My Memoirs - Citizen of the World

served hot to all of the delegates at the same time. An Italian TV
commentator stated that it was the largest seated hot dinner ever
served anywhere. The entertainment was superb. Famous Italian
singers were invited to perform. A repeating slide show was
projected on the walls for the participants, showing the beauty of
the provinces of Italy. It was unforgettable.
Italy is my favorite country to visit. In the city of Venice, where
taxis are boats, instead of automobiles and the streets are canals,
it’s like magic to see the great Piazza San Marco, that Napoleon
called “Europe’s largest drawing room”. My wife and I always
enjoy the magnificent restaurants and the beautiful Italian music.
In Venice, we rode a gondola through the Canal Grande (Grand
Canal), an enchanting stretch of water that divides Venice, is
crossed by three bridges and is lined with a magical parade of
palaces. We visited the world renowned Basilica di San Marco,
with its profusion of domes and sculptures, mosaics and marbles,
that houses the body of St. Mark, Venice’s patron saint, and the
Rialto bridge, that during the Middle Ages, was Europe’s financial
center, a sort of medieval New York Wall Street, where fortunes
were made and lost.
In Florence (Firenze), Michelangelo’s place of birth and one of the
world’s great artistic shrines, we visited many art galleries, palaces
and museums. I like to single out David by Michelangelo now in
the Academy Gallery, in a specially-designed room that is a giant,
four and a half meters high, with the only large nude sculpture
from ancient times, since no one dared to challenge the
masterpieces of Greece and Rome.
The Sorrento Peninsula and the Amalfi Coast is one of Europe’s
most beautiful coastal roads that run around the Sorrento
Peninsula, south of Naples. Every twist and turn opens up another
spectacular vista of sea and cliffs, while the string of villages it
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