Sicily 2009
The Queen was asked to attend the Second International Symposium on Thymosins in Health and Disease from September 30 to October 2, 2009 on Sicily. At the awards banquet two awards were given out - the Abraham White Lifetime Science and Humanitarian Awards. The awardees were Hynda and Cardinal Martino. Cardinal Renato Raffaele Martino is the President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, fluent in five languages, was the Pope's representative to the United Nations and somewhere along the way lost the ability to smile.
Eight of the 22 recipients of this award have been Nobel Prize winners.
Photo: The meeting was held in the little town of Santa Tecla, which is halfway between Catania and Taormina, on the east coast of Sicily. This is the view from our room at the Hotel Santa Tecla Palace.
Photo: Stepping out of the hotel lobby you are at the infinity pool.
Photo: The breakfast at the hotel was quite nice but the highlight was the almond milk. This was very sweet and quite delicious.
Photo: One of the more interesting things we discovered here was a different way of keeping wine cool. Instead of putting it in an ice bucket they wrapped it in an insulated cold pack holder.
Photo: This is a view of the hotel from down the beach in the little town of Santa Tecla.
Photo: The town was located very close to Mount Aetna and all the beaches along the coast were made of lava from the various eruptions of the mountain.
Photo: The first night we were entertained by one of the department chairs at the University of Catania. We took the penis bus to his house.
Photo: At the dinner near Mt. Aetna the Queen is with Claudio Cavazza, the founder and President of Sigma Tau, the largest drug company in Italy and Alan Goldstein, the retired chairman of the Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Department at George Washington University in Washington, DC.
Photo: One of the appetizer tables at the Banquet for the meeting.
Photo: At the meeting, the award is presented to the Queen by Alan Goldstein and Enrico Garaci, the President of the Instituto Superiore Sanita, the NIH of Italy.
Photo: As part of the award the Queen delivers a lecture on her career.
Photo: The other reward recipient, Cardinal Martino with Dr. Goldstein and Dr. Garaci.
Photo: One night we escaped from the meeting and were taken to dinner by Ruggero DeMaria and his wife Tania. They took us to this really nice fish restaurant in the next village that was small and inside a cave.
Photo: For the meal at the restaurant you picked out your fish when you entered, went to your table and they cooked the fish for you.
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