Modern Barcelona of Catalunya

If you had a chance to read my last blog Old Barcelona of Catalunya, you might have recognized that there is a good historical reason for a strong Catalan identity which has been the case indeed.  In fact, I have been carefully using Catalan language for all the names as what locals do.  Although the official Spanish (based on Castilian spoken in the Castile region) is closely related to Catalan, people in Catalunya refer refer to it as castellano as an equal to Catalano. 

Generalitat de Catalunya (Government of Catalunya) has been in existence as early as 1283 under the Crown of Aragon.  It was abolished in 17^th century at north when northern Catalunya was ceded to France by Spain in the Treaty of the Pyrenees, and in the 18^th century at the south when Philip V—the first Bourbon king of Spain won the War of the Spanish Succession and began the rein of a centralized Spain.

Catalunya government was restored in 1932 during the Second Spanish Republic but it was short-lived when the rebelled Nationalists commanded by Francisco Franco defeated the Republicans in 1939 in the Spanish Civil War that began in 1936.  Catalans paid a heavy price during and after the Spanish Civil War as a main pillar of the Republic, fighting against Franco’s dictatorship.  Catalunya regained its autonomy under the Spanish Constitution of 1978 after Franco’s death in 1975 when the current Parliamentary Monarchy was formed.

Today, Catalunya is one of the 17 autonomous communities (and 2 autonomous cities) of Spain.  It enjoys the highest degree of autonomy among them.  It has its own Parliament, President and Executive Council.  It controls its education, law enforcement, and budget etc. but not nearly as much for the revenue which creates a lot of complaints especially among the Catalan nationalists. The recent debt crisis and austerity measure of Spain that requires the budgets of autonomous communities be approved by the central government first has deepened the worries of the Catalan nationalists.  Just as an indicator of how strong the belief in autonomy, Catalan language, once banned from public schools under Franco, is now taught in primary and secondary schools in Catalunya with Castellano (official Spanish) as the second language.  It took us a while for us to realize that we will never find museum brochures in Spanish; they are marked as Castellano, next to those marked as Català. 

With this long introduction, we are now ready to see Fundació Joan Miró designed by Josep Lluís Sert, which was first open in 1975 to honor Catalan’s own son - the internationally renowned artist Joan Miró (do make sure you pronounce it as Catalans do: [ʒuˈam miˈɾo]).  The museum is within a short walk from MNAC on the Montjunic hill I described in my last blog.

Joan Miró was born in 1893 in Barcelona and grew up in the Barri Gòtic neighborhood (introduced in my last blog as well).  At this moment, there is a major special exhibit Joan Miró. L'escala de l'evasió (The Ladder of Escape) where 170 pieces of his life time works are presented. His early work, while more traditional and realistic, do suggest his awareness and sensitivity in culture and social political issues.  Among those paintings, the most important one is The Farm (see photos at right) that marks his first transition in his long career.  

Miró started this painting of his parents’ farm in Mont-roig del Camp (in southern Catalunya) and finished it from memory as he settled in Paris.   The details and visual effects conveyed can captured his deep feelings with the Catalan life in his unique style.  As the Wikipedia article quoted, Ernest Hemingway, who later purchased the piece, compared the artistic accomplishment to James Joyce’s Ulysses and described it by saying, “It has in it all that you feel about Spain when you are there and all that you feel when you are away and cannot go there. No one else has been able to paint these two very opposing things.”  The painting was a gift to the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C by Mary Hemingway, widow of Ernest Hemingway.  

Miró had never really left Catalunya in his life.   When he was in Paris, he returned to Mont-roig every year till Spanish Civil War broke out.  He developed his symbolic language and sense of nationalism which appear in much of his work.   His 1925 painting Head of a Catalan Peasant is an excellent example.  In this and many later paintings of his, the presence and the abstraction of barrentina, the traditional red hat worn by Catalan people and peasants, is more than obvious (see below for the photo of the painting along side with a photo of people wearing barrentina from Wikipedia).















Later he developed further his symbolism with ladder as the connection between earth/reality and the heaven (sun, moon, stars) which appeared in many of his work (see e.g. The Dog Barking at the Moon to the right), thus the title theme of the special exhibit.

