Rome

Pulling into Rome was kind of surreal. It's nice that at this point in the trip that we aren't "used to" being in these major iconic cities, each one still takes us by surprise. We still feel overwhelmed and incredibly excited to be in these places- though we can now navigate a subway system like it's nobody's business (knock on wood...). We didn't have a host or anywhere booked, so we used our guidebook to pick a few places close-by and called when we got into the train station. Marisa was slightly disappointed when the first woman told her that a bed in her hostel was 24 euro per person, but when she explained that it was too much for us to pay, the woman wanted to bargain. We ended up getting the room for 15 euro per person that night, and Marisa discovered a hidden skill- one that would be honed and perfected in the coming days. Starving after a day of travel, but in need of a cheap meal after a few days in the Cinque Terre, we turned to our Let's Go book for a suggestion. They reccommended a restaurant right around the corner, whose pizza was apparently "delectable," and wine cheap at 1.10 per quarter liter. Sounds great.

To start, the restaurant is empty and over-lit. The white linen table clothes meet awkwardly with basement foamboard cieling tiles. The pizza is far from delectable- the crust was that of a low-grade frozen pizza, no, the whole thing tasted like a low-grade frozen pizza. The "creamy pasta al forno" turned out to be limp lasagna noodles in a watery meat ragu. Marisa's white wine, though cheap as advertised, was room temperature. Andy's glass of red was colder. We left feeling discouraged, and wondering if maybe we shouldn't be trusting a guidebook written by college students to choose our restaurants for us. The upshot of the night was when Marisa reached into her pocket and found the foil-wrapped block of pecorino cheese left over from the night before. That cheese, we determined, saved the day. On the way home, Marisa bargained her way to a cheap bottle of red wine.

Because there was so much to see in Rome, Marisa carefully plotted our course around the city for the next two days. On day one, we got an early start. We saw the Colloseum, the Roman Forum, and Palantine Hill. It was crazy to be in a large, modern city, and then all of a the Colloseum is right in front of you, or some other unidentifiable structure equally as old. For lunch, we stopped at a pizzeria downtown. We thought it would be a good choice due to the lack of English speaking patrons. We observed for a few minutes before venturing to put our order in. There were about three people behind the counter, each with a pair of giant scissors that they would use to cut the foccacia style pizza into a strip however large or small you desired. It was then weighed, and priced by the 100 g. Our phrasebook Italian didn't fool the good-hearted man behind the counter who laughed when I ordered, and asked me how large I wanted my piece of the pizza with tomatoes, basil, and buffalo mozzarella cheese. It was so good I went back for more- this time with zucchini and cheese. Andy enjoyed pizza too.

That night we attended a couchsurfing event held on the outskirts of town. For 12 euro per person, we could enjoy as much food and wine as we could stuff in ourselves. We had checked out of the hostel that morning, hoping that we might be able to find a host at the dinner. We were in luck. We met a gentelman named Richard before the event started, all three of us wandering around some part of town in search of it. We ended up sitting at the same table and chatted for much of the night. He is from Frankfurt, Germany, and living in Rome for just a few months in order to improve his Italian (we were not able to help with that). When it was time to go, he saw our backpacks and offered us his couch. We very happily accepted. Marisa ate several baby shrimp at the dinner,thinking that they were golden raisins, and we both enjoyed the seemingly endless jugs of wine. Richard was pretty busy during the day, but did manage to show us a few little pastry shops near his house where we picked up some snacks.

The next day we saw a LOT. We started with the Vatican. We ticked off the Vatican Museums (Sistine Chapel) and Saint Peter's Basilica in the morning. St. Peter's was the most ornate of all the churches we have been in. The artwork here was also very impressive- mosaics that I could have sworn were paintings, and massive magnificent sculptures. After the Vatican, we made our way to the Pantheon. Here, I was very confused. As we walked up to the entrance, I turned to Andy and said, "wait, no, this isn't it, this is a church..." Little did I know that the Pantheon (meaning many gods!) was transformed into a Catholic Church. I was expecing ancient ruins, not a well kept ancient structure displaying opulant crosses and other religious symbols. I do realize that it is because of this transformation from pagan house of worship to Catholic church that it is the best kept ancient Roman building, but I can't help but think that it's a little strange and even perverse.

Some food that we enjoyed that is definitely worth mentioning: Jewish style fried artichokes from a little restaurant in the Jewish Ghetto, pasta cacio e pepe and rabbit (guess who had what...) at a restaurat that my mom and dad reccommended in the Trastevere section of town.

Next: Amalfi Coast + Sicily