I finally have time to catch up on posting some of the pictures taken around town the past few days.  Once thing I have already learned: have a camera with you at all times.  You just can never predict when some amazing spectacle is going to happen right in front of your nose!

Yesterday about 8:30 a.m. I was walking to my school for Italian lessons and happened upon this scene of about 200 mostly men but some women dressed to kill in these uniforms with gorgeous capes.  I snapped these pictures with my iphone and showed them to my conversational Italian professoressa and she told me they are police officers. I wondered if they were having a graduation ceremony or something, because they just kept pouring down the street.

The amazing backdrop for all these pictures is the venerable Santa Croce.  I live a five minute walk from this important church.  It pretty much blows my mind every day when I walk by it.

I maneuvered myself across the way from the swarm of uniformed people, and captured these scenes with the Borgo Santa Croce, the street on which my school is located.  Another pretty amazing background!  Some of these uniformed persons carried long swords!

Don’t know how safe they keep me, but they sure are pretty to look at!  And that counts for a lot in this beautiful country!