Miró eventually made the island of Majorca, his wife’s hometown, his home where he died.   Residing in Franco’s Spain, he was never shy in expressing his disdain for the dictatorship government as shown in e.g. his 1974 paintings of The Hope of a Condemned Man I,II, III.

Living through turbulent time in Spain and Europe of early 20th century, Miró has always had war and chaos in his mind as can be seen in his 1938 painting Woman in Revolt (photo to the right) where a woman is running away from her burning village. It was completed right after Miró work The Reaper (aka Catalan peasant in revolt), the mural commissioned from the Government of the Republic for the 1937 Paris International Exhibit.  Unfortunately it was lost after the exhibition and can only be seen through photo record.  It nevertheless is yet another strong accusation of the atrocity against his homeland by the Fascist.  The Reaper was exhibited right next to the famous painting of Guernica (of Basque Autonomous Community of Spain) in a similar vein by none other than the great Spanish/Barcelona artist Pablo Picasso who needs no introduction. 

Picasso was also anti-war and had taken strong stand against Franco’s dictatorship including vowing never to return to Spain as long as Franco was alive (another famous Catalan who made a similar vow was  the famous cellist Pau Casals).  Unlike Miró’s however, Picasso's works were largely devoid of political or nationalist emotion.  In the old city of Barcelona, there is the Museu Picasso (Picasso Museum) that has been attracting attention with growing popularity since its opening in 1963.  The museum now occupies five consecutive grand palaces with 22 rooms around beautiful courtyards with palm trees, following the architectural plan by Jordi Garcés.  Here one finds excellent collection of Picasso’s early work before he changed the world, supplemented with some of his later works.   

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) was born in Málaga in Andalusia (an autonomous community in southern Spain) and was not a Catalan.  However his family moved to Barcelona when he was 13 years old and he spent his formative years as a student of arts and protégé in Barcelona where he considered as his true home.  Until his self-exile from Franco’s Spain, he divided his time in Paris and Barcelona.  Among the most important collection of the museum is the complete series of Picasso’s 1957 work of his interpretations of the 1656 master painting Las Meninas by Diego Velázquez.  Of course Diego Velázquez is considered one of the greatest painters ever and is the leading artist of the Spanish Golden Age.  The painting Las Meninas can be seen at the Museo del Prado in Madrid.  With the photos below, you can contrast Picasso’s with Velázquez’s original work.  By the way, the photos of all the paintings here were sourced from Google Image database since neither museums allow photography.

When it comes to architecture, Barcelona is a city of wonder and second to none in the world.   Modernisme català, the Catalan Art Nouveau movement from late 19^th century to early 20^th century in search of the Catalan identity was centered in Barcelona.  One great example is the Palau de la Música Catalana near Plaça de Catalunya.  Designed by the famed modernist Lluís Domènech i Montaner (1850–1927), it seats over 2,000 and is tugged away in the back of alleys.  With natural light shines through the enormous stained glasses skylight and around the three story theater, great concerts and performances have been and continue being enjoyed by people almost daily.  

For most, however, the modern Barcelona is synonymous with Antoni Gaudí (1852–1926), one of the greatest architects of all time, with quite a few of his work being on the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites.  As one travels in and around the city, one just can’t help but noticing some of the most astonishing structures with unique designs and façades; there is simply nothing like it anywhere else.

One of the reasons why we find so many architecture treasures probably has much to do with the prosperity of Barcelona.  It has been a significant economic and geopolitical center of Mediterranean Sea for a very long time.  Although there was a setback when the political center of Spain moved to Castile after the Catholic Monarch was established in late 15^th century, it enjoyed the fruits of early industrialization that created many wealthy individuals and families who could afford to build enormous mansions and commissioned architectural genius like Gaudí.  One such a rich and influential Caltan in the 2^nd half of the 19^th century was Count Eusebi Güell who had commissioned Gaudí to design his mansion Palau Güell near La Rambla of the old city and Parc Güell, the failed housing development that was never completed and became public park (see photos at right).

