In another classroom she got into the rhythm, tapping her toes, then swaying to the beat as a quartet of alto and tenor saxophones played classical jazz. She applauded a sextet performing a Beethoven choral work. "Wonderful," she said. "They say Beethoven is the most difficult for the voice because he makes the most demands, but you make it look easy. I know it's not."
Rice was invited to play in both classes, but declined. Noting that she's trying to learn Dvorak's Piano Quintet in A with her ensemble, she said she'd come back and perform it for them on another visit. "Next time, you'll play for Paris!" said her host.
It was cute, but clearly calculated.
Not everything went as planned, however, including some photo mishaps.
In Belgium, the airport VIP area where she was formally welcomed Wednesday was decorated with two floor-to-ceiling photos of tourist beach scenes with hundreds of people -- including eight topless women, according to aides. Rice's advance team made sure that the American and Belgian flags were strategically placed so she couldn't see the photos and cameras wouldn't capture her in front of them.
When she went to Ramallah on the West Bank for talks with new Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Rice's motorcade deliberately sped by the grave of Yasser Arafat. During its first term, the Bush administration refused to deal with the late Palestinian president -- making new leadership the precondition for any contact or push on the peace process. But at the joint Rice-Abbas news conference, the Palestinians put the dais in front of a large photo of Jerusalem's exotically tiled Dome of the Rock -- with Arafat's face pictured on the side and within camera range.
Rice has big shoes to fill. Colin Powell was not only the most popular member of the first Bush administration -- both at home and abroad -- he was also one of the most admired Americans, according to public opinion surveys.
Powell was so trusted, an Arab head of state once reflected in private conversation, because when he began discussions he asked what was on the mind of his interlocutor. "Then," the leader said, "he will frame what the United States wants in terms of what we set out."
Rather than compare Rice with Powell, said a senior official who worked with both, it's better to compare Rice with herself when she served at the White House. (State Department officials routinely decline to be named, in deference to the secretary or because of the sensitivity of the ongoing diplomacy.)
"She knows what her strengths are," the official said. In contrast to the comfortable authority of Powell, a former four-star general, Rice is a former academic who specialized in the Soviet Union. "Condi is an intellectual who can give a sophisticated speech to an intellectual community," he said.
There are other differences evident on this first trip. In contrast to Powell's informality, Rice is meticulous. She mapped out the first full two months of her new job -- including three more foreign trips over the next six weeks -- even before being sworn in. To ensure success on this mission, she met weekly with envoys of each country she was to visit, her aides say.
On her first stop in London, she started off so early that she was 20 minutes ahead of schedule for her meetings with Prime Minister Tony Blair and British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw. The motorcade had to take a brief tour before dropping her at 10 Downing St.
Rice still has the discipline required to defy the odds of racial discrimination she grew up with in Alabama. Even on the State Department's sleep-deprived whirlwind trips, she gets up at 5 every morning -- often before aides -- to work out, sometimes on an elliptical machine brought to her room.
A senior official who worked with Rice at the National Security Council reflected Wednesday on how she'd often call him at 6 a.m. after reading the papers while she worked out that morning. "She'd always say 'Good morning' very politely, and 'How are you?' and then ask me if I'd seen some story in the paper. I'd point out that not everyone got their papers and read them by 6 a.m., that she wasn't on the normal delivery cycle."
