The world is chock full of good people. And I keep meeting them! (Italy, Part II)

In continuation! On Thursday, April 1, had breakfast in my hostel in Rome with my freakinawesome roomies, then checked out and hopped on a 4-hr train to Florence. Spent the afternoon there, wandering the amazingly gorgeous city, planning my itinerary, skyping parents :-), and bartering at the outdoor market thingy. After a delicious pizza dinner, went to a cute little church down the street for a performance of “romantic arias” in period costume. I don’t know how authentic the dresses were. The soprano’s skyscraper of a wig fell off at the climax of a high crescendo… that was interesting.

On Good Friday our hostel gave a free tour of Florence. I met a legit porteño (from Buenos Aires) who lives in Barcelona, actually, and we decided to be friends and accidentally spent the entire day together. Very very very cool city. Everything is beautiful, impressive, and historically important. Loved it. And yes, we tried the gelato. Yes, it was good.

Anyhow, I went off on my own to pick up my (reserved) ticket to the Uffizi Gallery but randomly met back up with Daniel, my Argentine friend, at the coat check, haha! So we did the ENTIRE museum together and concluded that the ancient sculpture was the best part. Go figure.

And yes, I saw David, and yes, he is perfect. He’s the awe-inspiring idol, the Gallery is his temple, the tourism people are his priests, and the tourists are the dedicated pilgrims that travel any distance, spare no expense, and endure whatever hardship necessary to pay him homage.

Had a long conversation in the market with a vendor dude from Bangladesh who told me all about his culture, his country, the history of India, why he moved to Italy, and why it’s such a great place to work. He had some interesting insights. Also chatted with the bookseller dude in the libreria evangelica about what it’s like for them to live in Florence. Interesting.

Ok, just a super quick bit about the rest of the week. Trying not to bore. Saturday night at a candlelit vigil in a convent (in Rome) was a magical experience. Rather profound. I don’t think I’ll ever forget it, at least I hope not. (See facebook video)

On Easter morning at the Vatican I waited in line for a couple of hours in the rain to get into St. Peter’s square. Which was fine, because I was so excited, and besides, in those types of situations you always have camaraderie with the poor souls waiting with you. While in line, I chatted with some American students, with a happy Latin American family, and some nuns. One of them had dropped her rosary and I found it for her, which was pretty darn awesome, I must say. It just sounds good: I helped a nun find her lost rosary. Doesn’t it? (photo/video: my view of the Pope, etc. for Easter Mass)

On Monday I took a train to Camucia to visit a friend from Union who’s studying there, yay! On the way, had an interesting conversation with a girl from Vietnam. One of those weird connections where I left thinking I really could have been best friends with her. I’m still amazed by how awesomely intelligent and kind she was. She was good at asking really interesting questions… and genuinely caring about my answers. I want to be more like that.

So I kinda accidentally hitchhiked… twice. I arrived in Camucia and was waiting for a bus to Cortona when I realized it was a holiday and the next bus wasn’t coming for three more hours. Desperately hoping I was wrong, I asked a woman nearby if she knew anything about it… She answered in English! She and her husband and little girl were on vacation from Australia, touring Italy by car. They must’ve felt sorry for me, because they gave me a lift up the mountain, quite out of their way. They said they were so grateful just to chat with another English-speaker. Gosh, nicest people EVER. I had completely different adventures coming back down again, but they were a bit frustrating. Anyhow, Allyn showed me Cortona, her beautiful little town. It was SO lovely to see a familiar face from back home. And then she took me to her ceramics studio, showed me her work, and instructed me in throwing my first pot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And my second, too, haha. I can’t even describe how awesome that day was.

Oh, Tuesday was a beast of a day, too. First I had a leisurely breakfast with a girl from St. Norbert College, WI. I made her talk to me about DePere, a town I loved living in (against all odds). But apparently Hansen’s has been closed for some years now. Sad! Ok, sorry, moving on!

I did the Forum, Palatine, Coliseum, Pantheon, S. Pietro in Vincoli, Sta. Maria Sopra Minerva, Via Appia, Catacombs of San Calisto, and saw the Santa Scala (from which I left feeling like angry Martin Luther in the scene from the Joseph Finnes movie, haha) all in one day. I think I took eight buses to enable all that. (photos: at top, me in the Coliseum. At bottom, Michelangelo's Moses at S. Pietro in Vincoli)

One more random tidbit: on a bus on the Via Appia Antica, I gave my seat to an old man. Then, turned out we took the same tour of the Catacombs (in Spanish). After, he came up to me and (in Spanish) said something like “On a bus full of people, you left me a seat. You are one of the best-mannered young persons I’ve ever met.” And thanked me. I was like, woah! I dunno, that left a big impression on me. It was, like, Flattery for Mary Week or something.

