Italia!

A week ago, the orchestra went to Italy to perform the MESS twice, and it was a blast. After being in Bosnia for a month and a half, we were quite excited to enjoy the comforts of Western Europe. There was fast and free wi-fi, the streets were clean, and the air was fresh. The only problem was that since we were staying in such a small town, all of the restaurants were closed by the time we got out of rehearsal. Our first full day there, we had rehearsal from 12 to 1:30. Siesta starts at 2 though. Luckily, Matt, Tim, Ivana, and I found a restaurant that would at least serve us sandwiches and wine for lunch when we wandered in around 2:15. The restaurant specialized in meat and wine. When you walked in, all you could see was legs of pigs hanging from the ceiling. They had excellent porchietta though. We also had the house red wine, which was my second favorite wine of the trip.

The city of Pordenone was homey and cute. It had a couple of “squares” that were intersections for at least 5 streets. There was an amazing chocolate store on the main shopping drag, and we passed quite a few clothing stores with fine, Italian fashion. In the older part of the city, we saw buildings that were built as early as 1347. Even though I have seen my fair share of Europe, I am always still fascinated by the fact that there are buildings that old. We don't have that in the US.

Since the city is so small, it didn't take us too long to find the theatre that we performed in. It looked like it seated about 600 people, and it was much roomier than the National Theatre in Sarajevo. We performed the Sconcerto both nights, and I have to admit that I think it went better the second night. It takes a lot of concentration to play that piece. First of all, you have to make sure to filter out the movements of the actor and only concentrate on Maestro Lena's movements. Secondly, the piece was set up like Corigliano's pieces with numbered cues for different events in the place of the traditional bars of music. And finally, there are a lot of notes on the page. We had played through it twice in the same day before the first concert, so between that and being way too excited about being in Italy, my mind was spent.

Luckily though, we didn't have a rehearsal or a sound check the second day. Therefore, Megan, Matt, Ivana, and I went to Venice with the maestro, the translator, and a few other people from the orchestra. I thought more people would want to go, but they all stayed in Pordenone because they thought it was going to rain. Their loss. It didn't rain until we were eating lunch and about to walk back to the train station.

I really enjoyed my time in Venice, as little as it was. We spent a few hours wandering through the labrynth of alleys that make up the city. I'm not really sure what the plan was originally supposed to be. Alma, the translator, and Marco, the conductor were kind of leading the group since they've both been to Venice before. There were a few things lost in translation though, so I didn't realize until halfway through the day that they were frustrated with us stopping to take too many pictures and enjoying the views of unimportant streets. The city was everything I thought it was from movies and tv shows. I also think that the weather gave it a special mysterious character with the overcast clouds.

We didn't get to ride in a gondola, but that's okay. I did have the best coffee I've had since I started drinking coffee in Bosnia, and I got to have my Italian pasta (I had pizza the first night, so all was good). I got canelloni with ricotta and spinach. Delicious! We only stayed in Venice for about 5 or 6 hours, but it was a lot of fun. I feel like we bonded with some colleagues in the orchestra that we haven't interacted with a whole lot, and we had some interesting conversations with Alma and the conductor. He apparently, had conducted at Oberlin before, so he and Matt bonded over that. Music definitely is a small world.

My favorite part of the trip to Venice besides looking out into the water was St. Mark's Basilica. First of all, the square was flooded, so we waded through water at first to get a good look at it. It was pretty cool. There are actually planks that they laid out to let you get from the street to the middle of the square without getting your shoes and socks wet though. But the Cathedral is so intricately constructed. Megan and I shared our fascination with the fact that anybody at any time in history could build such a gorgeous building. Even with the technology we have today, I think it would still be quite a feat.

We left Venice at about 3pm so that we would get back in time for our last performance of the MESS. It went pretty well. After that, Megan, Tim, Flobens, and I went out for some wine and food, and we happened to pick the same place where Maestro Lena, Alma, and a couple of other orchestra members were sitting. It was a good night. We split a bottle of local white wine and had a chicken and cheese pastry thing while Megan had some cheese with bread. On the way back to the hotel, we saw Matt and Ivana sitting at the wine bar we were at the previous night. I tell you, it was quite a small town.

Our trip was amazing, and I wish we could have stayed for a few more days. I hadn't been to Italy before, and I had many other things I wanted to do and foods I wanted to try. Oh well. Maybe I'll get to go as a tourist one day rather than an international performer. Ha, I can't believe I can say that I've played with a professional orchestra in Italy.

On the bus ride home, the magic of Italy wore off completely about 2 hours from Sarajevo. I had just gotten out my computer to watch a new episode of Dr. Who when I started hearing people freak out. Bosnians are the most laid back people I've ever met, so I knew something was up. Eventually, I heard Ivana say, “The bus is burning,” in the calmest voice ever. When I looked back, I saw smoke. We stopped right across the street from a cafe, so we just took our instruments off the bus and got some coffee while we waited for a replacement bus. Way to welcome us back, Bosnia.