Quando a Roma...Parte 3 (tre)

So, after spending some time with Bernini, we took a walk over to a church by Borromini - architectural genius of the Baroque (and actually from Switzerland). The name of the church is San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane (sometimes called San Carlino) - it is right next to a little intersection famous for holding four fountains, though I only got a good picture of one of them (it's hard with cars zooming by!).

So, background on Borromini - actually this is what made the tour so good - Simona, first off, really enjoys giving tours, and secondly, is always reading new books about the art and the artists she's presenting. She feels that to really understand artists' work, you need to know something about who they were as people - and I agree. Borromini was, essentially, the rival of Bernini, at least in his head. Borromini was basically everything Bernini wasn't - absolutely no people skills because he was manic-depressive. He was very sensitive about his work and didn't appreciate input from other people - which, when you are commissioned to create a church, is not the best personality trait to possess. He would tend to drop projects entirely if someone tried to suggest/demand a different technique or effect than he had planned. This unfortunately means that there is not tons of Borromini floating around. Also rather jealous of Bernini - obviously; Bernini was commissioned for architectural projects even though they were not his forte, and he often stole projects from Borromini because he was, after all, "Mr. Beautiful", and very good at getting what he wanted. I think Simona said that for the altar in St. Peter's Basilica, Borromini and Bernini were collaborating, but Borromini did most of the work and Bernini is the one who is credited with it. That gives you a good idea of the situation between the two. Borromini, sadly, committed suicide - but the way he went about it was to position a sword so that he could fall on top of it. It thus took him a few days of suffering before he actually died. Very interesting, and sad, life.

So, San Carlino: this is actually a brilliant Borromini church because he was given complete control on this project (see, this is why it's good to know about the artist's life!). It is just a little chapel commissioned by a convent that was on the site at the time. Very different from Bernini's showy style - the interior is mostly white. Borromini thought that corners were ugly, so you don't find any - everything is continuous and smooth. He covered the church with an elliptical dome (typical Baroque - actually that's a funny thing to say since Borromini is part of what defines the Baroque in the first place! - but I mean, in contrast to a circular dome, you would consider an elliptical dome more irregular). With Borromini, the complexity doesn't strike you at first; it is much more subtle (I mean, you can tell that Bernini is complex just by looking at all the different colored stone he used; you need to consider Borromini a bit more since everything is white). The dome is oriented so that you are walking along the major axis towards the altar. The fact that there are no corners also serves to give the impression that the church is hugging you - you feel very comfortable in it and I would say it isn't quite so much about being "awed" into God's presence but more about contemplation and reflection.

And now, the pictures!

Uno di le "Quattro Fontane" that is right near the church.

A little, inaccessible balcony above the entrance to let more light inside.

The beautiful elliptical dome! Borromini actually calculated the pattern to get appropriately smaller so that you have the illusion that the dome is taller than it really is. That was a mouthful.

The altar.

Quando a Roma...Parte 2 (due)

So, as I said, I had booked a 9:30 "Baroque Tour of Rome" for myself that would meet outside the church. This was a fantastic tour. It was small (that's the way to do tours, let me tell you...but more on that later). There was me, the tour guide Simona (a native Roman, as it turned out), a mother and daughter from Colombia - Ana and Mariana (Mariana recently turned 15 so instead of having a party for her quinceañera, she chose to tour Italy with her mother for a few weeks - these gals were so sweet. They both spoke excellent English - apparently Mariana goes to a British school - but does not have a British accent! And Ana speaks English, Spanish - well, obviously - Italian, and French. So awesome. I asked them about Colombia and they said that they live in the second highest city, that people still have maids and drivers and such, that the driving is even more crazy than it is in Italy, and that you live with your family until you get married. It was pretty cool to learn a bit about a completely different culture.), and a family of 3 from France. I never properly met them; they arrived about 20 minutes late because they got mixed up on the metro, and while I think they understand English well, it didn't seem like they spoke it so well (but that's how it is with me in Spanish and Italian).

