All in the family 2005/2006 - Lili on the Loose

7 04, 2016

Gondola Ride in Venice, Italy

By Lili|April 7th, 2016|Categories: Activities, Travel|Tags: 2006, All in the family 2005/2006, All in the family Italy 2005/2006, Christmas, door, Europe, Gondola, Gondola Ride, gondolier, Italy, New Year's Day, New Years Eve, Photo Essay, ride, Travel Thursday, UNESCO, UNESCO World Heritage Site, Venice, Venice Lagoon|1 Comment

On a cold rainy (and a little snowy) New Years Day I found myself in a actual Venetian Gondola. I was being serenaded by a man with an accordion. And while it was rainy, it was also magical. We were the only boats out that morning, and due to the cold the typical "smelly water" was nowhere to be smelled. It was amazing gliding through the side canals, under bridges. The few other tourists we saw took our photos like they were the paparazzi. If you make it to Venice you must take a ride in a gondola, no matter the

Museum Monday: Antinous as Dionysus

By Lili|March 21st, 2016|Categories: Museums, Travel|Tags: 2005, Alexandria, All in the family 2005/2006, All in the family Italy 2005/2006, Antinous, Dionysus, Europe, Hadrian, Italy, Roman Emperor, Rome, The Vatican, UNESCO, UNESCO World Heritage Site, Vatican City, Vatican Museum|0 Comments

Antinous was a lover of the Roman Emperor Hadrian who drowned in Alexandria in October 130 AD. After his death Hadrian commemorated him with many different statues and elevated Antinous to an almost god-like hero/deity. This version shows Antinous as Dionysus an Roman god of wine and ritual madness. It is on display at the Vatican Museum. Museum Monday is an every other week series about museum news, objects, and reviews.

Museum Monday: Laocoön and His Sons

By Lili|February 8th, 2016|Categories: Museums, Travel|Tags: 2005, All in the family 2005/2006, All in the family Italy 2005/2006, Europe, Greek, Hadrian, Hellenistic, Italy, Laocoön, Laocoön and His Sons, Laocoön Group, Pliny the Elder, roman, Rome, statue, The Vatican, Trojan, Troy, UNESCO, UNESCO World Heritage Site, Vatican City, Vatican Museum|0 Comments

I was lucky to have taken an entire class on Ancient Italian Art & Architecture the semester before I went to Italy. So when I turned a corner in the Vatican Museum and saw this statue I was very excited. This statue was re-discovered in 1506 but is thousands of years older. It is unknown if this was an original Hellenistic Greek Statue, or if it still dates from that period but is a copy based on a lost bronze version of the statue. It is so old that the famous ancient historian, Pliny the Elder, even referenced the statue on the