Hi all, the Internet cafe is jammed tonight and I'm on the slowest computer. Therefore, I'm going to just send this in one big posting and forego the pictures until I get to Venice and try again there. See the individual headings for times and locations! Leaving Florence tomorrow, so except for dinner tonight, this brings everyone up to date!
Because this is all one entry, you can read straight through, top to bottom. It was written in chronological order.
Bella Firenze
Feeling MUCH better after kicking ass and taking names, I led Mom, from memory, directly to our B&B on the Via Roma, and it even took my breath away. Large, wooden double doors open into a simple marble entry way that belies fully and finely restored apartments of Il Salotto di Firenze. Alessandro is only 31 years old, and although he doesn’t own the apartment, he started the B&B which occupies it several years ago and has been wildly successful ever since. For obvious reasons.
The main door opens onto a long hallway off of which three guest rooms over look the Via Roma with a small reception office at one end. Just before the office on the left is the entrance to the breakfast/common room which functions as combined travel library, dining room and kitchenette. On the far side of the dining room are three additional rooms in a hallway identical to ours. Our balcony over looks one of the fanciest shopping streets in Florence and the well-heeled and not-so-well-heeled traffic parades up and down all day and night. Mom sits outside, even in her nightgown, smoking at all hours.
We walked around the old city, stopping to admire Il Duomo and the Battistero, Palazzo Vecchio, and Santa Croce before stopping for a light lunch of various bruschetti then buying tickets at the tobacco shop and catching the number 13 bus up to the Piazzale Michelangelo where I finally got to see the city from the far side of the river. This was a perspective I had only admired in pictures, so I was delighted to see it from above.
Back in the heaven that is iSdF, I sat on the balcony while Mom slept, then showered and dressed up for the first time since Pompeii and took her to Ristorante Accademia, the little out of the way place Heidi and I had enjoyed so much when we were here with Daddy and Mary. The food and menu was the same, but the quiet, dark, local atmosphere of the place has been replaced by a large touristy crowd (probably because of its proximity to the Galleria dell’Accademia and its statue of David). This may be because we were here in January 2006, but somewhere, I’m convinced, the restaurant must have been listed in a guidebook which says it caters to groups and families. There were three large tables of American families, two of which had young children, but the food was exactly as I remembered it and we both had spectacular meals and wine.
Key fiasco
Because I had misunderstood the key situation (or forgotten, or just had my head up my butt), I had only taken one set of keys with us to the restaurant--the inside set that allows us to enter the B&B and our room, not the set that allows us to enter the building from the street. As a result, we had to figure out a way to call Alessandro to let us into the building--he lives off site. His emergency cell phone number is printed on the key card we have for the upstairs rooms, but the phone booth around the corner only takes phone cards and all of the tobacco shops that sell phone cards were closed. The time was close to 10:30 PM, Mom’s feet hurt, and we were both exhausted (but looked good!).
Thankfully, the second person we stopped on the street (it’s a busy street until very late at night) spoke English AND had a cell phone, so she called Alessandro for us. He was still out having dinner with his father, but said he would come let us in. We walked around the Piazza della Repubblica, took photos of the carousel, and window shopped for a while, then found a bench within eyeshot of the B&B and waited. About 30 minutes after we called, other iSdF guests, a Belgian couple, came by and we went upstairs with them, using our own keys to get into our room. Now how to let Alessandro know that we were in so he didn’t have to end his evening early?
I tried and tried and tried to figure out how to use the phone in our room, but I couldn’t figure out which combination of numbers I could leave off (the country code) and which numbers I needed to dial (the city code) before the actual number itself. I hadn’t watch the girl dial the phone before, so I had no way of knowing! We waited on the balcony and, apologizing profusely, hollered down to Alessandro when he came around the corner with his motorcycle helmet and messenger bag. He was extremely gracious and just glad we had made it inside okay.
Lucca and Pisa
We slept late on Friday morning and were the last ones in the dining room at 9 AM. This gave us an opportunity to apologize again to Alessandro and pick his brain about how we might best get to Lucca for the day. He printed out the train schedule from the Internet and we were on our way. He is so accommodating; his mother even made a sweet pound cake for the breakfast bar.
When we changed trains in Pisa for Lucca, we decided that if we had time to return to Pisa later in the day, we would. We disembarked the train in Lucca at about 1:30 PM and walked from the train station into the old city. Immediately, we fell in love with the place.
From our guide book: “Despite incessant wars with Pisa and Florence during the Middle Ages, the town has always been prosperous, a happy situation reflected by its splendid buildings. In 1805, Napolean gave it to his sister as a principality, and in 1847, it was incorporated into the Grand Duchy of Tuscany.”
We met a woman on the train who spoke no English, but we communicated as best we could with each other. She asked us where in Italy we had been, and when we said Pompeii, she indicated that lives near there and was on her way to see her daughter in Viareggio. We said words and made hand gestures like Coliseum, New York, Empire State Building, next year, last year, children, travel, flying, etc., but most of the time Mom and I had no idea what she was saying, or what she thought we were saying. It was great! When we took her picture with Headi, she gave us her mailing address to send her a copy of the picture. I think she thought we were nuts.
In Lucca, we briefly watched workmen construct an outdoor stage for the Lucca Music Festival which runs throughout the summer. Last week was Sheryl Crow and next week is Ennio Morricone. Too bad we couldn’t stay for Saturday’s show, but we didn’t know this week’s musician (an Italian) anyway.
We saw the Volto Santo, or Holy Face, in the Cathedral of St. Martin, which is a wooden effigy of Christ on the cross famed for the legend of its journey to Lucca, then tried in vain for about 30 minutes to find the Guinigi Tower, a 14th century palace tower topped with fully grown trees. Of course, we had passed its subtly-marked entrance twice and were only able to orient ourselves to it when we caught a glimpse of it at the end of an alley. Mom sat at the bottom while I climbed the steep and slightly scary stairs. The view of the ancient, walled city was an island of terra cotta roof tops surrounded by an ocean of green rolling hills. I met a lovely older couple fro London on top who offered to take my picture with Headi. They got a HUGE kick out of her.
We had lunch inside the walls of the Roman Amphitheater, which is now the town “square,” but really a circle because of the shape of the theater. I had a grilled vegetable pannini and Mom had her first pizza of the trip. Spoiling ourselves, we each ended our meal with a gelato sundae. She had vanilla gelato with Nutella and whipped cream; I had Amaretto gelato with whipped cream and pirouette cookies. I love the pirouette cookie.
On the way back to the train station, we walked the old walls which overlooked the lush statue gardens of Palazzo Pfanner, the 17th-century villa own by the Austrian who introduced beer to Italy.
Although it was already late in the day, about 5:15 PM, we decided to get off the train in Pisa and go to the tower. It would have been silly to have been so close but not to have made the effort. Instead of walking, which would have killed us, we took an eight euro taxi through the highly congested streets of this bustling little city (not like Lucca at all) and saved ourselves the 2-2.5 mile walk.
Like every other tourist there, we struggled for too long trying to line each other up with the tower in order to make it look like we were somehow holding it up. Easiest, of course, was Headi. She’s just so accommodating, and always takes a wonderful picture too!
Now she has money coming out the wazoo
Florence, Il Salotto di Firenze, Saturday, July 12, 2008, 6:45 PM
The wind is gone. No more train problems. Mom and I are both eating much healthier in Tuscany: more fresh fruit and vegetables, fewer unhealthy carbs, still lots of wine though. Just an update for those who want to know. And I know there are a few of you who do. ;)
Anyhoo…
At one point early last evening, she stretched out in her nightgown on the bed where I had left some euro coins. Unknown to her, they stuck to her thighs, so when she stood up, money slowly started falling from underneath her nightgown to the floor. She had no idea where they were coming from and looked utterly baffled but kind of delighted at the same time. I cracked up, as I am wont to do, and was barely able to chide, “The farting has stopped, but now you have money coming out the wazoo!” We’ve been breaking into side-splitting laughter about that one all day.
San Gimignano
We rose early today, our last full day in Florence, in order to do a few things we had been meaning to do, but hadn’t yet done. We strolled down to the Arno after breakfast and, before all of the vendors had opened, took pictures of the rowing skulls on the river and of the Ponte Vecchio bridge itself. We returned via the Uffizi courtyard taking pictures of the Piazza della Signoria and the Neptune Fountain. On our way back through the old city to the bus station, we walked, drooling, through the Mercato, to the leather district where vendors hawked their decadent smelling belts, coats and purses. We scouted out the items we wanted buy on our way back, noting the location of each stall and the time he or she closed.
After some effort, I found the SITA bus station (Mom waited at the train station and I fetched her when I found it) and we boarded the first of two busses for San Gimignano. We had a brief pause in our journey and changed at Poggibonsi for the remaining 11 km up to the walled city.
S.G. and its 14 towers sit high on a hill surrounded by it ancient walls and might be best known in the States as the setting of the women’s prison in Tea with Mussolini. We had lunch first, at Bel Songgiorno, a restaurant that on three walls is still the old stone, but has all glass on the fourth wall, offering picturesque views of the rolling hills surrounding S.G.
Because we only had 2 hours before our return bus (we wanted to be sure we actually had time to buy things once we got back to Florence), Mom and I split up. She went to the grim Museum of Torture which displays all sorts of horrible little (and large) devices of pain and death that have been used from medieval times all the way, they say, up to today, in Iraq.