Anyhow, a completely amazing trip. I feel pretty grateful about it. Sorry this post was so long in coming: writing them takes a very long time.

There’s No Place Like Rome!

For Spring Break, I spent 9 days on my own in Italy. I was definitely apprehensive about going alone, but it turned out to be pretty darn awesome.

Unfortunately, my camera memory card decided to die, so I lost most of my pictures. Will take it to a repair shop this week, but I’m not hopeful about it. But anyhow, it doesn’t matter that much. I saw a lot of tourists who were glued to their camera screens the whole time, kinda missing the whole point of the experience. So I wasn’t taking a ton, anyway, but was mostly focused on just BEING there and observing. But thank God for the iPhone, which continues to pick up the slack when all other technology fails me. So, aprovechen!

The day I arrived in Rome was lovely and sunny and I basically just wandered around the city aimlessly with a guidebook. Ate my leftover-bocadillo lunch by the fountain at Piazza Repubblica, just chillin and people-watching. Visited some huge churches covered in gold leaf and typical Catholic crap. Just kidding, I was paying attention: Santa Maria degli Angeli (inside the ruins of the Baths of Diocletian, converted to a church by Michelangelo) and the sorta-nearby Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore (humongous, ancient, and impressive). But, as I was recovering from a freakishly early flight that morning, mostly tried to get orientated and a feel for the city and stuff.

The next morning, Wednesday, I hied me to Vatican City for the Papal Audience at St. Peter’s square, in some ways an even cooler experience than Easter Mass itself because the crowds weren’t so crazy, I was close enough to see everything (had a golden ticket, actually), the sun was shining, and the Pope did a lot more talking. I actually understood more than I’d expected of Latin and Italian, and Spanish of course. There were bits of English, too. It was fun to see how excited all the people were about cheering and waving at Benedicto as he did his rounds of the square in his cool little pope mobile/golf cart thingy. They came prepared with flags and chants, too! My favorite: ¡Se nota, se siente, el Papa está presente! Yes, I was surrounded by hispanohablantes. They had a chant about the Pope exiting the square, too. Wish I could remember it! But yeah, loved the diversity of the crowd. People from all over the world! So many languages! Cool stuff. (photo: me at the Vatican on Sunday. No pictures left from Wednesday at all)

Bought some postcards, munched a sandwich and some cookies, and headed to the Vatican Museums to meet up with my little tour group. Guided tour of the museums, Sistine Chapel, and Basilica= best splurge ever. SO worth it (especially since it included tickets to the Papal audience and Easter Mass). Anyhow, the Vatican blew my mind. Loved the ancient sculptures, had a “moment” with Laocoön, admired some goddess chick wearing an AMAZING marble dress, haha. But really, one could spend years wandering through the galleries and still not have enough time there. Oh, I saw Nero’s gigantic bathtub, too, made of priceless purple porphyry.

Sistine Chapel: profoundly moving. GOT it. Well, as much as a person can in 30 min. Do I need to blog about this? bleh. Have a conversation with me.

Aside from Michelangelo’s Pietà, blog-worthy details about St. Peter’s Basilica: It’s freakin huge (the Statue of Liberty would fit inside with room to spare), covers an area of 5.7 acres and slathered in gold, lapis lazuli, and other flashy and expensive things. Also contains the bodies of two popes on display. Creepsters. Really though, it’s a nice experience. I appreciated the intricate mosaic copies that replaced all the original paintings. So meticulous! And I think Bernini’s 98-ft-tall canopy altar thingy rivals Solomon’s Temple as far as the whole inability to weigh the quantity of bronze-thing goes (see picture: Bernini's canopy under Michelangelo's dome). Overall very impressive, and isn’t that the point? I snapped a neat pic of a nun gazing at the statue of St. Peter that I am miffed about losing, but oh well. Took too many pics of Pietà, should have just paid attention more.

Oh, also came across my two hostel roomies on the Basilica balcony. Spent breakfast, morning, dinner, and evening with them having a pretty fabulous time and awesome conversations. All the Germans I’ve met have been generally awesome, actually. We were too tired to go out that night, so we had a “water party” in the hostel, turning word games into drinking games and generously refilling each other’s water bottles. It was hilarious. Loved those guys.

Another funny moment: I was trying to find a particular bus stop and having many adventures asking passersby where it was, basically with horribly contorted mixes of Italian and Spanish like, “Prego, dunde está la fermata de autobús de línea cuarenta?” Must have been dreadfully confusing. Finally, getting really tired of walking, I asked one more girl. She answered in perfectly clear American English, “Sorry, I don’t speak Italian.” (yeah, uhh, me neither, unfortunately) And helped me find the bus stop. Made me laugh. I scampered off and yelled over my shoulder, “You look European!”

I think this post is long enough now.