The tour was in English (well, naturally I would sign up for an English tour), and Simona was such an awesome tour guide. I mean, you would be hard-pressed to find someone better, I think. She first took us to a tiny little chapel - Santa Maria della Vittoria (St. Mary of Victory - named for a little icon of the Virgin that was brought to the church after a victorious battle of the Catholics over the Protestants - got to love the mixture of religion with politics) - which houses, of all things, L'estasi di Santa Teresa, by Bernini (in other words, perhaps the most famous sculpture of the Baroque period - still in its original little chapel, which you can enter for free of course, since it is a church - that's the great thing about Rome - you can walk into all of the churches - barring any construction work/masses etc. - and look at all the great art and architecture for free). Bernini was, to say the least, a sculptural genius. Apparently there is a piece he did when he was 12 that's in the Villa Borghese (big Roman museum) that is just ridiculous in terms of his mastery of sculpting. Will have to try to see that. Anyways, Bernini was actually known as "Mr. Beautiful" while he was alive - he knew how to win over people, had lots of charisma, was almost always in favor with the Pope, got all the jobs, loved being famous and in the spotlight - you get the picture. Well, he actually scultped L'estasi di Santa Teresa when he was out of favor - after the dome he had placed on St. Peter's collapsed - in order to get back in favor with the Pope (Bernini was a sculptural genius, not an architectural genius!).

I should probably take a moment to write an aside on the Baroque. The name wasn't acutally applied to the movement until about 100 years after it had occurred and people were looking back on the works of Bernini (scultptural genius), Borromini (architectural genius), and Caravaggio (painterly genius), and noticed similarities in what they had done (mainly in the irregularity and the focus on affecting your senses - as opposed to the Renaissance in which everything was rationally designed). Also, the Baroque is very much wrapped up in the religious politics of the times. We all know about Martin Luther and the 95 Theses, and well, the Catholic Church was hurting a bit in terms of membership! So we get the Council of Trent and the Contrarreforma - the Counter-Reformation - and a push to show people that the Catholic Church is not corrupt etc. Simona reminded us how there were no tvs, computers - well, everything we have now to entertain/distract us! - so new art and architecture was commissioned to go along with the new Church - and it was designed to appeal to people's senses, so that when you would walk into church, you would be affected by God's majesty, be in awe of Him, or perhaps be able to connect emotionally with the various depictions of the saints' lives, and thus be open to receiving the Holy Spirit. So that's what the Baroque is about - affecting your senses! Also, two people were made saints at this time - which is remarkable in that it was a relatively quick turnaround in terms of the time it usually takes for someone to be deemed a saint - Santa Teresa d'Avila and Sant' Ignazio di Loyola - and used to show that the Catholic Church did have something to offer in terms of examples of living a holy life.

All right, back to L'estasi di Santa Teresa (I told you it was an awesome tour - I learned so much!). It is a truly remarkable sculpture to view; it is of course sculpted from marble, but the way Bernini carved and lit it, it looks lighter than air and just seems to be floating in place - you don't really get a feeling for that from pictures, but when you're standing under it, you sure do! But the sculpture isn't the only part; Bernini designed everything around it as well (actually everything in this little chapel), so it is really about the whole experience. He uses a combination of all sorts of stone that makes the area feel like a painting. Finally, on the sides, faces of the commissioning family members jut out from the wall and are looking at/discussing the scultpure. This helps to make you feel like you are part of the piece - that you're not just an observer, but are there experiencing it (which, of course, is the whole point).

So enough of my ramblings! Here are the photos:

This is the chapel that houses L'estasi di Santa Teresa - just a little place on Via XX Settembre! Well, the façade makes it look grand, but the inside is actually quite small.

Close-up of L'estasi di Santa Teresa; when you're standing here you're completely in the piece, but in photos you don't get a feel for that unless you step back...

L'estasi di Santa Teresa! You can of course find much better, professional pictures of all the great sites of Rome, but that's not really the point, is it?

