Being a student at CIMBA has many benefits from being in Italy for three months to the planned outings. Our second outing as a group was to the small town of Asolo. Asolo is an 11-minute drive south of campus. When you pull up on the bus to the city center you are greeted with a beautiful fountain. Off to the right of the fountain is a Bar (café) that has amazing gelato and if you go to the left just up the street there is a family-owned and operated pizzeria. We had the pleasure of coming in on a Monday when they are closed, and having a first-hand look at how pizza is made. He told us the ingredients they use and what makes a good dough. Then it was time to put us to work. Three at a time, we went down and spread open the dough, put on the sauce and toppings, and let the wood-fired oven do its magic. I will say it was the best pizza I have ever had!
One of the many great class choices at CIMBA is ITALY LIVE and yes, it is what it sounds like. You learn Italian from your Italian professor in Italy and one of your classes has a guided tour of Asolo. Our tour was amazing even though we did not get the full one. We ran into some issues getting there and made our time noticeably short, but we made the best of what we had. Our professor told us about the three famous ladies who loved the city, Caterina Cornaro who was once the queen of Cypress, Eleonora Duse who was an international star in theatre, and Freya Stark who was an author and photographer. As the professor was talking about Eleonora Duse we stopped in front of this building. We look around and nothing really stands out, but someone sees a sign that says “BAR” and they make a joke about needing something to drink because it was an enjoyable day after all the rain we have been having. The group laughs and we proceed to this arch and into a courtyard. She tells us that the building now behind us was and still is to this day the local theatre. At one point many years ago, there was a fire and the whole inside has now been redone, but some wealthy Americans came in and bought the entire inside of the original theatre and it is currently at “The John & Mable Ringling Museum” of Art in Sarasota, Florida.
Just walking around the town, you see beautiful landscapes with magical Mount Grappa as a backdrop and if you look just right you will see a yellow building off in the distance; it stands out more than the rest because of its size and stature and that would be where CIMBA calls home, and if you look up you see years falling away from the buildings and the original artwork peaks through showing you a glimpse of this quaint town's history coming to life. I will warn you to be careful, do not stand right under anything that the pigeons can perch on, you could find yourself in a messy situation.