Travelogue -- Rome

Travelogue – Rome, Italy – December 28-31, 2005

In my Christmas stocking this year was a library book – a Rome tour book and a notice on it saying we’re going to Rome in 3 days! (Lyrad had doctored up an Italy Tours flyer to say: “RILEY TOURS...with your guides to Rome -- LARRY and Isaacissimo” Then he’d X’ed out the whole itinerary on the flyer and wrote “Lyrad has a Better Plan!”) Lyrad and I had talked about going to Rome but last I’d heard, it wasn’t going to work out. So what a fun surprise. And Isaac was going with us; he’s old enough to appreciate all the history (and hours of waiting in line) and really enjoys individual time with his parents. He’s been so good lately, we wanted to do a Special Trip for him. We left our house Wednesday afternoon in the snow and played “Set” at the airport while waiting and waiting for our weather-delayed plane. I read the whole “Ensign” and didn’t mind the extra waiting – we had snacks with us, we had no connecting flight to catch, and we had no impatient tired little ones whining in boredom. Isaac brought along his “Faith in God” booklet to set goals when he had free time. I encouraged him to bring a fun book, but he only wanted his scriptures and Anne auf Green Gables – not an easy read (in German) but he’s determined. When we arrived in Rome, Isaac and I began our Pickpocket-Alert and were successful at evading pickpockets for the whole trip. We caught an express train at the airport to ride a half hour to Termini Station, the huge main Rome train/bus station. My first impression of Italians is that they look and sound just like they do in movies and stereotypes (I don’t mean that in a negative way!) and I think a lot of Indian men live there selling things on the streets. We walked to our hotel and were pleasantly surprised with how close it was to the station – only 1-2 blocks away! We rode up an old elevator to the 4th floor, the Alberto Sileo hotel. It was only 55 Euro a night, total for all 3 of us. Great deal and here’s why – we can only stay there between 7 pm and 9 am, then our suitcases are left there all day while a nighttime train driver sleeps in the room all day long! Worked fine with us (yes, I assume the sheets are changed each time!) because we were there to sightsee, not lounge in the room all day. We walked around looking for a restaurant and Lyrad picked a Famiglia (family) one. The green salad came with no dressing, but we were always given olive oil and vinegar to pour over it. The bread could also be dipped in olive oil (Isaac loved it) and we tried spaghetti with white sauce and bacon, and a chocolate torte (cake). I prefer Olive Garden (I guess I like AMERICAN Italian food!) but I’m also too neurotic to enjoy eating in a restaurant that I don’t feel is too clean. The meal takes so long there, because there are several courses – an antipasto (cold mushrooms, etc), then the First Plate is a pasta, then the Second Plate is a meat, THEN comes the salad, then dessert. We never ate all 5 plates but had fun sharing things. When we got to our room at 11 p.m., I was sure Isaac would crash, but the disciplined boy would not go to bed until he’d done his sit-ups, push-ups, scripture reading, and writing in his journal. I read him a story from Sheri Dew’s No Doubt About it for his read-aloud, and then we all slept well in our tiny hotel room in Rome.
On Thursday, we walked to the station at 8:15 a.m. and looked for the hop-on hop-off tour bus. It rained all day and on EVERY street corner stood an Indian/Sri Lankan man selling an armful of umbrellas. I bought one for 3 Euro for our day in the rain, but that didn’t stop every other umbrellas salesman from approaching us as well. We kept joking about seeing the same umbrella guy all day long, on every corner, or was it The 8 Indian Brothers? We rode the red bus through downtown, seeing old ruins and beautiful churches. Mark Twain said you can’t swing a dead cat anywhere in Rome without hitting a church, and he’s right! The most thrilling sight for me was seeing the remains of the huge Colosseum (where the gladiators fought) and I pictured Androcles and the Lion as we rode by on the bus, knowing we’d be back later to walk around inside. We passed the site of the Circus Maximus (where the chariot races took place) and pictured scenes from “Ben Hur” though it’s only grass on the big oval now (no walls). Lyrad was very excited to see the Forum. We got off the bus at St. Peter’s Basilica to admire the life-size nativity scene out front and also the ornate building. We enjoyed many tourist shops, then boarded the bus again to ride the complete loop back to the Vatican to get to the USO office by 1:15 for a group tour. We had to sit in the roofless upstairs of the bus for a while and the cheap umbrella came in handy (though it couldn’t withstand the wind) then finally got seats in the warmer dryer downstairs and enjoyed the audio commentary while driving through Rome. For lunch we bought sandwiches in a tiny sandwich shop, including a cool sandwich pizza (panini) which is like a round folded-over pizza with spinach inside, cooked in a sandwich griddle and served hot – yum! We boarded a bus with a bunch of Americans for the USO ancient Rome tour, to the Colosseum and the Catacombs. The Colosseum is magnificent and we walked around up high and saw where people would sit in the OLD days (women sat way at the top) and also all the cages in the basement (under the arena floor) which held all the animals. The fighting shows were not regular events, rather they were held in conjunction with special celebrations such as a new ruler being chosen. Sometimes hundreds of animals would be killed during the weeks-long events. Christians were NOT put to death in the Colosseum (though they WERE put to death in another place in Rome). This huge arena was a very cool site to see.