I climbed the Torre Grossa, the Big Tower, which has been part of the town hall since the 13th century. Dante argued the case for S.G.’s alliance with Tuscany in its lower chambers in 1300. What amazed me about the frescoes on the courtroom walls was that almost every scene had a dos in it. Sometimes several dogs and several breeds. The Italians love their dogs. An unrelated tidbit of information is that a medieval ordinance in S.G. forbid any other structures in the city from being built higher than this tower. Today, it is the only one open to the public.
I’ll give you 10 euro for that
We made it back to Florence with time to spare and shopped our way back to the center of the city. We each bought little gift items for friends and family and a purse for ourselves. The vendor from whom I bought my bag loved my Obama pin, so I offered it to him if he knocked even more money off the price. It saved me three euro, or about five dollars.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Friday, July 11, 2008
Stop Thief!
Given that I have already explained my experience of the corruption in Italian government, I think I can now say I clearly understand the Italian working person’s response to it: getting as much money as the can from people they can sucker into giving it to them. Loredana, for example, who processed the one night we didn‘t stay there on my credit card so I couldn‘t refuse to pay her in cash. If I spend too much time recounting the experience we had on the train from Rome to Florence here, I’ll just get upset again (at myself as well as the conductor), despite the fact that I was vindicated in the end by a patient and generous customer service representative in the Firenze SMN station.
When the conductor came through the car to check tickets and stamp Euro rail passes, he targeted four English-speaking travelers and found “errors” on our passes and demanded 50 euro from each of us or he would call the police. That’s a shit load of money; do the math. Mom and I were two of the people he pursued, along with Naomi and Heath, two Aussies in their twenties backpacking through Europe who got engaged last week in Scotland. But, we didn’t find that out until several hours later--they were further down the car.
The scam he ran on us was a little different that the one he ran on N and H; he said our validation stamp was missing (which it was, but we had been told on the platform by another Trenitalia conductor that it would be stamped on the train) but that he would “validate” it for 100 euro and “give” us another day on our pass--which he clearly thought was a win/win situation, but he didn’t use that phrase.
After all four of us had given him our money--complaining all the time and arguing with him that he was wrong--because we saw no other way out of the situation, a group of Americans sitting behind us in the far end of the car told us that they had been on the receiving end of the same scam the day before but had no money to give, so the conductor just walked away. Naomi and I went after him and heatedly demanded our money back, but suddenly he didn’t understand us and said, in broken English, if we had a problem, we had to speak to the authorities in Florence. We screamed a little while longer, took his badge number and went back to our respective seats.
The four of us rendezvoused on the platform in Florence and made for Trenitalia information, which sent us to their customer service office. Naomi and I went in alone and, on behalf of all four of us, I made our case to Signore Franco. An hour later, I had convinced him to give us our money back. Because we each had proof that our passes had been tampered with (a change of date on ours, a validation stamp on theirs) he helped us fill out complaint forms, approved our refund, made several sets of photocopies of passes, reservations, receipts, and we will all get our money mailed back to our home addresses.
Really. Don’t laugh. I believe him. I really think we will, because if we don’t, we still have copies of our approved request to take it further once we get home.
Seriously, I don’t like that look on your face.
I heard that.
When the conductor came through the car to check tickets and stamp Euro rail passes, he targeted four English-speaking travelers and found “errors” on our passes and demanded 50 euro from each of us or he would call the police. That’s a shit load of money; do the math. Mom and I were two of the people he pursued, along with Naomi and Heath, two Aussies in their twenties backpacking through Europe who got engaged last week in Scotland. But, we didn’t find that out until several hours later--they were further down the car.
The scam he ran on us was a little different that the one he ran on N and H; he said our validation stamp was missing (which it was, but we had been told on the platform by another Trenitalia conductor that it would be stamped on the train) but that he would “validate” it for 100 euro and “give” us another day on our pass--which he clearly thought was a win/win situation, but he didn’t use that phrase.
After all four of us had given him our money--complaining all the time and arguing with him that he was wrong--because we saw no other way out of the situation, a group of Americans sitting behind us in the far end of the car told us that they had been on the receiving end of the same scam the day before but had no money to give, so the conductor just walked away. Naomi and I went after him and heatedly demanded our money back, but suddenly he didn’t understand us and said, in broken English, if we had a problem, we had to speak to the authorities in Florence. We screamed a little while longer, took his badge number and went back to our respective seats.
The four of us rendezvoused on the platform in Florence and made for Trenitalia information, which sent us to their customer service office. Naomi and I went in alone and, on behalf of all four of us, I made our case to Signore Franco. An hour later, I had convinced him to give us our money back. Because we each had proof that our passes had been tampered with (a change of date on ours, a validation stamp on theirs) he helped us fill out complaint forms, approved our refund, made several sets of photocopies of passes, reservations, receipts, and we will all get our money mailed back to our home addresses.
Really. Don’t laugh. I believe him. I really think we will, because if we don’t, we still have copies of our approved request to take it further once we get home.
Seriously, I don’t like that look on your face.
I heard that.
Lost in Translation?
Florence, Il Sallotte di Firenze B&B, Thursday, July 10, 2008, 6:24 PM
Because we never really know who’s listening, like we have always done in my family (or at least Heidi and I have always done), Mom and I have developed a vocabulary of our own. I will try to recount them here, but suddenly I can’t seem to remember all of them:
“Fine Italian design.” Inspired by our discussion of great artists like Bernini, Michelangelo, Armani and Lamborghini. Today’s meaning: Handsome man. Hot guy. As in, “Mom, check out than fine Italian design on the far corner.”
“General _____ vicinity.” Origin unknown. Vague Americanism deflecting specific clarity of action, location or thinking, as in “Mom, I think I lost my earring in the general toilet vicinity” and “I don’t find myself in the generally hungry vicinity yet.” Now becoming overused.
“Poughkeepsie(?) (!)” From Sex and the City (the movie). Used when we don’t want to offend a host or proprietor, but when we suspect the food or water might cause intestinal difficulty and want to ask or warn the other one. We clearly have had enough of intestinal difficulty already and don’t want to risk anything worse. Capisco?
“Breast your cards.” An expression used when playing gin or poker meaning one should hide beware of others’ wandering eyes. Contemporary usage means “Keep your purse/camera/belongings close at hand. I suspect pickpockets nearby.”
“Because Americans are repressed, that’s why.” Repeatedly used to explain why Italians scream at each other in public, haggle over prices, bunch up at bus tops and don’t form straight lines, don’t hide their mistresses, don’t say excuse me on the street when they bump into you, and steal your money on trains when Americans don’t. It’s a cultural thing.
Because we never really know who’s listening, like we have always done in my family (or at least Heidi and I have always done), Mom and I have developed a vocabulary of our own. I will try to recount them here, but suddenly I can’t seem to remember all of them:
“Fine Italian design.” Inspired by our discussion of great artists like Bernini, Michelangelo, Armani and Lamborghini. Today’s meaning: Handsome man. Hot guy. As in, “Mom, check out than fine Italian design on the far corner.”
“General _____ vicinity.” Origin unknown. Vague Americanism deflecting specific clarity of action, location or thinking, as in “Mom, I think I lost my earring in the general toilet vicinity” and “I don’t find myself in the generally hungry vicinity yet.” Now becoming overused.
“Poughkeepsie(?) (!)” From Sex and the City (the movie). Used when we don’t want to offend a host or proprietor, but when we suspect the food or water might cause intestinal difficulty and want to ask or warn the other one. We clearly have had enough of intestinal difficulty already and don’t want to risk anything worse. Capisco?
“Breast your cards.” An expression used when playing gin or poker meaning one should hide beware of others’ wandering eyes. Contemporary usage means “Keep your purse/camera/belongings close at hand. I suspect pickpockets nearby.”
“Because Americans are repressed, that’s why.” Repeatedly used to explain why Italians scream at each other in public, haggle over prices, bunch up at bus tops and don’t form straight lines, don’t hide their mistresses, don’t say excuse me on the street when they bump into you, and steal your money on trains when Americans don’t. It’s a cultural thing.
Last Supper in Rome
From the Indian jewelry dealer, we crossed the street and look at the menu at Ristorante Alfredo. Unlike some of the other places on our street recommended by Loredana, and probably in cahoots with her, Alfredo had a larger menu with FRESH FRUIT on it. I had an omelet with cheese, mushrooms, and red pepper, with a sweet and succulent fruit salad for dessert. My mom had veal. Both of us were eminently satisfied that we had had a balanced, “clean,” whole food kind of meal for the first time in days. And, I am still a vegetarian.
So much of the food we have been eating has been carbohydrates: bread, pasta, pasta and bread, occasionally supplemented with some kind of cheese and always accompanied by wine. Two glasses a piece for lunch. Two glasses a piece for dinner. I think they are substantial glasses, but my mother thinks they are small pours. We are splitting a half liter, so I will let the reader decide.
The music coming from the small sound system--we sat outside--was 80s music: Paul Young, Peter Gabriel/Kate Bush duet, Howard Jones. Heidi, you couldn't have made your presence known any less subtly if you had been sitting on the table. Wish you were here!
