Roman Holiday

It was early Sunday morning and Kate and I were waiting in line to board our Ryanair flight back to Frankfurt. Through the wall-to-wall windows on three sides of the poorly constructed box they called a terminal, I could see the dawn breaking over the tarmac on Rome’s Ciampino airport, casting vivid shimmers of yellows and reds through the sky that reflected on the glassy black asphalt.

I was disappointed to be leaving Rome. This trip had been my attempt at a romantic birthday holiday for Kate – albeit one that she knew about WELL in advance. And also albeit one that consisted of us spending the night in a four-bed hostel room with two unknown German tourists who, while seemingly nice, did nothing to cater to my poorly constructed romantic ambitions. But, despite all those preparations, our trip was cut short because I received an offer from work to attend a conference in the Black Sea port town of Batumi, Georgia, that would have me leaving Sunday (one day before our previously "scheduled" departure). Kate obliged, of course, but said that this one-day truncation to our trip did not add any romantic brownie points.

More importantly, I was disappointed because this was the first time I saw the sun in two days. Although the forecast only called for a chance of showers on the first day, we were met with nonstop Noah’s Ark type rain here the whole time. Typical, I hear, for the off-season.
Reflecting back on our trip, however, I’d classify the trip as a success despite the rain. (Kate didn’t like the word “despite” because she said it wrongly implies not minding the rain. She would use the words “except for.”)

Anyway, we both agreed: Rome was not a washout.

After landing in Rome’s “other” airport early Friday morning, we started off the drizzling day with a complicated but cheap connection from the airport to the main train station, which was conveniently only a five-minute walk to our hostel. By five-minute walk, however, I mean five minutes of looking at the map, 5 minutes of aimless pointing, 20 minutes in a yummy panini café pitstop where I got my first taste of Roman espresso (BUZZ!), 20 minutes in an impressively cavernous bath-cum-church pitstop that Kate’s friend Liz recommended, and then five minutes of walking until we arrived and dropped off our bags. Here's a pic of me eating the panini.The following 36 hours (apart from about 8 of sleeping, reading, and bathing) were the most walk-intensive hours a man could endure without needing serious medical attention. (Thankfully, the first espresso was followed by many more tasty and powerful brother and sister espressos throughout the trip, which sustained my high and kept me blissfully unaware of anything that could be classified as pain).

On the first day, we followed the marked map that Liz had given us and found the Roman Forum (think ruins in a grassy lawn), the Coliseum, Palatine Hill, the Sacra Argentina, the Pantheon, the Spanish Steps, and, of course, the inside of several noteworthy cafés.
We started at the Coliseum, where we splurged for a guided tour led by a sexist Roman named Roberto, who insisted on high-fives from appeasing men in the crowd after every women-suck joke. (The men ambivalently appeased because they wanted to be cool, but knew full well the consequences of making such a statement in front of their wives).

I was amazed the Coliseum was still in pretty good condition, considering it is now 1,924 years old. We learned many interesting and non-sexists facts, including how part of it was destroyed (earthquake), who fought in it (slaves mostly, but some professionals as well), and that they had pulley-system elevators (to raise the lions and tigers from their cages underneath the arena so they could eat the slaves). I also learned that the word Arena was Latin for sand, which was what the ground consisted of (because it soaked up blood the best), and therefore was what the locals called the place. Here's a pic of us inside the massive structure.
As for the sexist facts, the best one in my opinion was how the women had the worst seats (HIGH-FIVE!) weren’t allowed to sit down (HIGH-FIVE!) and didn’t have bathrooms (HIGH-FIVE!), so had to make #2 in doggie bags and pitch them over the side (HIGH-FIVE!).

After Roberto’s illuminating discussion, we took a tour led by a fast-talking New Jersey-ite named Jennifer who gave us WAY too many facts about Palatine Hill, which was the original settlement of Rome, founded by Romulus (hence, who Rome was named after) who was raised by a mother wolf (or perhaps a prostitute, as it's the same word in Latin), and who killed his brother Remus in the worst case of sibling rivalry since Emilio Estevez and Charlie Sheen starred in that awful early 90’s movie together where they were garbage men who were so smitten with a dame that they told impressive-sounding but unfounded lies to top one another until it unfolded in a comical wild-goose-hunt ending where nobody gets the girl.

OK, back to reality. Here's me cold on Palatine Hill.

Here I learned that the word Palace comes from a structure that was built on Palatine Hill and that Kate is really impressed by scattered stones.
The Sacra Argentina is just another green area on the map with hardly any write up in any of the travel guides. But believe you me, if ever there was a more impressive collection of feral cats who lived undisturbed in a major metropolis, I hadn’t heard of it.

