To the Colosseum and Back

Today was a beautiful day.

The day itself was rather unsightly, wet, and cold, but the very living of it was simply beautiful.  I got up and got ready in record time, and my friend Lisa who's "babysitting" me and I were out the door.  We were nervous at first, because we tried to go see the Colosseum yesterday but the metros were shut down for really no obvious reason, though it may have possibly been because of the raucous university protester-students.  We were determined, though, to NOT let them spoil our day!

After purchasing new month passes and taking the bus to the metro station, we were thrilled to see they were open.  I may have squealed.

We got off the metro at the stop "Colosseo," which is, fairly obviously, the Colosseum stop.  It's always a surprise to me when I exit the metro station and the Colosseum is right there.  It'll give you the chills.

Traipsing across the street and down a few blocks, we turned into Palatine hill and purchased day tickets and marched directly back to the Colosseum, where we entered after being accosted by several chubby gladiators wielding menacing umbrellas.  To our delight, the visitors were few so we didn't have to be herded around like as much cattle.

We immensely enjoyed running around and taking pictures with her camera, but I simply couldn't stop the chills from creeping up my back all the way up to the roots of my hair.  At one point, we were able to go far enough down into the Colosseum that we could almost touch the arena, and my imagination ran wild.  I pictured the pain, the destruction, the torment, the stench of blood, and felt as if I could almost smell the perfume that the workers sprayed to mask the heady aroma of death that so seduced the onlookers.  The persecution that went on in the Colosseum is simply.... indescribable.  It's impossible to be unmoved.

Once we left the Colosseum, we went back to Palatine Hill.  We looked in the museum by Augustus Caesar's home, and it's just all so surreal.  We walked and noticed several olive trees and were intent on picking one, but they were all too high in the branches.  At the end of our tour, we finally found some low enough, and Lisa bit right in.

The look on her face?  PRICELESS.

"This tastes like paint!!!!!!  Ew ew ew ew!!!"  She screamed in horror while I simply, well, laughed till I almost cried.  They were not ripe.  I dropped my olive and we continued.

As we were walking back to the station, she stopped dead in her tracks and grabbed my arm.  "We have to get some gelato!"

My favorite babysitter ever.  When are you ever told that you MUST have gelato?  Well, of course!

We walked up the hill above the station, and purchased some gelato.  Hers was awful (she purchased what she thought was Nutella gelato, but it was actually Nutella and yogurt, and it was tangy) and mine was a delight.  I got mint and chocolate.  Good call.  She finally cracked and bought a new one, which she enjoyed.

Finally, we arrived home and had lunch and watched some Anne of Green Gables until my geometry class while we sipped some peppermint-chocolate tea.

See?  A truly delightful day.  We ended it by making some red velvet cake balls for a dinner we're going to tomorrow night.  But I'll reserve a whole blog post for those treats!

Have a wonderful day, friends.

This is an SOS to the multilingual world

I'm rarely at a loss for words.  Not a day goes by where I don't have something completely irrelevant to say.

Until I moved to Italy.

I find myself stricken and at a complete crossroads on a daily basis.

"Do I just stand here and look dumb?  Or do I try really hard to say something in Italian, get it wrong, and look dumb?  Or do I speak English to them and look dumb?  I look so dumb!!!!!"

This is basically the thought process that courses through my synapses, which slowly putter out and disintegrate into minuscule pieces that fall out of my left ear.  I usually end up with a weak... "Uh, non ho capito.  I do not understand."  And they either roll their eyes and fire off rapid Italian at me, which is totally efficient, or they smile and say "Ok, ok."

No matter how they react, though, I always feel SO ridiculous.  Why am I not learning this faster?

And that's not even the problem.  I know Italian pretty well, but when it's just fired at me, I lose my mind and can't remember anything.  I can sit in the car saying "Quando arrivo a casa, non faccio NIENTE!"* and smile really big and it's great and everything's perfect.   But if someone asked me two minutes later, "Quando si arriva alla casa, che cosa fate?"** My right eye would twitch, my tongue would dry up, and I would say more "uh's" in a 30 second time span than you could ever believe possible.

Why is this?  What is so wrong with me that I can't speak a word of this language to actual Italians?

Someone help me.  I'm losing it.
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*  This means:  "When I arrive at the house, I'm not going to do ANYTHING!"
** This means:  "When you arrive at the house, what will you do?"

Trick or treat, rub my feet, I think I had too much to eat

What a lovely, lovely weekend!  I wasn't able to blog because I was actually out of town with my grandparents. We went to the magnificent city of Siena, and then to the absolutely breathtaking coastal town of Orbetello.

On Friday morning, I got up, finished packing (noticing later I had forgotten my allergy meds... great) and then we were off.  It's been terribly cold, so we were bundled up!  We took the bus to the metro station, and took the metro to the other metro station, Termini, where there are also long-distance trains.  We got on one of these "real" trains, and we were officially off.  The initial train ride was maybe an hour, and then we took an hour long bus ride to Siena.  So as you can see, public transportation is becoming my forte.

Once in Siena, we walked around after getting a quick lunch.  My goodness!  Siena is unbelievably beautiful.  I want to live there so, so, so badly.  It has great views and quaint shutters and brick buildings and iron balconies and everything else you picture when you think of Italy.  It's built in a very hilly area, so it's interesting to see the dynamics of houses and churches built on different levels.  Y'all should really go.  Really.

After a day and night in Siena, we hopped on a train with our friend David and his friend Angela.  They both teach in Siena, and David is a family friend.  We all went by train to Orbetello, which is a city on the coast.  It's breathtaking!  Except... it's windy.  So windy that I got WIND-BURN.  And I was freezing the whole time.  But, it was all worth it.  We met Sabina and Massimo.  They are friends of David and Angela, and they're lovely.  Massimo (nicknamed Massi) is my age, and we hung out a lot because he's trying to work on his English.  And, this weekend, there was a festival, which was so much fun!   They have the funniest tradition though... people buy a wine glass, wear it around their neck in a baggy, and then are allotted twelve small tastings with that glass.  It was funny to watch people with glasses hanging around their necks!

We also briefly saw a beautiful port town, Porto San Stefano, and it was gorgeous.  And we had some yummy seafood.  I ate quite a lot this weekend.... :)

All in all, I had a wonderful weekend.  I'm exhausted, cold, still damp from all the rain, my feet hurt, and I think I'm coming down with something.  But I wouldn't give the weekend back for anything!  It was marvelous.  I hope to go back soon!!

Ciao, mi amici (and oh, I hope you all had a great Halloween!)