The Eternel City

The saga continues.

From Florence we made our way to Rome, where our hostel was a huge disappointment after the luxurious Luna Rossa, but it was somewhere to sleep and that's pretty much what we needed since we had a busy two days ahead of us. First stop was the Colosseum, not far but of course, it had started to rain. Rain was pretty much the theme of Florence and Rome, unfortunately. We ended up taking a tour which I really liked-the guide was really informative and brought up some interesting perspectives on the events that took place in the Colosseum-whether we should think of it as inhumane or whether we should see it through the eyes of the Romans at that time, etc. Walking around the Colosseum was a pretty moving experience, thinking about how long it's been there, everything that took place inside, the history that surrounds it. From there we slowly made our way to the Trevi Fountain, stopping every five feet or so for more pictures and something else historical. Seriously, you couldn't throw a feather in Rome without hitting something of historical significance.

Eventually we arrived at the Trevi Fountain only to find our friends, Jenny and Bart. Let me explain. I have no idea what these people's name are. We just made them up. But we saw them at least 4 times between Florence and Rome, and they had come from the Olympics in Torino before that. When we saw them again at the fountain, I couldn't resist taking this picture. And do you know, later that night we saw them on the way back to the hostel, and someone finally said something to them and of course they'd noticed us as well (it's hard to miss a group of 5 Anglophones in Italy). It became a bit of a joke, but alas they weren't headed to Venice afterward, so we had to say our adieus in Rome.

By the time we got to the Fountain it was pretty much pouring and we were all miserable, so we ended up eating at a restaurant not far away called That's Amore, where I started my first love affair with an Italian guy. No, not really, but I decided that our waiter was fabulous, despite his unibrow. I think it was because he gave me wonderful pizza and cappucino, but my joke the rest of the trip was how I was going to bring the waiter, Berto Uni (my invented name for him in honor of his unibrow, named after Bert from Sesame Street), back with me to the US so he could make me pizza, cappucino, gelati. Dinner was followed by more gelati (remember when I said gluttonous?) and then on our way back to the hostel we ran into a random group of Anglophones headed for the bar, so we decided to join them for a drink. To make it short, we weren't intrigued by their company and headed back after one drink, but there was live music so it was still a good time.

We were up early the next morning to get to the Vatican, and stood in line outside in the rain for an hour to get inside. It moved pretty fast, though, and it was definitely worth it. We took a tour here as well, which was also quite good. The guide pointed out stuff I never would have known/noticed, seeing as I know virtually nothing about the Vatican-statues that lead to Michaelangelo's depiction of God, the ceilings that were painted to look raised but were actually flat. The museums were interesting, although we moved through quicker than I would have on my own, and I have to be blasphemous for just a second and say that the Sistine Chapel was a bit...disappointing. Let me explain. I'd seen so many pictures and it was so built up and I'd imagined it as one way in my head, when really it was quite a bit different. The artwork is certainly good, and when I remembered that one guy did the whole entire thing and all the little symbols included in it (as pointed out by our tour guide) I was certainly impressed, but yeah, I just thought it would be different. I did like St. Peter's Basilica a lot though, probably one of my preferred cathedrals out the however many that I've been to.

For our last night in Rome we walked (in the rain, of course) past the Ducal (?) Castle and then down toward Campo dei Fiori and Travestere, which we had heard was a cool area of Rome. It did seem pretty happening, and although the place we ended up eating left something to be desired our gelati wasn't bad and we found a good place to have a drink. All in all, a good trip to Rome and I'm excited to go back again with the fam in April.

Carneval is coming soon, but I've been on for awhile so I should probably let someone else use this computer!!