We have had a whirlwind few days here in Rome. I want to tell you about all the things we have seen and experienced, but there isn’t really enough blog space to write it all down. And, I think your eyes would cross about mid-way trying to read it all. But, I really DO want to tell you about all of it. So, I’ll do my best to point out some of the highlights in a concise and entertaining way.
Since last I posted, we have visited St. Peter’s, the largest church in the world and a very small church near the Piazza Venezia, where we attended a concert of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. Today, we rubbed elbows with the common people at the forum, the heart and sole of ancient Rome, and we visited the great Colosseum, where the brave Gladiators fought great battles for the entertainment of the masses.
In between visits, we managed to find a Sicilian restaurant down the street from our hotel that was filled with locals and presented some of the best food we have had on the trip. As you know, food is very important to us. And, as I write this, I am using the last teeny part of my brain that’s not filled with fun and interesting facts about Rome to plan where we might eat dinner tonight. HMMM…..so much food, so little time….but, we are up for the task!
As you can probably gather, I am a pretty independent traveler. As a rule, it’s not my style to engage tour guides or do organized tours as I travel. And, I have followed this pattern as we have done our traveling on this trip….until I got to Rome.
As I usually do before we started on a trip, I picked the brains of every person I could find who had been to the areas we were visiting to gather tips on important and interesting things to see. I had lots of great suggestions from people on all of our target areas. But, when I started to talk about Rome, literally, everyone I talked to said, “You need to see the Vatican and the Colosseum, and you need to do an organized tour.” So, I did….for each….and, I slipped in the night walking tour of the city. I am so glad I did!
Rome is a mass of artifacts, history, and art. It’s overwhelming…and without someone to guide you through, I think it would be difficult to really appreciate all that it has to offer. There’s a big difference between seeing something and actually understanding it. I don’t know about you, but if I am going to spend the time to go somewhere, I want to do more than just look. I want to understand……and connect. Thus, I now have 3 new friends in Rome….Jeanette, Simone and David….tour guides extraordinare! The credentials of this group were absolutely incredible…one was a master’s prepared art historian, one was an archeologist, and one had and extended education in Roman architecture and history. I can’t think of a better way to get a Roman education. Can you?!! What an opportunity!
I have to say, though, the best thing about my new group of friends, besides their vast knowledge, was their enthusiasm around their subjects. I have never seen people more excited to share their knowledge. Kudos to all of them!
We happened to be at the Vatican and the Colosseum on days where they were not jam-packed. Don’t get me wrong, it was crowded, but you could actually move around freely and look at things and linger…unheard of in the summer. Both of the guides took this opportunity to move us back and forth in a systematic way so that we could put the together the stories of the art and history. They were like “kids in a candy store” running us from place to place so that we could see their favorite things. In a word, it was fantastic!
The Vatican tour included the museum, the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter’s Basilica. We also had a small extra, the Raphael rooms, which was an area of the Vatican that was painted by Raphael. For the Vatican, we had what I would call a private tour. There were just 4 of us in the group and Simone, our guide. Before we really got started, Simone sat down with us and her trusty iPad and walked us through some history of the Vatican and showed us pictures of its evolution. She also walked us through what we would be seeing in the Sistine Chapel with pictures, so that we could recognize the important pieces as we looked at the real thing. We went through panel by panel and looked at some of the nuances that make this work of are so incredible!
A fun fact……It seems the famous ceiling that we are all familiar with was actually a project assigned to Michelangelo in order to get him “out of the way” of another project that he had already begun…..a very political story. I won’t bore you with the details, but, definitely a long way around to getting this famous final product.
It took Michelangelo about 5 years to complete the Sistine Chapel. He worked alone on the actual painting and scheme, with some assistance only on building the scaffolding to support him as he worked on the project. As he came to the end of the project, there were many negative changes happening in the power centers of Rome, which touched him deeply and he became depressed. This is reflected on his work. Here, there is a self-portrait that shows just his skin being carried away by a saint. Historians felt that this was a depiction of his mood at the time. He felt that everything he respected was being taken away. How sad!
The Vatican Museum was just filled with a wide variety of pieces produced across a wide scope of time. There were sculptures with absolute perfect bodies that we learned Michelangelo had studied in order to get the Sistine Chapel work exactly right. There were some pieces by Matisse and Dali, which surprised me. There were also some pieces that were very modern……abstract, really. Simone admitted that as an archeologist, she had a hard time connecting with these pieces. But, she continued to study them in order to gain an appreciation.
In St. Peter’s, we saw the golden altar and Michelangelo’s pieta, which he created at the age of 23. The detail on this piece and the artistic flow was incredible. I don’t know about you, but I don’t know many 23 year olds that have the talent and insight to produce something like this. Phenominal!
In St. Peter’s we also saw the body of Pope John the 23rd. It was actually in view in something of a mummified state. His face was preserved with wax, Kind of creepy!
All in all, our day at the Vatican was amazing!
The Colosseum and forum tour was equally as good! Our guide, David, walked us through what life in ancient Rome might have been like.
The forum was the gathering spot of the people of Rome back in the day. All of the major activities were carried out here from lawmaking in the Senate to addresses to the masses to entertainment in the Colosseum. As you might guess, the remains of the buildings are not in tact as they were in Roman times. The remains are arranged in the form of what the buildings would have been like in ancient Rome, so as to give one an idea of the original buildings. David was a genius at connecting the dots for us and painting a picture of how things looked and felt in Roman times. When we got to the area where Marc Anthony presented his famous address to the masses (you know the one…..”Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears…..”) we felt like we were among those listening to the address. You could almost hear the words linger in the air. What an experience!
Our tour through the Colosseum was fascinating as well. This was the venue that was built by the Romans to keep the masses entertained. As it turns out, the Romans were a generous society. As long as you followed the rules, there were lots of tangible perks….food, clothing, shelter, entertainment… and, they were all free!
Gladiators, who were really slaves that were trained to do battle with each other and some pretty fierce animals, provided the entertainment “show” in the Colosseum. The job of “gladiator” was one that was actually sought after by the slaves. The death rate was quite high, but if they could stay alive and become popular contenders, they could buy their way to freedom. Such a deal!
The most fascinating thing to me, though, about the Colosseum was the vast size of the structure and the engineering done by the Romans stage these “shows” for the masses. As part of our tour, we looked at the underground area where the “shows” were staged. There were 12 or so underground elevators that lifted the large animals to the arena area and about 28 smaller elevators that lifted the Gladiators to the stage area from the underground. All of these were manually driven by slaves. Imagine this kind of technology being developed in Roman times. It’s incredible when you think about it. Those Romans were pretty smart fellas!
Throughout the Forum, there were other examples of forward Roman engineering that were equally as impressive. One was an aquaduct that was built by the Romans and was still in use today to carry sewage to the river. The other one that I thought was interesting was a space that was engineered under the marble floors where they could blow hot steam in during the winter to warm the floors. My mother’s retirement home used the same kind of engineering to warm the floors in her condo. Amazing!
My overall thoughts about my last days in Rome are this……the ancient Romans were engineering geniuses and Rome, in the time of the rise of the papacy, was the gathering place of some of the most insightful and talented artists in the world!
As Mike and I have walked the streets and observed the shoddy road repair, dirty streets and graffiti on just about everything, we wonder where the genius of this culture has gone. We’re hoping it comes back. Italy has a lot to offer.
But, for these times……”IT’S still ITALY”……
Travel With Betsy 
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