My sister and I today had an absolutely spectacular tour with Federico. I think it is fair to say that we are fairly critical people. I am a former academic; my sister is highly involved with the arts .As an academic, I enjoyed both challenging my students and being challenged myself. And so today in our all too short, three hour tour with Federico we chatted about extraordinarily diverse topics: the agricultural means of production and support of the Nobles in Rome by the people in the countryside, the Jews of Rome in antiquity, the ways in which the monks in the crypt were skeletonized, contemporary and ancient politics etc etc. These topics were by no means what we had anticipated talking about with him!! Of course, as expected, he was lyrical and expert about the history of Rome, and our time with him was all too short. He excelled as an educator, leaving us with a desire to learn far more than we were able to glean from this all too brief experience. We were tremendously impressed that no matter what we asked him, he had something valuable to contribute. Frankly, there are not enough superlatives to offer and we end with this: if you have the opportunity and the privilege to have Federico interpret and show you some of the wonders of this eternal city seize it! Many thanks, Federico. ( pictured is Federico with his iPad which he used to illustrate salient points)