Next we rode the bus to the San Sebastian Catacombs and I loved seeing these. We walked underground through the narrow tunnels (very extensive) to see where people were buried (to save ground space, Romans often buried the dead underground in what looks like bunk beds along the walkways). We saw some elaborate tombs for richer people. Very neat. We drove along the Appian Way, and I asked our Italian tour guide if it was the same Appian Way on which the female pope gave birth to her baby. The tour guide assured me it was, though emphasized that it’s only a legend. (I’m a believer; what else could an intelligent woman do in those days a thousand years ago but pretend she’s a male if she wants to read and be educated. The book Pope Joan was fabulous; even if she wasn’t a true person, the details of the times and Roman life in the middle ages and of the corruptness of the popes was fascinating)
We rode the red bus a little way back, then got out to see the Trevi Fountain (beautiful huge fountain, 250 years old, with Neptune and 2 tritons; one triton is wrestling a sea horse) – beautiful. According to legend, a coin thrown into Trevi Fountain guarantees a visitor’s return to Rome. So Isaac tossed in a coin! We bought kiwi gelato and mint gelato and loved it. We walked across Rome back to our hotel, then went out to dinner at a Roman restaurant. We enjoyed this very clean restaurant, especially the spinach-ricotta ravioli and the artichoke appetizer. Lyrad had been looking all over for ravioli in red sauce, but I guess that’s only the American way to serve them.
On Friday, we left at 7:30 a.m. to ride a public bus across town to the USO office for the Vatican Tour. Pickpockets hit hard on the buses, we’ve heard (many of our friends have told us of near-escapes from pickpocketers on crowded buses) but we were fine. There was a different challenge on this bus – a terrible smell from a little old lady (I think she was carrying a bag of manure for fertilizer?) and when someone said something to her, she just began yelling and yelling back in Italian and I was grateful to get off the bus soon after that. We waited in line for an hour and 40 minutes to enter the Vatican Museum. Luckily, no rain (and even some sunshine) that day. We met some nice American families in our tour group also stationed in Germany and it made the wait more fun. One 4-year-old girl was so tired of standing there, so I held her on my back while chatting with her mom and it helped me not miss my little guys so much! (I knew our 4 were having the time of their lives so I didn’t feel too bad about leaving them…none of them would’ve enjoyed walking for hours in the rain, waiting in line, going through crowded museums) Outside the museum the tour guide explained the pictures in the Sistine Chapel on a big poster. In the museum we saw sculpted busts, mosaics, some beautiful paintings and rooms, my favorite being the Gallery of Maps with maps painted all over the walls and beautiful paintings all over the ceiling. Very impressive, though Lyrad, Isaac, and I became separated from our tour group in the big crowd here. We rushed along to catch up (but we were actually way ahead) and were relieved to find them again. (We had ear phones on and could hear our individual guide explaining history) Being in the Sistine Chapel was very cool – though I thought it amusing in the pictures of Moses’ life that the scenes had Roman arches and architecture in the background, and the Egyptians drowning in the Red Sea looked just like Roman soldiers. Lyrad bought a poster of the inside of the Sistine Chapel so we can always remember walking through it. Next we walked to the adjacent building – St. Peter’s Basilica. Michelangelo’s dome of St. Peter’s is the tallest in the world, but the artist died before its completion. We saw Peter’s tomb (and later walked by a spot where he might have been in jail), the dome begun by Michelangelo, the statue of a very young Mary holding the dying Christ (“Pieta” by Michelangelo), statues of popes, and ornate decor. We saw the door that only opens once every 25 years, by the pope in a Jubilee Year. By the end of the tour we were hungry and tired of standing and I was grateful for the once-in-lifetime experience and glad our other children were spared this!
