MICHELLE OBAMA WITH HER DAUGHTERS IN ST MARK’S SQUARE

Michelle Obama with her two daughters and her mother visited St Mark’s Square, the Basilica and the Doge’s Palace on Friday 19 June in the late afternoon. The Obama women arrived in a launch escorted by various police forces, who in the hours before the arrival of the US president’s wife had cleared the accesses to the monuments, the adjacent canals and cordoned off many areas to keep the curious at bay. Inside St Mark’s basilica, as a choir of about 50 boys and girls from New York dressed in white greeted Michelle Obama, the primo procuratore di San Marco Alberto Tesserin and the religious authorities received the American First Lady with no little emotion. On her arrival at Venice’s Marco Polo airport previously, Michelle Obama had been met by the prefect of police Domenico Cuttaia, the president of the Veneto regional administration Luca Zaia and the mayor of Venice Luigi Brugnaro. The First Lady was enthusiastic about the city and the monumental beauty of the St Mark’s area. In the photo the now famous ‘selfie’ of the new mayor of Venice Luigi Brugnaro with his wife and Michelle Obama.