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Arrivo in Roma: Benvenuto!! |
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written
by Kaia Chessen / 07.04.2004 |
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Itinerary |
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Finally, today is our long awaited arrival in the heart of Italia... Roma herself. The city we've been reading about, discussing, analyzing, even viewing films set in this city, anxiously anticipating delving into its art, culture, and way of life. It seems too ephemeral, after all this waiting, idealizing, to be finally a reality.
Megan, Lesley, and I arrived in Italia over a week ago, before most of our classmates. We've backpacked around the country from hostels to campgrounds and from bustling museums to bucolic vineyards, living out of small (but heavy!!) bags and constantly moving. As we sit on trains and buses throughout the entire first half of the day, we dream about comfy beds to replace our lumpy, ever-changing cots, a place to unpack, and our own kitchens. Apartments will be nice. Rome will be the end of one journey and the beginning of quite another.
We look forward to meeting up with the rest of our group as well, catching up on summer adventures and to have comfort in the presence of familiar faces. Many of these familiar faces come from around the world as well... France, Laos, to name a few. It will be interesting to hear stories of their adventures.
Arriving in Rome, the first task is to find the Rome Center: a feat within itself through the mazes of disordered vias and piazzas. As we stand in the Campo de' Fiori, we cluelessly let our eyes wander through this new place. All the buildings surrounding us look old and weathered, but beautiful in the mid-day light. None of them, among the outdoor ristorantes and cafes, appear to be school-like in the least.
As we peer at the address over and over again, we realize that the UW Rome center isn't like an American school building with hard lines and plain expanses of singular colors, new coats of fresh paint -- it is hiding in one of these historic apartment buildings. Towering above the coblestone, unobrusively camoflauged in the scene, we buzz the "administration" button next to the giant rounded doorway.
The next obstacle is finding Shawn, who will distribute keys and subsequently, living spaces. Ah... sweet thoughts of showers. Finally, in our apartments, we feel immediately at home.
After a seemingly short siesta, we regroup at the Rome center and walk, in mass, to a nearby restaurant. It's on Shawn's tab, so we eat well tonight... pastas, insalatas (salads), etc. We are seranaded by street performers on accordians, saxophones, and even maraccas.
We leave with full stomaches and heads swirling with warm conversation and new sights and sounds. We tour the Piazza Navona, full of Bernini-sculpted fountains and street vendors. A group of German tourists sing harmonies in the background (perhaps a choir?). In the night, the statues are lit from below acquiring a silvery, glowing effect. A breathtaking welcome, un benvenuto bellissimo!
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Highlights |
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The piazza is empty with bits of debris from the street vendors, leftover boxes and scraps from the daily bustling and colorful marketplace which disappears by the afternoon. We see it less as garbage than as a promise of a colorful, fruitful morning excursion when they inevitably will re-emerge.
A cold shower. Roma is a sweaty city.
The anticipation of what is to come. Everyone is filled with a mutual excitement and fascination. A curious energy curls through the air like a heavy fog. Luckily, the sun is shining and we are fanning ourselves subconsciously. There will be no actual fog in this city.
A scrumptuous Italian dinner (for me, mussels and clams in a bed of thick olive-oil and garlic drenched pasta... all topped with a small glass of vino rosso... I would have ordered tiramisu as well, but unfortunately and fortunately alike, my dessert time was relinquished for exploring).
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Images |
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| mystery woman |
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| River Fontana |
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The first image here captures the buildings one sees directly outside the main doors of the UW Rome center. This is the place we all had to find on our arrival to Rome. If you look to the lower right hand corner of the photograph, you can catch the upper half of Ben's head. Above Ben's head and to the left slightly is a frescoe painting to the Virgin Mary. Religious paintings such as these are all over Rome, on nearly every corner. Below and to the left of the painting, if you strain your eyes, you can see a little dot of someone gazing out her window. This is an older woman who none of us know personally, but she seems to be on a tight schedule. Every morning at 9 am sharp, she's at her window sill, watching us gather for our morning walk. I wonder if she's noticed yet that we're watching her as well....
The bottom photo is only a small piece of a very large fountain in L'Piazza Navona. The fountain was sculpted by Bernini in his day and is called "La Fontana di Quatro Fiumi", The Fountain of Four Rivers, symbolizing four of the great rivers of the world: The Nile, the Danube, and two others which escape me, but if you're curious, I have an article on this sight from last quarter which explains it in detail. Four marble male giants with streams of water flowing under them suggest the rivers and in the middle, rests a tower covered in Egyptian hieroglyphics.
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