Oh my gosh, sooooo much to write for this weekend!
Friday night a group of Gringos were supposed to get dressed up and go out to dinner before the symphony. We were meeting at the front of the Teatro Nacional at 6 so we could go to dinner together (we all live in different parts of the city). So Sarah and I had planned to go together but we get on at different bus stops so we tried to plan it so that we could get on the same bus… Well we failed, she got there way before me and took the bus ahead of the one I was on. Sooo, here’s this tall blond girl, wearing a bright green and tyedye dress (I stick out a little) walking through the streets of downtown San Jose, by myself. So I get there and we waited for a couple of the other people to show up. We ended up going to El Patio, a restaurant not too far from the theatre. I had pasta with pesto sauce and it was phenomenal.
Sarah, Me, and Josh at dinner (I look kind of crazy).
Anyways, so after dinner we headed over to the Teatro Nacional for the symphony.
The stage set-up at Teatro Nacional
The first piece they played was by Mendelssohn and it was really good. Then they stuck a grand piano in the middle of the stage and some guy came out and started talking in very Gringo-y Spanish. He was from the United States, is one of the most decorated piano players of this time, it was his birthday, and he was going to sprinkle Beethoven’s Cadenzas into Mozart’s Concerto No. 20. Can I just preface this by saying that musicians who are so passionate in what they do (which is almost all of them) are the most inspirational thing. Anyways so they all start playing and I could not take my eyes off the pianist. He was so absorbed in the music, it overtook him, and I could tell that this is what this man was put on this earth to do. It just smacked me in the face because someday I want to find something that I am that passionate about. I’m sure it has taken thousands and thousands of hours of practice and frustration to get there, but that is what I want. It was absolutely phenomenal.
The rest of the symphony went well, the music was beautiful but the pianist had easily stolen the show.
After that, we went to McDonald’s for ice cream (everything else was closed), and went home early to pack for my field trip to La Marta.