Quando a Roma...Parte 1 (uno)

So I had my first outing to Rome on Saturday (July 26) - and it was quite a full day! I had booked two tours for myself - a Baroque tour of Rome in the morning and a tour of Vatican City in the afternoon. Lots of pictures of course, so this will probably take a few posts...the question is, where to begin? I think I will use some advice from Alice in Wonderland:
The March Hare: "Start at the beginning!"
The Mad Hatter: "Yes, and when you come to the end, stop!"
(you all know I'm obsessed)

So my journey to the Eternal City began early in the morning - I wanted to catch the 7:30 train so that I would have plenty of time to get properly lost before finding the meeting site for my 9:30 tour. On the way to the train station I took this picture - it's of Via L. Bonaparte (not sure what the "L" stands for...there's a lot of that with street names around here - take the street outside LNF: Via E. Fermi - I always say "east" in my head for some reason even though I at least know in this case that the "E" stands for "Enrico"). I think it looks like the trees are growing out of the sidewalk (and I don't know how they manage about the roots around here - you don't see any traces of them).

It was good that I decided to arrive early because, of course, I got a bit confused leaving the train station and headed in the wrong direction. Nothing like getting lost to help you find yourself! Roma Termini is the main train station in Rome - all the metros stop there as well, and my destination was the Piazza della Repubblica, which, it turns out, is actually much closer to the station than it looked on my map. In any event I got to the right place at about 8:45 so still had some time on my hands...easily solved, however, because the meeting place was in front of Santa Maria degli Angeli - a beautiful church! Well, actually it doesn't look like much from the outside, as you can see. The area is the former site of the Diocletian Baths, and thus there are many ruins about. Someone saw fit to build a church inside, however, and while the outside is humble, the inside is stunning. I tried to take a good picture of the dome that covers the entrance, but those sorts of shots are always difficult. It is capped with the most beautiful, geometric stained glass. It really is a magnificent church, and I think moreso because you are so shocked by the contrast between the exterior and interior.

View of the Piazza della Repubblica - before things get rolling!

The dome over the entrance of Santa Maria degli Angeli. The picture doesn't do it justice at all, I'm afraid.

Interior of la chiesa. I got a little weak in the knees when I walked inside (literally).

Not a bad start to a day in the Eternal City, I'd say.

My new, other, 'Room with a View'

I actually have a new office now - I was borrowing someone else's desk for a few weeks, but am now permanently settled for the rest of the summer! The new building is quite nice - it houses la biblioteca, and on the ground floor, it houses some models of various kinds of detectors and displays about particle physics. I'm on il primo piano (which in the US would mean the second floor) and have quite a nice view from my window. So, no complaints here about the move!

Views of my new work-place. It is a very nice brick building with very reflective windows! I think the architecture is pretty cool, and there is a large seminar room on the ground floor.

Model of a cryogenic gravitational wave detector on the ground floor of my building - I think the wooden person is my favorite part.

Sometimes I really luck out with the view - these were some awesome clouds. My desk isn't right next to the window, but I can still see out of it easily!

The terrace on the first/second floor of the building.

I pass this gate on my walk to work. It happened to be cloudy that day, and something in the loneliness of the place called to me, so I took a picture! My walk to work isn't quite as nice as when I walked through the Oxford University Gardens to the Materials Department last summer, but it's not too bad (and there are blackberry bushes growing along many strips of the road - yum!)

Frascati

So after torturing you guys with my lovely, brilliant, award-winning poem, I think I will tone it down a bit and just post some pictures of Frascati.

Let me add that Frascati is a very nice place to go and relax - it is rather amusing because it is about 20 minutes from Rome, so Roman families come here for a day trip to get away from the hustle and bustle of the city (and they did that in ancient times too!), and Frascati families always seem to go to Rome. It reminds me of something out of the Hitchhiker's Guide - akin to bypasses, perhaps? Anyways, for those of you familiar with San Diego, think Balboa Park on a large scale.

My favorite place in all of Frascati: the boulevard of Viale Vittorio Veneto. Green benches flank both sides; the left looks out towards Rome (Frascati is on a hill) and the right borders the main piazza - Piazza Guglielmo Marconi. People of all ages just come here in the afternoon and sit and watch the world go by. It's wonderful.

An apartment complex that I always pass when I walk up to the heart of Frascati. I think it is ridiculously cute.

This is one of Frascati's drinking fountains. I guess this is why you're told to carry bottled water when you're walking around Italy. I will add that I did actually see someone drink from a similar fountain elsewhere in Frascati - I was impressed, to say the least!