We ate at a pasta restaurant – more ravioli and gelato, and Isaac and Lyrad tried new appetizers such as squid. Then we began our long but interesting walk all across Rome, stopping at places along the way. We stopped in a French Church (San Luigi dei Francesi) and enjoyed some large Caravaggio paintings and more painted ceilings. I found it amazing how we could be walking across Rome, from one main tourist attraction to another, and on our way we passed so many elaborate churches and could just step inside the door and enjoy. We saw a few beggars on the steps of the churches and shared some of our cereal biscuits with them. (We bought fruit juice and cereal biscuits and dates and green olives for breakfasts and snacks; the cereal biscuits were crumbly crackers but very healthy and good) At Sant’Ignazio di Loyola Church we enjoyed seeing the ceiling – the builder didn’t have enough money to build a dome, so he painted an illusion of a dome (fake perspective painting) in a big circle on the ceiling – very convincing! We walked across a bridge over the Tiber River, enjoyed Trajan’s Column (an obelisk built in AD 113 with a story of the emperor’s exploits carved in pictures up the obelisk, all in one continuous line wound around the obelisk), saw a pantomime in the Piazza Navona carnival area next to a castle and big fountain, and bought little things for those we left at home (soldier for Josh, angel pics for Madi, Pinocchio stuff, matching pasta chef hats for Lyrad and Shirley). We went into the Pantheon and were glad it wasn’t raining; the circle opening at the top of the dome is not covered! Raphael is buried in this Roman pagan temple (built in Hadrian’s time around 125 AD) which later became a Christian church. We stopped at a grocery store to buy our dinner and breakfast – Isaac was loving the green olives and very bitter chocolate we’d found. The market had huge meat slabs (legs were hanging right in the store) and huge cheese wedges – I guess parmesan cheese is a staple in Italy! Back at our hotel, we warmed up with our fruit juice, yogurt, rolls, pastries, etc, then tucked Isaac in. After that, Lyrad and I tried to stay awake to read The Da Vinci Code together (interesting though not too believable of an adventure).
On Saturday morning, we set off in a drizzle and decided to walk across Rome instead of taking the public bus. As it was New Year’s Eve, the streets were pretty empty but luckily the Museo Nazionale Romano was open. We ate breakfast on its steps, then walked around the beautiful huge paintings and busts and more nude statues than I’d ever want to see. Many paintings were historical, and beautifully done but too violent – such as Romans stabbing the conquered and the kidnapping of the Sabine women which the Romans undertook to populate their new kingdom, around 500 BC. (This event inspired the brothers in “7 Brides for 7 Brothers”) We saw many depictions of Romulus and Remus being nursed by a she-wolf; according to legend, when their uncle threw them out of the city to die, the wolf saved the toddlers and Romulus came back to found Rome around 700 BC. Isaac appreciated the beautifully carved folds in statues’ togas, especially when made of black and white marble.
Next we walked around on the Victor Emmanuel monument, which has a fire burning on a platform and marching guards wearing capes next to it. The monument was built 100 years ago in honor of the first king of a unified Italy. The large building with many steps leading up to it is nicknamed by unadmiring Romans as “the wedding cake” or “typewriter”. But it provided nice views of the city.
Our last stop was to the remains of the Roman Forum – the center of commercial and political life in ancient Rome. Legal cases were heard here in the basilicas, and many victorious Romans built triumphal arches. We found the Arch of Titus particularly interesting, as it was built in 81 AD to commemorate the Romans’ destruction of Jerusalem. One relief on the arch shows the Romans carrying off spoils from the Temple – a menorah, altar, and trumpets. Isaac and Lyrad walked around (while I sat under an umbrella, took a break, and read) and were impressed by the House of the Vestal Virgins – 6 virgins were chosen at a time to keep alight the sacred flame of Vesta, a full-time responsibility (“honor”?) for 30 years. We saw Palatine Hill where Romulus and Remus were cared for by the wolf, and also Cicero lived here. Then we headed back to the hotel, ate pasta on the way (and my efforts at arguing for being way overcharged were unsuccessful), boarded the Express Train for the airport, then enjoyed our last sights of Rome (crowded apartments in the outskirts) as we headed to the Da Vinci Airport (while reading about the same airport in the Da Vinci Code). At the airport, we played “Set”, then read more together while Isaac read a biography of Albert Einstein (Einstein attended German schools, too, and we’ve been to many places he’s been to). After an uneventful flight home, we were grateful to be home safely and excited to see our happy children and grandma at home who had made chicken noodle soup (with homemade noodles from our new pasta maker) and bought candy for a New Year’s Eve celebration. They had a great time at home, and we had had a great time seeing some of the ancient wonders of the world.