Arrividerci Roma

Today is our last day in Rome.  The children and I have spent it packing, and unpacking, and repacking, and running errands.  Tom has spent it schlepping our big suitcases up to studio for storage purposes.

Tomorrow we turn in our keys to the apartment, and get a train to Salerno.  From there we will get a bus to Amalfi for a few days by the sea.  We will cap off our Italian adventure with two days in Naples.  One day for Pompeii, one for the Archeological Museum. 

How sad to be leaving.  It feels like we just got here.  Maybe we can come back again sometime. 

I will not be posting again until we get back to the Good Old US of A.  See you on the flip side.

Fiat Cinquecento

I have to tell you something.  I don’t like to drive fast.  I do all my fast driving vicariously through my fondness for Formula One and Formula One drivers.  A high performance car would be wasted on me.  What I like, what I really, really like, are the teeny tiny cars.  Cars like the Volkswagen Beetle (old and new), the Mini, the Smart Car and the granddaddy of them all, the Fiat Cinquecento.  These are the greatest little cars ever.  I love them.  They have started making them again, but I think the originals are about the same vintage as old school VW Beetles. 

They have little canvas roofs that fold back, and just about enough room for four.  And they are so small.  I think you could probably fit two of them in a standard sized parking place.  Maybe even three.

All of this leads me to my story for today.  One of K’s Italian friends has a 1964 Cinquecento.  And he is the original owner.  The original owner, of a car that is 4 years older than I am.  Wow.  So today he took me out for a quick tour of Rome in his car.  Oh.  My.  God. 

First of all, I have to say, this car is in immaculate condition.  He obviously loves it very much.  It still has the original engine in it.  He showed it to me.  I think there are lawnmowers out there with bigger engines.  Hilarious.  The dashboard is just a speedometer.  And it has a push-button starter, and no seat belts.  Apparently you just have to hope you are thrown clear of the wreckage in case there’s an accident.

This particular model also has a little something the later models do not have.  The doors are on backwards.  Apparently this was a quirk of the very earliest models, and in 1965 they started putting the doors on the right way round. 

 

So we all got in the car and went putt-putt-putting all around Rome.  He took me up the Aventine hill where there is less traffic.  This is good, because no matter what else is on the road the Cinquecento is the smaller, weaker car.  And this was my first trip up the Aventine Hill.  It’s very pretty up there, very green and quiet.

We drove around for about half an hour and then K’s friend had to go to a meeting.  So he drove over to the Pantheon (!) and parked in the Pantheon parking lot.  Not many people get to park by the Pantheon.  I didn’t even know it had a parking lot.  Amazing. 

And he told me something else that was very cool.  At his country house he has a Citroen 2CV.  I love those too!

 

The Spanish Grand Prix report

Ah, our last Sunday in Rome. I will give you three guesses how I spent it.

1. Enjoying a lovely day with my family
2. Packing
3. Sitting in a faux Irish pub drinking wildly overpriced beverages watching racecars on the TV.

If you guessed C you win the prize.  And the prize is:  the satisfaction of a job well done.

First I went to Mad Jacks, but the sign out front said Roma today at 3.  So I knew they would have football on their TVs, not racecars.  This was an unacceptable situation.  So instead I went to the Abbey Theatre, another faux Irish pub down by Piazza Navona.  Tom had marked it for me on the map.

I walked in and the bartender said “are you here for the racing then?”  I said yes and he said, “I thought you would be”.  I was of course wearing my full Alonso/Renault kit.  So I had a half pint of Harp lager and settled in.

The race itself was not the best.  Heikki Kovalainen had a terrible accident on lap 22. He had a wheel failure and speared the tire wall.  They had to call in the medical team, and he was airlifted to the hospital.  Reports from those who know say he has a concussion but should be fine to race in Turkey in two weeks.  That is a huge relief because it was a really scary crash and it seemed to take forever for the medical crew to get to him.  I’m not sure if it really took that long, or if it just seemed like it because I was worried about Heikki. 

And then, Alonso’s engine went kablammo on lap 34.  Stupid Bloody Renault.  And it was his home race too.  Oh, well.  He gets another home race in Valencia later this summer.  The good news is, the Renault was looking much quicker, right up until the time the engine blew up.  Alonso was fine.  He parked the car on the side of the track and went up the hill to wave to the fans in General Admission.  What a nice guy.

I stayed to watch the end but my heart wasn’t really in it anymore.  It is kind of weird to watch without the volume.  Even though I wouldn’t understand the commentary, it would have been nice to hear the engine noises.

