so.... Roma is flooding

Like, seriously. The Tevere (Tiber) is way high, and I hear that parts of Trastevere are under water. A barco (tourism boat) totally broke away from its dock near Ponte Cavour and flowed with the rushing waters left behind by the nearly-incessant winter rainy season thanks to the Mediterranean. This barco ended up smashed against Ponte Sant'Angelo. Like so:



I'm not sure when the Tevere last flooded like this. Most likely it was a very, very long time ago-- I say this partly because of the fascination of the locals. ALL day there were hoards of italiani with their chic little high-tech telefonini (of course they had cameras in them, duh) snapping away and creating photographic evidence of this CRAZY event. It was nothing short of hilarious. I love italiani- such a strange breed, but ever so endearing. The river is flooding! The river is flooding! Text Giuseppe! Call Gaia! Tell Francesca! Che peccato, ma eccolo! Interessante, fantastico, che spettacolo! Oh, Rome..

Recently lots has been going on in light of finals and whatnot. But that stuff is boring-- the important thing is that JCU is a thing of the past (good.). But this past Sunday before finals Msgr. Wells, my theology professor//Vatican big shot (perhaps the first American pope?) took our class and the arkies (so about 60ish people, give or take) on the traditional pilgrimage 7-church walk. The list-

• San Pietro in Vaticano
• San Paolo fuori le mura
• San Giovanni in Laterano
• Santa Maria Maggiore
• Santa Croce in Gerusalemme
• San Lorenzo fuori le Mura
• Santuario della Madonna del Divino Amore

So we hit all those churches (walking) plus two more. If you are at all familiar with Roma, you'll notice that San Paolo fuori le mura-- St. Paul's outside the walls [Roman CITY walls]-- and San Pietro are very far apart from one another. We started the day at 7 am in St. Peters (the only people there, yay ND) and headed from there to Santa Maria Maggiore, then to San Paolo [pictured], then along Via Appia outside the city to San Lorenzo and Santuario della Madonna, then to San Giovanni in Laterano, then across the street to Santa Croce. Whew. 12+ miles of walking. We were on our feet from about 7 am until 4pm. It was pretty cool, though, because all that walking led to a number of really great conversations, plus the weather was wonderful (no rain !!!) and the skies that Roman blue. We stopped for lunch and to hang out somewhere on Via Appia, which is just Lazio paradise-- cyprus trees and grass and old hunks of rock everywhere. Overall a great day, one during which tons of awesome talks were talked and pictures taken. One of my faves-- I love walking, and I especially love walking around Roma, quite possibly one of the most gorgeous and colorful places in the world.

In other news: I found another GREAT gelateria today. Gelateria del Teatro on via dei Coronari, near Navona. Also, I was introduced by Nathan to the best coffee in all of Roma, quite conveniently located near the arkie studio. And the Pantheon. Definitely the best coffee I've ever had in my entire life- including that of Vienna and Ljubljana. In addition, be prepared for the Eurotrash wardrobe that is coming home with me. Trends I've noticed over the past 4 months a Roma:
1) really really REALLY tight pants on both guys and girls
2) man purses (bonus points for Louis Vuitton)
3) Dolce&Gabbana everything
4) colored tights
5) fur
6) boots of all sizes, shapes, colors, materials-- just NO stilettos ( the cobblestones limit that one)


Oh, yea- and one more interesting thing going on. CHRISTMAS STUFF. Here is the Vatican getting ready for Christmas:
A presto! Un bacio~ K

gelato

Two really excellent gelato combinations:

(1) arancia//mirtillo//yogurt [orange, blueberry, yogurt] Somehow orange and blueberry are actually a really really really amazing (yes, unexpected) combo. Excellent.

(2) gianduia//fondente//ciocc. bianco [chocolate-hazelnut, dark chocolate, white chocolate] I guess this one isn't too creative, but still- the flavors si sposano bene.


Finals are stupid.

Austrian Tour 2008

..was really fun! update soon. Coffee, cake, Mozart, and Sacher. !!!

parlami d'amore (di Roma)

Sono innamorata di Roma. Like, hardcore. I just bought the most GORGEOUS pair of flat black suede boots, knee high. I LOVE THEM. A LOT. They're GORGEOUS. Aaaaand on this rainy Friday morning in Roma, Jessie and I were boot shopping on via Candia and the shopkeeper asked us se siete spagnoli. Abbiamo risposto noo, siamo degli Stati Uniti, ma studiamo qui a Roma. To which she asked aaahh! Studiate all'Erasmus, alla Sapienza? And then asked if we were staying for the whole year. My heart literally dropped and a little sad, no, torniamo agli Stati Uniti fra una settimana... AHH. WHY.

