We arrived at the Termini train station, which is the main station in Rome. Thanksfully our hostel was only a two minute walk from the station. Once again we lucked out, we had a four person room, with just us three. My first impression, this was the land of the Vespas and Smart Cars. About 50% of the vehicles were Smart Cars, they were everywhere! I remember when my mom came back from Italy, she wanted one. Now I want one. We decided to walk around and find some dinner.
We found the Colosseum and were shocked to find that it was surrounded by stuff. We thought it would be more like Stonehenge, out in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by a field of grass. That's not the case, it's surrounded by restaurants and stores. We found a restaurant for dinner. We ordered a green salad which is apparently just week-old lettuce on a plate. Granted, we weren't eating at expensive places, but they weren't really cheap either. It would be the equivalent of eating at PF Chang's or something, and you can expect good food there. Not at this place. After realizing that you make your own dressing using oil and vinegar, and eating almost my whole salad, I found a snail in my salad. Stacy, a vegetarian, started freaking out. She doesn't touch anything that has even been around meat, and yet I'd found a snail in my salad. I was unappetized as well because I don't eat snails and I don't like surprises at all but especially where food is concerned.
Then they brought out our pasta. Bad. Whoever said Italy is famous for its food, lied. Or maybe you just have to spend an arm and a leg to get decent food. I had tortellini. My plate consisted of about seven of the noodles and the rest was just sauce. Immediately after dropping 15 euros on the meal I was like I'm starving. However, Jan ordered something amazing, cacio y pepe on noodles. Cacio is some kind of strong cheese from southern Italy and it is served with pepper to bring out the flavor. Stacy liked it too. We should have ordered that.
The next day we woke up and went to the Colosseum. Without the Internet, we had no idea what the weather was going to be. There were a ton of people there. I was commenting about this when a tour guide came up and told us that entrance was free because that week was Rome's birthday and most of the stuff was free. We decided to spend extra and pay for the tour, though. Without it, we would have just been looking at the structure, which could pretty much be summed up in one glance.
Interesting facts about the Colosseum from the tour guide:
*That is not the original name, it was originally Flavian Ampitheatre
*It only took eight or nine years to build with slaves
*Right after it was built, there was 100 day party with free festivities to attend at the Colosseum
*Although it seats 50,000, it could be filled in ten minutes- as the staff used incentives (whips and canes) to get people to their seats faster
*Rumors of religious issues are unfounded, only one religious man died there, and it was because he jumped in to save someone
*700,000 people died in there plus at least one of every exotic animal and tons of other animals, however, this was still considered "family entertainment"
*It originally had a canvas covering to block from sun, but it had to be opened a few times a day because the stench of so many things dying was unbearable
*The south side fell down due to an earthquake
*There is no floor which allows you to see the gladiator "locker rooms" and passages where animals were kept underneath
*Gladiators were not usually volunteers, instead they were slaves, forced to train at the training facilities which were much like prisons
*Half time entertainment includes: woman vs. midget or dog vs. porcupine
*It was free... until 1990, when they started charging for admission
*At some point the Romans began stripping it for building materials, in that way, the Colosseum is technically all over Rome
While on the tour it began pouring rain. As in like street flooding, almost washing away the Colosseum rain. I had no umbrella and was quickly soaked. Since I was already starting to get sick, I started coughing and sneezing and shivering. I left early and went back to our hostel where I took a nap. I guess I was knocked out because Stacy and Jan said they came back and turned on the light and I didn't even know.
Later that night, we met up with our friend Julia who studies at University of Hertfordshire and is originally from Rome and two girls from Mexico that are also in our program. We met at the Piazza di Navona. It was useful having Julia because she finally took us to a good restaurant, where Stacy and I promptly ordered Cacio y Pepe for dinner. After dinner we walked to the Trevi Fountain, Fontana di Trevi in Italian. It looks amazing at night. Stacy, Jan, and I made a wish and threw in a coin. Then we saw a bride getting her wedding photos with her groom taken there. It was a whole affair with tons of cameras. Julia told us that it was good luck to see a bride and that in all her 22 years there, she'd never seen one. Lucky us! The fountain takes up the entire side of a building. It is huge. It is significant because it is at the junction of three roads and originally marked the terminal point of the aqua duct, Aqua Virgo.
The next day we were supposed to meet up with the girls and go see the Vatican. I was excited and didn't know what to expect. Julia told us that the lines were going to be hours and they didn't want to wait, and we were indifferent about waiting. So, we decided to meet up at the unfortunate hour of 9am. What do you know? The girls weren't there. Jan called them and they were still asleep and we were at the Vatican. We decided that since it was such nice weather, we'd just see the outdoor sites and do the Vatican the next day.
The first stop, the Spanish Steps. It is the longest and widest staircase in Europe.
I didn't think it was that sensational the night before when we'd seen it because they had removed all the flowers. However, in the daytime, they put out pretty pink flowers and since the steps overlook the Piazze di Spagna, you can people watch. I found out later that the piazza was divided into two parts, the French Square at the top of the steps and the Spanish Square at the bottom. The steps came to be called Spanish Steps because foreigners that trespassed into the Spanish Square were all of a sudden recruited to be soldiers in the Spanish army.
We returned to the Trevi Fountain in the daylight. I liked it better at night. Then we were off to the Pantheon. Everything was pretty close and we ended up walking a lot. It's so funny because I think of the Romans in the sense of the "Roman Catholic Church," but I forget that they were originally polytheists. The Pantheon was to honor the highest gods in the Roman religion although there is a dispute as to who they are. After the Roman Catholic Church came to power, while destroying all things non-Catholic, they decided to preserve the Pantheon. I was somewhat confused because the outside is so old, the brick is disintegrating, yet, the inside has marble that is fairly new but made to appear old and cracked. It also has a hole in the roof/ceiling. Julia explained to me that this is some kind of advancement in architecture for the time. It allowed the roof to be made of solid concrete, and without that circular piece at the top, the ceilings of buildings could be constructed much higher and more elaborately. However, I've read that some also believe the hole was made to be a sundial or an astronomy viewing point.
