Travel-Lens

Day 20-23

August 8-11

Roma, Italia

Rome is like Paris to me; there are a few very old and extremely interesting things that must be seen by any and all travelers but then you should just get out.  The traffic is horrible.  The heat is almost unbearable.  The mass of people at every typical tourist destination seems so large that one only wants to just run away and hide.  But the beauty that the Colosseum or the Pantheon and of course the Vatican reveals takes your breath away and you tend to be so captivated by them that you just feel so alone.  You no longer hear the complaining tourists talk about the heat or the long lines or the prices that they paid to see these ruins.  You no longer care about anything but how wonderful it is to finally see what you have for so long desired to experience.  

We walked these streets and visited these sights, as we should, and learned a few things along the way.

On the last day, after we visited the Piazza Navonna and watched street performers, purchased sketches of the city"s most famous sights, we just walked.  We found and entered a small market.  It was one of those typical Italian markets that only has certain things.  It seems that yo have to visit numerous markets to complete any particular meal but this market seemed to have everything that I would need to have an Italian meal.  I saw pasta, oil, wine, bread, and meats.  The butcher behind the counter was ready to cut us up some meat faster than we could say "no thank you". the smell of salami and cheese was so thick in the air, it felt like a suffocating blanket.  We grabbed a small bag of Cerignola olives and left.  We continued to walk. We talked about opening the olives but didn't.  We didn't open them until we were just about hungry for dinner.  I tore the bag open and poured some of the juice out so we could reach in and pick the ones we wanted.  My mom reminded me of uncle Ralph and how he used to make his own olives.  I remembered.  I thought of it my self and how we kids would run around that huge backyard to sneak into the pots and grab olives with out dirty hands.  We thought that we were being sneaky.  We found a great little cafe in another narrow street and sat to finish our olives, talk about the great trip and perhaps eat when we became hungry.  

Yes we did see the sights, followed the crowds to the next destination, hurried through the Vatican museum to only see the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, but the best time, for me, was the time spent walking and talking and resting at all of the little street cafes and just realizing that we were there.  We were there with each other.