World Cultures: trip to Rome

On Thursday the 18th of January, a group of 25 second years visited Rome on the World Cultures trip with Henry Thomas leading them through one of the most visited culturally and historically important cities on the planet. This is the main field trip for the IB World Culture’s course which was originated and developed at UWC Adriatic 10 years ago.

The students and 4 teachers stayed at the monastery Padre Tiatini which is in the center of Rome where the monastic discipline agreed with the group as they enjoyed the routine of compulsory sleep and silence at 23:00.

The trip included a visit to the Roman Fora (imperial and republican), St. Peter’s and the Vatican museums to see the Sistine chapel and the Raphael stanze, mosaics in early christian churches including Santa Maria Novella and Santa Pudenziana where the apse mosaic dating from 390 AD is one of the earliest christian schemes in the city.

Another subject that engaged the students’ attention was the art of the Baroque in Rome. They visited the extraordinary Benin sculptural group – ‘The ecstasy of St. Teresa’ where our Spanish students shared with the rest of the group their knowledge of Spanish mysticism and the cult of the saint.  A highlight was a visit to the two great Jesuit Churches il Gesu and St. Ignatius in order to see their astonishing ceiling paintings.

The students have also compiled 7 hours of film footage of the trip.

The weather was exceptionally good. Showers of sunlight and a minimum of 17 degrees which led to one of the reasons why the group slept well: the miles and miles of walking all over Rome. Public transportation was used merely to get from the train station to the monastery and back.

The travelers returned to Duino at 22:00 on Monday night, ready for class on Tuesday.