So much of the food we have been eating has been carbohydrates: bread, pasta, pasta and bread, occasionally supplemented with some kind of cheese and always accompanied by wine. Two glasses a piece for lunch. Two glasses a piece for dinner. I think they are substantial glasses, but my mother thinks they are small pours. We are splitting a half liter, so I will let the reader decide.
The music coming from the small sound system--we sat outside--was 80s music: Paul Young, Peter Gabriel/Kate Bush duet, Howard Jones. Heidi, you couldn't have made your presence known any less subtly if you had been sitting on the table. Wish you were here!
Rome in Review
I am writing this entry on the train from Rome to Florence. It is great to leave Rome. We have been overwhelmed by heat, inconvenience, expense, among other things. I wrote this post on: Thursday, July 10, 2008 10:02 AM.
When we arrived on Tuesday and checked into the B&B, Loredana bean to attack us for Ione’s phone call on our behalf the previous morning. She said that Ione was rude and yelling at her, which we know isn’t true because we were sitting there the whole time. Loredana insisted that we had to pay for the previous night because we had booked through a service, but that if I had emailed her directly to book the rooms, she wouldn’t have had to charge us. I had, however, emailed her early this spring as our plans were coming together to inquire whether or not she had a special rate for returning guest. I never hear back. I told her that, but she said that my letters must have gone into her spam folder. Yeah, right. Anyway, there wasn’t a scene, but she was aware that I wasn’t happy.
We dropped our bags in the room and headed out for the Coliseum. We took an easy stroll down through side streets and came upon the stadium from the side, a view that offered a nice surprise to Mom.
We had to wait in line almost an hour before we could get in, maybe more. Then in another 2 lines for Mom to get the audio guide. New on this trip is the combined charge for the Coliseum, Forum and Palatine. On previous trips when I have been Rome, the Forum has been free--one could walk directly through it after exiting the Coliseum.
Because Mom’s feet hurt terribly from the uneven travertine [later found out it's not travertine], we hopped on one of the “hop on/hop off” Rome city buses that gave us a panoramic view of the city while also getting us back to the station and near the B&B.
On the bus, we saw St. Peter’s, the Quirinale (Italy’s White House?) the Via Veneto among other things. The extended period of time in the Coliseum set us way back on time, so we didn’t get back to the B&B until close to 8 PM. At that point, Mom was done for the day, so we didn’t go back out to eat, but I went to the Internet café to upload those first several posts.
Next morning, we lit out for a shoe store at 9:30, but were waylaid by the lack of selection in Mom’s size. While she shopped, I browsed an eyeglass store (like Pearle Vision) and an amazing bookstore that had a vast literature, poetry and drama section. We hopped back on the open top city bus at a little after noon and stayed on back to the Coliseum, where we disembarked and headed up to the Palatine (which is also the new entrance to the Forum). Because we had paid the combined ticket, we were supposed to get in without waiting in line, but Mom accidentally threw her ticket away. Instead of both of us waiting in line, I gave her mine so she could see the Palatine alone, thinking I’d buy another ticket and walk directly to the Forum and we could tour that together.
After waiting in line close to 45 minutes, two young men came by selling their tickets. I jumped at the chance to skip the remain 30 mins or so in line, and walked directly to the ticket holder entrance. Turns out that the tickets were no good, and if I wanted to get in, I would have to go to the end of the line--which was now 3x as long as it was when I had gotten in it. ARGH!!!!!!!!!
Thinking fast, I turned around and made for the Palatine exit/Forum entrance, a point where the two come together but are separated from the public by an iron fence. It was at this point, on the inside, that we were supposed to meet. I found Mom there sitting in the shade waiting for me, explained what happened and told her I’d meet her when she was finished. She toured the Forum alone (albeit with Headi) and we reconnected at about 2 PM, hopped back on the bus.
Our next stop was the Bocca della Veritas (am I getting the chronology right?), the Mouth of Truth that was featured in Roman Holiday, with Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn. Back on the bus, we got off at the Trevi Fountain, had lunch at a nearby café where we had our first Chianti of the trip, then walked (first in the wrong direction) to the Spanish Steps. Along the way, we did a lot of window shopping and had some gelato.
We are hearing much more English in Rome than we heard in Naples/Pompeii, and encountering American students of a more down-to-earth sort. We are both fascinated by the number of times English is used as a second common language between Italians in the tourist industry and Russian, German, Asian, Indian travelers. I don’t remember that happening before--perhaps because other world economies are stronger now, non-Westerners are traveling in higher numbers?
[I stopped writing before the train pulled into to Firenze SMN without giving full details of that train ride--that is to come later--and have restarted at 5:21 PM. Mom is napping; I am typing on a balcony overlooking Via Roma. I swear to God I think I just saw Colin Firth walk down the street in khakis, white shirt and blue blazer.]
After showering and cleaning up in the late afternoon, we headed back out for dinner, stopping first at small Indian vendor whose windows I had been eying for two days. I knew he closed at 8:30, so we walked in at about 8:10 tried on a number of bracelets necklaces and earrings before I asked him a price.
All of the pieces were sterling silver, some with inlaid turquoise, so he weighed them and gave me a price per item. He was charging 40 cents (multiply that by 1.69 for US dollar) per ounce but insisted that was 10% lower than what he would normally charge. I was hoping for something lower, so we started haggling. All I really wanted was the bracelet, but I know that he’d give me a better price the more I bought. I offered a price that was too low for him; he said no. I said refused the three pieces on the ocunter and kept looking. I found something else I liked, hen asked him a price for the bracelet and the new piece, without the two pendants. It was getting close to 8:30 and as I suspected, he was eager to close on time and still make a sale. I didn’t save much, but I got him to come down $6 on the price.
When we arrived on Tuesday and checked into the B&B, Loredana bean to attack us for Ione’s phone call on our behalf the previous morning. She said that Ione was rude and yelling at her, which we know isn’t true because we were sitting there the whole time. Loredana insisted that we had to pay for the previous night because we had booked through a service, but that if I had emailed her directly to book the rooms, she wouldn’t have had to charge us. I had, however, emailed her early this spring as our plans were coming together to inquire whether or not she had a special rate for returning guest. I never hear back. I told her that, but she said that my letters must have gone into her spam folder. Yeah, right. Anyway, there wasn’t a scene, but she was aware that I wasn’t happy.
We dropped our bags in the room and headed out for the Coliseum. We took an easy stroll down through side streets and came upon the stadium from the side, a view that offered a nice surprise to Mom.
We had to wait in line almost an hour before we could get in, maybe more. Then in another 2 lines for Mom to get the audio guide. New on this trip is the combined charge for the Coliseum, Forum and Palatine. On previous trips when I have been Rome, the Forum has been free--one could walk directly through it after exiting the Coliseum.
Because Mom’s feet hurt terribly from the uneven travertine [later found out it's not travertine], we hopped on one of the “hop on/hop off” Rome city buses that gave us a panoramic view of the city while also getting us back to the station and near the B&B.
On the bus, we saw St. Peter’s, the Quirinale (Italy’s White House?) the Via Veneto among other things. The extended period of time in the Coliseum set us way back on time, so we didn’t get back to the B&B until close to 8 PM. At that point, Mom was done for the day, so we didn’t go back out to eat, but I went to the Internet café to upload those first several posts.
Next morning, we lit out for a shoe store at 9:30, but were waylaid by the lack of selection in Mom’s size. While she shopped, I browsed an eyeglass store (like Pearle Vision) and an amazing bookstore that had a vast literature, poetry and drama section. We hopped back on the open top city bus at a little after noon and stayed on back to the Coliseum, where we disembarked and headed up to the Palatine (which is also the new entrance to the Forum). Because we had paid the combined ticket, we were supposed to get in without waiting in line, but Mom accidentally threw her ticket away. Instead of both of us waiting in line, I gave her mine so she could see the Palatine alone, thinking I’d buy another ticket and walk directly to the Forum and we could tour that together.
After waiting in line close to 45 minutes, two young men came by selling their tickets. I jumped at the chance to skip the remain 30 mins or so in line, and walked directly to the ticket holder entrance. Turns out that the tickets were no good, and if I wanted to get in, I would have to go to the end of the line--which was now 3x as long as it was when I had gotten in it. ARGH!!!!!!!!!
Thinking fast, I turned around and made for the Palatine exit/Forum entrance, a point where the two come together but are separated from the public by an iron fence. It was at this point, on the inside, that we were supposed to meet. I found Mom there sitting in the shade waiting for me, explained what happened and told her I’d meet her when she was finished. She toured the Forum alone (albeit with Headi) and we reconnected at about 2 PM, hopped back on the bus.
Our next stop was the Bocca della Veritas (am I getting the chronology right?), the Mouth of Truth that was featured in Roman Holiday, with Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn. Back on the bus, we got off at the Trevi Fountain, had lunch at a nearby café where we had our first Chianti of the trip, then walked (first in the wrong direction) to the Spanish Steps. Along the way, we did a lot of window shopping and had some gelato.
We are hearing much more English in Rome than we heard in Naples/Pompeii, and encountering American students of a more down-to-earth sort. We are both fascinated by the number of times English is used as a second common language between Italians in the tourist industry and Russian, German, Asian, Indian travelers. I don’t remember that happening before--perhaps because other world economies are stronger now, non-Westerners are traveling in higher numbers?
