This may well be my last Italian day without drenching rain. The kind that fills buckets and soaks shoes. This, then, is the day for walking. Cafe bar life is slated to fill our hours tomorrow.
But first, breakfast. Two of the group are staying next door, so I'm just with Bee and her husband for our morning meal. I go easy on the food again. Well, slightly easy!
And right away, I learn this hard truth: traveling with friends ups my coffee consumption considerably! Lingering does that to you: three cappucinos later, I catch myself. The hotel staff at the Roma Times is so friendly, so accommodating that they will be at your side, ready to refill and keep you going. I need to be careful, or sleep will become very elusive for me in Rome.
Immediately after breakfast, my friends set off on their own. This is the one morning where everyone is going to be doing something different. I blame the Vatican for it. Gosia and her husband are heading for the Sistine Chapel. That's a whole production! We've lost them for the day. Bee and her husband are going to St. Peter's Cathedral -- a slightly lesser commitment, but still, a chunk of time is required for it. I'm not willing to give in to that either. I've already written plenty about my transformations with respect to Rome: used to not like it, changed my mind. With respect to visiting the Vatican, it's the reverse: used to appreciate the art that goes with the entire church hierarchy, now -- not so much. Not helped by the fact that the whole Vatican complex is the biggest draw for tourism here, so I imagine the crowds gathered there even in February will not be small. They were already not small yesterday afternoon in the Centro Storico. It's all too much for me and so we arrange a meetup "on the town" for the time after their Vatican visit.
Meanwhile I do what I love most -- meander through the streets of this fascinating city, heading first toward the old Jewish ghetto, but passing a multitude of beautiful relics of the past mixed with structures that have to support daily life now, in the 21st century. Such a chaos of styles, accommodations and adaptations!
(Visible: the Colosseum. If some of these photos are familiar, that's because I believe I took a similar walk last year! All roads lead to the same parts of Rome!)
The Jewish ghetto itself is very quiet. Was I wrong to think that tourism has overwhelmed this city? It's so still here.
(how does anyone have so much white laundry anymore?)
(aha! a shoelace on a sneaker!)
(The presence of protective forces reminds you of the troubles of this world...)
And now a hop skip to the Campo de' Fiori. The colorful outdoor market of Rome. Again, fairly quiet. And very lovely!
This is when I begin to appreciate my farmhouse readings on Rome. Much of it may have been useless, but every once in a while I did come across some interesting hint or tidbit and I'd note it down. In case I'm in that neighborhood, I should do this! At the market square, there is a bakery (Forno de' Campo dei Fiori) which produces, among other things, fantastic pizza breads and especially Rome's favorite snack food. -- pizza bianca. I say snack food, because it's just about the only thing that a Roman would eat while on the run. Otherwise, Italians are not much into the street food scene, preferring to sit and talk over their ingestibles. Like these guys:
The pizza bianca is a slice of pizza bread without sauce, without any trimmings actually, save for a rub of good olive oil and a sprinkle of salt. Fresh out of the oven, it is delicious!
(waiting for the fresh batch to come out)
(It's here!)
(And it's delicious!)
And now I am really close to Piazza Navona. I have always liked this square -- even in days when I didn't love Rome. And again, I'm thinking -- not too bad, not too crowded, nice!
(the cleaning of the fountains...)
And then, as I leave the square, all hell breaks loose. I veer toward the Pantheon (so close, after all...). And I hit the tumult. Crowds, seemingly coming straight at me. I'm to meet Bee and her husband here, but I think it is pointless. I dont want to go inside, I dont want to stand here and wait for them either. I hate the packed feeling of the place.
(it took me a while to find a moment when the picture frame wasn't filled with people...)
I text that we should meet up after they "do" the Pantheon.
And life just gets a lot worse for me before it gets better! To walk back toward the hotel, I pass Trevi Fountain. It's hypothetically a beautiful spot, but it's absolutely crazy there now. In February no less! So many people? Is this even fun?
I retreat to the Monti neighborhood (of my hotel). I find a beloved cafe (of one writer who lives in this neighborhood). The Er Baretto.
I go inside, order a salad (I'm so happy to be eating a big salad again!) and I think about Rome.