Another example is the Casa Milà (aka La Pedrera meaning the 'The Quarry') was built for the wealthy and flamboyant Catalan couple Roser Segimon and Pere Milà.  The story goes that Gaudí’s condition for accepting the job was that he would have a free hand to do whatever he wants without budget limit.  You can see for yourself the result of it as the photos show below.   When we were there, the building was closed to tourists for whole week due to maintenance.  I wasn't able to take photos of interior and the roof; you can however find many such photos from web sources by searching e.g. the Google image database.

Yet another incredible work of Gaudí's is the Casa Batlló which is only a short walk south of Casa Milà on the same street - Passeig de Gràcia which is the most expensive and boulevard of Barcelona full of high end shops.  The house was built for the textile industrialist Josep Batlló.  What soon becomes obvious to visitors when entered is that you will hardly find a single straight line in this 6 story mansion. Countless varying artistic details are being carefully integrated into functions of every room and floor with their distinct purposes, from fireplace through main reception room to attic and chimneys on the roof.  The building is simply one piece of art and you feel like you live in and are a part of a sculpture. It is not a collection of nice looking decorations; it is a one gigantic piece of art with shape, color, lights, atmosphere, all included.  To be honest, I have never experienced anything like that before.  For once, I felt I finally understood the dream of every inspired architect – to build a structure that is the integral of best arts and engineering.

 



Looking to northeast when on the roof of Casa Batlló, you can see the completed towers of the Basilica de la Sagrada Família (Basilica of the Holy Family) a mile away.  Sagrada Família is the crown jewel and the life-long project of Gaudí’s that he started in 1883 at age 31.  While the design and architecture plan was completed before his unexpected death in 1926, the construction of it has been continuing at varying rate for the last 130 years, depending on the level of private donations (including ticket sales) as an expiatory church.  The church was consecrated by Pope Benedict XVI on 7 November 2010. It is hoped to be completed by 2026, in time for the commemoration of the 100th year of Gaudí’s death.  From the design and the symbolism used, this is the best place to see and understand Gaudí’s expression of his belief as an extremely religious man. 

The Basilica has three grand façades.  The Nativity façade to the northeast is about the birth of Jesus and was constructed between 1894 and 1930 inclusive of four towers.  The Passion façade to the southwest is about the suffering of Jesus during his crucifixion.  Its four towers were completed in 1976 and the work of the details of the façade were begun in 1987 by a team of sculptors, headed by Josep Maria Subirachs.  The construction of the Glory façade to the southeast began in 2002 and is still ongoing.  It is about the celestial Glory of Jesus and represents the road to God: Death, Final Judgment, and Glory.

When completed, Sagrada Família will have 18 spires/towers.  The cross on top of the main tower will rise to 170 meters (560 ft) high soaring into the sky to become the tallest church in the world, symbolizing the connection of heaven and earth.  The interior of the Basilica is even more breath taking.  The central naïve vault is at 60 meters high supported by columns that resemble tree trunks and branches signify God’s creation of nature.  Sunlight passing through the large stained glass windows of the Basilica projects colorful lights on the columns and floors.  Most importantly, when visiting Sagrada Família, one feels the humility and selflessness that is not coming from the altar, the immense size and elaborate sculptures of biblical figures like many churches do.  Rather, it is coming from the expression of respect for nature and god of the heart and soul of a genius architect who stretched his human talents to the limit.  Below are some photos of the interior of Basilica de la Sagrada Família and a 3-D model picture from a project by Toni Meca which shows what it would look like when it is completed.

























A four day visit like what we just did is too short to appreciate Barcelona and Catalunya.  We will have to go back sometime to visit it along with neighboring areas like Montserrat (Gaudi’s major inspirations) and Figueres (Salvador Dali’s hometown).  Adéu (Catalan for goodbye), Barcelona!  We will be back. 

Old Barcelona of Catalunya

Situated on the shore of western Mediterranean Sea at the northeastern part of the Iberian Peninsula, Barcelona is a major cultural center and one of the most beautiful cities of the world.  It is the second largest city of Spain with a population of 1.7 million.  It is the capital of Catalunya, an Autonomous Community of Spain that is consisted of four provinces - Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, and Tarragona.  To understand Barcelona and Catalan people, one needs to go back in time to appreciate its roots and changing geopolitical significance.  