[I stopped writing before the train pulled into to Firenze SMN without giving full details of that train ride--that is to come later--and have restarted at 5:21 PM. Mom is napping; I am typing on a balcony overlooking Via Roma. I swear to God I think I just saw Colin Firth walk down the street in khakis, white shirt and blue blazer.]
After showering and cleaning up in the late afternoon, we headed back out for dinner, stopping first at small Indian vendor whose windows I had been eying for two days. I knew he closed at 8:30, so we walked in at about 8:10 tried on a number of bracelets necklaces and earrings before I asked him a price.
All of the pieces were sterling silver, some with inlaid turquoise, so he weighed them and gave me a price per item. He was charging 40 cents (multiply that by 1.69 for US dollar) per ounce but insisted that was 10% lower than what he would normally charge. I was hoping for something lower, so we started haggling. All I really wanted was the bracelet, but I know that he’d give me a better price the more I bought. I offered a price that was too low for him; he said no. I said refused the three pieces on the ocunter and kept looking. I found something else I liked, hen asked him a price for the bracelet and the new piece, without the two pendants. It was getting close to 8:30 and as I suspected, he was eager to close on time and still make a sale. I didn’t save much, but I got him to come down $6 on the price.
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Thanks Tara!
You are so sweet for offering to get us from the airport. We had plenty of ride offers, but I decided that I wanted to make it special for my mother from beginning to end, so I'm splurging. If things change, I'll let you know. Love to you, Sam and AC!
Rome in a Day (teaser)
Back at base, Rome, July 9, 2008, 7:39 PM
I am a day behind in writing in the journal, but I have just uploaded today’s pictures to the slide show at left. Rather than trying to upload a ton of written entries with photos and videos, I will just leave the entries here for the night and write back in the room at this time. Hopefully, future entries will exhibit more brevity without a loss of enthusiasm!
Coming soon, development of the following:
The lines are extremely LONG here, so all we have been able to do is the Coliseum, Forum (Mom only because I am an idiot American--more on that later), Bocca della Veritas, Trevi Fountain, and Spanish Steps. We had to shift to plan B for most of this morning to buy Mom decent shoes (over an hour in a Foot Locker). Stopped for a delish lunch at an outdoor café. Got a gelato at the Steps. Bought some GREAT jewelry--Indian silver cuff bracelet and STUNNING neckalce. Truly, Stunny Rooney. We can’t stop laughing and I am compiling a lexicon of catch phrases from the trip, including the omnipresent, “general _____ vicinity.” As in, "No doubt we can get bottled water in the general Coliseum vicinity" and "Mom, can I use this towel as a washcloth or have you used it in the general crotch vicinity?"
Mom's wind has subsided, yet mine is gearing up. If history is any barometer, something evil this way comes.
I am a day behind in writing in the journal, but I have just uploaded today’s pictures to the slide show at left. Rather than trying to upload a ton of written entries with photos and videos, I will just leave the entries here for the night and write back in the room at this time. Hopefully, future entries will exhibit more brevity without a loss of enthusiasm!
Coming soon, development of the following:
The lines are extremely LONG here, so all we have been able to do is the Coliseum, Forum (Mom only because I am an idiot American--more on that later), Bocca della Veritas, Trevi Fountain, and Spanish Steps. We had to shift to plan B for most of this morning to buy Mom decent shoes (over an hour in a Foot Locker). Stopped for a delish lunch at an outdoor café. Got a gelato at the Steps. Bought some GREAT jewelry--Indian silver cuff bracelet and STUNNING neckalce. Truly, Stunny Rooney. We can’t stop laughing and I am compiling a lexicon of catch phrases from the trip, including the omnipresent, “general _____ vicinity.” As in, "No doubt we can get bottled water in the general Coliseum vicinity" and "Mom, can I use this towel as a washcloth or have you used it in the general crotch vicinity?"
Mom's wind has subsided, yet mine is gearing up. If history is any barometer, something evil this way comes.
Naples to Rome, finally
Rome, Maryelen B&B, July 9, 2008, 8:38 AM
On the second leg of our journey, we shared a compartment with three young female travelers and one middle-aged man. Two of the girls were from Perth who were coming up from the Amalfi coast and were heading to Spain. The other young girl, Anna Maria, was returning to Rome where she worked in some kind of language instruction. She spoke fairly good English, but she understood everything we said.
Anna Maria was with her dog, Andiamo, who was sprawled out an sleeping under my mom’s seat the whole 2 hour train ride. At first, I thought he was a stray, but early in the trip, I understood he was hers. He didn’t flinch when I opened my left over pizza from the night before. I’m beginning to think Ray is the most spoiled dog on the planet. Maybe he needs to live in a train station and be fed scraps for a while to really appreciate how good he has it. ;)
Anna explained to us why Mt. Vesuvius was so filthy. An Italian economic recession and rampant corruption aside, Naples blocked the building of a municipal trash incinerator for environmental reasons. The result was private trash companies bid for the garbage contract, the lowest bidder coming in at twenty cents per kilo. When he discovered he couldn’t do it for that price, he just stopped collecting. No trash has moved for six months and the environmental hazard is now of another kind; stray dogs, feral cats, rats are everywhere and there is no end in sight. She told us of a demonstration against Berlusconi to be held in Piazza Navona later tonight. I would LOVE to get photos of that!
On the second leg of our journey, we shared a compartment with three young female travelers and one middle-aged man. Two of the girls were from Perth who were coming up from the Amalfi coast and were heading to Spain. The other young girl, Anna Maria, was returning to Rome where she worked in some kind of language instruction. She spoke fairly good English, but she understood everything we said.
Anna Maria was with her dog, Andiamo, who was sprawled out an sleeping under my mom’s seat the whole 2 hour train ride. At first, I thought he was a stray, but early in the trip, I understood he was hers. He didn’t flinch when I opened my left over pizza from the night before. I’m beginning to think Ray is the most spoiled dog on the planet. Maybe he needs to live in a train station and be fed scraps for a while to really appreciate how good he has it. ;)
Anna explained to us why Mt. Vesuvius was so filthy. An Italian economic recession and rampant corruption aside, Naples blocked the building of a municipal trash incinerator for environmental reasons. The result was private trash companies bid for the garbage contract, the lowest bidder coming in at twenty cents per kilo. When he discovered he couldn’t do it for that price, he just stopped collecting. No trash has moved for six months and the environmental hazard is now of another kind; stray dogs, feral cats, rats are everywhere and there is no end in sight. She told us of a demonstration against Berlusconi to be held in Piazza Navona later tonight. I would LOVE to get photos of that!
Pompeii back to Naples on the Circumvesuviana
I love the word Circumvesuviana because it sounds so much like circumcision but I can say it in mixed company. The C sound at the beginning is pronounced Ch.
Rome, Maryelen B&B, July 9, 2008, 7:48 AM
The train was already crowded when we boarded. It had come from Sorrento and was only halfway through its journey. We sat next to another grizzled character who had spread his belongings over three of the four facing seats. He cleared two seats and let us sit down. At first, we didn’t say anything to each other, but after a few minutes, he asked in Italian if we were American. We struggled through sporadic conversation about New York and Los Angeles, Frank Sinatra and the mafia, before I began to sense that he was likely homeless, or at least some kind of conjurer who tries to turn other people’s waste into money.
Spread on his lap was an intricately annotated racing sheet with the numbers of the horses that had come in first, second and third in recent races, probably over the weekend. In his hands, he held a huge stack of crumpled and discarded betting slips that he had collected, about the size of three or four decks of cards. Each in our own language, but clearly enough that each understood what the other was saying, we communicated that he was comparing the bets to the results to see if anyone threw away a ticket without claiming his winning, but he wasn’t having any luck either.
From his pocket, he drew out a small black box, like a hinged eye glass case but smaller, like a ring box only bigger, and showed us two tiny gold coins, like miniature dimes. One was a commemorative John Kennedy piece, the other was a Roman reproduction. He beamed so much it seemed like those must have been his prized possessions, as if he wanted to show us he was a man of consequential possessions after all. It was a poignant exchange.
As we disembarked onto the platform in Naples, my mom and I reached for our cameras to take a picture with him, but a young women stopped us and said it wasn’t safe to open our purses. I’m still not sure if she meant in front of him or just on the platform with all of the people around, but he had said already said goodbye and moved off in the other direction.
Rome, Maryelen B&B, July 9, 2008, 7:48 AM
The train was already crowded when we boarded. It had come from Sorrento and was only halfway through its journey. We sat next to another grizzled character who had spread his belongings over three of the four facing seats. He cleared two seats and let us sit down. At first, we didn’t say anything to each other, but after a few minutes, he asked in Italian if we were American. We struggled through sporadic conversation about New York and Los Angeles, Frank Sinatra and the mafia, before I began to sense that he was likely homeless, or at least some kind of conjurer who tries to turn other people’s waste into money.
Spread on his lap was an intricately annotated racing sheet with the numbers of the horses that had come in first, second and third in recent races, probably over the weekend. In his hands, he held a huge stack of crumpled and discarded betting slips that he had collected, about the size of three or four decks of cards. Each in our own language, but clearly enough that each understood what the other was saying, we communicated that he was comparing the bets to the results to see if anyone threw away a ticket without claiming his winning, but he wasn’t having any luck either.
