Photos

The Vatican museum and Sistine Chapel is free every last Sunday of the month, but one will have to fight the crowd of tourists that line up as early as 7 am. The second day I found myself in Rome happened to have landed on the last Sunday of November. So I hurried and got dressed only to be detained by Malou and Linda and Therese. All three ladies have been living in Rome for at least seven years now and they still haven't been in the Vatican museum. I was forced to wait for them - Rule #12 "When travelling wait for no one" - and sure enough the line at the Vatican was at least a kilometer long. And Cristina had the gall to comment that the Sistine Chapel was not worth standing in line. I was ready for murder then, how did you think I was during Christmas Eve?! Anyway, after travelling through Northern Italy, I came back to Rome with the sole purpose of going to see the Sistine Chapel. I did. Last Monday. In a word. Beguiling.

Raphael's Stanzas are rich in history, both in the biblical and classical sense. The room called "Signatore" where the Popes used to sign important documents have on its walls the "Allegory of the Blesses Sacrament" where God, Mary and Jesus, St. Thomas Aquinas and others are depicted. In the same room, on the opposite wall is the "School of Athens" where persons like Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Alexander, Euclid, and Bramante populate the fresco. All four rooms where Raphael worked reflected the high Renaissance art that this artist was greatly known for. Great colors, brilliant use of dark, light and shade. And Michaelangelo's picture story of the creation on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel was more than worth the 18,000 Lires I paid to get in. His fresco of the Last Judgement I found to be both fearsome and engaging. Fearsome because of the fire and brimstone feel to it, engaging because as he was getting cynical and tired of all that he was doing for the church, he did not lose his sense of humor and he showed it in his art. Close to the center is a painting of a soul whose appearance I can only describe as a body with yards and yards of skin and no meat. The droopy face is said to be Michaelangelo. And he painted the lord of the underworld with pointy ears and tail, keeping in mind the face of the priest who criticized his work for its nudity. Michaelangelo is one cynical and vindictive artist, indeed.

I was told by a priest-friend that most Pinoy pilgrims (note, they are called pilgrims, and not tourists) to the Vatican, come not because they are intested in art and architecture. They come to Rome and the Vatican for spiritual validation. So with the last sermon-esque e-mail I received from my distant religious cerberus, I found myself going to the all four basilicas in Rome. First of course in my itinerary was St. Peter's Basilica. What can I say about this massive structure? Hmm...Its ahmmm. well, BIG.

I am Mary Grace
Dec 1999