View across the Piazza Marconi up towards the Villa Aldobrandini.

This is Frascati's cathedral - Basilica of St. Peter Apostle in the Piazza San Pietro. Quite grand, I'd say. I think there was a wedding or something big happening when I took the picture because a lot of people were walking into the cathedral in very fancy clothes.

PS

I suppose that here, "PS" stands for "pre script" rather than "post script" due to the way this is being posted. In any event, I was hoping to post some pictures tonight, but I've been having internet connection issues today and while it seems I can write, my computer does not want to upload images right now. So, ciao e a presto!

A Random Question

So I was poking around the "profile" section of my blog, and as an option, you can answer a random question. Now, I composed this lovely answer and the server tells me that it can be 400 words at most! So, I'll post it here instead.


Question: The children are waiting! Please tell them the story about the bald frog with the wig:


Response:

Once upon a time,

(and of course, this must rhyme)

there was a little Frog,

who lived in a bog.

Now, this Frog was quite sad -

no hope to be had;

you see, his head was bare -

he hadn't any hair!

So, he hopped to the farm,

and brushed up on his charm;

he would talk to the Pig,

and beg for a wig.

And, how, you may say,

did he intend to pay?

Well, the Pig was troubled too -

and he didn't know what to do.

You see, the Pig was very plump,

and all he wanted was to jump!

But now my part is done,

and I'm telling everyone:

Go sit on an old barrel,

and take some Lewis Carroll,

and read "A Pig-Tale",

though it may make you wail.

For some stories are quite sad

(and some poems we write are bad)

but it's all in good fun,

and now my poem is done.

(Hooray!)

Why I'm Enjoying Particle Physics at LNF

This is where I'm working at LNF - my office is currently in the little building on the right (where the car is) - it may not look like much, but at least it is air conditioned! Which is wonderful after my 20 minute walk to work in the morning. Temperatures have been warm here but not unbearable - maybe a little humid. Apparently it is about 10 degrees hotter in Rome, so I'm just fine in Frascati, and we occasionally get a nice breeze (but more on the weather in a different post). Anyways, one of the really cool things about this building is that it is on - get ready for it - Viale Isaac Newton, and here's the picture to prove it. That is probably the best thing about working at a national physics lab - all of the crazy physics-ness of the place. Every via, viale, piazza, piazzale - you name it - is named after a famous physicist here. And then there are the amusing road signs. I think it all kind of goes well with the particle physics atmosphere - I would argue that high energy physics is the most creative branch of physics in terms of naming its components and experiments. Take the case of the quark (I mean, really, what sort of a name is that for a particle when we're used to protons and electrons and neutrons): not only does it come in six flavors (up, down, charmed, strange, top, bottom), but it also comes in three colors (red, green, blue). So the fact that the names of some of the experiments I've run across are truly wonderful acronyms isn't surprising. For example: AMADEUS (yes like Mozart - in fact there was a small reproduction of the first page of one of his quartets next to his picture on the second page of the paper), SIDDHARTA (yes, like the Buddha - this is the team that I am working with), and the name of the accelerator - DAFNE (think Greek goddess - actually, it is sometimes spelled with the capital greek letter phi instead of the F because it is a "phi-factory" - producing phi mesons.) And then there are the units sometimes used: "shed" and "barn" (I haven't actually seen any sheds in the papers I'm reading, but there have been plenty of barns). But I literally broke down laughing today while I was reading the AMADEUS Letter of Intent when I got to the following paragraph:

"The season of systematic investigation of kaon-nucleon interactions suffered an abrupt ending around 1980, with the closing down of most of machines and beam lines dedicated to this branch of physics...So, many of the statements on the successes of flavour SU(3) - just to mention one single case in the physics of the Standard Model - so abundant in particle physics textbooks are in reality based on a handful of old, low-statistics, low-resolution experiments, performed using kaon beams with momenta hardly less than some hundreds MeV/c, that nobody would even think today of proposing to a selecting committee."

Priceless.