From his pocket, he drew out a small black box, like a hinged eye glass case but smaller, like a ring box only bigger, and showed us two tiny gold coins, like miniature dimes. One was a commemorative John Kennedy piece, the other was a Roman reproduction. He beamed so much it seemed like those must have been his prized possessions, as if he wanted to show us he was a man of consequential possessions after all. It was a poignant exchange.
As we disembarked onto the platform in Naples, my mom and I reached for our cameras to take a picture with him, but a young women stopped us and said it wasn’t safe to open our purses. I’m still not sure if she meant in front of him or just on the platform with all of the people around, but he had said already said goodbye and moved off in the other direction.
Leaving Pompeii
Hello to Heidi, Cheri and Tara! You seem to be the only ones reading, or at least commenting! Great to know you are there! Here's the dish on yesterday. I’m going to try to remember to insert the day and time of the entry when I write it. Because I seem to constantly be a day behind, this just gives you a sense of when/where I am when I sit down to write:
Rome, Maryelen B&B, July 9, 2008, 6:47 AM
I woke up early for some reason--I couldn’t sleep beyond 5 AM after having gone to bed so late after the dinner at Bocconci (?)--but stayed in bed until 7 AM when I showered and packed for our trip to Rome. We went upstairs to breakfast where Antonio was running behind schedule and chatted while he finished setting the buffet. After a quick breakfast, not as leisurely as the day before due to our nerves about making the connection in Naples, Mom returned to the room to pack her stuff while I spent close to 30 minutes playing with Romeo, the 5 month old golden retriever. What a schmoo.
Romeo is in the teething phase of his puppy career, so I let him pretend to chew my fists the way I let Radar do when he was little. Although he is a much bigger dog, his breed is known for its soft bite, so it only got painful a couple of times. He released when I said ouch--he was very responsive to all commands--so it never became a problem. After about 30 mins, I put a dirty sock over my hand, which he loved, and we transitioned into tug of war then catch.
Saying goodbye to A and I was bittersweet. We had really bonded with them over our helplessness with the train strike and our reports of our passegiatta, delicious meals and Pompeian and Vesuvian discoveries. Mom had brought along four Pittsburgh kitchen magnets to leave with each of our hosts as a memento and Ione was so touched she gave us each commemorative bronze coins they had in their office. We took photos with each A and I and vowed to stay in touch (which they were quick to add they don’t say to everyone.)
On the way to the train station, Antonio told us more about their lives. It is his second marriage (which Mom has suspected) and he has an 18-year-old daughter who normally lives with him, but is on a tour of Greece and Cyprus for two weeks. He said he had been in the food import/export business, but didn’t like having to deal all of his employees’ issues, so sold off the business 5 years ago and opened the B&B. Ione has two advanced degrees, one in Art History and one in ancient Italian, and is an accomplished piano player. He says she may be small of body but she is big of mind. They have been together three years and she is 15 years younger. She wants to have a baby, but he’s not sure he wants to start all over again, plus his daughter is very jealous and doesn’t want a younger brother or sister running around.
We made the train with two minutes to spare.
Rome, Maryelen B&B, July 9, 2008, 6:47 AM
I woke up early for some reason--I couldn’t sleep beyond 5 AM after having gone to bed so late after the dinner at Bocconci (?)--but stayed in bed until 7 AM when I showered and packed for our trip to Rome. We went upstairs to breakfast where Antonio was running behind schedule and chatted while he finished setting the buffet. After a quick breakfast, not as leisurely as the day before due to our nerves about making the connection in Naples, Mom returned to the room to pack her stuff while I spent close to 30 minutes playing with Romeo, the 5 month old golden retriever. What a schmoo.
Romeo is in the teething phase of his puppy career, so I let him pretend to chew my fists the way I let Radar do when he was little. Although he is a much bigger dog, his breed is known for its soft bite, so it only got painful a couple of times. He released when I said ouch--he was very responsive to all commands--so it never became a problem. After about 30 mins, I put a dirty sock over my hand, which he loved, and we transitioned into tug of war then catch.
Saying goodbye to A and I was bittersweet. We had really bonded with them over our helplessness with the train strike and our reports of our passegiatta, delicious meals and Pompeian and Vesuvian discoveries. Mom had brought along four Pittsburgh kitchen magnets to leave with each of our hosts as a memento and Ione was so touched she gave us each commemorative bronze coins they had in their office. We took photos with each A and I and vowed to stay in touch (which they were quick to add they don’t say to everyone.)
On the way to the train station, Antonio told us more about their lives. It is his second marriage (which Mom has suspected) and he has an 18-year-old daughter who normally lives with him, but is on a tour of Greece and Cyprus for two weeks. He said he had been in the food import/export business, but didn’t like having to deal all of his employees’ issues, so sold off the business 5 years ago and opened the B&B. Ione has two advanced degrees, one in Art History and one in ancient Italian, and is an accomplished piano player. He says she may be small of body but she is big of mind. They have been together three years and she is 15 years younger. She wants to have a baby, but he’s not sure he wants to start all over again, plus his daughter is very jealous and doesn’t want a younger brother or sister running around.
We made the train with two minutes to spare.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Blog under construction
Just a personal note to everyone:
I am sitting in an Internet cafe on the Principe Amadeo near the train station in Rome where it has taken me one hour and five minutes to cut and paste entries I have written previously on my lap top and to upload the accompanying photos. I had intended to include many more photos and video clips (I am getting GREAT video), but because the process is extremely slow, I might not be able to do that until I get to Florence and Venice later in the week. Worst case scenario, you'll get the highlights now and you can tune in after the 15th for the full show. Trust me, it's going to be a good one.
Also, I am going to try to upload a running series of photos to the left, but that might crash all the computers in the place. Keep checking back to see if I can iron out the bugs.
Much love to everyone!
I am sitting in an Internet cafe on the Principe Amadeo near the train station in Rome where it has taken me one hour and five minutes to cut and paste entries I have written previously on my lap top and to upload the accompanying photos. I had intended to include many more photos and video clips (I am getting GREAT video), but because the process is extremely slow, I might not be able to do that until I get to Florence and Venice later in the week. Worst case scenario, you'll get the highlights now and you can tune in after the 15th for the full show. Trust me, it's going to be a good one.
Also, I am going to try to upload a running series of photos to the left, but that might crash all the computers in the place. Keep checking back to see if I can iron out the bugs.
Much love to everyone!
Forecast: more wind
She shouldn’t laugh either. But, we have decided that the cause is a train strike of her own. ;)
Raphaele
Last night, again on Antonio’s recommendation, we made our way to a local restaurant on the edge of town. We didn’t even leave the B&B until 9 PM, so arrived at the small café very late. I can’t pronounce the name of it for the life of me. It was something like Bococini, but that’s four syllables and the actual name only has three syllables [Bocconci]. It was run by a young man named Raphaele whom Antonio suggested we ask for him when we arrived and say that Antonio sent us. Immediately, the three of us had a great rapport. My mother walked right up to him and said, “Are you Raphaele?” to which he replied with a big smile on his face, “Who wants to know?”
He is only 31 but has started this restaurant which he calls Italian slow-food franchising, as opposed to American fast-food franchising. This is a walk-in, sit-down, table cloth kind of restaurant, but he is selling franchises of them and has now opened a total of eight in Italy and in the past two weeks has opened one in Malta and one in Tenerife.
Before he took our order, Raphaele brought us complimentary glasses of strawberry wine in glasses rimmed with crystallized sugar. Everyone reading this (of legal drinking age!) should run right out and find a bottle of strawberry wine. So sweet and fruity that one could easily drink a whole bottle sitting in the shade on a sunny afternoon. We had it chilled, but over ice would be even better.
The savory menu is built around cheese (hallelujah) in all of its manifestations: salads, pizzas, spreads. He also offers fresh cuts of meat grilled on lava rocks. My mother started with bruschetta with the freshest tomatoes I may have ever had dressed with the lightest of olive oil an garlic. (One word: yum.) Then she had a mixed salad (more on salads later if I have time) and ended with a medium rare steak char grilled on Vesuvian ash. Perfecto.
I had a Caprese pizza with those same tomatoes and fresh buffalo mozzarella that spread like cream and tasted almost like goat cheese. This is an area known for its buffalo mozzarella, and I can see why.
He is only 31 but has started this restaurant which he calls Italian slow-food franchising, as opposed to American fast-food franchising. This is a walk-in, sit-down, table cloth kind of restaurant, but he is selling franchises of them and has now opened a total of eight in Italy and in the past two weeks has opened one in Malta and one in Tenerife.
Before he took our order, Raphaele brought us complimentary glasses of strawberry wine in glasses rimmed with crystallized sugar. Everyone reading this (of legal drinking age!) should run right out and find a bottle of strawberry wine. So sweet and fruity that one could easily drink a whole bottle sitting in the shade on a sunny afternoon. We had it chilled, but over ice would be even better.
The savory menu is built around cheese (hallelujah) in all of its manifestations: salads, pizzas, spreads. He also offers fresh cuts of meat grilled on lava rocks. My mother started with bruschetta with the freshest tomatoes I may have ever had dressed with the lightest of olive oil an garlic. (One word: yum.) Then she had a mixed salad (more on salads later if I have time) and ended with a medium rare steak char grilled on Vesuvian ash. Perfecto.
I had a Caprese pizza with those same tomatoes and fresh buffalo mozzarella that spread like cream and tasted almost like goat cheese. This is an area known for its buffalo mozzarella, and I can see why.
