Chicago 2016 - Day Twelve

Today Tom was able to see parts of Chicago that he had never seen before. And they weren't that far away. Which, I suppose, shows that Tom has been working very hard at his studies and singing and hasn't been able to aimlessly wander around the city streets like we have. So it was nice to be able to show him around a few places. 

There are many amazing buildings here, which you may have already picked up if you've been reading so far, and one of these has stones or pieces from a number of significant buildings around the world. The Sydney Opera House is there, as is Saint Sophia - a magnificent old church (now mosque) in Constantinople. This building also has fantastic gargoyle type things which made it worth looking up. 

The rivers here have many bridges crossing over them, and these bridges are able to be raised. Today we saw this happening, but not quite to the extent that you can see on The Blues Brothers. Nonetheless it was kind of exciting to see it happen. It really messed up the traffic though. 

After Tom returned to his room to prepare for the evening, Anne and I enjoyed some more live street music. That bass player was fantastic!! Again!!!! 

But the main thing today was the Showcase Concert tonight at Roosevelt University. We are very proud parents tonight having watched and heard Tom sing in a setting like this. Tom, with one of the girls at Uni, sang I Have Dreamed from the musical "The King and I". Her mum was sitting near us and was taking some sneaky photos, so I hope to get a copy of these. Tom also did a magic trick in another of the numbers performed tonight. 

Anne and I then had a chance to meet a number of Tom's friends and some of their families. It was lovely to hear people speak so well about Tom and the friends he has made with their children. And lovely to be able to meet those people who have become such good friends with Tom in his time at Roosevelt. We hope to meet them again sometime. Perhaps they will have the chance to come to Australia. 

After the concert, and after everything was packed up, the three of us with one of the other singers, Dusan - who is from Serbia - enjoyed a late night snack. Again, we had the chance to visit a local restaurant where I, because we are in America, had apple pie. And because we are in America, I didn't have cream.