The Pantheon was next (although, really, what act could top feral cats?). This building – not to be confused with the Parthenon, which has an extra R and is located somewhere in Greece – is older than the joke “older than dirt,” but just as much fun. First off, it's huge. It's got a 43-meter dome (the biggest until the 19th Century, I think), an "oculus” in the top (which is just a fancy word for "hole," but does shed some ethereal light throughout the whole place), and is free. It also has a bunch of old mosaic art and some impressive balance reminiscent of the Parthenon, I'm sure.

That was followed by an espresso and hot chocolate stop.

Then came the Spanish Steps, which was not the dance moves to the Tango I was disappointed to find out. There’s nothing really to say about these except for there’s a lot and they culminate in a great view of the city (if it weren’t rainy).

Following was dinner at a buffet across from our hostel. We had to circle this place on the map for any future visits as the food was mind-bogglingly good and the wine cheap.

On the second day we got up, had a croissant that was listed as having 433 calories (pre-butter), and took the metro under the city to a the smallest independent nation in the world. Officially called Stato della Città del Vaticano, you and I probably know it better as the Pope’s house.

After waiting in line for over 1.5 hours to get in, our first stop was the Vatican Museum, where we were eager to see the many frescoes by Perugino, Botticelli, and Michelangelo – especially, of course, the Sistine Chapel. To get to the Sistine Chapel, however, you have to go through the museum, which is about as big as the Vatican City is small. In fact, it has so many works that someone said if you looked at one piece of art per minute, you’d be there for forty years.
OK, if that’s true than we probably skipped over 99% of what’s there because we were only inside for about two hours. And those two hours were filled with Kate with a information-giving earpiece attached to her ear and me with a flashy camera attached to my hand, completely unaware of the importance of the works I was photographing.

It all sort of looked like this: imposingly grand, abuzz with people, and luxurious.
Then there was the Sistine Chapel. To be honest, this was really the only reason I went.... Frankly, I have no idea who Perugino or Botticelli are. All I cared about was that one picture with God reaching out to give Adam the finger. And when I saw it, I was kinda disappointed.

It was a crowded, dimly lit hall and all the pictures and frescoes were 68 feet above our head – too high to be seen with any perspicacity. Like the Mona Lisa in the Louvre, the Creation of Adam was smaller and hazier than expected, so it took about two seconds of neck craning to get my full appreciation from it.

Unfortunately, it was against the rules to snap any photos there, so you’ll have to live with one, taken somewhere in there.

After that, we walked out to the drizzle and waited in line to enter St. Peter’s Basilica. The largest church in Christendom, this place covers 5.7 acres and can hold 60,000 people. Before going in, I knew nothing about this place. Afterward, I can know proudly tell you that it has an old wooden chair – the Chair of St. Peter – and a neat sculpture called the Pietà, by Michelangelo that some guy attacked in the 1970s, yelling, “I am Jesus Christ.”

Satisfied with our striking increase of knowledge, we left and embarked on a twenty-minute walk to a place on our map that Liz had marked as “Yummy pizza!” and “Great gelato!” Although we weren’t in the mood for pizza, gelato sounded pretty irresistable at that point, so we walked through a charming little cobblestoney neighborhood and found our way to Liz’s recommended gelato haunt. Kate had double chocolate, I had double pistachio and we were both overwhelmed with how many calories could be compressed in a two euro cup.

But, since it was raining and cold, we decided we should splurge on some hot chocolate to warm us up. And, boy, was that ever worth it. Rich, thick, and dark, this hot chocolate was almost chewy, and we loved it.

It kept us warm all the way to the Trevi Fountain, which seemed to magically POP out of nowhere as we rounded the corner of a small alley. The fountain was gorgeous, probably the most memorable part of our Roman Holiday.

You might remember the fountain from the famous 1960 film La Dolce Vita. If not, how about Mary Kate and Ashley’s “When in Rome”? (Yeah, I thought that’d do it).

What you’re supposed to do there, as you can see in our pictures, is throw some coins with your right hand over your left shoulder to guarantee yourself a trip back to the Eternal City. Through this, the city of Rome acquires about 3,000 euros each day. Pretty nice, huh? It was then getting toward dinner time, so we decided to head back to the buffet across from our hostel – again (met with much support from me). But before we did, we managed to stumble upon the Boca della Verita or the Mouth of Truth, which is a huge marble head that, legend has it, bites off the hands of liars. Daredevils, both Kate and I stuck our hands in, with no ill effects.
Afterward was the Santa Maria della Vittoria, a church that houses the Ecstasy of St Theresa, an apparently famous Bernini sculpture in which St. Teresa shows an orgasmic grin as she pulls a spear out of the body of a foe. It was nice, but I was hungry.

After dinner that night, we circled some more places on the map that we enjoyed and decided to send it on its third journey of Rome, this time with Kate’s brother Edward, who will use it on his trip with his girlfriend in March. Good luck finding the buffet, Edward! Here's the address.