My Visit to Italy 1962/63

 

Sometime around 1962/1963, my family relocated to Cairo, Egypt and on our way there we took a cruise ship from New York to the Italian port of Genoa.

From Genoa we traveled to Pisa, Livorno, Florence, Rome, and Naples before visiting other countries in Europe.

I was 15/16 years old and while I was old enough to understand the importance of where I was, I was not old enough to appreciate the significance of what I saw...  which looking back, is a damn shame.

Rome was probably the most exciting city that we visited with all its ancient structures... but what stuck in my mind more than anything else was the Pieta sculpture by Michelangelo in St. Peter's Basilica, Vatican City, Rome, Italy.

The guide told us that the dress of Mary had been cut so thin that light would shine through it from behind if a light source was put there.  The artistic skill to be able to do that was incredible and I doubt has ever been duplicated by another sculpture.

But more impressive than that was the fact that in 1962/63, visitors could walk up to the Pieta and get close to the sculpture that if you wanted to you could reach out and touch it.

However, asshole vandals ruined that and when I returned to St. Peter's Basilica in 2012 with my wife, we could only stand at the end of a hallway, behind bullet proof glass if we wanted to look at the Pieta.

Italy is a place that I would never get tired of visiting.