My Italian Adoption

OK, if I can't be with my grandkids I'll have to adopt and I've found the cutest little guy to be my Italian grandson.  His name is Giulio and he comes to me becomes he likes my magnetic name tag. Molto dolce!

IT"S HOT!!!!

Oh my goodness it is hot in Bari right now.  We are learning how to cope with it but the young missionaries have it much harder than we do.  At least we have air conditioning in our apartment--they just have fans...They walk around most of the day getting to appointments or trying to make appointments and we travel in our air conditioned car.  When we came out of church today at 12:00 this is what our car showed us.........Once the car got going it went down to 36 so --no problem!

When you have temperatures like that you get to see things growing like this:

Olives and grapes EVERYWHERE!  And these pictures were taken just off the side of the road we were driving on yesterday..  beautiful!!

Primary activity/GANS Barbeque

The Primary asked the GANS (Young Single Adults) to assist with their summer primary activity so Claudio, Valerio, Giuseppe, Gabriella and Gionni  stepped right up and took care of things. Here Claudio is teaching how to do a relay-- hoola hoop pass down the line without using your hands.

Next is wet sponge dodge ball--they loved it--it was so hot outside!

A few of the older Primary kids (and some no longer Primary) 

Then...water balloon catch

The GANS had a barbeque and we were in charge of doing the hanburgers.  Chris tried to clean up a couple of really rusty barbeques to use but ended up just buying one.  How do we get THAT on the plane home??  These aren't the best pictures of a barbeque but they just finished playing basketball outside and were trying to cool off in the air conditioned church.  Didn't take a picture of the  great food we had (my mother would be ashamed) but it was a great time.  The missionaries also came and it was PDay so they are all on their tablets writing home. 

 This is wonderful Mima who has a daughter on a mission and next to her is a missionary that served in Bari a couple years ago and now teaches Italian at the MTC--Sorella Preston.

 Below is Claudio, Valerio and Giuseppe.  Claudio is leaving in September for the Milan mission and Valerio just got his call to England.  We sure love these ragazzi!

Borghese Galleria--best place to see in Rome!

Chris and I love the Borghese Gallery.  It is by far the most awesome place to see paintings, statues and other works of art.  The Galleria Borghese houses a substantial part of the Borghese family collection of painntings, sculture and antiquities, begun by Cardinal Scipione Borghese, the nephew of Pope Paul V (1605-1621).  Below is the statue of the Rape of Persephone (or Proserpina) by Hades. We were amazed at the ability of Bernini to sculpt creations like this out of one block of marble and make the skin look so lifelike.

Between 1622 and 1625, Gian Lorenzo Bernini sculpted a marble life sized figure entitled Apollo and Daphne. Apollo clutches Daphne’s hip pursuing her as she flees trying to escape him. Apollo desperate and longing wears a laurel crown foreshadowing Daphne’s metamorphosis into the laurel tree. Daphne is portrayed halfway through her metamorphosis into the laurel tree with her arms already transforming into its branches as she flees and calls to her Father to save her from Apollo.(from Wiki)

Below is the statue of Apollo and Daphne. 

Below is the figure of Napolean's sister who was married to Camillo Borghese. The bed she lays on looks like it would be soft to the touch but of course it is all in marble.

When in Rome-do as all the other tourists do--

Rome!  I love Rome--there is so much to see and do and eat! After Pompei we headed for Rome for a 4 day stay.  The first thing we did was head to Trevi fountain of course...With the crowds around it the best way to get a picture was to do it like this....

At night, Trevi is beautiful.

Then off to the Coliseum--Spectacular!

We even took the tour into the dungeons where all the lions and gladiators spent their time waiting for their turn for the action above.

This is the contraption used to lower or raise areas to transport the animals or gladiators to the main floor.

The Arch of Constantine to commemorate Constantine's 10 year reign and his victory of one of his major battles.  They built these arches almost every time they won a battle.  This one was built around 300 AD.

Underside of the arch

The Palatine is one of the most ancient parts of the city.  Excavations show that people have lived in this area since the 10th century BC.

Almost every corner you turn in Rome there is an amazing piazza with incomparable statues.  This one is Piazza Navona.

And at night....

Pompei

Straight ahead in this picture is Mt. Vesuvius.  I have loved the history of Pompei ever since I studied it in Elementary school.  I have always wanted to see it and thought it was such a singular traumatic event in history.  At last I got my chance..Sorrento is right next door to Pompei so we went to the historic sites there. 

Pompei

Pompei was mostly destroyed and buried under 13-20 feet of volcanic ash in the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 AD.  It was left that way for almost 1700 years.

Two thousand people died, and the city was abandoned for almost as many years. When a group of explorers rediscovered the site in 1748, they were surprised to find that–underneath a thick layer of dust and debris–Pompeii was mostly intact. 

Jo and Dave were exhausted from all the walking and site seeing

As was I.  We just let Chris drive us everywhere....

Wo..hold on a minute.....

Amalfi coast

Jolayne, Dave, Chris and I drove from Bari to the Amalfi coast and ended up in a hotel in Sorento.  It is very similar to driving Logan Pass but with a lot more traffic!  It is covered with hotels built into the mountains overlooking the sea.  Every 4 years on the 3rd Sunday in June the most important event of the Amalfi coast takes place called the Historical Regata. What are the chances we would be travelling on that very day?  There is also a historic boat race called the Regata Storica delle Repubbliche Marinare (which Amalfi won) on that day--so everyone was on the tiny roads.  It took us 8 hours to get to our hotel.  Beautiful but frustrating for Chris driving it.

People live on the sides of these mountains and grow grapes.

One of the hotels on the coast of the Tyhrrenian Sea

From out hotel room in Sorrento