Dogs
Stray dogs are everywhere in Pompei. My heart breaks every time I see one, which is on every fourth street corner, except in old Pompei where they were shading themselves in every house. Sadly, I’m becoming obsessed by them for more reasons than one: I miss Radar, I find myself empathizing with them, I want to rescue all dogs. There were three in the train station where we tried to exchange our tickets this morning. According to Antonio, when a family no longer wants a dog, they turn it out into the street. State law prohibits euthanizing them, so, essentially, they become property of the state. Only about 2/3 appear to be mutts. The rest appear to be full breed dogs and probably cost someone some money.
Antonio says people feed them, put water out for them, brake for them, still I want to reach out to them and take them home. Unfortunately, most of them have fleas and many are ill, so I don’t dare. They have no fear of people and can sleep in a small corner of a room or building while 20-30 people stand around talking or doing business. If I had my way, I’d come home with a hundred dogs.
Antonio says people feed them, put water out for them, brake for them, still I want to reach out to them and take them home. Unfortunately, most of them have fleas and many are ill, so I don’t dare. They have no fear of people and can sleep in a small corner of a room or building while 20-30 people stand around talking or doing business. If I had my way, I’d come home with a hundred dogs.
Accents
We aren’t hearing many American accents; about half of those that we do hear turn out to be Canadian. Mostly we are hearing and meeting Italians on holiday, some Irish, a few Poles; as I mentioned before, we have also met Australians. One interesting observation is that the majority of Americans we have heard are students. Snotty, spoiled American students. All they talk about is drinking or shopping. Few carry backpacks and they all dress well, which signifies to me that they are staying in one place for a long time, washing and ironing their clothes, and spending someone else’s money. The one or two American students we have seen actually carrying their belongings are their backs are much more appreciative of the scenery and local flavor and have been able to carry on meaningful conversations with us and locals on busses and trains. I am disappointed to think that the weak economy in the US is only allowing affluent students to travel Europe this summer. That will certainly reinforce the negative American stereotypes.
As will windy mothers. ;D
As will windy mothers. ;D
Mt. Vesuvius
Outside the Scavi, we caught a private tour bus that drove us up to Mt. Vesuvius, about 20 km away. The drive there took close to 45 mins, however, due to the steep angle of the mountain and the hundreds of switchback turns that we had to maneuver in the coach. Several times, cars coming down the mountain had to back up in order to allow the bus to make the full diameter of the turn. The bus driver honked his horn in advance of each turn, but most of the cars ignored his warning and almost ran into us as we moved into the blind turns. Surprisingly, the roadway was covered with trash--and I don’t mean litter. Bags and bags of trash, as if everyone decided to drive to the nearest bus stop and abandon their weekly garbage. The bus driver just shrugged when we asked why it was there. Many people who we spoke to back in the States said that Naples was a dirty, crime-ridden city, but I didn’t think to such an extent. And we really weren’t even in Naples, just on the outskirts. Filthy.
After we drove as far up as we could go, my mom and I disembarked at the observatory, where she remained while I climbed the rest of the way to the top.
It took me 45 minutes to climb to the summit, but only 20 minutes to get back down. The mountain is still entirely covered in ash, so climbing the steep pathways is like walking uphill in sand. The higher I climbed, the windier the peak became, but this was offset by the perfumed air. A fragrant yellow tree, something like frangipani, grows most of the way up the mountain.
At the top of the mountain, the crater is deep and ominous. Smaller in circumference than it looks from sea level, but more craggy. It was sad to think how much destruction began right before my eyes.
When we returned to the B&B and took off our shoes, we realized how covered in ash we were from the mountain. Because of the dark line around my ankles, I, especially, looked like I had a deep farmer’s tan. I had loaded up on sun block before we left, so I knew the line had to be dirt. When I turned around and saw the trail of dust I had left on the clean white tile and on the bedspread, I was horrified. I jumped in the “shower” (sit down with hose extension) and scrubbed the grit from myself, but lo and behold, some of the demarcation was actually tan. So, call me farmer Arlan.
After we drove as far up as we could go, my mom and I disembarked at the observatory, where she remained while I climbed the rest of the way to the top.
It took me 45 minutes to climb to the summit, but only 20 minutes to get back down. The mountain is still entirely covered in ash, so climbing the steep pathways is like walking uphill in sand. The higher I climbed, the windier the peak became, but this was offset by the perfumed air. A fragrant yellow tree, something like frangipani, grows most of the way up the mountain.
At the top of the mountain, the crater is deep and ominous. Smaller in circumference than it looks from sea level, but more craggy. It was sad to think how much destruction began right before my eyes.
When we returned to the B&B and took off our shoes, we realized how covered in ash we were from the mountain. Because of the dark line around my ankles, I, especially, looked like I had a deep farmer’s tan. I had loaded up on sun block before we left, so I knew the line had to be dirt. When I turned around and saw the trail of dust I had left on the clean white tile and on the bedspread, I was horrified. I jumped in the “shower” (sit down with hose extension) and scrubbed the grit from myself, but lo and behold, some of the demarcation was actually tan. So, call me farmer Arlan.
Pompeii or Pompei?
One “I” or two? The cycloptic version of the word is the Italian version, the bioptic version is Inglese.
Pompeii digested
We’ve been trying to sum up in one word what the archeological site at Pompei means to each of us, and although we can throw out one-word answers, there are many single words that apply. Does that make sense? Mystifying, saddening, hot, spiritual, quiet, sprawling, alive, exhausting, frustrating, accommodating. Each word works, very well if I may say so, but no one word sums up the entire place. When one stops to think that in one instant in 79 AD the whole city was buried, but now it’s all above ground, time seems unthinkably fast moving. But, when one sees that the excavations are on going,
that workers are erecting scaffolding, digging ditches, and re-pointing ancient casas, I cannot imagine the excavations ever coming to an end. I suppose that although the volcano buried the whole city in the blink of an eye, the four hundred years since Pompei was rediscovered have wreaked their havoc as well. It must be a constant struggle to keep the encroaching modern city at bay.
that workers are erecting scaffolding, digging ditches, and re-pointing ancient casas, I cannot imagine the excavations ever coming to an end. I suppose that although the volcano buried the whole city in the blink of an eye, the four hundred years since Pompei was rediscovered have wreaked their havoc as well. It must be a constant struggle to keep the encroaching modern city at bay.
Scavi
Pompei itself wiped my mother out, twice. We entered through the back gates which messed up the walking tour we had planned, so we decided to walk all the way through the site to the main entrance, then turn around and start with our original plan. Because it was so interesting, right from the start, we took almost 90 minutes making our way to the main gates. By that time, we were already out of water and needed to find shade to cool off.
We sat in the main entrance tunnel for 10-15 minutes while Mommy cooled off and finished her water before we discovered that there is a restaurant inside the Scavi. As soon as we realized we could eat and drink for real, and go to the toilet, we headed through the Forum and found an air-conditioned cafeteria to sit down in. On our way, we saw a group of Japanese tourists who know how to travel. Almost all of them carried parasols, and many of the women wore gloves to protect their hands from the sun.
After a light lunch, we sought out the House of the Tragic Poet with the “Cave Canem” mosaic
and several of the larger houses and brothels (the one with all of the dirty mosaics was closed for renovations),
before my mother began to get chills (borderline heat stroke?) and we made for the exit. Even at that point, we were still about 20 minutes from the exit, so we were beat by the time we actually hit the street again. All told, we were inside over four hours, probably closer to five, before we left through the same gates by which we entered. In the car park across from the entrance/exit, we stopped for some gelato, our first of the trip. A special shout out goes to Victoria Layser who recommended the chocolate chip gelato. It was great and for a few minutes, you were with us in Pompeii!
Above: Worship her, she is Headi.
We sat in the main entrance tunnel for 10-15 minutes while Mommy cooled off and finished her water before we discovered that there is a restaurant inside the Scavi. As soon as we realized we could eat and drink for real, and go to the toilet, we headed through the Forum and found an air-conditioned cafeteria to sit down in. On our way, we saw a group of Japanese tourists who know how to travel. Almost all of them carried parasols, and many of the women wore gloves to protect their hands from the sun.
After a light lunch, we sought out the House of the Tragic Poet with the “Cave Canem” mosaic
and several of the larger houses and brothels (the one with all of the dirty mosaics was closed for renovations),
before my mother began to get chills (borderline heat stroke?) and we made for the exit. Even at that point, we were still about 20 minutes from the exit, so we were beat by the time we actually hit the street again. All told, we were inside over four hours, probably closer to five, before we left through the same gates by which we entered. In the car park across from the entrance/exit, we stopped for some gelato, our first of the trip. A special shout out goes to Victoria Layser who recommended the chocolate chip gelato. It was great and for a few minutes, you were with us in Pompeii!
Above: Worship her, she is Headi.
Strike!
Antonio was extremely generous by helping us sort out the train problem before we left for the day. We had reservations to return to Rome tonight after seeing the excavations (Pompei Scavi), but due to the strike, nothing is moving. Last night, when we checked in, they told us that they were full for tonight and that we wouldn’t be able to stay here. After all of my planning, that really threw me. Really threw me--I have tried to plan for every contingency, but I missed this one. Luckily, we found out this morning that those travelers who had reservations for tonight weren’t able to get down here, so our room remained available. The bad news, though, is that when Ione called Rome to let Loredana know that we wouldn’t be able to make it tonight, she told her that we would still be responsible for paying for our room up there tonight that we will not use. Kind of crappy. Antonio was really pissed because he is not charging the people who were originally supposed to be in our room for their lost night. I think Loredana’s policy may have something to do with us being Americans, or at least non-Italian tourists. Doesn’t seem like anyone could get away with doing that to a countryman.
