Wednesday 10 September 2008

Finally, Rome in Three Days

The Return of the Rental Car
Good god, this was a trial. First, we only had the weak ass map in the Rough Guide. Luckily, the road of the Hertz garage was actually labeled on the map. But then, after somehow fumbling our way from the autostrada to the city center, we spent the next hour aimlessly driving around in search of a gas station. Central Rome, designed for the chariot, not the automobile, does not have ample land to waste on gas stations at every highway exit. It's like trying to find a gas station in midtown Manhattan, but 100 times harder. I had essentially resigned myself to returning the car half full when we chanced upon a station. (Incredibly, it cost over $60 fill up our car, which I believe had an 11 gallon tank.) Then we spent 30 minutes trying to get to the car park, which was on a street composed of two one way sections heading in opposite directions. The garage lay at the exact center of both.

This is all in a Deathrace 2000 driving environment. My Manila-bred driving skillz kicked in and I, through the grace of God, avoided damaging the car or killing any pedestrians or scooters. To top it off, the polizia pulled us over to do some random document check. Kind of like a DUI checkpoint, but with fascist overtones. Anyway, we made it.

Food in Rome
Generally a disappointment, so I won't bore you. We stayed in an apartment in Trastevere, a great neighborhood across the river from the main part of town (thanks for the suggestion, Sam!). There are dozens of outdoor eateries here, and both tourists and locals flock to the place, creating a party atmosphere every night. However, the food varies dramatically from place to place. It's like trying to find a good Italian restaurant in North Beach or a good Chinese restaurant in Chinatown. We eventually found a pretty good pizzeria after some wandering.

Colisseum
We broke down and joined a tour, and had a great time! Paolo, our beefcake guide, described the horrors of gladiator life in a wonderful droll Italian accent. After hearing all this, I was mostly amazed at the historic accuracy of the Asterix comics, which I read religiously as a kid. All the weapons, armor, descriptions of the events, were spot on!

Then, Christine, a perky British classics student, took us on a tour of the Palatine Hill, where Rome was founded. "Are we all here? Brilliant!"

Transit Hell
Too cheap to pay six euro for a bus map, but having dropped 20 euro on a three-day bus/museum pass, we spent three hours finding our way to the Museum of Modern Art, where we spent about one hour. (To be fair, it's not a very big museum.) Mostly, we took buses that were headed in the general direction of the museum, and got off when they started to go the wrong way. Jen, to her credit, did eventually sort it all out. I was too busy wailing about my feet.

We also played transit roulette, and just rode buses around until we felt like going back to the center. Because it was 90 degrees out and the buses were air conditioned, this was a great way of checking out the city.

Shopping
Here's us with our packages from shopping. God my feet hurt that day.

My People
I saw more Filipinos in Rome than I see in San Francisco. Some tourists, lots of service workers. And one group of Filipino teenagers dressed like black hip hop heads, speaking in Italian. Wonders never cease.

Also, I saw more nuns in Rome than I have seen in the last 20 years combined. And 90% of them are from other countries, speaking to the source of new Catholics and the gradual erosion of the church in Italian life.

Coming Home
Over 26 hours of Iberia and American Airlines later, we arrived in SFO last night exhausted and nauseous in a way that only happens after long flights. Jen's brother, Ed, in town for work, picked us up and brought us straight to Daimo where we got a good fix of rice and noodles. Two and a half weeks of Italian food, while great, left us jonesing for Asian and Mexican eats!

Here's a photo of me, looking pathetic and sad, as we leave our Rome apartment at 4:45am.

And here's a photo of Jen scraping dog shit off her shoes with a plastic gelato spoon. Good times!

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