Catalunya has an area of 32,000+ Km² which is about the size of Maryland state of U.S. and a little smaller than Taiwan.  Remains of ancient Neolithic people from over 4000 years ago have been found in the area.  Being on the Mediterranean Sea, it was colonized by ancient Greeks over 2500 years ago who settled around the Roses area.  

The Iberia Peninsula was never immune from the continuous wars in Europe, despite of being isolated from the rest of the Europe on land by the Pyrenees mountain ranges between France and Spain that peak over 10,000 ft at places.  It was on the side of Phoenician’s Ancient Carthage (located in what is today Tunisia) against the Roman Republic who were vying for the supremacy in the western Mediterranean Sea.  

Although Hannibal (247–183 BC) had led Carthaginians and allies crossed over the Alps with impressive victories in its legendary surprise land attack of Romans in the 17 years long Second Punic War (208-201 BC), Romans eventually prevailed and emerged as the dominant power over Mediterranean Sea and the area became a colony of Roman Empire for the next 400 years.  

After the collapse of Western Roman Empire in the 5^th century, the Visigothic Kingdom, one of the Germanic successor states of the Empire controlled the region till the early 8th century when Muslim Moors of the Umayyad Caliphate conquered Iberia Peninsula at the beginning of the 8^th century.  Unlike Andalusia of the southern Spain which was ruled by Moors for the ensuing 800 years, Catalunya regained autonomy after only a brief occupation and became a buffer state under the protection of the Frankish Kingdom of the north.  Indeed Barcelona was the political center of the Count of Barcelona which ruled Catalunya from 9^th till 17^th century. At its peak, Crown of Aragon which was formed by the dynastic union of Aragon and the County of Barcelona  in 1137 ruled the western Mediterranean Sea with outlying territories in Naples and Sicily and reached as far as Athens in the 13th century.

Barcelona was made into a fort around 15 BC by Romans.  Today one can still see the foundation stone laid by the Romans at the Temple d’August near the Plaça Sant Jaume.  While the old Roman city wall is no longer visible, one can navigate through the narrow stone-slab streets of the old city that evolved, grew and expanded over the next two thousand years through the Middle Ages to become today’s Barcelona.  

To explore and enjoy the city without worrying about transportation, we chose to stay at an inexpensive but nice and modern “minimalist” Hotel Curious in the Ciutat Vella (means Old City in English) district.  It is conveniently located on a street right off La Rambla, a 0.7 miles long street of Barcelona that connects Plaça de Catalunya with the 200 ft tall Monument a Colom next to the port.  La Rambla was built on a dry river bed and now the busiest street of Barcelona.  It has a wide pedestrian mall in the middle that is filled with tourist and locals, café tables/seats, souvenir and flower stands, as well as street performers.  Here is an evening shot of it and an interesting street performer who manages to float in the air indefinitely and none of us could figure out how it was done.

The north end of the street is Plaça de Catalunya which is the major transportation hub of Barcelona and where the old medieval Barcelona meets the expansion since 19^th century.  Walking southeast towards to the Mediterranean Sea, one will soon pass by La Boqueria, a large 800 years old traditional market popular with locals and tourists alike. A little further south, near the staircase to the Metro Liceu station, you will see, if you look down, the pavement mosaic by the famed Catalan artist Joan Miró.  If you look up, the building at the left has an unusual façade with decoration of umbrellas as it was initially an umbrella store.  A few steps further, the 165 years old Gran Teatre del Liceu, or simply Liceu, stands at the right which is one of the premier European opera houses where Wagner's Lohengrin was first performed in 1883.  It is still active today presents frequently Italian and German operas and ballets.  Below are some photos of these scenes.