Why does this city feel so overwhelming in some parts and so beautiful in others? I mean, I am a tourist. I contribute to the problem of over-tourism, don't I?
There are about 35 million tourists that pour into Rome each year and 10 million more than that who go to Paris in any given year. I never feel overwhelmed in Paris! Why is that?
I think the condensed nature of Rome's principal attractions -- the narrow streets, the closed spaces -- this is where the problem lies. The Centro Storico is small. Packing in 35 million there is just crazy. I love Rome for its neighborhoods, I don't love it for its "main attractions." If I never see the Fountain of Trevi again, I wont care.
And yet. Say I bought a grandchild to Rome. Wouldn't I want to check off the main sights? I tugged my daughters to the Sistine Chapel, to the Trevi Fountain. But in those days, it wasn't Disneyland on steroids. It was just plain fun. I cant imagine Snowdrop, for example, having any sense of Rome at all if it took her to the Pantheon, or Trevi, or the Vatican. And why go to Rome if you wind up not having a sense of the city at all?
I wish people would love cities with all their senses, for the taste, for the life-unfolding aspects of them and not feel compelled to all crowd into one square, stand before one painting, feel satisfied with tossing a coin into one fountain. Or maybe that's unfair of me? If I could not travel often and indeed had resources for only one trip to Italy, would it be fair to tell me to skip the "big attractions?" The seventh wonder of the world (i.e. the Colosseum)?
As I sit and mull over these imponderables, I text Bee and tell her I retreated to our neighborhood and am eating lunch at a local cafe and I'll join them after they're done with the sights. Wait for us! -- she texts back. And I do. And this is how we wind up eating together, finishing with a delicious canelloni and (dont tell anyone) a cappucino. (I do the forbidden thing in Italy: cappucino after lunch.)
We then shop for our friend Gosia whose name day it is today! Alright! Done!
In the later afternoon, Bee, her husband and I have tickets for the Borghese Gallery. I thought ahead of time how I would approach this incredible collection of paintings and sculpture. To me, any canvas that dates back in time more than a couple of hundred years is too difficult to understand without help. At the same time, I hate guided tours, hate little speaker things attached to your belt droning away at you, hate following along with herds of other from one famous canvas to the next. So instead, in advance of this trip I bought a guide to the Gallery (Amazon is so great for these off the wall purchases!) and back at the farmette, I read it very, very carefully. I almost bought a book on the life of Caravaggio as well, because this painter was one wild dude, but I ran out of time, so now I'm relying on bits and pieces of information about this artist's manic engagement with life. In any case, all that prep work was well worth the effort.
I truly loved seeing the sculptures by Bernini...
... and the Borghese canvases, in all their glory. Especially those done by Caravaggio, even though again, I have qualms about viewing art that was so ill-begotten. (The way the Borghese clan acquired the paintings way back when, leaves much to be desired. But, the government now owns the art, so there's that. Though the descendants of the original acquirers are still alive and spinning their aristocratic wealth in Italy.)
I have to say that in the end, there was too much for me to digest at the Gallery. On the second floor, aside from a few famous paintings by such notables as Titian and Raphael...
... few others were memorable for me. The park just outside the Gallery provided a welcome relief.
And guess what we saw -- the flying parrots of Rome! My bird identifier tells me for sure that they are actually the rose-ringed parakeets. And of course, the park has a number of the beautiful umbrella pines of Rome.
We walk back by way of the Spanish Steps. For the view again.
(my precious friends...)
And we have just a few minutes to recover before it is time to set out for dinner at Colline Emilia. Others were charged with putting together most of the plans for our stay in Rome, but I was charged with coming up with (walkable) dinner places. A terribly risky proposition, as tastes are fickle and varied, but I figured there's always pasta for the hard to please. You cant go wrong with that!
(it's Gosia's name day!)
And the dinner is great: meats, cheeses, artichokes. Pasta made earlier by this expert pasta maker (I passed by and watched):
And served by a wonderful crew of waitstaff.
(the classic Roman winter dish: the artichoke)
Tomorrow is the challenge: the rains are coming to Rome! We will see how that will play out. Until then, good night! Under the light of the almost, almost full moon...
(earlier, at the Borghese Gardens...)
