Santa Maria Overload

Day 19: Tuesday
In class we spent our time discussing whether or not it was rational or irrational for the Romans to stay in Rome after the sack by the Gauls and whether the arguments Camillus used to get them to stay were rational or irrational. I thought it was completely pointless, but it had nothing to do with the reading we were supposed to do that I didn’t do, so I was glad it went on for the entire first half of class. During the break I got a delicious canoli, then after class we started talking about Book VI of Livy, which I read maybe 15 pages of. Participation died, but Tobin tried to keep it going. After class finally ended we had big plans, so we (me, Elli, Kari, David, Kelly) headed out right away. Our plan for the day was to have a Santa Maria day, aka visit a billion churches. First we went over to Campo de’Fiori market and they had the sweatshirts we wanted to buy, but we didn’t want to buy them then, so we walked away, unknowingly bartering with the man trying to sell them, and we got them all the way down from 22 euro to 15. Then we went to the Jewish Ghetto for lunch, and found a place called Ba’ Ghetto. I was extremely disappointed. The food was nothing spectacular and was excessively expensive. I ordered ravioli, which had close to nothing inside, and I only got five pieces. For 12,50 euro! We also got deserts, so by the end my meal was 21 euro and nowhere near enough food. We didn’t even have a cute Jewish waiter! I did get to see adorable Jewish children when we walked back, so at least that made me happy. We went back to Argentina and got on the 40 bus to head to our first church: Santa Maria Maggiore. It was huge! There was a canopy over the alter on the inside which reminded me of St. Peter’s, but it was nowhere near as spectacular. The ceiling was all gold, and it reminded me of what I imagine Versailles to look like. Next we made our way to Santa Maria delgi Angeli dei Martini, which is a super old church right off Piazza Nazionale. It was also a huge church, and when we walked in a man was playing to organs, which was really cool to hear and see. The chapel and alter was designed by Michelangelo, and there’s a meridian through it that accurately tells what day it is. Next stop was Santa Maria dell Vittoria, but it wasn’t open yet, so we moved on to Santa Maria della Concezione, which was by far the most interesting. The inside was nothing spectacular, but there’s a crypt that’s made from the bones of 4,000 monks. The bones are all arranged in all kinds of decorations, and even the lamps were made out of human bones. It was beyond creepy. I tried to use my anatomy skills to identify the bones, and I think I did a pretty good job recognizing the coccyx, scapula, sternum, femur, and the lumbar spine bones. There were some S-shaped ones that I had no idea what they could possibly have been. The skeletons seemed way too small to be grown men and all looked like children, which made it even more creepy. I wish I could’ve taken pictures of it all because it’s incomprehensible. The creepiest part of the entire thing was at the end there was a sign that said “Comme vous nous étions; Comme nous vous serez,” which means something like “Like you we once were; Like us you will become,” but it sounds much more poetic in French. Next we went back to Santa Maria della Vittoria, which is the church for Fire in Angels and Demons and has the St. Teresa in Ecstasy statue by Bernini. It was slightly disappointing because it was so far away and up high, but Bernini’s talents once again never cease to amaze me. Reading the description of the scene the statue depicts was quite entertaining because the entire thing is a big “That’s what she said.” Next we hopped on the Metro (first time using it!) to Piazza del Popolo for Santa Maria del Popolo. We wandered into the wrong church at first, but it was kind of cool. We ran into Brandon, Joe, and Dylan in the Piazza, and they had just come from the church and Castel Sant’Angelo. They told us to check out the Caravaggio paintings in the church, so we went in, and I was on a hunt to find the Angels and Demons location. Kari found it, and we saw the hole in which the first Cardinal is found for Earth. Unfortunately the Bernini statue which points Professor Langdon in the next direction was covered up. We looked at the Caravaggios, but I was particularly inspired, much like the ones from Galleria Borghese. Next we decided to try to make it back across town for Santa Maria Cosmedian, the Mouth of Truth church, and hopped back on the Metro. We tried to transfer trains at Termini, but the B line never showed up and the amount of people waiting was ridiculous, so we decided to skip it and just head home. I tried to start reading Book VII of Livy when I got home, but I fell asleep right away. After I woke up I managed to read half of it, and then Elli, Kari, and I went over to the boys’ to have American Dinner Night with David. We made mozzarella sticks only in balls fried in oil, burgers, and fries. Such a good break from pizza and pasta and to finally have a meal that can fill me up! Then we hung around for a while talking and reading Livy, then David started watching Angels and Demons, so we watched about half of it, getting excited about all the things we’ve seen and know about. Tomorrow is our last excursion day, and we’re going to the ancient port of Rome, and then the BEACH! So excited to relax and catch up on class reading for the day! I also have a paper to write and a huge list of things I still need to see before I leave Rome…so busy! (PS I know a lot of my last posts haven't had pictures, and I'll try to get them in there soon, I've just been very busy trying to finish up Rome, like I said)

Santa Maria Maggiore

Santa Maria delgi Angeli dei Martini

St Teresa in Ecstasy

My burger :)

Adventure is out there!