  

At the southern end of La Rambla near the Sea, there stands the Monument a Colom which was completed in 1888 at the site where Christopher Columbus returned to Spain after his first voyage to the Americas.  Ironically, it was Columbus’ expedition of Americas in 1492 that marked the beginning of the Spanish Empire and the shift of economic center of Europe away from Mediterranean to Atlantic and thus diminished the economic and political importance of Barcelona/Catalunya. The Catholic Monarchs (bestowed by Pope in 1496) of the dynastic union of Queen Isabella I of Castile and King Ferdinand II of Aragon (in 1469) who shaped the colonial and modern Spain had its court in Toledo of Castile.  The court of the Catholic Monarchs was later moved to Madrid in 1561 that became the political center of Spain till this day.

East of La Rambla, a 2-3 hours tour of the maze like Barri Gòtic quarter streets will take you back two thousand years and walk you through the medieval times.  Walking north on Carrer del Bisbe Irurita Catedral from the Plaça Sant Jaume where city hall is located, you see the beautiful “Bishop Bridge” that connecting the old residence and office of the bishop which is now the Presidential Palace of Catalunya. Further up the street, tugged away behind the alley on the left, is the tranquil Baroque Plaça de Sant Felip Neri.  It is hard to imagine a little over 70 years ago in the morning on January 30th, 1938, bombs were dropped there and many civilians including children were killed by Franco’s warplanes during the three years Spanish Civil War.  The history has not been forgotten, nor did the stone façade of the church that was permanently scarred and still protesting silently to this date. 

Turning to east, one comes to the 700 years old grand Gothic Barcelona Cathedral which is dedicated to Eulalia of Barcelona, co-patron saint of Barcelona.  Behind the Cathedral, one can find a gothic cloister where 13 white geese are kept to memorialize the fact that Eulalia was 13 when she was martyred.  Southeast of the Cathedral is the Palau Reial Major that was the royal residence of the counts of Barcelona and Kings of Aragon.  In its complex, there is the 14^th century gothic Salo del Tinell room where Queue Isabel and King Fernando received Columbus after his return from America.  It was also where the Spanish Inquisition (of Barcelona) took place.  It was believed that the walls of the room would move if the accused are not truthful !

To get a sense of the Catalan culture and arts that thrived through the medieval days of Europe, one must visit the wonderful National Art Museum of Catalonia (MNAC).  It is housed in the Palau Nacional on Montjuïc hill, overlooking the Plaça d'Espanya and Font Màgica fountain below. The museum has one of the best collections of Romanesque (10^th-13^th century) arts in the world.  Of particular importance are its unique collections of murals and sculptures of Romanesque churches and chapels on Pyrenees mountains of Catalunya (see photos below).  They remind me of the murals found at places like Mogao Caves of China which were painted between 5^th to 14^th century (corresponding to the Middle Ages) but at a much larger scale.

 
 

MNAC is organized in galleries by period, from Romanesque to Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, and finally Modern era.  Strolling through these galleries in chronological order, one gets a distinct impression in few hours of the changing time and society over one thousand years.  In particular, the trend and development towards to humanism is unmistaken.  The subjects of the artists have become increasingly secular and diverse.  The story tellings and expressions have gone from completely religious focus to the other extreme of self-examinations. 

This concludes my highlights of Old Barcelona.  Next stop is the Modern Barcelona.  Talk to you soon!

Person of the Year

Ever since 1927, Time magazine reveals its choice of Person of the Year (formerly Man of the Year till 1998) by its editors at the end of every year for the person or persons “who most affected the news and our lives, for good or ill, and embodied what was important about the year.”

For obvious reasons, the majority of the selections have been political leaders in U.S. and the world. Most of them proved to be excellent choices in hindsight if not then. For ones related to China, Generalissimo and Madame Chiang Kai-Shek were named in 1937 when they led China to fight against Japanese invasion.  Deng Xiao-Ping was named in 1978 when he returned to power and began a series of reforms in China.  Somehow, Time missed opportunities of putting Mao ZeDong up although it did eventually include him in 1999 on its list of Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century (again, regardless good or evil).