I love Roma, I love it. I love Roma.

howwwwwwwwww

..is this semester already ending?! I can't believe it. Today was my last day of classes-- and haha, I managed to sleep through la storia della civiltá ovestile. Italiano was so sad- I love my pffssa, Ada. She brought panettone (a traditional milanese Christmas bread, think a better version of fruitcake) and a traditional winter cake from Verona. Then we just talked for an hour- about languages, about Napoli and Gomorra. That class was sometimes a pain because of the work and the frustration involved in being in a class with 4 native speakers and feeling stupid, but now I realize how much it helped my lingua italiana. Solid :) Pathways came and went and though that class is full of heavy, thick Roman Catholic theology, I will def miss Msgr. Wells, the coolest English Secretary of State the Vatican has ever seen.

After class it was sunny and the sky was a perfect blue (I looooooove Roman weather), and though it was a little chilly, I set off to do what I usually do when I'm within 25 walking minutes from my favorite place. I went to Giolitti. Today was a cioccolato bianco/caffé/gianduia day. Then I walked through the back streets of the city center, just totally content that I knew where I was and know Roma.. walked up toward p. del Popolo.. over into Prati.. down via Cola di Rienzo.. and did it. I did it. I got my second gelato of the hour at Pellacheria- biscottino/bacio/cioccolato-canella. I know I'm a fat American, you don't have to tell me. Anyway, for a long time I window shopped and boot hunted down via Cola di Rienzo. It's north of the Vatican in the neighborhood Prati, which is much less touristy than other parts of the city. It's also very pretty- tree-lined, tall-ish Renaissance apartment buildings, flat paving stones instead of cobblestones. If I could pick anywhere in Roma to live it would definitely be in Prati, probably on this street.
The sun set, the twinkling lights appeared, and thus began my boot hunt. And I found some, at this small store called Danielle. The two pairs that I am going to go back and buy tomorrow are flat suede slouch boots, in black and brown. I am also looking for brown leather boots. Oh, yea- and when I was walking down via Cola di Rienzo I saw a stand selling some scarves for 1,50E and so I bought myself 2 summer scarves in a grayish blue and a buttery yellow. Then I went into my favorite specialty foods store (higher end without being ridic priced, with lots of regional cibo italiano) and bought some presents- balsamico, pesto, cioccolato. Whatevs. Mmmm good day. And now begins the finals studying.... BLAAHHH.

late-night lasagna, timtams, pear juice, and paper-writing

First off, it's 1,30 my time and my apartment is finally quiet and peaceful- I'm sitting at our dining room table not quite sleepy but entirely aware of the fact that I have class in 8 hours. Anyway. Today was a really interesting day and I don't blame you if you don't read all of this. It's kind of for my own reference, too. But feel free to read on as part of your finals procrastination ;)

So today started out chilly and cloudy, pretty typical for a Roman November day. Class all day, test in italiano about various literary terms and stuff.. fun. Last night I finished my second-to-last final paper in italiano, which was a composition about this dramatic love affair in which a guy named Claudio has his heart ripped apart by his ragazza, Elena. I was inspired to use Elena because it's the name of a girl I met on the train back from Vienna this past weekend. Anyway, class was normal, got pizza bufala from Pizza Pazza, the tavola calda near school on piazza Trilussa.

Then I went boot hunting. No luck, but definitely made the sweep up via Arenula, toward Corso, up Corso, down the street parallel to Corso, down via dei Condotti (hahahah like I can afford anything on that street- it's the Michigan Ave/5th Ave of Roma).. I am currently on this special quest to find flat suede slouch boots in both black and brown. And I would also like a nice pair of brown leather boots, also flat, with some wear and not too equestrian-looking. Challenge. The nice part about this time of year is that it gets dark at like 16,30 every day, so by the time I really got into my boot hunt, the Christmas lights strung like clotheslines from building to building were twinkling and all was gorgeous in my beautiful city. I will post pictures later- they're still on my fotocamera. I found 2 exceptional things on my wander today:

1) the dry cleaning store that the Vatican uses to get the Swiss Guard uniforms cleaned- OMG
2) Giolitti, not so much by accident. Today was a mela verde/visciola/riso day. Mmmmm. And yea, the skinnier dark-haired scooper with the most formal uniform did comment on the fact that I come to Giolitti a lot. And he asked me why I was alone as he handed me my LARGE cone of HEAPING incredible gelato. I love being a girl here.

I also had a wry conversation with a nice italiano about the incessant winter rains in Roma. Ogni giorno devo portare l'ombrellone quando esco! After a few hours of walking I headed back to Trastevere, where the Christmas lights dance above the cobblestones and light up the backstreets of Old Rome. Pizza Pazza happened again (gli zucchini con some rando cream/cheesy sauce) and then I made my way to school again to watch Gomorra, a film one of my professoresse made us go see. Which leads me to another point..

