Great Performances

Another big highlight of my time abroad was the great performances I got to head to. Mostly opera. The list, here:

• Miranda and I saw Sharon Gless in "A Round-Heeled Woman" at the Aldwych in the West End.


• Ross and I saw "Cosi fan Tutte" at La Fenice in Venice.




• I made it to Aida at the Arena di Verona. I was on my own for that one, but it was completely worth it to go, and sitting in the cheap seats worked out just fine.




• Linda and I took her friends Phillis and Roger to Musica a Palazzo to see an evening of love duets.


• I hit up Musica a Palazzo a second time to take Ross, Mark, and Mary to see "Il Barbiere di Siviglia," it was another big hit!


• I hit up a cafe to see my friends Pete Ross and the Sapphire do their live show.


• I made it to La Scala on my last night in Milan to see "Lohengrin", a classic Wagner opera. And it's a beautiful opera house.

I am going to skip talking about all the art and gallery and museum shows I saw, since if I listed it down it would be a distressingly long list!

Lohengrin at La Scala

On Tuesday night (my last night in Milan) I went to see Lohengrin at La Scala. Let me say, it was a great show. The singers, the orchestra, the set design, all of that was great. Lohengrin has pretty good music, really pretty for a Wagner opera.

La Scala is a beautiful opera house. Opera houses do usually have lovely chandeliers...



I sprung for a good seat, a balcony box front.



The boxes are tiny. My seat was the front right one. A nicely dressed businessman was sitting on the little stool one seat "behind" me. The view was probably OK from his seat, but really, I think I had the only good view in the box...



Ceiling clocks are a thing in theaters in Italy.



The cast of Lohengrin, taking their bows. Much deserved! The woman playing Ortrud was probably my favorite, she really was a great actress as well as a good singer.



All in all, a great night. I even got a program, which was basically a hardback book! (Complete with dust cover!)

Vanity

I'm trying to decide which of these three pictures of me at La Fenice I should rework into a profile photo. I'm wearing my new Venetian mask from La Bauta in all of these.

This one I think could be made into a great Facebook cover page thing, perhaps.



These second two might be better for a profile pic.



The flash makes the colors a little brighter, but maybe it's a little too harsh.



Well, what do you think? I'd love some input!

Venice, Day Two

Sunday the 19th was a full day in Venice for us. We decided to walk the city. We walked up through the Ghetto Ebraico and along the north coast of the city, through Castello, to Arsenale, where we had lunch.



The usual fun of Venice is looking at the architecture and the details. This was an awesome door pull we passed.



Costumed folks were already out on the streets in the morning, we saw a lot on our strolls.



There are a few hospitals in Venice, and one of them is on the north coast. They have ambulance boats... since nothing else would make sense in Venice, really.



Every little piazza had a few costumed characters in it.



Our evening was spent at La Fenice, seeing Cosi fan Tutte. Wow, it's really beautiful on the inside. The boxes are beautiful!



Here's Ross in ours. Each box has four chairs, two in front, two in back. Hooks for the coats, a mirror for getting beautiful. The theater was rebuilt recently, you can tell by the installation of the fire equipment!



And of course, the famous sign.



The opera was a lot of fun. Having a private box does make it more pleasant!

On our walk home, we went over the Rialto bridge. This was another great costume we saw on the way home.



And this glass art really cracked up both me and Ross!



We had dinner at a pizza place that was really tasty, and got to bed at a decent hour!

London Part 4

Monday last, I spent the morning in class with Miranda (the history of medieval Scotland) and then headed to Brixton to meet up with Peter. I got the full tour of his neighborhood! He's got a lot of his work in his studio, I got to see the wide variety.



He's a part of the Artichoke Print Workshop, which we visited in the afternoon. It's a large shop with several serious presses.



Peter makes lots of trouble in the studio!



Miranda and I decided to grab dinner at Wasabi, a Japanese fast chain. I really liked the food, and the variety of choices was quite impressive. You can buy single rice balls or single nigiri or two-packs of little maki roll bites, adding it up to a meal, or large soups and large dinner plates or bowls or salads and garnish with some little stuff. Downsides: you have to pay for individual soy sauce packets (a few p.) and like many English fast food places, you have to pay extra to sit at a table, even though they don't really serve you or anything.



We also bought some candy bars on the side for our night at the theater... They were all actually quite good.



We were at the Aldwych to see "A Round-Heeled Woman" with Sharon Gless...



Another fun night!