la dolce vita
May. 27th, 2002 05:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fictionalSo (finally)...update from Roma:
The flight over here was long, and it was impossible to sleep. The food was disappointingly, but unsurprisingly plastic, and I actually got carded for a bottle of wine. I haven't been carded for alcohol on an international flight since I was 12 years old. The nice old Italian gentleman in the seat next to me reassured me that no one would ever dare ID me for alcohol in Rome.
Meeting up with Jennine in the airport was surprisingly easy. I actually saw her plane arrive at Fiucimino minutes before we taxied up to our gate. So that was simple. We located the train into the city without a problem, even managing to order our tickets in Italian (although the ticket-taker did look askance at us and pointedly talked back to us in English). We saw a train at the station and ran to get into it, and only after it left, did we realize that we were headed express to the main Termini Stazione. So we waved goodbye to our stop, (Stazione Trastevere) and got off at Termini where with a mixture of Italian, English and Spanish, and conversations with lots of people in different uniforms giving us contradictory directions, we finally made it back on the train to Trastevere. Once there, after some courageous jaywalking, we caught the tram to the Largo Argentina and made it to the Palazzo Lanzarroni (which is where the Cornell-in-Rome program makes it's home.) We checked in and got keys to our apartment which is right around the corner.
The apartment is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. It has three huge bedrooms, a common area, a kitchen, and two bathrooms. The huge windows of the bedrooms overlook this courtyard which is covered by this canopy of leaves. You can step out through them and look out onto what looks like our own personal rainforest. There is a five story bougainvilla of a shocking fuschia outside the windows that eats up your eyes everytime you look. There is also a well and a fountain in the courtyard, and the constant splashing lulls you into sleep. The bells from the nearby church, Santa Brigitta clang constantly, and seem to follow some esoteric code for the number of chimes, which I have as yet been unable to decipher.
Our apartment building is steps away from the sacred area of the Largo Argentina, which are the remnants of old republican temples. Right outside our door is the place where Caesar was assasinated, in fact our tram stops pretty much on the exact spot.
I have 6 apartment mates who are mostly totally livable. I'll probably bitch more about the bitchable things in later posts, so I won't bother with it now. Upstairs there's another apartment of people, who are also really neat. We've all been discovering Rome in constantly shifting groupings, which is nice. There's another apartment that lives about 15 minutes away and we have only seen them in class since we got here.
We are right next to the Campo dei Fiori, which is this incredible open air market, lined with restaurants, cafes, and bars. The fruit and flower scent that rises of the stands is one of the most intoxicating smells ever.
Our supermarket is right next to the Pantheon, and that is pretty incredible in and of itself. The Pantheon itself took my breath away. Watching the full moon rise over it, and illuminate the nearby apartment buildings and the cobblestoned streets with a pearlescent glow while sipping a mimosa was perhaps the highlight of the days so far. Or maybe it was sitting and writing in a deserted corner of the Forum surrounded by crumbly bits of columns. At the Colosseum, a gladiator asked me if I wanted to take a picture with him. I looked at the ruff on his helmet, realized it was a spray painted broom, and laughed and declined. He smiled at me (he was actually quite young, and cute) and kissed my hand, and called me, "My Queen..." It quite made my day, especially when I went back and he remembered me, calling me "bellissima" It was the first thing of the kind to happen since I got here, and before it, I was beginning to wonder if there was something wrong with me.
We've been drinking tons of wine, and attempting to discover the non-touristy restaurants that speak no English, and don't charge "American Prices". I can see my Italian improving already, (though I suppose it doesn't take much to move up from nothing!)
Okay, this entry is getting enormous, and I have both writing and sketching assignments due tomorrow. Also there's a mosquito in here eating me alive. Tomorrow I'll try and write about the Bernini Elephant, Trastevere, the incredible Churches, the nuns, the pope, the Piazza Navona, and the Piazza Farnese...and whatever else happens between now and tomorrow. Then I should be all caught up.