The next day was really the Vatican. At this point, I am really unhappy with the weather in Rome. Purse contents:
sunscreen
gloves
umbrella
sun glasses
ipod
coat
book
Who knows what weather today will bring. Must be prepared for anything. We didn't have to wait in line at all to see St. Peter's Basilica, which is basically just a huge church. It is also the site of many former Popes' tombs. You can go downstairs and see their graves. Some of them are actually up in the church as well. Like most of the Catholic Churches I've seen, there are alters for the saints, pews for service, a huge alter in the front, and paintings on the ceilings. What I hadn't seen before was that there were about thirty confessional booths. A large area of them were closed off and you could only confess certain hours. It was so amusing that above all the Latin writing on the confessional both it would say "English" or "Italian" or whatever languages that priest could understand. I heard that the Pope makes public speeches on Wednesdays but we were leaving Wed morning so I didn't think I'd be able to see it.
Then we went to the Vatican Museum which the Sistine Chapel is part of and the Vatican Museum is a part of the Apostolic Palace, residence of the Pope, and the Palace is part of Vatican City. It's confusing as to what is what. We didn't really want to see the religious art throughout the ages as we were fairly museum-ed out. However, you have to walk through an 1+ long maze to get to the Chapel. Luckily, we did get the half-price student discount to get into the museum.
After walking through about 100 rooms and down and least six flights of stairs and back up again, we finally arrived at the Chapel, expecting to see God reaching out to a man (you know that famous painting) covering the entire ceiling. We get in there, it is a huge panting on one of the short walls, and several smaller paintings covering the other three walls and the ceiling is covered in several rectangular scenes. It's almost an overload of sensations. There are just too many paintings to look at each individually, and yet when you find one and you are looking at it (and you start to get light-headed from looking up so much) and look away for a second, when you look back you have to find it again and refocus. The God/man picture is the center of the ceiling, but still, it is only a piece of the collage, so why is it so famous? We left feeling unsatisfied, why is that so built up. I mean ya Michelangelo painted it.. but still. Only later would I become interested in the Chapel.
We, then had the most expensive, and hilarious lunch... kinda. We were starving by the time we left the Vatican, we hadn't expected to take a huge hike to see the Sistine Chapel. We jumped in the first restaurant we found. We had promised to pay less for food and find a grocery store, but after Berlin, we hadn't been able to find a decent grocery store, so we were stuck eating out. We all decided to go with the meal for 11 euros where you pick a pasta plate, a main dish with salad (we all know how that went over last time), and fruit platter for dessert. Like other restaurants, no tap water served, so we were forced to order Coca Cola. Then our Waiter brought us bread. We were all starving so Jan and Stacy immediately snatched up bread. It was hard so I didn't want to eat more than a bite. But as I put the piece back into the basket, I saw mold. We examined the bread and realized that it was moldy and didn't eat anymore. Then he brought the pasta. I have never had such low quality food. Actually I have, in the cafeteria in elementary school. It was like canned tomato sauce on week old pasta. Then they brought my "main course" which was three, paper thin, post-it sized pieces of pork roast with plain lettuce on the plate.
At this point, even though we were starving, we were over the food, so we asked him to bring out the fruit platter for dessert. He actually brought us a small plate with a whole red apple, a green apple, a tiny orange, and a butter knife. No pre-sliced melons, no fruit salad, it was actually household fruit on a plate... with a dull knife. We were so over this restaurant that we demanded the check. "The check" is apparently some lady who just comes over and tells you your total verbally. Somehow our bill 51 euros. We ask to actually see our bill. So she whips out a pad and starts writing (how professional.) 2 euros for bread, our food, our drinks, and a 15% service charge for eating in the restaurant. We were shocked. He brought us bread without us asking and then charged us for it, and it was moldy at that! We left in a huff. That was a $22 meal per person, in America you could get a lot of good food for that much money.
This was clearly a place for tourists. Not only were we ripped off with the bread, but also, they didn't have to make the food quality because they knew we were never coming back anyway. I guess that's what you should expect right next to tourists attractions. Later in our guide book, we read that it is illegal to charge people for bread, but that beware as tourists because they sometimes do it anyway and you have to ask them to take it off your bill. Live it, learn it. I learned, don't eat in Italy! Bring a suitcase of your own food. It is expensive and not good. We also wanted to go shopping. I wanted a dress from Italy, however we weren't able to find anything. The stores were either designer, and really expensive, or really cheap clothing. Oh well.
After re-packing for our journey home, we wanted to at least attend one of the events in celebration of Rome's birthday. We decided to go see Elena Borelli e la New Band in an outdoor concert. On the walk there, we saw the Colosseum at night as well as the ruins at Palentine Hill. The concert was great. It felt like one of the few things that we had done that was truly Italian. The entire concert and commentary was in Italian so we had no idea what was going on. We stayed for awhile and then left.
On our way home, we stopped at the book store. While Jan and Stacy looked at books, I glanced at one about the Sistine Chapel. It had the paintings separated and talked about each one. Upon realizing that the pictures told a story, I was extremely interested. I want to make it my goal to do more research on that artwork.
The next morning we woke up early and took a train to Pisa. We hung out there all day and ended up going to Bazeel for a second time. Then, we got on our flight, took a bus from the airport and got back to Hatfield on Thursday morning at 2am, exhausted, and with memories to last a lifetime. I'm making sure mine last a lifetime by writing them down otherwise, knowing my bad memory, they wouldn't last five minutes.
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