Vatican City and singing at the Main Altar of St. Peter’s Basilica

Hello there!  Long time no see!  It’s been very difficult for me to post on the blog because I haven’t had any wifi.  But here I am!  Right now, we are on a three and a half hour bus ride to Venice. 

Even though we’re almost done with the trip, I want to fill you in on all of the amazing adventures that we’ve had on this trip.

Vatican City and singing at the Main Altar of St. Peter’s Basilica

Today was amazing.  It’s difficult to express in words how we all feel after our performance today, but I’ll try my best to help you understand.

We woke up very early to start our day.  Today in Rome is a giant tourism bus strike and our dear driver, Antonio, couldn’t drive us today.  The drivers are protesting their excessive taxes that they have to pay to drive inside of the city (600 euros per day!!!)

Anyway, the first adventure of the day was riding the Roman subway system.  We walked about a mile to the nearest subway station and hopped on! It was very crowded, but definitely an adventure! Imagine trying to get 100+ people through and on the same subway.  It was hectic!

But we all got to the right destination: Vatican City.  We had lunch in small groups before we entered our second country of the trip.  My group found a little pizza restaurant with personalized pizzas that I’ve learned are called Pinsas.  I had an eggplant pinsa and a caprese pinsa! I couldn’t choose just one. ;)

We met back up with the big group to go into the Vatican for our tour. It was a 3.5 hour line to enter the Vatican for regular tourists without advance tickets. And it was 88 degrees! Craziness. 

We entered the Vatican and met up with our tour guide for our private tour of the Vatican Museums.  We saw so much amazing art.  Tapestries, paintings, sculptures, it would never end! Our guide told us that if you spent one minute looking at each piece of art in the museums, it would take you seven years to see it all!   We were especially lucky to spend more than 45 minutes in the Sistine Chapel.  I stood there with my mouth wide open the whole time. 

After the tour of the museums and St. Peter’s Basilica, it was time for the Mass.  We were told in advance that we wouldn’t be able to sing at the main alter due to a reburial of a pope.  However, the reburial had finished and the main alter was to be used for the mass.  

The Mass started with our opening song, “A Joyful Alleluia”, to which the cardinals and priests processed into the church.  The entire service was in Latin and Italian, so we couldn’t understand most of it.  We sung a variation of “Santus”(Soloists: Ariel Alvarado and Makayla Potts) , “Agnus Dei” (Soloist: Amelia Rivers), and “Ave Verum Corpus”.  We sung “Lift Thine Eyes” by Felix Mendelsson, and closed with “A Psalm of Praise” (Soloists: Rebecca Pulliam, Elise Wendelburg, and Cardell Smart).  The Priest closed with a blessing of us (in English!): “This choir is not really from Georgia, but from Heaven”.  It was amazing and we were so very moved.  After the Mass, the Priest spoke with Dr. Shaw and asked if we were doing any more concerts in Rome.  Dr. Shaw told him about our next one and he told us he would be there! It was amazing.

We finished our time in the Vatican doing some souvenir shopping and eating Gelato. I’ve been putting together lots of pictures of kids eating their gelato. I can’t wait to share them!!

That’s all I have for now. I’ll upload photos when I have better connection- not a wifi hotspot from my phone!  I’ll be back soon! 

Ciao! 

Elise