A Room with a View

I need to watch that movie when I get back to the US. This is the view outside my window, which is directly across from my bed - what a glorious way to wake up! Especially when I wake up with the birds at 5:30 - they start singing to tell the sun to get up, and me too, I guess. (You all know I'm a morning person.) I'm actually living in a hotel about a km from the lab - LNF (Laboratori Nazionali di Frascati). In any event, the view is waaaay better than the construction site I got to see (and hear) while I was at Oxford. I'm actually in a handicapped room - which is funny because it is on the first floor, only since this is a villa-style building (the name of the hotel is the Villa Mercede), that means that to get to it, I walk in the lobby, up one flight of stairs, down a hall, then down two flights of stairs. There are of course (very small) lifts, but the whole situation is rather amusing. Also because every time I take a shower my bathroom gets slightly flooded (I'm an expert at taking a shower with almost no water now!) I considered asking to change rooms but when I was looking at the floorplan posted for emergency exits, I decided that the position of the window in relation to my bed was worth the price of a slightly flooded bathroom. So I bought some paper towels at the supermercato and am content. You'll notice also in the picture my begonia - I named it Vittoria and practice my Italian on it (and perhaps pretend that I'm like Alice in Wonderland talking to the flowers...) - I bought it my first Sunday here (when I was finally properly awake) at L'Angolo Dei Fiori (The Flower Corner) from a lady who doesn't speak any English (and as I don't really speak any Italian, I'm rather proud of the accomplishment - the little things count!). I also have una televisione piccola with about 10 channels. Only one is in inglese - CNN - so I have been getting caught up on world news. (Which is not a bad thing, since I tend to isolate myself from the news while I'm at school.) It has also been somewhat of a novelty to find The Lord of the Rings on one of the channels - I'm expecting part 3 this coming sabato. Luckily I have watched these movies enough that I basically know what is being said, in spite of the dubbed italiano (one of the guys in my lab group is from Romania - he said that he is impressed that the Italians take the trouble to dub everything; in Romania, imported shows and movies are in English with subtitles). CNN has just finished up a "Going Green"-themed week, and I found two reports particularly interesting. One was the idea (still very much in the idea stage, but with promise for future implementation) of vertical agrigulture - basically imagine a skyscraper that has sprouted corn and you've got the idea. I think it sounds pretty cool, and it will be interesting to see if it actually turns up in a few years (and by a few, I could mean 20). The other is something already in use - pollutant-fighting cement! Actually I really liked this story - the origins of the cement date to the construction of a church commissioned by the pope to celebrate 2000 years of Christianity. The architect of course designed a very modern building, with a concrete and glass exterior. However, he didn't want the concrete to get dirty with time but rather to stay white, so he hired an Italian cement company to work on the problem. Only after creating it and in the process of conducting some tests on it did the company realize that in sunlight, whatever they're adding to the cement reacts with pollutants and breaks them down into nonpollutants (well, I'm tired and not very eloquent at the moment). Apparently a few places in Rome have been paved with it and are under study (obviously damage to all of the old buildings due to pollution is a major concern here). It's amazing what you learn when you watch the news.

Ciao! e "Estoy aqui???"

Primo, in my blog address - "Non parlo italiano ma quello che sara" (there ought to be an accent on that last a, but I don't see any options for that right now...) means "I don't speak Italian but whatever will be, will be." Also, seeing as about half of you know me as Katie and the other half as Kathryn (and some as Katie-Kathryn), it only seems fitting to sign off as "Katie-Kathryn" (add to this the fact that when I was little I thought my full name was Katie Kathryn Lorraine McGill; I think I'm regressing). In any event, I made it safely to Frascati! And my biggest problem right now is that I don't speak any Italian, but I do speak some Spanish, so my brain has been nicely confusing itself every time I try to say something. (Let me add that it has been 4 years since I have taken any Spanish classes or spoken any Spanish, and yet I am continually amazed by what my brain is dredging up!) There is just enough cross-over between the languages that when the little Italian I have learned this first week tries to speak up, Spanish decides to take over instead, and I end up speaking a jumbled mess of English, Spanish, and Italian (in that order). Luckily there are enough people around that speak at least some English that I've managed to take care of everything so far.