Oh, Kimi Raikonnen won in his Ferrari, his teammate Felipe Massa was second and McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton rounded out the top three.  Congratulations to all of them.

Brunch

We went over to Team G’s house for brunch this morning.  M called early with a grocery crisis.  She wanted to know if I knew whether or not they had maple syrup at Standa.  I told her I wasn’t sure but I would stop and check on our way up.  However, I had a moment of inspiration and we stopped at that funny little shop with the American groceries instead.   They did have pure maple syrup, in tiny little bottles, for 6 euro.  But you really can’t have pancakes without syrup.  Hard to believe the semester is over and we are all packing up.  Brunch was a lot of fun.  Friend One made everybody omelets and there were pancakes and fruit salad and fried potatoes.  We all sat around in the kitchen chatting.  We will most likely be home before we see them again.  That is kind of weird.

After brunch we walked over to the Castel St. Angelo and did a lap.  We walked across the Ponte St. Angelo, which has a lot of statues along it designed by Bernini.  They are very pretty.  We did a lap and split a bottle of water.  Then we decided to take the stairs down to the river level and walk down that sidewalk toward home.  It’s nice down there.  Our side of the river was in the shade, and you can’t hear the traffic noise down there.  At one point we passed a little island and saw a beaver sitting there minding his own business.  Not what you expect to see in the middle of a big city, but he didn’t seem to mind.  We suspect this must be the same beaver Tom and the kids saw back in January. 

The kids were getting hungry so we stopped at Pizzarius for a snack and then came home.  I made one of my last trips to Standa and did some packing.   I feel like I have purged a lot of stuff, but there still seems to be a ton to pack.  Fortunately I still have one whole duffel bag I haven’t even started filling yet.  I will have to work on it some more tomorrow.  Of course I still have to finish the laundry first.

While we were at Team G’s today I got on their scale.  It was way off, and sat at 20 kilos even without anything on it.  But I couldn’t resist and I got on it anyway.  It said I weigh 49 kilograms.  This seems unlikely because I think that is only about 100 pounds, and while I know I have lost some weight, I doubt very highly I have lost that much. Actually, it’s 108 pounds, I just did the math.

 

Gladiators

Today was Italian Independence Day.  All the grocery stores were closed, but not the tourist sites of course! 

The children and I hung out around the house this morning, took a quick run around the playground.  We met Tom and Russ at studio at 1:30.  But first we did a lap of Tiber Island.  It was on the C-man’s list of things to do again.  I suggested we do it this afternoon.  He was kind of not sure he wanted to do it.  He said, “Well I want to do that someday”.  I had to tell him that we are fast running out of somedays and it might be a now or never situation.  So we went.  We walked all the way to both ends and all the way around it.  I took some pictures.

When we met Tom he was in the last throes of an end-of-semester meeting, so we spent some time hanging around studio.  There were a surprising amount of students there checking their email and whatnot.  I think we are all kind of ready to go.  I don’t exactly want to go home, but I think I am ready to leave Rome.  All the one-last-times are getting to me.  I hate long goodbyes.  I think part of me would just like to get on a train tomorrow and go somewhere else.  But then, who would do the packing?

After the meeting we walked down the Via Foro Imperiale to the Colosseum.  This was another thing on the C-man’s list.  It was actually pretty cool walking down that way.  They had closed the road to traffic, I’m not sure why, so you could just walk down the middle of the street.  This meant there was actually enough room for all the people trying to walk down the road, which made a nice change.

Once we got to the Colosseum we headed around the corner to a small excavation site.  It turns out this is where they used to train the Gladiators before they went to the big show at the Colosseum.  I have to say; I don’t really see why you need to train the gladiators.  I thought the whole point of the gladiator fights was for everybody to end up dead when they were over.  But I guess they did have to put on a good show.  Who knows?  It just strikes me as odd.

When we had finished admiring the Colosseum we walked back into town for a stop at Gelateria della Palma.  Good grief was it crowded there.  They were three and four deep at the ice cream counter.  You couldn’t even get a good look at all the flavors.  This is a shame because there are about a zillion flavors there and it is fun to wander down the cases trying to decide what you want.  Plus, many of them are very pretty colors.  But today, that was not to be.  We squeezed in and squeezed out, and ate our gelati standing in the street.  The Piazza della Rotunda (in front of the Pantheon) was wall-to-wall people.  I think because of the holiday today, but it was definitely a sign of things to come.  Or perhaps, how things already are.  I don’t think we will be going there again if we can avoid it. 

