Today was one of those days that was filled with four sessions of meetings in the Aula Magna, each running for 90 minutes. The first was at 9 AM, the next at 11 AM, then lunch and a break until 3 PM, and the final one at 5 PM. After a while, those wood chairs in the Chapter Hall become even harder. But the discussion is very strong, significant, and captivating. These were some of the final discussions on various documents and reports, most of which will be made available to the worldwide Institute. So people wanted to be careful with all of the details.It was announced that the father of one of the Brothers (Br. Hillaire) had suddenly died in Madagascar, and we had a moment of silent prayer. I saw him later in the day and expressed my sympathies. He was in the process of packing, having secured a flight tomorrow to Europe and from there back to Madagascar. It's difficult when something like that happens, especially if it is unexpected. That makes about 4 deaths now that we have heard about during the course of this Chapter. It sort of puts things into perspective.
I spent most of the day taking care of other matters, since most of the work d
one in the Aula Magna now would be shown in the final documents. I had a closing ceremony to prepare, plus several other projects. For the opening prayer today, Br. Georges Absi sang a religious song in Arabic. It only took one practice before everyone joined the wonderful melody that was the setting to Arabic words that he had written so that we could pronounce them (and translations were provided as well).I snuck away for a bit as I tried to track down some good photo paper for the printer. I have a very nice shot of Br. Alvara, the Superior General, with Pope Benedict and I'd like to give it to him (to Alvaro, that is - Benedict has lots of pictures already, I'm sure). I did track down some paper, but it ended up not working. However, Br. Jose Antonio Warletta was able to find some paper among his things and worked for a good while to come up with a good print, and I found a nice-looking frame at Upim across the street. Now I just have to find the right occasion to give it to him.
This evening, those of us from the San Francisco District went out to dinner in the Trastevere area of town. We met at the gate around 6:45 PM and took a bus to just beyond the Vatican where we got off and pretty much arrived at the restaurant. It was a fine time with good food. We solved all the problems of the Institute, the District, and the world, of course, as the
dinner progressed. Around desert time, however, I excused myself to make my way over to the Trevi fountain.Yesterday I had received an email from Janis Hoffart, one of the administrative secretaries at Christian Brothers, that Patti Gallagher and Tom English and 30-some CB kids were in town. Although I couldn't join them for dinner, I did manage to get hold of them through their tour guide, whose cell phone number was provided, in order to arrange a rendezvous after dinner at the fountain.
I took the 46 bus further than I'd gone before, trying to keep tabs of where we were via a map of Rome, while holding onto the strap and holding my shoulder bag in front and holding my camera in my pocket and eyeing the people around me for the pickpocket candidate of the day. By the time we got to the Victor Emmanuel monument, everyone got off the bus so I figured that this must be the end of the line. Then I spent some time trying to orient myself. It was dark but the street lights were bright. Cars were going all over the place, but I just stepped out into the crosswalk like a native and moved through the traffic without so much as blinking an eye. I made my way down the Via Corso and came to a busy side thoroughfare. The Trevi fountain must lay in that direction, with the vendors and the people congregating in the small street. A little while later I arrived at the fountain. Another phone call confirmed that they were on the other side of the fountain and soon enough Tom English saw me and greeted me, leading me to where the others were congregating.
It was great to see the kids, Patti, and Tom. They were also excited to see me, I think, and had been on the lookout for a while. We took a couple of group pictures (although I look morose in them, not knowing when the picture would be taken) and then spent some time talking and catching up. They said that the video that we had done here in Rome for the Founder's Day Liturgy went over very well. They would be going to Florence tomorrow and then on to Venice and Paris. After about 15 - 20 minutes it was time for them to catch their bus and we said goodbye. It's really something to have had this chance to see these kids, many of whom I'd seen almost daily for the last year or more. I'm sure that it was just a nice encounter for them, but for me it was like touching base with the reason why we're doing all of this work in Rome. It's all finally about them, even if they don't know it. And I truly felt a bit of the welling of the heart when I was with them. I know that I'll miss that quite a bit next year when I've moved to Napa. Hopefully, there will be other ways to have similar encounters and involvements with students.After m
eeting up with the CB kids, I made my way to the Via Corso and found out that Bus 46 does not go anywhere near it, apparently. So I checked my map and walked the 10 -1 5 blocks to the Metro stop for Barberini. When I got there at 10:30 PM, I heard them closing all of the entrances to the Metro. This was a new twist, since I'd thought that the Metro ran until midnight. I wandered around a bit and finally asked the waiter at a restaurant for some directions. He told me to take the "MA1" bus which followed the Metro line exactly, except on city streets. Twenty minutes later one of them came by, filled to the brim with people, and I joined the cozy bunch - now fully alert as to my shoulder bag, etc. Trying to fit the people who had thought to be in an 8-car Metro train onto a bus means that the bus was chockfull of people all the way to Cornelia. But I arrived relatively unscathed and walked back to the Motherhouse, arriving much later than I had anticipated.But never mind, it was worth it just to see Tom, Patti, and the CB kids. It made my day.
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More pictures at http://picasaweb.google.com/gvangrie/ItalyMay31
