La mia nuova vita in Europa

Ciao, amici miei!

I am now in bella Roma, and I absolutely love it.  Mom, Dad, and I will be here for about six or seven months, and then we will move to Belgium for three years. (Hence the blog name... pasta? Belgian waffles?  Ha?  ha?)

Living in a foreign country sure takes some getting used to, but luckily most of the people I have met so far have been patient.  I live in a more suburban region of Rome, so there are hardly any tourists.

My family = Sore thumb

Really, though, I find Italians fascinating.  They are so passionate and enthusiastic about everything!  They wait about half a second before blowing the horns on their little-bitty smart cars, they wave their hands around when they speak (even when on the phone), and get very excited about every. single. thing.

Today, mi famiglia took the metro (Subway train) to the real center of Rome.  We saw, first, the Spanish steps!  They were absolutely beautiful!  We didn't go up the steps, because for some reason, all of the tour groups decided to come out that day.  Next, we went to the Trevi Fountain (La Fontana di Trevi), and don't ya know, that was also crawling with tour groups wearing very strange hats.  But it was completely worth it.  It was the most gorgeous fountain in all of... ever.

We all threw a euro into the fountain.  Legend has it that if you throw a coin in La Fontana di Trevi, you're sure to return to Rome.  Sounds legit; worked for my parents who have been here before.

As we were heading to the Pantheon (Y'all, I didn't realize everything was so close together) we saw, no joke......

A mariachi band.

Which needed some more practice.

So.....

We walked past the merry band of players and found a quaint gelateria.  The gelaterias abound in Italy, much to my delight.  I got a scoop of stracciatella, which is like chocolate and vanilla but better, and a scoop of menta, which is just mint chocolate chip, in un cono.  (In a cone.)

Finally, we arrived at the Pantheon.  It was so beautiful, though pockmarked with age, and would ya believe it, there were more tour groups.  So many.  So very many.  And this time? They sang! And they clapped! And cheered! And I didn't know why! Because they were German!

I'm positive we'll go back, and I hope we'll go at a time where we can actually go in and see the sights up close.

After the Pantheon, we sat down at a cute little cafe, and I had a caffe fredo, which means cold coffee.  It was really just a tiny cup of cold espresso, and it gave me the jitters for a moment, even though I didn't drink it all.  That's strong stuff.  But it's also delicious.  So I will be getting that again.

We also had some caprese salad which was surprisingly mediocre.  It didn't have any basil, which is wrong. Just wrong. And the tomato wasn't quite ripe.  But the people at the cafe were very sweet, so it made up for the unfortunate salad.

Lastly, we just walked around and went in a couple shops. And much to my delight, they have a Sephora.  I'm pretty sure I may have sorta kinda possibly squealed and skipped across the cobblestone like a little schoolgirl.

Finally, we hopped on the metro to come home, and the last train was so full!  (And a little smelly.)  One nice looking girl stepped inside where there was hardly any room, and this old Italian man started yelling at her.  It was rather frightening, and she just meekly stepped off the train.  That man's mama needs to teach him some manners.

Now, I am back in our little hotel (we move to our apartment soon) and I'm making this little blog.  I hope you'll all enjoy it!  Please feel free to leave comments!

Grazie (Thank you!),