Perpetually late.

Friday, February 6, 2009

On this fine morning, at the wee, tiny, not-supposed-to-ever-be-seen hour of 5am, I awoke to commence Adventure Roma. Of course I hit the snooze button. You know you’re tired when you get out of bed and walk across a freezing cold tile floor just to hit the snooze button and fumble back to the warmth of your mattress – which, if you’re me, looks more like the nest of some large, alien, bird-like creature.

Of course, I made us late. No, we didn’t have the misfortune of missing our 6:40 train, but we were at least 10 minutes later in arriving at the station than we had planned. We weren’t panicked, or even rushed, per-se, but it wasn’t a good feeling when we didn’t see our destination on the black and overbearing station schedule board. I went and asked one of the TranItalia representatives, and she pointed us in the right direction. It turns out our train’s final destination was, in fact, Naples. We dragged our sleep-heavy bodies over to track seven, certified our four-seat ticket, and boarded car numero sei.

The train ride was beautiful. Misty countryside made itself ever more visible as the sun rose over Italia. The train sped towards its destination through the hills, rather than over them, plunging its passengers into darkness at the sudden appearance of a tunnel and then blinding us with the light and the breathtaking landscapes that it divulged to our bleary eyes. With the scattered houses in Tuscan Gold hues with their Tarra Cotta rooftops, and the neatly lined forms of miles of vinyards, one was almost able to ignore the popping in ones ears. The further south I traveled on that train, the more hills we passed and the more castles and ancient-dwellings. The scenery was magical, and put me into a tired trance. Try as I did, I could not stay awake. I dozed off and woke up when we were about a half hour outside of Roma.

Upon our arrival in Roma, we immediately made our way to relieve ourselves…but toilettes were E0,80. Who pays to pee? I thought, Not Americans, that’s for damn sure.

So we followed the signs that led the way to where taxis were parked outside the station and took a ride from that point to Via Boezia, Colors Hotel. We travelers, new to the sights and sensations of Rome, had no idea how to get to the Hostel from the train. The taxi driver did. He weaved the van between other vehicles, buildings, and pedestrians alike. I felt like I was in a car chase on Cops.

We checked into the Hostel, gave our passport information – Jen had to call her father in the U.S. since she hadn’t brought even a copy of her passport – and paid our dues. We then dropped our bags in Nick’s single room since our quad wouldn’t be empty until 11am and then had to be cleaned. The cleaning process would take until 1pm-ish.

Not wanting to waste a minute of our weekend in Roma, we wandered to a Trattoria for lunch/breakfast…brunch, if you will. We all got sandwiches, and I ordered an Iced Café Latte. They didn’t know what an Iced Café Latte was. I explained in simple words and they looked at me like I was crazy, but obliged. The ice was mostly melted by the time I got the drink. At least they tried.

The Vatican we found in passing il Fiume Tiber. The view from the river of the dome of the church was beautiful, as was the river itself. Steps led down to it and, upon further examination, we discovered that there was actually a walking track that went along the length of the river. We walked around the Tiber for a while, admiring its general splendor and taking pictures. Nick had a moment of inspiration during which he decided to take and assemble six huge stones into pyramid shape. He was too proud. “No one will ever do what I have just done.” I asked him if he was going to sign it in any way, or leave his mark for others to find. “No, it has to be unanimous.” He meant anonymous.

I couldn’t help but to laugh my ass off. Already, within our first three hours in Rome, I had heard the best quote of the trip. It was unanimous. Oh, Nick.

I paid for Nick to get into the Vatican because he hadn’t stopped at an ATM before we got there. We walked up the granite steps, past a giant flat-screen T.V. and various Vatican City Guards, 

make our way to see the tombs of the Popes. I felt out of place with everyone crying. I also took accidental illegal pictures of the Popes’ tombs. They post signs, but for the most part they are in a different language (Italian, who would have thought?) or poorly placed.There was one tomb in particular that I found very striking. The casket itself was a beige yellow, but the top of the tomb was a metal likening to the Pope whose body resides within it. Jaimee called it the Batman tomb. I didn’t get a picture of it because it came into view after I had figured out that I wasn't supposed to take pictures. St. Peter's Basilica was also strikingly beautiful.

