Assisi Retreat

Here is the aforementioned Assisi retreat post. Here are some photos to accompany the post.

Friday I woke up fairly early. I finished my second art history paper that I started the day before in the morning. After that, it was a little cooking, followed by a walk over to Termini. It was probably the longest walking trip from point A to point B I have done yet (rather, up to that point. More on this later). It was worth it though, because there were rumblings of a transit strike, and I didn't want to deal with getting stuck having to take a taxi because the metro isn't working. I saw the Repubblica piazza for the first time, which was nice. I walked near, but not by the Trevi Fountain. I still need to go there.

Anyways, painless trainride to Assisi. We had a couple of guys along for the trip from Campus Ministry: Andrew, the Europe youth-contact stationed in Dublin, and Darryl, who came from ND for a few retreats (one here, one in London, one in Dublin). Both were very nice, and they kind-of knew there stuff. Somewhat. Okay, not so much, considering Andrew says he was "obsessed" with St. Francis and has a Franciscan cross tattooed on his wrist, but that's okay.

Got in, walked to our room. We stayed in this convent-like area for pilgrims (with the bed and breakfast for two nights, plus 3 prepared meals which were excellent, it ran the tab to over 2000 euros, or $2920 for the 18 of us. I know this because I did the translating and did the conversion. I= sooper jenius. And we only paid 5 euro). The four male students on the trip (myself, John, Pat, and Andy) had a really, really sweet room. It was two stories, and the beds were super comfortable. Very pleasant.

We arrived pretty late at night, and unlike the major cities, Assisi shuts down at night. The religious pilgrims ain't as big into the whole party thing, apparently (that's not fair: party at God's house on Sunday morning! Wine provided!). We played a fun game called Mafia. Essentially, it's a game based around lying. Appropriate. It's not like that is expressly forbidden by the Ten Commandments or anything. Actually, I had a blast with that. I played fairly well. People were not defending themselves when they were accused of being Mafia, and a few times when I was Mafia I got off because of some fantastic acting. Not to brag, or anything. But pretty much nobody else did. They're clearly too honest in real life. Suckers.

The next morning and day, we saw the sites of Assisi. It is a very, very small little mountain town. Somehow, though, when I went with Kutner after 10th grade, we did not see the sites. We didn't even see half the Cathedral with some Cimabues and some Giottos. To be fair to Kutner, the sites were generally forgetful, other than the Cathedral. The actual town was much more enjoyable than the religious stuff (again, to be fair, I am probably the least religious person who was at the trip). Great little food spots. And it was cheap, too. I probably dropped around 30 euro on food, and that doesn't even include any sit-down meals. So I have (check that, had) plenty of dolci.

Our tour of the Cathedral was probably the coolest thing we did, though. We were led by the only English-speaking native Franciscan at Assisi, and he knew his stuff. He was also very jovial, a sense you get from most of the Franciscans. That's good; taking yourself too seriously is would seem to be an easy trapping if you dedicate yourself to the highest calling. Anyways, like I said, he knew his stuff, and he did a great job.

After the tour, I ran back to the center-city, got my wine (I don't want to talk about the energy I put into finding this bottle of wine again), ran back, and we joined a procession that was happening, and we processed into Saturday vigil Mass. The Mass kind of bothered me, to be honest. I think it was the patriarchal nature of the mass; I'm not really all sure why. "Signore" is the Italian word they use in place of God, for example. I can't explain.

That night was a meal, then Mafia again. Good times, good times. EDIT: Oh, and that whole deal with the wine. I have not yet successfully repressed the memory.

Sunday morning, we got up, I chugged approximately 8 shots of espresso, and we went to hike up a hill to this little hovel that St. Francis used to go to. We took some crazy back way. The hike up got really really steep at some points, and I got the first real cardio exercise I've had since I got to Rome. Sweating and whatnot. It felt good. The problem is, there were like 3 kids and the youth advisor who are in pretty good athletic shape, including myself. If I'm sweating, the other kids must have been dying. I say must have, because we got separated from them pretty early, and I've heard some horror stories. We got lost, though, and ended up walking probably about 7 miles to walk what should have been about 2-3. And the place we went to was not that cool, either. The hike made the trip; I found the silver lining. For others, it must have been terrible. We ended up not all being together in a group until about 1:45 when the last group of stragglers, including myself because I volunteered to wait around until we thought we had everybody, came into lunch an hour and fifteen minutes late.

We then went down, checked out a church on the base of the city which looked brand new and actually was really sweet, and then hopped on the train to come home. Upon the arrival to Medag, I spent like 2 1/2 hours trying to read all my stuffs on the Internets. I still have more to do, so I will now get to that.