Day 18: Monday
Today we had a guest speaker on Livy for the first half of class. I thought he was unbearably boring and went on about things that were irrelevant for lengthy amounts of time, such as how Emperor Augustus got his name for at least ten minutes. And he said “What should we say?” every single time he paused. I’m not excited for him to take us through Ostia Antica on Wednesday. By now Tobin has realized that most of the class is not caught up with the reading, so we talked about things that were basically irrelevant to Livy but were very PTCD. After class we went home, had scrambled eggs, went to the grocery store, and then set out to find stamps. Every Tabacchi we go to tells us they don’t have stamps or they only have a couple, so I haven’t been able to send any of my postcards. Finally we found one that had plenty! Then walked down to the photobooth so Elli could take passport pictures and went to our favorite lemonade place and got more deliciousness. Then we walked back home, dropped our stuff off, and went to a camera shop to get Elli’s camera fixed. It was way on the other side of town we haven’t been to, on the very southern part of my map. We took a while to get there and got a little lost of the way, we when we finally found it, Elli realized her camera was a Sony, and the place only dealt with Canon. Luckily, we had an address for a Sony place, so we hopped back on the bus, then hopped off to find a taxi. We found a taxi driver who was about 70 years old and had no idea where we wanted to go, so he asked another taxi driver who knew where it was, but we still had to go with the old man, who drove tame for an Italian driver. As we drove, him and the other driver were yelling at each other across the intersection directions. Finally it seemed that our driver knew where we were going, so we just sat back and waited. We went literally all the way across town. We passed the Palantine and Circus Maximus, the Vittoriano, the Tiber, and up behind the Vatican, to the very Northern part of my map, where the driver dropped us off in exactly the right place. Accent, however, and sent us to a place that no longer exists. It has been closed for quite some time because the signs are turned around and there was mail shoved in the gates of the door. Realizing our defeat, we decided to head to a main road and try to find a bus with a bus stop we recognized. We ended up in the Pantheon area, and decided to visit Trevi while we were there. We also found a McDonald’s and rewarded ourselves from our journey with fresh hot French fries. We headed toward Argentina and browsed through souvenirs, then finally got on the tram for home, making it back four hours after we left. The best thing ever awaited us at home because Kari made dinner! It was so delicious! After dinner we failed at reading for class and had a jam session instead. After our adventure today I am confident that I could never be so lost in Rome that I could never find my home. Using huge churches as monuments doesn’t hurt!

In Napoli Where Love is King

Day 17: Sunday
I got so much sleep, it was amazing. Some man wandered into our room and started making noise at about 8am, and I drifted in and out of sleep from then until 10am when we decided to get up. We realized it was raining outside, but that didn’t stop us. We left our stuff at the hostel and made our way toward the first castle. We stopped at a shopping gallery and a piazza with a really cool church (Galleria Umberto and Piazza Plebiscito). We got to go inside for a brief moment before they kicked us out because service was about to start. Then we stopped to eat and I got a cheese pizza, which was better than the corn and ham one. It was still raining when we finished so we decided to order desert. This was a good choice. I got warm little doughnuts with sugar and nutella on it, Elli got white pudding/cheesecake stuff with strawberries (which was the best in my opinion), Dylan got a coffee thing called a BeBe, Joe got the same as me, and Brandon got a chocolate cake-type thing with ice cream and whipped cream and topping sauce. After our delicious desert, out waiter strangely made us tip him, which never happens in Europe, so he probably ripped us off. Oh well, it was only two euro. Then we made our way to the Castel Nuovo despite the rain, but we were disappointed to find it closed when we got there. We walked around the outside and took pictures, and we were right by the water, so we made our way down to the other castle. There was no beach so we walked along the piers that had just rocks where beach would’ve been. We saw some kitties on the way! When we arrived at the other Castle (Castel dell’Ovo) it was also closed, so we made our way back across town to the Duomo. It was strange that we saw little girls everywhere wearing wedding dress-looking dresses and taking pictures. We stopped at a piazza to get Grinita drinks and Dylan chased the pigeons. We had little hopes of the Duomo being open when we got there, and it wasn’t, but we sat outside chilling and deciding what to do next. Then a tour group came up and opened it, so we followed them inside. We couldn’t take pictures, but it was beautiful. We wandered around there for a while, it being the only thing we actually managed to see all day, then headed back to the hostel. We decided to see if there was a train earlier than the one we planned on taking, and there was, so we rushed to the train station and managed to get seats, but not together. The train was super crowded and there were a lot of people standing. I read all of Book 5 of Livy, which was surprisingly actually good and exciting. Finally! The Gauls arrive in Rome and it is very suspenseful. We got off the train and found the bus to Argentina, then got on the tram and finally made it home. It made Rome feel more like home because we were coming back from somewhere else to here, which is familiar. We showered, made dinner (buttered noodles), and I skyped my family and Jordan. Looking forward to sleep before class tomorrow, and it should be a busy last week in Rome trying to see all the rest of the sites. (I'm posting from the weekend so my my last post was actually written earlier, but now I am finally caught up! YAY!)

