Italia Part One!

On Wednesday morning, October 27th, I woke up at the butt-crack of dawn to go to Italy. I left the house at 6:45 and hopped on the metro. I left so early because I didn't know how long it was going to take to get to the airport via metro. It didn't take that long so by the time I had checked-in and gone through security I was 2 hours early for my flight.  I ate an overpriced apple-tart and juice and watched the sunrise while waiting for my plane to board.  The flight over was super easy.  I slept the majority of the way and when I woke up we were getting ready to land.  I made it to the hotel from the airport with ease.  I checked in and rested a bit since I was already tired.  Finally I decided that if I lay there any longer I would never get up. So I put on my coat and boots and headed out to explore a bit.

I walked around the majority of the center of town.  I saw the Colosseum, the Roman forum and other 2000 + year old buildings.  It was weird to think that these things have been around that long, especially since the area around the Colosseum is basically a traffic circle. Nonetheless I enjoyed walking around and breathing in some fresh Italian air.  I must have had my weirdo magnet on full power because some Indian guy who was living in Paris asked me a question then wouldn't leave me alone while he told me his life's story and confessed his love to me.  I finally managed to get rid of him when I gave him my telephone number, which I made up off the top of my head.  By that point it was getting dark and I had no desire to walk around a strange city alone in the dark so I headed back to the hotel to relax.  I didn't even eat dinner because I was so tired I just ended up falling asleep.  At midnight I got my first text from Dad saying his plane was having mechanical issues and it would be delayed.  I fell back asleep and at 3:30 am I woke up and realized I hadn't heard anything more from Dad.  So being so smart like I am, I pulled up flight tracker, and realized that when Dad's plane should have been over the middle of the Atlantic Ocean he was just leaving Canada, meaning he was not going to get in until 3 hours later than expected.  So I fell back asleep anxious for his arrival.


On Thursday morning I woke up early enough so that I could have breakfast in the hotel.  It was pretty basic but I was satisfied with my yogurt and croissant.  When I was finished I went back to the room to wait for Dad. I got ready to go out for the day etc, and when that was done I watched some TV.  Once 12pm rolled around I was beginning to wonder where Dad was.  So I checked again to make sure his plane had made it safely (it had).  All of a sudden there was a knock on the door. I bolted out of bed and opened it and there was Dad with the front-desk lady.  I was so happy I cried (a lot, and I had just done my makeup so I looked quite lovely if I do say so myself.)  After Dad settled in we went to meet our tour guide so we could do our 1st tour of the Catacombs and other mysterious places in Rome.  Our guide wasn't much older than me and he was definitely a history nerd because he told us a lot of things that we didn't necessarily need to know to enjoy the tour.  The first thing we did was go on a tour of the catacombs, or underground burial places on the outskirts of the city.  It was crazy underground there.  There was a maze of passageways and multiple levels.  You could easily get lost if you didn't have someone with you who knew what they were doing.  Most of the graves had been opened and robbed hundreds of years before, but there were still some closed ones which was kind of creepy.

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Next we went to a Capuchin monastery to see one of the weirdest things I've ever seen in my life.  The decorations for this monastery are human bones.  No, I am not lying.  The legend goes that the Capuchin monks were removed from their first monastery so they brought the bones of all their deceased with them.  Then one day a convict or refugee or someone of that sort from France sought refuge with the monks.  Apparently he was the one that began designing things with these bones.  Nonetheless it's pretty crazy to see.  They basically used every bone in the body as part of these murals.  It definitely something you have to go and see if you are ever in Rome.  After that we went to a church that was built in the 12th century, below that church was another church from the 4th century, and below the church was a house from the 2nd century.  It was crazy to compare the 12th century church in Rome to the one I saw in Salamanca.  They were so different!! Rome's was infinitely more ornate that that of Salamanca.  The 4th century church had some artifacts leftover from when it was a functioning church, but the house didn't have much more than the structure.  It was still an amazing thing.  They attribute this type of thing to the annual flooding of the river.  Before they put reinforced walls around the river it would flood the surrounding area and made buildings uninhabitable.  Instead of trying to rebuild everything that was destroyed, the Romans would simply cover everything up and build again on top.  That's why whenever they try to dig underground in Rome they find all of these ancient buildings and artifacts and they have to stop everything so archeologists can come in and see what they can recover (if it's worth it).

After our tour we were really hungry since we hadn't eaten much lunch.  Our tour guide recommended a place to eat dinner so we made a reservation for 7:15 when it opened.  It was only 6:20 though so we had some time to waste.  We went to another restaurant around the corner that was already open and had some wine while we split an antipasto that had the best ricotta cheese I've ever eaten on it.  Finally when we finished that it was time to go to the other restaurant for the rest of our dinner. We split some eggplant parmesan and then each had a main course.  I had some amazing pasta with shrimp.  Then we split dessert.  After that we were full, happy, and tired so we went back to the hotel, skyped with Mom and Carolyn for a bit, then went to bed.

Outside the Vatican Museum.

On Friday we had to get up early so that we could be at the Vatican for 9 am.  The woman at the front desk seems very distraught that we were not eating breakfast even though we assured her we'd be find and took a croissant to go.  Once at the Vatican we met up with our tour guide, Luca (who is probably the only red-headed Italian I'll ever meet).  Luca proceeded to give us a 4 1/2 hour tour of everything that is Vatican City.  It was pretty amazing I have to say.  However, there were tons of people and it made it difficult to walk around without bumping into people or thousand plus year old things.

Trevvi Fountain

 After we had finished with the tour Luca brought us to a local Italian deli.  It was Dad and I and this group of crazy middle-aged ladies who were unfortunately from the US.  So Dad and I did our best to try and ignore them.  We spit an antipasto of Italian meats and mozzarella cheese which was delicious.  Then we each had a homemade pasta dish.  All of this plus bread, and wine only cost €20. After that we walked to Piazza Novena where we ate original tartufo (accept not imitations!!!)  After eating dessert in the Piazza we went to the Pantheon and chilled out there a bit.  Then we went to Trevvi fountain.  After throwing a coin in the fountain for each of my family members, we were tired so we went back to the hotel and took short naps and rested a bit.  After resting we went out again and went to the Spanish steps (where some guy basically thrust some roses upon me and made Dad pay for them). Then we went to the Trevvi fountain again because Dad said at night it's all lit up, but it was too early and there was no way I was going to wait until then. So instead we went and got some dinner at this restaurant right around the corner from the house.  We both had pizza and wine.  It was delicious.  After that we called it a night.