We exited the tombs and got in line to climb to the very top of the Vatican church to its cupola, or dome. When we bought our tickets there was an offer to pay an extra E2 for a lift ride (elevator ride) up the first three hundred or so stairs. Who needs a lift?! We scaled the first three hundred and continued up the more than 320 steps that followed those. We came to a platform situated between all of the domes on the East side of the Vatican where we could catch our breath and take some pictures that resulted in our breath being taken away yet again.

It took another hundred or so steps to get into the actual dome where we were afforded some arial views of the inside of the church...through a fence that had probably been installed to keep people from jumping. 

 We then walked down the steps and into the actual church where we walked around more and took pictures. Some of my group prayed. I sat observing the marble sculptures around the top half of the church. Some of the people depicted - angels, i guessed them - were doing strange things like holding onto a unicorn’s horn, or holding the earth down with their foot, or pushing a dog away. One was standing on the head of a man who was holding a serpent.

We left the church, passed the poor Vatican guards who are required to dress similar to court jesters, and went around the outside wall of the Vatican city to the Vatican museum where we had to pass more body guards to enter…one winked at me. *Shrug* Inside the Vatican museums are various exhibits. They all looked very interesting, but we only walked through the Egypt exhibit and the Sistine Chapel.

The Sistine Chapel was never ending. Made of up a multitude of rooms absolutely filled wall-to-wall with fine works of art, by the time we actually made it to the Chapel we were completely exhausted. The half of the museum following the Chapel was a complete blur to my tired eyes and feet and legs and buttocks. I just wanted to lie down at that point and pass out.

I did wonder at how intricate a display the Vatican is…all for something which has not been proven to exist; the epitome of faith. It was as if I were at a shrine for Harry Potter or something – a whole lot of people into something that doesn’t necessarily exist.

We left, exhausted, and chose a path strategically leading towards our Hostel. On the way we stopped for pizza. Jaimee and I shared a Prosciutto pizza and a mozzarella and tomato salad.  I paid for Nick yet again, so at that point he owed me E14,50.

We walked a good three blocks towards the Hostel when Nick realized that he had lost his EuroRail Pass. He acted as if it didn’t even matter, but Jen suggested he go back to the restaurant and look to see if it was there. He did, and it was. He said the owner looked upset that he had actually came back for it. The guy probably wanted to take a nice vacation.

We met back up with Nick at the Hostel where we all took a three-hour nap. It was the most glorious nap ever taken in the history of mankind – 5.30pm to 8.10pm-ish. We hadn’t planned on sleeping for so long, but we also hadn’t planned on our Quad room having down comforters. Excellent.

After my nap I put makeup on my “naked” face, and we all made for the Spanish Steps, dinner, the Trajan Column, and Trevi Fountain

Steps were our first stop, where we took several corny pictures. We then hit up a pizzaria for dinner and dessert. PHENOMINAL. Home-made wheat pasta with clams mussels and prawns and Black Truffel Gelato. I would make the trip back to Rome simply to eat at this restaurant. We actually all go different desserts so that we could each try each others and it was WELL worth it. Outside we saw a Ferrari and the driver revved its engine for us. The night was shaping up to be an amazing one. What we thought was the Trajan column ended up being a replica, but we did see the Trevi fountain. When we walked up to the fountain this Indian guy gave us free roses and offered to take our pictures with our cameras...and then asked for Euro. We should have known. Another Indian guy harassed Nick and Courtney - yet another asked me for a kiss and asked Jen if she was Chinese (duh). The men were all from Mumbai, India...and they were really quite obnoxious.

We escaped the onslaught of crazy Indian dudes and made it back to the Steps. As we gazed upon the gorgeous expanse of Rome, we thought how nice it would be to have a bottle of wine to share between the five of us, but we hadn't seen any open shops on the way there. We decided we would go back tomorrow to drink and hang out on the Spanish Steps all night.

The sky was clearing around 1am, and the view from the top of the Steps was indescribable. I felt as if my life was spread out before me in the form of a beautifully aged city; felt like the world was just waiting for me and that if I reached just a bit further I could grasp the stars that were strewn across that captivating night sky. Walking back, we passed fountains and the Fiorne Tiber.

I fell asleep to the sound of revving engines on the street outside.

Tomorrow: Apple store, campo di fiori, colosseum, roman forum, etc. Lunch at the same place we ate dinner, dinner @ campo di fiori, and wine on the Steps.

I finally fell asleep at 3am