Antonio then drove us to the train station to try to get us a refund on our train tickets. We are clearly not the only ones affected by this inconvenience, so the answer was no. He helped us re-book reservations back to Rome in the morning, then dropped us at the entrance to the Scavi at about 10:30 AM.
Antonio then drove us to the train station to try to get us a refund on our train tickets. We are clearly not the only ones affected by this inconvenience, so the answer was no. He helped us re-book reservations back to Rome in the morning, then dropped us at the entrance to the Scavi at about 10:30 AM.
Our B&B: Certe Notti
The breakfast room at Certe Notti is upstairs on the second floor. It is small with four tables (the B&B has four rooms) and a screen painted with a French café scene that separates it from the kitchenette. The breakfast bar was on the right when we walked in and offered mango and pineapple juices, along with a selection of breads and meats (salami or prosciutto) and cheeses. Also, Nutella and a variety of jams. Ione offered us hot tea or coffee and brought out the biggest croissants I have ever seen. Our breakfast, or colazione, was not protein rich, but it was delicious and sweet.
Mama mia est vertoso (My mother is windy)
My mother can’t stop. She shouldn’t bend over or reach up. Seriously. I wish she would warn me when they are coming so I can get one on videotape.
Passegiatta
After that short but HOT walk to our B&B, Certe Notti, we checked in, dumped our bags and took naps--mine was about 2 hours, my mother’s about 90 minutes. Both of us woke a little dazed and thick-headed, but cleaned and dressed ourselves up and went off into Pompeii (the new city) at about 7:30 for our first passegiatta.
It was wonderful. Neither one of us expected the streets to be quite so crowded with people, especially on a Sunday night (we decided it might have been a holiday because we heard fireworks late in the evening).
Antonio, the proprietor of our B&B had suggested three local restaurants that weren’t geared for tourists where we could find local cuisine at a good price. We needed to ask directions three or four times in order to find Zi Caterina, but it was worth the minor hassle. On our way, we saw a puppet show and spoke to several people, each of whom gave us different directions to the restaurant.
When we headed out for dinner around 8 PM, we discovered that the city wasn’t nearly as quiet as we had first thought. All of Pompei was in the town square seeing and being seen.
We found the restaurant that Antonio recommended called Zi Caterina where Mom had the house ravioli (homemade, of course) and I had the gnocchi. We split a half liter of red wine, which was more than I have had in a while, and a tiramisu for dessert. In the States, neither one of us would touch tiramisu, but last night, it was de-lish. The place itself resembled a tavern with its dark wood and timbers and we were the only Americans there.
It was wonderful. Neither one of us expected the streets to be quite so crowded with people, especially on a Sunday night (we decided it might have been a holiday because we heard fireworks late in the evening).
Antonio, the proprietor of our B&B had suggested three local restaurants that weren’t geared for tourists where we could find local cuisine at a good price. We needed to ask directions three or four times in order to find Zi Caterina, but it was worth the minor hassle. On our way, we saw a puppet show and spoke to several people, each of whom gave us different directions to the restaurant.
When we headed out for dinner around 8 PM, we discovered that the city wasn’t nearly as quiet as we had first thought. All of Pompei was in the town square seeing and being seen.
We found the restaurant that Antonio recommended called Zi Caterina where Mom had the house ravioli (homemade, of course) and I had the gnocchi. We split a half liter of red wine, which was more than I have had in a while, and a tiramisu for dessert. In the States, neither one of us would touch tiramisu, but last night, it was de-lish. The place itself resembled a tavern with its dark wood and timbers and we were the only Americans there.
Pompei, old and new
Coming out of the train station in Pompei, I was holding the map upside down, so we headed one block in the wrong direction before we stopped to ask for help. The B&B Certe Notti was further from the train station that I had originally believed. Not a terribly long walk, but a little taxing with our luggage after such a long day. Most people seem to estimate walking lengths as “20 meters” or “450 meters” when things are really more like ¼ mile or 1.5 miles. I don’t know exactly what “20 meters” or “450 meters” converts to in miles, but I know it’s not nearly as long as what we are walking. We arrived at the door step at about 4:30 PM, an hour and a half later than we had planned to arrive due to missing our connection in Naples, so the streets were quiet at that time of day on a Sunday.
At Certe Notti, Antonio and Ione were expecting us and showed us into their small office and checked us in. He looks a little bit like Gianni Versace (Was he the one who was killed by the crazy guy outside his home a few summers back? That’s the one I’m thinking of). He is very outgoing with good English, but Ione is very shy and doesn’t have a large English vocabulary. She looks like Amy Sedaris. It seems like she does most of the work, however. The have a golden retriever puppy named Romeo with whom I am now in love.
Our first floor room (not ground floor) has a white tile floor and balcony that overlooks an orangery and small grove of lemon and lime trees.
Mommy enjoys sitting out there for a smoke while I stay inside and wash out my clothes or try to catch up with my on-line journal. [Writing and keeping up with warp-speed travel is taking more time that I thought it would. I am writing this at the end of our first full day in Italy, July 7, 2008, so she and I have been doing quite a lot of that.]
At Certe Notti, Antonio and Ione were expecting us and showed us into their small office and checked us in. He looks a little bit like Gianni Versace (Was he the one who was killed by the crazy guy outside his home a few summers back? That’s the one I’m thinking of). He is very outgoing with good English, but Ione is very shy and doesn’t have a large English vocabulary. She looks like Amy Sedaris. It seems like she does most of the work, however. The have a golden retriever puppy named Romeo with whom I am now in love.
Our first floor room (not ground floor) has a white tile floor and balcony that overlooks an orangery and small grove of lemon and lime trees.
Mommy enjoys sitting out there for a smoke while I stay inside and wash out my clothes or try to catch up with my on-line journal. [Writing and keeping up with warp-speed travel is taking more time that I thought it would. I am writing this at the end of our first full day in Italy, July 7, 2008, so she and I have been doing quite a lot of that.]
Hurry up and wait
We made it to the gate in Philadelphia with only seconds to spare, but then sat on the runway for 2 1/2 hours because they were replacing s seal under the right wing and because the airport was so overloaded with travelers we couldn‘t get slated for takeoff. We eventually went wheels up at 8:30 PM. The plane was new, or new-ish, because it was one of those that has monitors in each seat back. Although we could choose from a selection of movies, I only watched one: Vantage Point, with Matthew Fox. It was all action, no character development. I would have liked it to have been more fleshed out, but it kept me awake for an extra 90 minutes or so until I was really tired and fell deeply asleep.
The mother and daughter sitting in front of us are following the exact itinerary we are, but not going to Pompei. They are from Arizona. The daughter just graduated from HS and will be going to the University of Prague in the fall to study international business. When she was in HS, her family hosted a Czech student with whom she has maintained close contact, so they will be rooming together at the university.
We caught the train into Rome, about a 30 minute trip, then scouted around inside the Roma Termini for an edible lunch. We found a busy deli counter (for lack of a better term) that had prepared sandwiches. I had a tangy vegetarian wrap with fresh tomatoes an buffalo mozzarella, but my mother selected some kind of salami sandwich that was so dry she couldn’t finish it. We found our reserved seats on the train and, in perhaps the funniest moment of the trip so far, and there have already been quite a few, my mother stood on her cushion trying to shove her bag into the overhead storage compartment and let out the squishiest sounding fart right in the face of the man sitting across the aisle. He looked at his wife with the most confounded look on his face while she tried hard not to laugh. I, of course, was unable to contain myself and laughed for about 5 minutes non-stop with tears streaming down my face. My mom, taking it in stride, just shrugged and kept working with her luggage. “What?” she kept saying. “What?”
Our 90-minute train ride to Naples (on an air-conditioned EuroStar train) went by very quickly because we sat with a young Australian couple just out of university who are spending about 6 weeks traveling Europe with most of their time in Italy. Ned’s working as a sports journalist in Sydney, while Char is an administrative assistant in a large office. Turns out, Ned’s father is a famous journalist in Australia working on a TV news program that sounds like the equivalent of our 60 minutes. His name is George Negus, but I haven’t had the opportunity to look him up yet. The four of us talked about everything from geography and agriculture to entertainment and politics (as if they aren’t the same thing) spending most of our time discussing the American presidential election. It didn’t surprise me that they were quite well versed in the intricacies of what’s going on in the US right now, but I was pleased to learn a few things about Kevin Rudd, their new PM and what he’s been doing in Australia. He apologized to the aboriginal people of Australia right after he was elected and declared a national “Sorry Day.”
We just missed our connection to Pompeii from Naples because we took time pee in the most disgusting, toilet paper-less bathroom on the planet. Actually, there was toilet paper, but we would have had to pay a creepy looking old man sitting out front 1 euro per sheet. We opted to use the Kleenex we had with us which worked fine. Not that anyone reading this needed to know that. We waited an hour in the Naples train station for our connection south. Found out, however, that there is a train strike scheduled for Monday (tomorrow), so we are not going to get back to Rome tomorrow night. That means we will have lost the price of the train reservation we made weeks ago and will have to reschedule our trip north on Tuesday morning. More on that as it develops.
