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My last post covered our first day in Siena, our encounter with a certain Scotsman on a balcony overlooking the Piazza del Campo, and our dinner experience with Mr. DeNiro.  The next day found us, after a pleasant morning, seated once again on the balcony stools, overlooking the square, anticipating some kind of celebration.  Since the air was a bit chilly, and we were exposed high on the balcony, we had decided to splurge on a mug of Italian hot chocolate.  If you've never experienced true Italian cocoa, well . . . you ought to, unless you're one of those who don't like chocolate (I've heard that there are a few people like that -- not sure what they look like, how to recognize them.  Maybe they have a lean, gaunt, pitiful, hungry, hollow-eyed appearance.)  Anyhow, drinking Italian hot cocoa is almost impossible.  That's why you're often served these sweet fingers of dipping pastry with the cocoa (sort of like donut sticks) and a spoon.  The cocoa is thick, dark, and creamy;  it feels and tastes as if you're drinking the richest hot dark chocolate pudding.
Oh dear me.

Back to the point.  We could tell something special was up, for the square was buzzing with more folks than we saw the previous day.  Chairs and a speaker's podium were set up directly in front of the old town hall, facing us.   Soon, obvious dignitaries congregated, standing at the chairs, shoulder to shoulder, in a couple of rows, facing outward toward the square and the gathered crowds below us.  Some facing us were military, with medals and ribbons;  some were in business attire.  One looked to be a bishop in frock;  and several were in medieval attire of leggings and tunics.  The area was festooned with flags -- we assumed of the city, the country, and the Tuscan paratrooper base.

We had an incredible view of all of this, perched on our shallow little balcony;  I felt sort of like the queen up there and I started waving to my subjects in a stiff-wrist, twisting, queenly way.  Eleven o'clock arrived and we heard something.  Recall that the walled city has very narrow roads, enclosed by continuous stone and brick buildings.  So the sounds coming from the roads leading into the piazza were amplified, bouncing and sweeping from the openings into our square:  men's voices singing, accompanying brass and wind instruments, drums beating, and boots hammering the brick streets.

Here they come!

Then they poured in, resuming precise lines once freed from the tubes of roads, in fatigues, maroon berets, and armed:  seven abreast and seven deep -- one group, another, another, until five groups of fifty men, each with its leader, and then the band;  they  stood at attention facing the gathered dignitaries, all the while their proud deep voices singing, drums beating, horns playing.

I wished we understood the words, but we absolutely felt them.  I knew that Greg felt the same when we shared looks from moist eyes.  The love of country was so evident and strong, that for that time, we were Italian too.  The paratroopers fell into parade rest, and stood silently through the ceremonial inspection by a medal-encrusted general, and next, the speeches, and the bishop's blessing.  Thank you, Will, you lovely Scotsman.