Roma, Day #4

Tuesday

I guess we really had three full days in Rome and four nights, so this is the third full day and the fourth night, etc. Wednesday we are off to Mantova.

This morning we started at the Vatican Museums. We had a reservation at 9 am and we were let inside the entrance around 8:40, then we sort of snuck in with a tour group to the grounds around 8:45 (it was a good idea).

We proceeded to walk through the entirety of the Vatican art collection (old and new) in a desperate search for two things: The Raphael Rooms, and The Sistine Chapel. It took us almost 30 minutes to finally arrive in The Raphael Rooms, which were EMPTY. Yes, empty, as in not a soul in the room with us. It was kind of incredible to be in the room with these incredible frescoes all to ourselves. You have no idea what I'm talking about? Does this trigger your memory?

Okay! So after we found the Raphael Rooms, we knew the Sistine was close, but first we stumbled upon a room full of Matisse paper cut outs which were beautiful. They kind of looked like quilts. Also the contemporary art collection at the Vatican (which is what we define as modern art) is really great (Dali, etc.).

The Sistine Chapel was really very beautiful. I am glad I got to see it. It was kind of ironic though, they expect you to be silent (a room full of people who speak many different languages) and they have guards yelling every 5 minutes "SILENCE, BE QUIET." Um, thanks for breaking my concentration! I wanted to leave because of how rude and inconsiderate the guards were. They also have places you cannot stand but they are not marked off, so there are guards coming over to you very rudely and moving you elsewhere. Dear Vatican, put up a barrier if you don't want us to stand there. Thank you.

Regardless, it was nice to see all of the frescoes, and my mom and I had a few laughs, esp. at God's butt in the creation of the sun and the plants:

Afterwards we walked around in some of the other spaces, and then we went to Saint Peters. When we arrived at Saint Peters (after we had been given incorrect directions, and it should be so simple from the museums) I quickly decided that I did not want to go inside. There was a line of about 1,000 people at least, and I was not going to wait in it to see this church. Sorry, but it wasn't worth it to me, in the sweltering heat. I wanted to see other things, and my mother has already seen Saint Peter's.

We walked alongside the river and we crossed at Ponte Sant'Angelo. I wanted to cross here for two reasons. The first reason is, it put us in the correct direction to go to the Pantheon. The second reason is because of the locks. This bridge is one of the bridges where couples come and they lock a lock to the sides of the bridge to express their eternal love for one another, and then they throw the keys in the river. Here are some of the locks:

I just think it is the sweetest thing.

We finally ended up in the square where the Pantheon is and we decided to have lunch. We took advantage of the €12 special! One glass of wine, or a glass of beer, one piece of bruschetta and one pasta dish or margherita pizza. I had white wine and Olio e Aglio (oil and garlic pasta). It was delicious, exactly what I wanted. Mom had a beer and a Canneloni. She enjoyed it as well. The service was good too, they fixed our wobbly table!

Afterwards we went to the Pantheon where I discovered the 22 holes they have drilled in the ground to drain the floor when it rains (if you don't know it the Pantheon has an opening at the top of the dome. I found the space to be extremely beautiful and moving so I enjoyed our visit immensely.

Then we took our time getting back to the hotel by way of several shops (although we didn't do too much shopping). When we were walking to dinner we stumbled upon what I think was the best art find of my trip so far. It was a site-specific public installation that is put out every morning, and taken down every night, and then all of the parts are re-made and put up the next morning. I am sad that I didn't think to take photos of each of the pieces, but here is one of the pieces just so you can see what the work is like.

There was no artist or name attached to the work, but I left a €2 donation for the artist (in a box for donations.

We ate dinner at Obika Roma (if you don't know Obika is a chain restaurant, there is one in LA, one in New York, one in Tokyo, a few in London, and the food is delicious. We had complementary glasses of very good prosecco (they have a voucher on their website).

And that was Rome!

Roma, Day #3

Monday

Today we started our day at the Colosseum! We decided to do a tour of the ancient things because neither of us are well versed in this type of architecture and history, so we thought it would be the best thing. Our tour guide was a woman from Italy and she was very knowledgable and funny. The nice thing about going on a guided tour is that you skip all of the lines and you see everything you want to see without getting lost or confused. The guidance works like this: everyone has a audio player and a headset in one ear, and then the group is on one channel so we all hear the same thing. All tour groups in Rome (and probably elsewhere) are the same. I think this is better than one person yelling at 30 people, things can get complicated.

So our tour consisted of the Colosseum, which looked like this in the morning:

Then we went to the Palatine Hill (where you can see the forum, and there are also some ruins up there, which looked like this:

And then we walked through the Forum, but by then we were so exhausted that the taking in of information was hard (also I've been having problems with my right leg), so those pictures looked like this:

As you can see, a lot of pictures, but not a lot of explanation. Rome was extremely hot and difficult because of that. But we had a great time.

After our tour we went to the old Jewish Ghetto, which is still full of Jewish shops and Kosher restaurants. We were instructed to go there by a few people, most importantly my Aunt Tania who said we would have whole fried artichokes there that would be incredible. She, as always, was right. As was everyone else who recommended it so thank you!

Whole fried artichoke? Yes! YOU CAN EAT THE WHOLE THING!

We also had falafel and humus and some fried mozzarella things that weren't what we ordered but we ate them and enjoyed them.

After lunch we walked back to our hotel for a breather (I had been working on my paper still).

Then we went to dinner at the restaurant with 114 pasta sauce choices. Yes they were all different (some only slightly different, but it still counts in my book). I had bolognese and mom had shrimp with tomatoes and spinach or rocket, she enjoyed it. We also had a salad that would not stay on our forks, or get to our mouths, so we had a laugh about the slippery salad and I think the people next to us thought we were crazy.

Then we went to the Trevi fountain (because we were told to go at night) and it was really beautiful at night. I believe I had tears in my eyes. We threw pennies over our shoulders as we both want to return to Rome, and that was our night.

Note: Ginger and Cinnamon Gelato = amazing.