The train to Pompeii was an old local with hard seats and open windows, but the scenery was breathtaking as we stayed in the shadow (well, not really shadow) of Mt. Vesuvius along the coast south of Naples. Mom and I were both so exhausted and hungry that all we wanted to do was stretch out and sleep. The hot sun was streaming in the window and we were getting sunburn inside the train. By this time it was 3:30 PM local time, which means we had been in transit close to 21 hours non-stop with only a couple hours sleep and not much food. (Hard to imagine. Pittsburgh seems so far away.)
Because the train was a local with few tourists, we found ourselves in a car with another old character. He must have been 75 or more, green t-shirt, no teeth, but talked loudly on his cell phone and had his German shepherd puppy, Stella, with him.
She did well on the train with all of the movement and people, exploring when the train was in motion and returning to his side when we pulled into stations, but she wasn’t overly friendly with other passengers, which I would have liked.
There are many more dogs in Italy than I remember or than I saw last time. They just wander free, few with collars, sometimes alone or in small groups. All breeds and cross-breeds. Makes me miss Radar all the more. My little schmoop.
The mother and daughter sitting in front of us are following the exact itinerary we are, but not going to Pompei. They are from Arizona. The daughter just graduated from HS and will be going to the University of Prague in the fall to study international business. When she was in HS, her family hosted a Czech student with whom she has maintained close contact, so they will be rooming together at the university.
We caught the train into Rome, about a 30 minute trip, then scouted around inside the Roma Termini for an edible lunch. We found a busy deli counter (for lack of a better term) that had prepared sandwiches. I had a tangy vegetarian wrap with fresh tomatoes an buffalo mozzarella, but my mother selected some kind of salami sandwich that was so dry she couldn’t finish it. We found our reserved seats on the train and, in perhaps the funniest moment of the trip so far, and there have already been quite a few, my mother stood on her cushion trying to shove her bag into the overhead storage compartment and let out the squishiest sounding fart right in the face of the man sitting across the aisle. He looked at his wife with the most confounded look on his face while she tried hard not to laugh. I, of course, was unable to contain myself and laughed for about 5 minutes non-stop with tears streaming down my face. My mom, taking it in stride, just shrugged and kept working with her luggage. “What?” she kept saying. “What?”
Our 90-minute train ride to Naples (on an air-conditioned EuroStar train) went by very quickly because we sat with a young Australian couple just out of university who are spending about 6 weeks traveling Europe with most of their time in Italy. Ned’s working as a sports journalist in Sydney, while Char is an administrative assistant in a large office. Turns out, Ned’s father is a famous journalist in Australia working on a TV news program that sounds like the equivalent of our 60 minutes. His name is George Negus, but I haven’t had the opportunity to look him up yet. The four of us talked about everything from geography and agriculture to entertainment and politics (as if they aren’t the same thing) spending most of our time discussing the American presidential election. It didn’t surprise me that they were quite well versed in the intricacies of what’s going on in the US right now, but I was pleased to learn a few things about Kevin Rudd, their new PM and what he’s been doing in Australia. He apologized to the aboriginal people of Australia right after he was elected and declared a national “Sorry Day.”
We just missed our connection to Pompeii from Naples because we took time pee in the most disgusting, toilet paper-less bathroom on the planet. Actually, there was toilet paper, but we would have had to pay a creepy looking old man sitting out front 1 euro per sheet. We opted to use the Kleenex we had with us which worked fine. Not that anyone reading this needed to know that. We waited an hour in the Naples train station for our connection south. Found out, however, that there is a train strike scheduled for Monday (tomorrow), so we are not going to get back to Rome tomorrow night. That means we will have lost the price of the train reservation we made weeks ago and will have to reschedule our trip north on Tuesday morning. More on that as it develops.
The train to Pompeii was an old local with hard seats and open windows, but the scenery was breathtaking as we stayed in the shadow (well, not really shadow) of Mt. Vesuvius along the coast south of Naples. Mom and I were both so exhausted and hungry that all we wanted to do was stretch out and sleep. The hot sun was streaming in the window and we were getting sunburn inside the train. By this time it was 3:30 PM local time, which means we had been in transit close to 21 hours non-stop with only a couple hours sleep and not much food. (Hard to imagine. Pittsburgh seems so far away.)
Because the train was a local with few tourists, we found ourselves in a car with another old character. He must have been 75 or more, green t-shirt, no teeth, but talked loudly on his cell phone and had his German shepherd puppy, Stella, with him.
She did well on the train with all of the movement and people, exploring when the train was in motion and returning to his side when we pulled into stations, but she wasn’t overly friendly with other passengers, which I would have liked.
There are many more dogs in Italy than I remember or than I saw last time. They just wander free, few with collars, sometimes alone or in small groups. All breeds and cross-breeds. Makes me miss Radar all the more. My little schmoop.
On our way
July 5, 2008. Pittsburgh airport. 3:15 PM.
We are currently at the Greater Pittsburgh Airport waiting for the first Philadelphia leg of our trip to begin. The car picked my mother up early, at 11:45 instead of 12:00, so we were running early or on time until just a short while ago. I was rushing around at home at the last minute, as usual. Having to get Radar walked and packed and off to Mary Jo’s didn’t get me back to my house and into the shower until about 11:45. So, I was barely dressed and dried before the car pulled up. I had arranged an airport car service to drive us to save time and money. It actually ended up being cheaper to hire someone else to drive us to the airport than to drive ourselves and pay for parking.
We stopped for lunch at TGIFriday’s in the airside terminal:
My mom was hoping for a place to have a cigarette, and I was hoping for a drink to augment my Xanax, but only one of us was satisfied (me). Smoking is entirely prohibited at the airport now, so she’ll have almost 18 hours before she can have another one--unless she can find a place in Phila. At Friday’s, she tried sliders for the first time, but didn’t think that they were any less filling than a regular burger. I had the Portobello mushroom sandwich and a bowl of red pepper soup. I’m still planning, hoping, to maintain a vegetarian lifestyle while I’m away, but I’ll be flexible if I have to. The thought of eating meat now makes me sick, so I will try everything I can not to eat meat.
On our way to the gate from the restaurant, we began to experiment with Headi for the first time.
Above: our new-found friend, Headi, in the Pgh airport with the Calder mobile.
She spends most of her time wrapped in bubble wrap, but we got a shot of her with Franco Harris and a shot of her on the people movers. We were laughing so hard, I almost peed my pants and people were looking at us like we were nuts. But what else is new. We are off to a great start.
The first unfortunate news when we reached the gate is that the plane is already delayed. Right now, it’s only 20 minutes and the gate personnel are reassuring us that the delay does not affect anyone’s connections, but I’m not convinced. I won’t relax until we are on the plane to Rome. After the trip to Ireland in 2005, I think the Philadelphia airport is HELL ON EARTH, so I won’t be happy until we are free and clear of its airspace. One possible saving grace, however, is that we don’t seem to be the only passengers connecting to Rome. So, if USAir realizes that they have a number of people trying to make the same international connection, the pilot might wait for us.
We are currently at the Greater Pittsburgh Airport waiting for the first Philadelphia leg of our trip to begin. The car picked my mother up early, at 11:45 instead of 12:00, so we were running early or on time until just a short while ago. I was rushing around at home at the last minute, as usual. Having to get Radar walked and packed and off to Mary Jo’s didn’t get me back to my house and into the shower until about 11:45. So, I was barely dressed and dried before the car pulled up. I had arranged an airport car service to drive us to save time and money. It actually ended up being cheaper to hire someone else to drive us to the airport than to drive ourselves and pay for parking.
We stopped for lunch at TGIFriday’s in the airside terminal:
My mom was hoping for a place to have a cigarette, and I was hoping for a drink to augment my Xanax, but only one of us was satisfied (me). Smoking is entirely prohibited at the airport now, so she’ll have almost 18 hours before she can have another one--unless she can find a place in Phila. At Friday’s, she tried sliders for the first time, but didn’t think that they were any less filling than a regular burger. I had the Portobello mushroom sandwich and a bowl of red pepper soup. I’m still planning, hoping, to maintain a vegetarian lifestyle while I’m away, but I’ll be flexible if I have to. The thought of eating meat now makes me sick, so I will try everything I can not to eat meat.
On our way to the gate from the restaurant, we began to experiment with Headi for the first time.
Above: our new-found friend, Headi, in the Pgh airport with the Calder mobile.
She spends most of her time wrapped in bubble wrap, but we got a shot of her with Franco Harris and a shot of her on the people movers. We were laughing so hard, I almost peed my pants and people were looking at us like we were nuts. But what else is new. We are off to a great start.
The first unfortunate news when we reached the gate is that the plane is already delayed. Right now, it’s only 20 minutes and the gate personnel are reassuring us that the delay does not affect anyone’s connections, but I’m not convinced. I won’t relax until we are on the plane to Rome. After the trip to Ireland in 2005, I think the Philadelphia airport is HELL ON EARTH, so I won’t be happy until we are free and clear of its airspace. One possible saving grace, however, is that we don’t seem to be the only passengers connecting to Rome. So, if USAir realizes that they have a number of people trying to make the same international connection, the pilot might wait for us.