There’s nothing like a day in Rome to remind me how limited my understanding of Roman and Catholic history is.
We started our Coliseum tour by boarding Paulo’s tour bus, then being told we were on the wrong bus. We disembarked, waited for our bus to arrive, then boarded a bus driven by....Paulo. As someone quipped, quickest tour ever. That turned out to be one of the few glitches in a busy day. It was easy to see where our fellow tourists reside — those wearing shorts and no jacket were clearly from places that are colder than those wearing long pants and a jacket (like lots of locals). If we believe the bus thermometer it was about 14C in the morning and up to about 25C in the afternoon. The sky was a gorgeous rich blue and there was little to no wind.
The Coliseum is indeed impressive! We nearly circumnavigated it from the outside, then entered, and got to walk inside for about 240 degrees (per the Jana-Marla mathematical calculation consensus). Sobering to hear about where the gladiators and lions entered, and the hierarchy of who sat where. Impressive to hear that Rome already had a million people when it was built. I am pleased that my new camera seems to be working well and that I should have nice photos to share later.
I would need to consult my guide to find out exactly what we saw on our extensive walking tour — Circus Maximus, Trevi Fountain, several obelisks, churches, buildings, statues, etc. Giuseppe, our tour guide, had a story for everything....but there was so much information that it was hard to distinguish the most “important” information. To my untrained eye it seemed crowded but Giuseppe assured us that it was blissfully us crowded. I got to have my first sorbetto of the trip at Trevi Fountain — that was the first-ever time sorbet-o’clock occurred before lunch. 11,000+ steps later we rebounded the bus to return to the hotel at the end of our morning tour.
Six of us had lunch together at yesterday’s dinner location, then we reconvened for our Vatican tour. Again, way too much information to process — Michelangelo started as a sculptor, Jana reminds me we learned that someone (Hercules?) always had a lion’s skin in a statue, and there were a lot of popes and characters whose names I recognized from Julius Caesar.
The Vatican was intellectually and historically interesting but didn’t resonate spiritually to me, not exactly a surprise given my religious leanings and lack thereof. The Sistine Chapel was impressive. I’m sure it was more meaningful to someone who is religious, what I took was awe at the concept of spending that many years painting a ceiling masterpiece is absolutely remarkable. St. Peter’s Basilica was ostentatious, and apparently built on top of Peter’s grave (a stark contrast to Native Americans’ and Australian aborignals’ appropriate objections to building on old burial grounds). It was somehow reassuring when Giuseppe finally mentioned Martin Luther’s objections to indulgences. It was nice to see St. Peter’s square.
There were a few reminders throughout the day that the early Romans and Jews were not exactly going to kick back in a bar together and toast their unity.
Jana and I returned to our favorite restaurant (again) and were greeted as old friends. As with lunch, we were gifted chilled limoncello at the conclusion of our meal. Limoncello to me tastes like a mix of lemon-flavored cough syrup and yellow-colored “purple” — quite sweet, very viscous, and probably lots more alcohol than it seems. Then we returned to our room to call it a night after a busy and satisfying day.
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