Then this evening we all went up the Janiculum to watch the sunset.  Actually you don’t watch the sun set, you watch the city of Rome while the sun sets behind you, but the light is amazing.  We fed the kids dinner at their usual time, and then walked up there.  Russ, Tom and I had dinner after we got the kids to bed.  We had a fine time catching up some more, and comparing notes about Rome.

 

Catching up

Sorry to be quiet the last couple days.  Our friend Russ is in town, and we have been hanging out with him in the evenings after the children go to bed.  But I will catch you up on our week now.

Tuesday the kids actually got moving in the morning and we went to Santa Maria della Concezione, otherwise known as the Bone Church!  Woo Hoo!  We have been trying to get there for ages.   The crypt is actually not in the church; it is downstairs in the basement for extra creepiness.

You pay a donation to get in, and the nice lady tells you not to take pictures.  There are four chapels (I guess you would call them) decorated with the bones of several hundred dead Capuchin monks.  C-man was fascinated.  Even the light fixtures were made out of tiny bones.  Princess O, on the other hand was pretty creeped out.  She made it all the way down to the end of the crypt, but she beat a hasty retreat when I told her she didn’t have to wait for us.  She met us in the center chapel, (no bones in that one) and then we all walked out together.  C-man got a couple postcards, but the Princess decided she would rather wait and get postcards of pretty things.

After our visit to the crypt we went upstairs to visit the church.  The guidebook said there wasn’t much to see in the church and they were correct.  But they were having an organ music concert when we arrived so we sat for a bit listening to Bach on the organ.  By the way, I only know it was Bach because the woman at the door gave us a program and told me so.

When we had heard enough organ music and started to get hungry we walked down to the Spanish Steps and the Fancy McDonalds in the Piazza di Spagna.  C-man has decided this is the fanciest McDonalds in the world. 

It rained while we were eating but stopped conveniently just as we were ready to leave. We wandered slowly home.  First stop was the Trevi Fountain.  But we stopped in a few souvenir stores on the way.  We were in once such store when a man came up to me and asked where they could find the McDonalds.  We left the shop at the same time they did, so I walked back down the street with them and pointed them toward the Piazza di Spagna.  I hope they found it okay.  The Trevi Fountain was surprisingly uncrowded.  I wonder if the rain had driven all the people away.  We didn’t stay long, just long enough to take a couple last photos.

Of course the next stop, on this our usual walk, was the Pantheon.  We ducked in there too and that wasn’t very crowded either.  Strange. We stared at the hole in the roof, and walked over to Raphael’s grave for one last visit.  It was great to have one last jaunt through town with the kids.  That really has been my favorite thing to do while we’ve been here.

When we got home I made an early dinner for the kids and we walked up to studio for the final gallery show.  All the students had pinned up their best projects and had their sketchbooks out on the table in the library opened to their favorite sketch. Princess O and the C-man had their sketchbooks in the show too.

Russ came home with us for a late dinner and we had a fine time catching up.

Wednesday morning the kids and I took it easy and hung around the house.  We met Tom after lunch and we wandered over to the Vatican for one last peek at St. Peter’s.  So the children got to show me the baby on the baldacchino after all.  I never would have found it by myself, because it is on the marble base, and I had been looking at the brass columns.  Silly me.

Tom went back to the office and Russ and I rode the bus home with the kids.  We took Russ to Fior di Luna for an afternoon snack.  We hung out at home for an hour or so waiting for Tom.  He and Russ had a drink (I opted out) and then Amy came over to watch the kids while we went out for dinner.  We went to that restaurant on the other side of Santa Maria in Trastevere, tucked right up next to the church.  Tom and I had wanted to try it.  I finally got to have suppli.  These are balls of risotto with a bit of mozzarella in the middle, then rolled in some kind of breadcrumbs and deep-fried. Wow, are they good.  Part of me is glad I didn’t discover these earlier, and part of me wishes I had been eating them every day. 

And that brings us to today.  I called E to arrange a play date with L.  E had told me last week that she didn’t have school today.  But she was wrong.  L did have school today.  So instead of coming down here she invited us up there for after school.  We went up at about 4 and then went to Villa Sciarra where the children spent a very wet hour catching tadpoles in the fountain.  I was pretty sure the C-man was going in head first on a number of different occasions.