The first time when Time magazine named an unorganized and anonymous group of people as Man of the Year was in 1966, against the backdrop of escalating Vietnam War and the (Afrian-American) Civil Rights Movement in U.S.  It gave them the name The Inheritor and the profile: “ … ran the mile in 3:51.3, and died under mortar fire at An Lao.  He got a B-minus in Physics I, earned a Fulbright scholarship, filmed a documentary in a Manhattan ghetto, and guided Gemini rendezvous in space. He earns $76 a week with Operation Head Start in Philadelphia, picks up $10,800 a year as a metallurgical engineer at Ford, and farms 600 acres of Dakota wheat land. He has a lightning-fast left jab, a rifling right arm, and reads medieval metaphysicians. He campaigned for Reagan, booed George Wallace, and fought for racial integration....”

Almost half a century later in the December 14^th 2011 issue, Time magazine chose The Protester as the 2011 Person of the Year. The cover story recounted the waves of protests like brush fire such as the Arab Spring from Tahrir Square of Cairo in Egypt to streets of Damascus in Syria, and those in Europe from streets of Madrid, Athens to London and Moscow, and in U.S., the movement of Occupy Wall Street. The cover story notes that “All over the world, the protesters of 2011 share a belief that their countries' political systems and economies have grown dysfunctional and corrupt — sham democracies rigged to favor the rich and powerful and prevent significant change. ”Unlike the Inheritors of 1966, there is no ideological consistency and it is global this time. The most indicative of all and the one thing the Protestors do share in common is what Time’s quote of Miral Brinjy, a 27-year-old blogger and TV-news producer who grew up in Saudi Arabia: "I know what I don't want."

There is no doubt that such discontent and frustration expressed on the street have been simmering for quite sometimes and have reached boiling point in 2011. All they were waiting for was another straw or a spark. For the Arab Spring, it was literally the self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi when he set himself on fire with gasoline and a match in desperation. In Occupy Wall Street, it was the peaceful protest initiated and planned by the Canadian activist group Adbusters at the Zuccotti Park near Wall Street with the sole purpose to draw attention to the growing income and wealth inequality. But you can easily trace it back to preceding years as seen in the Tea Party movement, or as expressed earlier by singer and song writer James McMurtry in his 2006 AMA (American Music Association) Song of the Year - "We Can't Make It Here" below (see the lyrics here)

There is no doubt that Internet and social media have brought the potential and dynamics of crowd forming to a new level. And there is no doubt that accelerated news cycle and increasing sensationalism by mass media has fueled and incited extreme reactions and promoted polarizations, intentionally or not.

The potential for destruction of the power of crowd has always been feared by many especially those who are in power and favor status-quo. Occasionally, we find few crafted ones such as Adolf Hitler and Mao Zedong who made use of the crowd psychology like suggestibility and contagion to advance their agenda and position at the national scale. Crowds by definition are transient and dynamic. The emotion can explode and dissipate in no time with few memorable moments or meanings in between. How many of us still remember the Vancouver riot 6 months ago? To jug your memory, here is the famous photo of the Kissing Couple of the Vancouver Riot that was just named by Esquire magazine the Photo of the Year 2011.

Gustave Le Bon, the French social psychologist and pioneer of crowd psychology, told us more than 100 years ago in his influential 1895 book La psychologie des foules(English translation The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind) that one key characteristic of crowd is that it “can never accomplish acts demanding a high degree of intelligence.”He observed that crowd is formed when the heterogeneous intellectual individuals are overwhelmed and taken over by common ordinary quality of unconsciousness. Have you ever had the temptation or encouraged by the anonymity and done something that you normally wouldn’t do when you disappeared into a crowd?

Now year 2011 is coming to an end, the more challenging and open question is if and how the energy of the Protestor can and will be transformed into positive lasting changes and new orders. The alternative would be painful but sometimes necessary, which is to go through the full cycle of the crowd development from snowballing to crashing, followed by opportunities to rebuild the new from ashes.

Wish you Happy Holidays and Exciting New Year!

The Ultimate Patriotism

For quite some time, many eyes have been on Italy who is one of the key dominoes at risk in current Europe’s debt crisis. Like many other European countries where public funding for arts is the primary source of income for organizations and facilities devoted to arts, the ever increasing pressure on reducing government spending/debts and the implementations of austerity measures have inflicted severe damages on the development and sustaining of Italian’s culture programs, opera included.