The flight over here was long, and it was impossible to sleep. The food was disappointingly, but unsurprisingly plastic, and I actually got carded for a bottle of wine. I haven't been carded for alcohol on an international flight since I was 12 years old. The nice old Italian gentleman in the seat next to me reassured me that no one would ever dare ID me for alcohol in Rome.
Meeting up with Jennine in the airport was surprisingly easy. I actually saw her plane arrive at Fiucimino minutes before we taxied up to our gate. So that was simple. We located the train into the city without a problem, even managing to order our tickets in Italian (although the ticket-taker did look askance at us and pointedly talked back to us in English). We saw a train at the station and ran to get into it, and only after it left, did we realize that we were headed express to the main Termini Stazione. So we waved goodbye to our stop, (Stazione Trastevere) and got off at Termini where with a mixture of Italian, English and Spanish, and conversations with lots of people in different uniforms giving us contradictory directions, we finally made it back on the train to Trastevere. Once there, after some courageous jaywalking, we caught the tram to the Largo Argentina and made it to the Palazzo Lanzarroni (which is where the Cornell-in-Rome program makes it's home.) We checked in and got keys to our apartment which is right around the corner.
The apartment is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. It has three huge bedrooms, a common area, a kitchen, and two bathrooms. The huge windows of the bedrooms overlook this courtyard which is covered by this canopy of leaves. You can step out through them and look out onto what looks like our own personal rainforest. There is a five story bougainvilla of a shocking fuschia outside the windows that eats up your eyes everytime you look. There is also a well and a fountain in the courtyard, and the constant splashing lulls you into sleep. The bells from the nearby church, Santa Brigitta clang constantly, and seem to follow some esoteric code for the number of chimes, which I have as yet been unable to decipher.
Our apartment building is steps away from the sacred area of the Largo Argentina, which are the remnants of old republican temples. Right outside our door is the place where Caesar was assasinated, in fact our tram stops pretty much on the exact spot.
I have 6 apartment mates who are mostly totally livable. I'll probably bitch more about the bitchable things in later posts, so I won't bother with it now. Upstairs there's another apartment of people, who are also really neat. We've all been discovering Rome in constantly shifting groupings, which is nice. There's another apartment that lives about 15 minutes away and we have only seen them in class since we got here.
We are right next to the Campo dei Fiori, which is this incredible open air market, lined with restaurants, cafes, and bars. The fruit and flower scent that rises of the stands is one of the most intoxicating smells ever.
Our supermarket is right next to the Pantheon, and that is pretty incredible in and of itself. The Pantheon itself took my breath away. Watching the full moon rise over it, and illuminate the nearby apartment buildings and the cobblestoned streets with a pearlescent glow while sipping a mimosa was perhaps the highlight of the days so far. Or maybe it was sitting and writing in a deserted corner of the Forum surrounded by crumbly bits of columns. At the Colosseum, a gladiator asked me if I wanted to take a picture with him. I looked at the ruff on his helmet, realized it was a spray painted broom, and laughed and declined. He smiled at me (he was actually quite young, and cute) and kissed my hand, and called me, "My Queen..." It quite made my day, especially when I went back and he remembered me, calling me "bellissima" It was the first thing of the kind to happen since I got here, and before it, I was beginning to wonder if there was something wrong with me.
We've been drinking tons of wine, and attempting to discover the non-touristy restaurants that speak no English, and don't charge "American Prices". I can see my Italian improving already, (though I suppose it doesn't take much to move up from nothing!)
Okay, this entry is getting enormous, and I have both writing and sketching assignments due tomorrow. Also there's a mosquito in here eating me alive. Tomorrow I'll try and write about the Bernini Elephant, Trastevere, the incredible Churches, the nuns, the pope, the Piazza Navona, and the Piazza Farnese...and whatever else happens between now and tomorrow. Then I should be all caught up.
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H aha
Date: 2002-05-29 08:46 am (UTC)HA
HA
HA
!
There's nothing wrong with you. But you're in a BIIIG city. Go to a smaller mountain town, like I did, and you'll be the toast of the town.
I'm so jealous, but I'm equal parts of happy for you. You needed this-and you deserve it. I also love your descriptions of things-you writer you ;-)
-E