Two visitors from Maryland

The birthday party

Two visitors arrived last Monday at about mid-day, Jacqie and David. We were sad to see David’s sister, Laura, leave a few days before with her family but we were happy to see Jacqie and David arrive to celebrate his birthday even though it had been a few days since the actually event.

The birthday cake was a surprise to David. The cake was a layer cake with a fruity jam between the layers and a “frosting” of sweetened almond paste, a flavor very much like the candy we call marzipan. The cake was good, the frosting divine, and the birthday celebrant was a little surprised by the hoopla.

The four of us walked around the city of Florence. Each of them had visited the city once before. It was a treat for us and for them, we hope, that they were able to spend most of a week in Florence this time.

Jacqie and David in
Piazza della Signoria

We spent a good bit of time in Florence’s largest civic piazza, Piazza della Signoria, where the statue of Michelangelo’s David stands just out of sight to the left in the photo. The Uffizi painting gallery is just off the piazza and we toured the gallery another day. On a sunny day the piazza is filled with tourists walking between the famous sites of the city.

Tough choice; selecting a pastry
at Nannini's in Siena

We spent a day on a trip to Siena, a smaller city about 50 miles to the south. Florence is compact but Siena is even more so. The streets are narrow and the sidewalks (when there are sidewalks) are barely wide enough for people to pass one another. Fortunately, there is very little traffic allowed in the city and the streets are shared by pedestrians, buses, and taxis.

The city has one large, famous open place, a piazza called Il Campo or The Field. Of course, it’s not a field but a huge half-circle paved with brick and stone. The piazza slopes down from its curved edge to the center in front of the Palazzo Comunale, the City Hall. 

On the edge of Siena's
famous piazza

A museum is located in the this city hall with famous fresco paintings from the 1300s, among them the Good Government and Bad Government frescoes by Ambrogio Lorenzetti. In the Good Government  fresco Justice is seated to the left above the figure representing Concord. The Siena government is represented by a tall figure to the right dressed in black and white, the city colors. Justice, Concord, the people, and the Leader all hold a rope which signifies common agreement. In Bad Government Justice is in chains near the bottom of the fresco. The leader in Bad Government is a monster named The Tyrant.

We also visited Nannini’s, a famous coffee bar and pastry shop. The choices are bewildering. A lot of careful consideration must go into the choice of a mid-morning treat.

Frittelle out from the fryer

There are treats everywhere in Siena. We visited the city during the celebration of the Feast of San Giuseppi (or Saint Joseph’s Day.) A temporary shack was set up on an edge of Il Campo where frittelle are deep-fried and offered for sale. The recipe is on the wall of the shack; the little donut holes are made of flour, rice flour, and orange. They are cooked quickly and are surprisingly light.