Yesterday me, my girlfriend, her sister and her boyfriend packed up, and went to Verona, to go tho the Opera!

The quite different part in this is that the opera (Rossini’s “Il Barbiere di Siviglia”) is performed in the Arena di Verona.

And yes, it is a Roman Empire era coliseum (much like the one in Rome), almost perfectly preserved, where every summer a lot of shows are held. Mostly opera and synphonic music, but sometimes also rock and pop concerts.

It’s a strange experience to walk on those pinkish stones, knowing that they have been worn out by millennia of people going to all manners of shows… from the gladiatorial games of the past to the concerts of nowadays.

You step inside, go up a couple of stories, and bam, the arena opens in front of you.

The thing is huge. The sensation of open space, and of height, is exhilarating (pictures like this on wikipedia do not really convey this feeling).

Then the sun sets, coloring the stones of all kinds of variations on the tones of pink, cream, gold and orange, and the time for the show arrives.

I won’t make a complete account of the evening. Let’s just say that next time (if there will be one, and it probably will) we’ll try to take a place lower, even if maybe not so directly in front of the stage.

All in all, anyway, we had a really good time. I liked the opera, and all of us today is singing snippets of the arias :)