Opera was born in Italy around 1600 and its popularity has quickly spread to Europe and eventually the world. It remains to be a dominant form of performance arts in Italy with more than 40 opera houses throughout that country. It is not an exaggeration if one wants to consider opera a symbol of Italian culture.

Indeed the public sentiment and concern had reached the boiling point earlier this year when the world-renowned Italian conductor Riccrado Muti conducted the performance of Giuseppe Verdi's opera Nabucco in Rome on March 12^th, celebrating the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy. Muti interrupted the performance after the chorus of Va' pensiero and turned to the audience to express his concern that Italy would be lost with the continuing onslaughts of cuts in arts funding. He then asked the audience to sing along with the chorus to perform the most unusual encore of Va’ pensiero as demonstration of their patriotism. Below is a video recording of the event.

For those who are familiar with Italian opera, the political symbol of the song Va’ pensiero is unmistaken. Giuseppe Verdi, the 19^th century transformational figure of Italian opera, wrote Nabucco which was first performed in 1842, contributing to the Italy unification movement. It tells the story of the Jews' struggle for freedom after the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem in 587 B.C. by Nebucco, the King of Babylon. The best-known song from the opera is Va, pensiero, sull'ali dorate (in English: Fly, thought, on golden wings), aka "Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves” that many had wanted it to be the Italy’s national anthem.

Often we associate patriotism with actions/reactions of people in response to threats on their country’s physical, social or economic existence or well-beings. However when one’s cultural roots are in danger, the outpouring of spontaneous support and emotion by average citizens as demonstrated by the audience that evening is more than remarkable. Any country whose people care so much about their cultural identity is enough to convince me that they will be able to pull through difficult times. Viva Italia!

Before I go, I would like to leave you a few Youtube videos of beautiful arias of Italian opera with English subtitle. What I have chosen for you are from the opera Turandot which is the last opera of Giacomo Puccini (1858 – 1924), one of the most popular 20^th century opera composers. The particular production is the legendary 1987 production of Franco Zeffirelli at the New York Metropolitan Opera with Placido Domingo (tenor) and Leona Mitchell (soprano) and Choreographer Ching Chiang 江青.

It was based on a Persian story, set in China (of Yuan Dynasty), about the pursuit of the ice cold Mongol Princess Turandot by the exiled Prince Calàf. The most Chinese part of the opera, apart from the adaptation of the Chinese folk song Jasmine Flower 茉莉花, is the rule for the suitors of the Princess: a suitor must answer three riddles correctly or be executed.

The first 8+ minutes of the video below is the exchange in Act I between Prince Calàf and the slave servant Liù who secretly loves him and desperately wants to convince him not to enter the contest which in all likelihood would result in his death. As one might expect, the Prince, blinded by his ambition, ignores her plea and asks her to take care of his frail father should he fail. The exchanges are Signore, ascolta! "My lord, hear me!" and Non piangere, Liù "Don't cry, Liù" with the scene ended as Prince Calàf enters the contest sounding the gong.

When Prince Calàf answers all three riddles correctly, Princess Turandot is still resisting and does not want to honor the agreement. To win over her heart, Prince Calàf offers her a way out if she can tell his real name. The result was an all night frenzy of the capital city in search of his name as Prince Prince Calàf sings arguably the most popular opera aria of all time - Nessun dorma! (None shall sleep!), with the confidence that he will win the wager. See the three minutes segment (from minute 3:30 till 6:30) of the video below. By the way, the three riddles are: 1) 'Straniero, ascolta!' - What is born each night and dies each dawn?, 2)'Guizza al pari di fiamma' - What flickers red and warm like a flame, but is not fire?, 3) 'Gelo che ti da foco' - What is like ice, but burns like fire? Want to give them a shot?

As Princess Turandot tries to extract Prince Calàf’s name by torture from his slave servant Liù, Liù taught Princess Turandot the true meaning of love before she kills herself to protect the secret. See the first 8+ minutes of the video below.

Enjoy and talk to you soon!