Roman Holiday, Part 1: When in Rome I Don't Do as the Romans Do

Last weekend we went to Rome. This happened over my 32nd birthday. We left on Thursday afternoon from Nice. We arrived at the Rome airport which was about 30 minutes outside of the city toward the Mediterranean coast after a flight which took less than an hour. Upon getting off the airplane, we set about the task of getting to our booked bed and breakfast, Casa Linnea. I had it in my mind that we were going to take public transportation, but when we went to the "tourist information" window in the terminal we were promptly booked on a shuttle. I think this was because my first attempt at Italian was ridiculously bad and the guy automatically knew we would hopelessly fumble around for an apartment building in a neighborhood that wasn't a tourist area. In the end we were glad to have an air conditioned transport that took us strait to the door. On the ride over, the driver took a very small detour to show us St. Peter's Square which was terrifically beautiful. Our B&B was about 10 blocks from the square. During the transport my first observations were of the "Roman Nose" and how beautifully dressed everybody was. I definitely did not blend in with the natives.

We pulled up to what appeared to be an apartment building. There was a label by a doorbell, however, that read Casa Linnea so we were relieved to have found it. A German girl named Cornelia, or Constance, or Corrina, or some name that started with a C booked us in. We promptly met Claus, the Swede who was sharing the apartment with us. It was very cute, and our room was quite comfortable. The cable television didn't really work, but, if that's the worst complaint then that's not too bad. Claus was with his girlfriend Erica, and their three adult children who were on holiday. C-girl gave us a map with all the sights marked on it and directions to the Metro station. When we asked about where to eat nearby she didn't really have a recommendation, so we had to explore.

What we found was an awesome neighborhood. (C-girl could have told us this, maybe she did and I didn't catch it.) As mentioned before, it was off the tourist path, so there was a bit of a local feel. An impromptu market formed one street (Via) up from us with dresses, purses, belts, sunglasses, etc. with other specialty food shops, a knife and sword shop, and best of all, a gelato stand. We tried looking for a restaurant, and after trying to get a table at a couple of places we ended up at the ristorante on the corner, called San Marco.  Ty ordered pizza and I ordered a rigatoni with sausage, sage and some type of grated cheese. It was terrific! I attempted Italian again and accidentally ordered white wine instead of red wine, but was actually glad in the end. We decided to eat there the next night too.

The next morning we set out for an adventure. Neither of us are super experienced travelers, having opted more often for resort-style luxury than do-it-ourselves accommodation. But we decided it looked easy enough to get on the Metro and take it to the Colosseum. On our way to the Metro we found the Tribunali, which we assumed was some type of courthouse. It looked busy, the streets around it were lined with small "smart car" sized vehicles and scooters. At least in that respect, we might fit in with our scooter, though I would never ever ever want to drive in Rome.

At the Colosseum, we were immediately approached by an American trying to get us to sign up for a tour. I was skeptical at first, but again in the end, I was glad that we forked over the $40 E for the tour because there were no signs describing what the hell we were looking at nor to contextualize some of the most fascinating shit in human history. The purchase also included a tour of the Palatine hill. That was also fortunate due to lack of signage. As we were touring through the Colosseum, it began to get really hot. Our tour guide in fact suggested that we all go have a long lunch in some air conditioning and get out of the heat. He recommended that we come back to the Palatine Hill for the last tour at 5:30 that evening. Ty and I thought that was a good idea, but instead of sticking around we decided to go to the Trevi Fountain and cool off.

This was a mistake. I assumed that people would be partying IN the fountain, but as it turns out, that's not allowed. So while it was beautiful and magnificent, we ended up walking for over an hour in probably 98 degree humid heat to a fountain that we couldn't get in where there were also about 2,000 people. This was not a relief from the heat in any fashion.

Just about to jump in any way.

It was then required that we find some AC. I have definitely inherited a "sweaty gene" from my father, and when I reach a certain temperature I start my own fountain. This was happening the entire time we were in Rome. It was like I was at a concert or something and had my most groovy groove happening, but all I was actually doing was walking at a leisurely pace. So we went from cute restaurant to restaurant, but did not find air conditioning until we passed by a McDonald's. It was the best crispy McChicken I've had in years. One thing of note though, they charge for ketchup. That's a little weird.

After I'd regained some glandular composure, we decided that we were close enough to the Pantheon and had enough time before the 5:30 Palatine Hill tour to continue our hellish trek. The city was not built on a grid, that's for sure. Grids must have been too easy for these very industrious, intelligent and ambitious Romans. We did our very best impression of tourists with our map, backpack and Ty's hat. But any way, we eventually guided our way to the Pantheon. Here we needed a tour guide. It was very confusing that a building named the Pantheon on the outside became the Basilica of St Mary and the Martyrs on the inside. It was also two very different architectural styles. The best explanation we could come up with was that the Christians were into recycling, one of their more virtuous tenets, I guess. Or else they were in a hurry, or lazy.

We ran out of water at the Pantheon, a crisis in consideration of my "problem." We started looking around for our next $5 bottle of water when we noticed something at first strange, then thought to be gross, then known as the next miracle. People were filling their water bottles out of the fountains! I went up to an American and asked him if he was a glutton for some giardia or what? and he replied it was as pure as the rain from the sky. I was skeptical, but also damp, so I decided, When in Rome.... This ended up being one of the coolest discoveries of our trip! There are little flowing water fountains all over the place, and they come from Roman aquifers that are thousands of years old but still work to deliver cool, clean, good-tasting water. Who'd have known?

It was time to head back to the Palatine Hill. I didn't know why this was a place to be visited, but, I thought that maybe the Forum was there and I remember a little something about the Forum from the three or four days I attended my Western Civilization class as a freshman at Boulder. It was ringing a bell. Plus, we'd already paid for a tour. As we walked our way back through the muggy heat, we came across some ruins that a high-rise builder accidentally found as he started excavation for his luxury condos. D'oh! I also made my first of three stops into a Farmacia, this time for some baby powder. (Skirts are good for some things and not others.)

I had wrestled the map away from Ty's detouring ass and decided that we should walk by the Circus Maximus on our way back to the Palatine Hill. It was clearly marked on our map and not too far out of the way, or so I thought. I had visions of Charlton Heston racing his horse-drawn chariot and the unfortunate actor who's last credit was for getting trampled. I expected more crowds, broken down columns, and some type of tourist trap involvement. How I lamented when we found that not only did the Circus Maximus look like something out of an African track and field expo, there again were no signs, and to top it off, we walked the long way around the base of the Palatine Hill (no topographical component to our map) and there weren't any trees or shade or elevators. It wasn't even worth taking a picture. I handed the map back to Ty.

So the Palatine Hill. Pretty cool. Basically the birthplace of modern civilization. All you need to know really. We had a fantastic tour from a very funny and hot (in more than one way) South African dude. He finally gave us the long version of the legend of how Rome was founded, the Saga of Remus and Romulus. I won't recount it here as I'm tiring of typing. But the best part of this tour was that he made us feel that eating at McDonald's was the best decision we had made all day. He cursed the food around Rome as "tourist shitholes" and gave us some advice as to where to go for actual good food, Campo di Fiori square. He also advised us to quit trying to see all the sites and take back a Grappa on ice. We heeded all this advice. Stay tuned for Roman Holiday, Part Due: Happy Birthday to Me for the next installment. It's time to have some more dinner in Nice.