, her mother said she does not sing, except in the ward choir, but her mother sang opera at BYU-Idaho, so the daughter certainly comes by it naturally.  I love music, but don't particularly like opera, although I appreciate the skill needed for this type of singing.  After we left and were walking to the car, there were many, many young people in the piazza, it would have been fun to go to one of the open cafès with them for an after opera snack.

The community theater in Alessandria, where operas are held.

Walking back to the car after the performance.

I took this pix, which I will use in my presentation to the new missionaries this week, to show them what can happen to their bikes, if they don't lock them up properly.  We got on the freeway, which, after driving a while, we found was shut down, we assume because of an accident.  We were re-routed, and didn't get home until almost 1 am.

Today at church I played for Primary, as I have for the past two weeks.  They are preparing for their annual sacrament meeting program, on Nov 20 (when we will be with David in Venice.)  I gave the music to an American sister, who will play for them.  We came home and I had a nice nap, then came down and typed this.

Ciao for now.