Castel Nuovo

Piazza Plebiscito

By the harbour with Vesuvius

Il Duomo

Pompeii

Day 16: Saturday
After three hours of sleep, which felt like none, Elli and I reluctantly woke up and started getting ready. At 7:15am we made our way to the tram, then to a taxi stand because we didn’t want to talk to Termini Station. The taxi driver totally ripped us off too. Then we tried to find our platform, but apparently not all the screens have all the trains, so we asked a man and he told us. We walked down the train looking for empty seats, and we passed a car that had some, so we got on it and got situated. A little while later Dylan realized we were in first class, so we  had to move to a different coach with yelling mothers and screaming babies (good thing they got off soon after). So strange how we managed to randomly pick the one car on the train that’s first class. After we moved and got resituated I tried to sleep but it wasn’t working so I just sat and listened to my music. I think I finally fell asleep for a little bit, but I woke up and got excited about looking out the window. I did a horrible job at reading any of Livy, but oh well. We arrived in Naples at about 11am, and stepped out into another new place. People had told me that Naples is kind of sketch, but so far I haven’t seen any of that. I think where they get this impression from is that Naples is definitely not as clean as Rome, and the buildings are not as well-kept. We started making our way toward our hostel, getting assaulted by men selling us iphones “for no money.” The other thing we noticed about Naples compared to Rome was that it seems like people actually live here, whereas in Rome you only see tourists or businessmen. Here you see children playing, laundry hanging everywhere, and people just hanging out. The drivers are almost even more crazy because they drive their vespas on the sidewalks and don’t wear helmets. It also seems to be the vehicle of choice for a family of three. The walk was longer than we would’ve liked, but we finally found the place. We rang the doorbell and called a billion times, but no one was answering. So we just waited outside until finally someone came and let us in. As he was checking us in, we started getting into a political discussion (of course we did, we’re Madison). He was also an American, so we updated him on the situation with the 2012 election and Obama and the lack of serious Republican candidates, and about the birther controversy and the Osama thing. We were getting so into it that we got yelled at twice by some bitchy Quebecois girls who were trying to sleep still, at noon. Finally we got to our room, which is shared with the guy who checked us in and another guy, both Americans with lots of tattoos. We put our stuff down and immediately got ready to head back to the train station to go to Pompeii. We stopped at a place for lunch where I had the most interesting meal I’ve had yet in Italy: A pizza with ham and corn. I definitely tried to order penne pasta, but I got this pizza instead, but oh well, it was good, just very strange to think of. After lunch we went to the train station, bought our tickets for Pompeii (4.50 euro round trip), then waited on the platform for the train. We weren’t 100 percent positive about what we were doing, so we watched the other group of American tourists and got on the train they did (it also said Pompeii, so it seemed promising). The train ride was about a half hour, and we were already exhausted. We finally made it to Pompeii though! Elli was lucky with her UK passport and only had to pay 5,50 euro, while the rest of us stupid Americans had to pay 11 euro. Oh well, it was totally worth it. I had pictured in my mind Pompeii to be as big as the Roman Forum; just a place to walk around and take pictures of for a couple hours, but I was completely wrong. First of all, you don’t just get to take pictures of the ruins, you actually walk on them and through them, just as Pompeians did. Another thing is that it slips your mind that Pompeii was an actual city. And not only was it a city, but most of it is still there. So we were amazed by how it just kept going and going in literally every direction. We walked around for hours taking pictures, and it was so awesome to walk through the streets and see the buildings that are so old. It is much easier to picture what it would’ve been like than the Roman Forum because the buildings are so well preserved. Another thing that struck me was the color. I had always imagined old Roman cities as being completely brick and marble with no color, but many walls in Pompeii had red or blue and pictures painted on them, as well as mosaics, which made me realize that it actually was more than bricks and marble. We were so happy when we found a functioning water fountain, and we stumbled into a big theater. I felt that we were able to appreciate the city a little more than other tourists because of our interest in and devotion to studying ancient Rome. We wandered back toward the front, where we bought postcards and realized there was a lot we hadn’t seen. Even though we were exhausted and just wanted to go home and go to bed, we decided to go back out and venture toward the giant amphitheater. It was cool, but not the Colosseum. Finally we made our way back to the train station, stopping for some slushies and sandwiches on the way. We had to stand on the ride home, which was unwelcoming since our feet hurt already, and of course I couldn’t reach the bars to hold onto. It was about 8pm when we finally wandered back into our hostel, where we collapsed, changed clothes, and went online. The host made a pasta dinner for everyone, so I wandered out to check that out, and there was the tattoo guys from our room, the bitchy Quebecois, a Brit, and a bunch of Asians. I had some pasta and started talking to some Asian girls, whom I found out were South Korean. We chatted about Italy, Asia, and America, and they were amused by the random Chinese sayings I know. After dinner I went back to the room, and now it is time to read some Livy until I fall asleep, very welcomingly. I’m exhausted.

Chillin in Pompeii

Columns

Elli and I

Being statues

The group in the Forum with Temple of Jupiter and Vesuvius in the background