Gomorra is a film made up of six short episodes with six main characters-- all revolving around the four-sided criminality between the port of Naples, Scampia, Castelvolturno and Terzigno. It's based on the book written by an Italian writer, who was placed under a death sentence by the Camorra clan he exposed. Mafiosi at their cruelest, meanest, most desperate and malicious. It was really dark and good, I guess, but definitely unsettling and upsetting. It's real. And after seeing it, I'm not sure I can ever return to Napoli or Campagna.. it was a dealbreaker. Very intense film-- it took on the form of a documentary moreso than a film with a plotline. Also, it showed the Camorra at all of its stages: a young boy longing to be a part of it, young men gunned down, a middle-aged man wheeling and dealing for thousands of Euros, old men relaying messages and delivering orders. Opposing sides constantly "at war" with one another. Dark and true. It added a whole new dimension to this semester. I mean, I obviously KNEW that the Camorra was still active and still ruthless in Campagna (anyone who really knows anything about Italia knows that much).... but the fact that it was so real and so..accurate kind of made me think and brought me back down to earth. Italia isn't Disneyland. It's a real country with real problems. Food for thought. If you're interested in gangster movies or modern Italian clture, definitely see Gomorra.

Anyway, time to work on a history paper. Ciaociao a tutti! Un bacio~

hava nageela

I need to start writing about the different neighborhoods in Roma. There aren't too many-- Trastevere, Centro Storico, Prati, the Jewish Ghetto, Vaticano, North Rome, Quirinale/East Rome, San Giovanni, and Termini are a good representation. Today I'm going to talk about the Jewish Ghetto and Trastevere.

Trastevere.
School's here, so I've gotten to know it just by default. I've never hardcore explored Trastevere, but somehow I feel like I know a good deal about its old-Rome streets. Trastevere is colorful- its buildings are stuccoed orange, brown, yellow, muted pinks, dark reds... none of the buildings match perfectly, but somehow they all work together-- just like how they're strung together by clotheslines of aprons, towels, clothes, and rugs any day of the week. The cobblestones seem most uneven in this area of the city, which is in SW Roma just across the river (get it? tra-Tevere?) from the Jewish Ghetto. This is the place you'll find little white-haired Italian ladies doing their fruit shopping in the morning near s. Maria in Trastevere and its piazza, but by night all the trattorie, osterie, and ristoranti are lit up with their sparkly Christmas lights and chattering fills the narrow, zigzaggy streets and wide, open piazze. The fountains even come alive at night. It's fascinating, because Trastevere is sleepy and somewhat quiet and totally quaint and cute and aaaaawwww, ROMAAA by day, but once the sun sets, it is the place to eat and linger for hours and the place for young ragazzi to hit the chicest bars in the city and mingle. Trastevere is gorgeous- that's really all there is to say. No monuments- only a few really significant but often-overlooked churches. The most important church here is Chiesa di santa Maria in Trastevere, which was the first church in Roma and the very first church ever dedicated to Mary. It's very, very old, and it has the longest consistent run of charity to the poor in the whole city-- over 1600 years' to be exact. Its facade is covered in gold mosaics and sits on the main piazza in the neighborhood, piazza di santa Maria in Trastevere (clever naming). Not much English is spoken here, and the food really is good. The best pizza in Rome is located here at la Scaletta........

Jewish Ghetto.
When you walk through the cobblestoned streets, the buildings aren't stone or columned like in some other parts of the city. They're mostly muddled browns and mustardy yellows, muted earth tones. There's not too much to see here in terms of over-touristed sites. It was where the Jews were placed during the world wars (hence ghetto with jewish in front of it), and there's still a large population of Jews that still live there, work there, and go to school there today. When walking down Via Arenula from Largo Argentina, all you have to do is duck into one of the alleyways to your left and you're there.. you'll know you've reached your destination when you spot a few men here and there... ok, everywhere.. wearing yarmulkes and prayer shawls. There's a grade school on the main street of the Ghetto (via del Portico d'Ottavia), which is also lined with Kosher bakeries and restaurants (Il Portico has the best pasta cream sauces in all of Rome but also happens to charge a HIGH servizio- service fee). This is also home to
Pasticceria Ebraico Boccione, the unmarked, tiny, family-run corner bakery that only makes 8ish items....including my fave, the torta di ricotta e cioccolato. SO GOOD AAAAHH. There's a huge synagogue practically across the street from an ancient pagan temple, so that's fun too. The Ghetto is mostly just a really nice, residential place to stroll and eat good food. Since there's nothing huge to see there, it's not touristy and is just Romans. Jewish Romans... and those clever enough to discover what amazing offerings it brings to Roma.