This morning we went to the playground and then Pizzarius for lunch.  Calvin had pizza margherita, I had potato pizza with sausage and Olivia had chicken strips!  She said they were good.  They looked pretty good.  I would have had a suppli but they didn’t have any.  We also took a walk around Trastevere this afternoon and poked into some alleys and little streets we hadn’t been down before.  I walked them over to gate by the Villa Farnesina and then back, then down the street with the Chinese restaurant and back. I hadn’t brought my map so we didn’t want to get too adventurous.  Maybe next week.

Food, glorious food

Suddenly I feel like I don’t have any time left at all.  We had some friends over for dinner tonight.  They have been in Italy all year, and will be here for the next two years as well.  I think they leave for home about a month after we do.  We were comparing notes tonight about what we miss.  And we agreed the thing that sticks out for all of us is food.  Specifically American junk food and Chinese food.

For example, I could really use a bag of Doritos, the kind with two flavors in one bag. I can’t remember now which two flavors I like, but I will know them when I see them.  And really, I have never met a Dorito I didn’t like so I am sure any kind would be delicious.  The really odd thing is, I almost never buy them when I’m home and can have them any time I want, I only seem to want them because I can’t get them.

Princess O meanwhile is pining for Cheetos. 

I’m not really sure what the C-man is longing for.  Probably Kraft macaroni and cheese or maybe pizza.  I know, I know, we are in pizza central right now. But, you see, it is not the right kind of pizza.  He has been a good sport, and found some pizza places that he likes, but really it is just not the same and so to him that means it is not as good.

I don’t know what Tom is craving either.  He mentioned barbecue tonight, and I have to admit that does sound pretty good.

So all of this brings me back to the point that we don’t have much time left.  I suppose that is a good thing.  Better to leave wanting more than be counting down the minutes until we can go home.

A few more last things

Today was gorgeous.  We loafed around this morning, and then after lunch we walked over to the Forum so the C-man could sketch the Temple of Saturn.  It has been on his list of things to do for a while.  We did not go down into the Forum, though I absolutely refuse to pay 11 euro to get in there after wandering through it for free the first two months we were here.  So we just went to the overlook behind the Campidoglio and sketched there.  The kids looked so cute sitting on the sidewalk with their sketchbooks.  The couple standing next to the C-man was watching him draw. 

One of them asked me where we were from and when I said America he told me he thought American kids seem to be very interested in Art.  He said they were just in New York and saw some kind of exhibition of work from a children’s art class.  He said you would never see Italian kids sitting in front of the Forum drawing like that.  I’m not so sure that’s true, I think maybe our kids are just a bit unusual that way but never mind.

When we finished our sketches we walked over to Santa Maria della Pace.  This is a church over on the other side of the Piazza Navona that I wanted to see.  Actually, the church is usually chiuso but the cloister is open all the time.  There is apparently some kind of art museum in there.  There is also a great little coffee bar on the second floor.  There are little tables for two all around the cloister.  The seats are stone seats and they are original to the space. Apparently this is where the monks would sit and chat way back when.  Now they have little glass tables in between them for people to put their coffee on.  They also have food but we just had cappuccinos and cokes.  And the kids had brownies.  Mmm-mm, there’s nothing like a brownie and a Coke to jump-start your afternoon.

When we were done eating we took a quick look in the bookshop and Tom got a book about the domes of Rome.  It is en Italiano but it will give him something to do.  We also got two books for the kids.  Florence for Kids and Venice for Kids.  They read them all afternoon.

After that we just walked home through Trastevere and hung out in the apartment until it was time to watch a movie and have dinner. 

We did get some of the papers cleared out of the kids’ room today.  Most of them belonged to the C-man.  Princess O has decided she wants to work on hers by herself.  I told her that was fine as long as she actually did it.  We shall see.  I will give her until Wednesday and then I will start nagging her.  Then on Friday I am just going in there with a trash bag.

In other news one of Tom’s students is going to try to go to the Spanish Grand Prix next weekend.  I think I will give him 20 euros and ask him to get me a program.  That is, if Tom sees him this week before he leaves.  A program from the Spanish Grand Prix would be a cool thing to have. 

 

Picnics and piazzas

Another Saturday, another picnic.  This time it was a dinner picnic.  The children were confused.  I think they thought you could only have picnics for lunch.  Some of the students organized it, and it was potluck.  We brought a baguette, salami, mozzarella, chips and olives.  The students brought all kinds of things.  Pasta salad, deviled eggs (yum), fruit salad, fruit, pizza bianca, and cookies with nutella.  All of it was delicious.  I will miss having picnics like this when we get home.

After we ate the kids played Frisbee and dodge ball with the students.  They had a grand old time.  Princess O especially loves hanging out with the college kids.  Not sure how they really feel about it, but they are good sports.

