On Christmas day, after one hour of church, we opened our presents and skyped all the kids when it got late enough. During the evening we all went over to the Mission Home, where the office anziani opened their gifts.
The anziani bought gifts for each other and us. We bought them engraved pens. Pres and Sorella Allen gave us aprons with a pix of the four office anziani on the bottom, with "The Hoopes Group" written above. We could use them when we serve for zone conferences, but it may be an issue for some of the anziani who have worked in the office and aren't in the pix. But we love them, the aprons as well as the anziani.
On Monday, Dec 26, Santo Stefano's Festa (national holiday), after finishing our work, we went with the Salatini to Bergamo to a concert at the old basilica, next to the duomo. We took the funicolare up the hill to cità alta.
And went to the little place that sells polenta, for a late lunch.
I had polenta with sugo from chianina beef (from Toscana), with extra cheese (inside), with acqua frizzante, which was really good. Myrna had a panino (ham and cheese), because she doesn't like corn meal mush too much.
We stopped in a pastry shop and bought some goodies.
Although we didn't buy a gingerbread house.
As I have previously pointed out, the duomo (cathedral) in Bergamo, is the white marble church ahead, and the older, larger, and more beautiful bascilica is to the right.
We got there at 3 pm, and the concert was to start at 4, which it did. The choir was rehearsing their numbers, so we listened to them. They started each piece, skipped the middle and ended the piece, for their practice. This is the regular choir for this basilica, the duomo has its own choir. We got seats up front, there weren't very many in the audience, and the hour long concert was free. It was all traditional (from the 17th ad 18th centuries) Christmas music, and ended with "Tu scendi dalle stelle," the most beloved Christmas song in Italy, which is older than Silent Night (they didn't do Silent Night.) The accompaniment was the small pipe organ in the front middle, a violin, viola and cello.
But sometimes the organist jumped up and played the big organ, which also sounded good with the choir. He also improvised (without music, he was making it up), on the old melodies, between choir numbers. That small choir and organ can certainly fill the entire large basicila with beautiful sounds. I recorded several of the numbers with my regular camera, which turned out well.
This new, portative pipe organ has five stops, four stops divided between bass and treble. It sounded heavenly, and with the quint stop it made a lovely oboe-like melody, used for one of the Bach pieces.
After the concert we walked around the busy streets of old Bergamo, cità alta, one of my favorite places in Italy.
On Wednesday we welcomed 5 new missionaries, which is a relatively small group. Anzianio Simmons, who works in the office with us, volunteered to make lasagna for their dinner, which he made in the mission office kitchen. We minded the sugo, which simmered in the room next to our office, all day.
The newbies with their trainers around the conference table. The new missionaries were, as they always are, very tired after their long flight from Salt Lake.
To the left is AP, Anziano Morgan Pyper, who will return home to play football for BYU. He is from Idaho Falls. His mother used to judge Junior Miss in Soda Springs. We learned this when he was skyping with his family on Christmas and brought his ipad into our office so we could meet his family.
The "match" when the newbies are matched with their trainers, is always an emotional experience.
Our roles with newbies have evolved. I instruct them on using their money and cards, and then take their "official" pictures with their companions for the mission blog. Sister Clark, in the middle, lost her personal card in the airport in Dallas, so I helped her get a new one this week. Sorella Hoopes worries about them (many phone calls and emails), sometimes for months, until they get their permessi.
We made breakfast and a lunch for them and sent them off to their first cities with their new companions, after singing the mission hymn and a kneeling prayer. (We also get them back in a few weeks for more training.)
On Saturday we had a p-day with President and Sorella Allen. We went to Cremona to the famous Museum of the Violin.
This poor one, out front, looks like someone got mad and smashed it.
This "modern art" piece, called Soul of Music, was also interesting.
The museum is fairly large, and quite new, for Italy.
Looking out the front window, you can see the bell tower of the duomo, which is only a couple of short blocks away.
You aren't supposed to take pictures in the museum, but I snuck in a few in the large room with many famous stringed instruments by the famous makers, Stradivari, Guarneri, Amati, etc..
Of all shapes and sizes, including a guitar made by Stradivari. One of the guides, who spoke English, said they have one violin that sold for 300 million euros, which is 4% more than 300 million US dollars. Some are owned by the city and some are on loan. Most are playable, and are played at concerts, etc, and the most important are played every day. (There are fascinating YouTubes showing this.) There are also lots of other exhibits at this museum, showing the history of stringed instruments, lots of artifacts from the famous instrument makers on Cremona, including the hand tools they used and videos of making violins. They had many musical, with sound, displays and a large room for listening to various violins being played. (I have discussed organ sounds with people, who said they all sound like an organ and they can't tell the difference, which I thought was ludicrous, but, to be honest, I think all of the violins I heard sounded like violins, so I guess my ear is not very discriminating, although I think I like the sound of the cello, which is a tenor violin, better.) They had a large world map showing where lutanists, people who make violins, are located. There are still many in Cremona and in Italy. However, we saw a school of violin making at the Sforzi castle in Milano.
Jokes: What is the difference between a violin and a fiddle? About $10,000. You would't care if you spilled beer on your fiddle. A violin has strings and a fiddle has strangs. Isaac Perlman, a world famous violinist, has a Stradivarius violin and refers to it as his fiddle. I learned that the difference is really the kind of music played on them. Violins and fiddles are essentially the same, although of different values and qualities.
After the museum we walked over to the piazza duomo, where they were selling fresh flowers on New Year's Eve.
Although, because it was 12:30 pm, the duomo itself was closed for riposo (siesta).
There were other vendors as well, including those selling used clothes.
Even the octagonal baptistry next to the duomo was closed. The baptistry wasn't closed the last time we went to Cremona, during the summer, and we stayed in it until the duomo opened at 14:30. From here we went to eat lunch at an ostaria in Cremona. I had a cotaletta gigante (300 gram pork cutlet, breaded and fried in butter, with oven baked potatoes) and Myrna had risotto with aspargas.
On our way back home we stopped at the Certosa di Pavia, just as it was closing on New Year's Eve, and was taken on a tour by the same Ethopian monk who has been our guide several times. This was the first time Pres and Sorella Allen had been there. You aren't supposed to take pictures there, and I didn't take any, inside.
This is one of the inner court yards, on Dec 31, without flowers. It was about 4 degrees C outside.
They are working to restore part of the roof.
I think I want one of these kinds of faucets for my hand washing sink.
After we got home we went to the IPER mall to buy some groceries, since the next day, Jan 1, is Sunday and Monday is a holiday. They had this duomo of Milano, in chocolate balls, which is about ready to be taken down--Christmas is over.
Italians love seafood, especially for special meals, but the pickins were slim this late time of day. About all that was left of the swordfish was his sword.
But there were still some octopuses available, for the brave.
This afternoon and evening we worked on our usual tasks in the office. I did rimborsi and Sorella Hoopes made calls to missionaries about permessi and worked on meals for this week. Tomorrow, Jan 2, is a national holiday, but we will still work as usual, although there won't be any mail (bills and packages for missionaries).
Ciao for now.
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