Before the picnic we went for a walk into town.  Our destination was a small outdoor market where they sell reproduction prints of Rome.   I would guess they are originally 18th century, but the ones we bought are just copies.  The kids each picked one out for their rooms as well.  They will go well with the horse posters and Yu-Gi-Oh pictures they have on their walls now.

Once we had made our purchases we wandered over to the Spanish Steps.  They have put big pots of pink and white azaleas on them.  Why?  I have no idea, but it looks spectacular.  And it was absolutely a sea of people.  Maybe K was right; maybe we are getting out of here just in the nick of time.  The kids and I also stopped for gelati in the Piazza della Rotunda and took a quick peek in Santa Maria Sopra Minerva.  One last look at the Michelangelo…

I’m not sure what we will do tomorrow.  I think I will be very mean and go through the children’s toy boxes.  They are mostly full of paper swords and light sabers and menus from their pretend restaurants so it should be easy to do.  I will just go in there with a garbage bag and throw stuff in it.  I have told the children time and time again that they are not bringing that stuff home, but they are resistant little creatures and I don’t think they believe me.  Either that or they are hoping I will give in if they put up a big enough fight.  Poor misguided souls.  

One last trip to Vatican City

Today in our quest to strike a balance between closure and relaxation we went to the Vatican Museum One Last Time.

We tried a new strategy today and went late in the day instead of first thing in the morning.  Of course, by late I mean 12:45pm.  The museum closes at 1:30, but that is actually only when they stop letting people in.  They don’t start kicking people out until 3:30.  I knew we would only be there a couple hours so it seemed like a good plan. 

It worked like a charm.  We waltzed right into the museum, with only a minimal wait at the security check and again at the ticket booth.  And the nice man in the ticket booth pretended I said the C-man was six instead of seven (actually he’s eight, but I had forgotten that for a moment since he just had his birthday) and let him in for free.  What a nice guy.  He had asked how old the C-man was and I answered (all in Italian) so when he repeated “six” I thought to myself “wow my pronunciation must be awful” and corrected him saying “no, seven”.  The second time he said six he winked at me and rang up the tickets.  Then I realized what he was doing and smiled my best blonde haired, blue-eyed smile and said “grazie mille”.

This was our third trip to the Vatican Museum.  We really haven’t expanded what we’ve seen of the collection.  The children have their favorites and I have mine, and we just stick to those.  Actually today, we saw a little bit more of the Roman sculpture galleries because the other way to the Sistine Chapel Route was closed off.  They were interesting statues, but Princess O really, REALLY wanted to see the Sistine Chapel again, so we were kind of on a mission.

We did stop in the Pinacoteca again to see Raphael’s Transfiguration.  I can’t remember if it was the Princess or the C-man who wanted to see that.  My children have very unusual tastes for their ages. I suppose this is a side effect of having an Art History Geek for a mother.

The early part of the museum was relatively uncrowded since it was so late in the day, but as we moved closer and closer to the Sistine Chapel the crowds really increased.  It think this was easily the most crowded we’ve seen it.  And it was hot in the Raphael Rooms and the Chapel.  I get the feeling that would not be much fun in July.

We stayed in the Chapel and looked at the ceiling a long time.  I could see the Princess was getting emotional.  I was afraid she would be too upset to enjoy the Art.  I told her not to cry, and to try to enjoy seeing it without being too sad.  But it was too much for her and she was pretty weepy when we left.  I felt bad about it.  Especially since I felt like we were really booking through the museum.  I just wasn’t into it today. I tried to let them lead, and they said I wasn’t rushing them, but I felt bad just the same.  I felt bad for two reasons, one, I felt like I was rushing them, even though they said I wasn’t, and two because nobody should be bored in the Vatican Museum.  People count themselves lucky to see this collection once in their lives, and here we were, on our third visit.  But it was hot, and crowded and I just couldn’t get into the Priceless Works of Art groove today. 

When we left we stopped on the Borgo Pia for a snack and had some pizza and pop.  Then back through St. Peter’s square.  We had thought we might duck into the Basilica for one last glimpse of the Pieta, and so the children could show me the baby on the Baldacchino, but the queue to get through the security check was huge and we decided it wasn’t worth it.  So we just walked through the parking garage back to the bus stop.

Rome has definitely become much more crowded with tourists.  I know I shouldn’t complain, but it is kind of a pain in the neck to find big crowds at stuff you practically had to yourself just a few weeks ago.  I guess I just don’t want to share.