WEEK 1 Monday (lunedi) oncoming subway graffiti doors Today I went on my quest to find a gym. I spent a few hours researching this over the weekend and knew where I wanted to go to find these Roman gyms. Unfortunately I had absolutely no luck. I did not find a single gym in over two hours of searching for them! (Fortunately that does qualify as exercise though!!) First I went to look by the Termini station but I did not see the gym on the street that it was supposed to be on. So instead I decided to post the letters I wrote this weekend (including that big one! Woah, nervous am I! Fortunately since the Italian postal service is reknowned for being very bad, I can always assume that if I don't hear back that the Roman post lost it or is still sending it - indefinitely!)) Then I figured I'd go up to Piazza de Spagna and look for the two really big gyms that are supposed to be up there. I figured it'd be a good time to take the Metro since then I could just walk home without exhausting myself. Since this was my first legitimate subway ride, I figured I should take a few pictures for my journal. To the right is a picture of the train coming into the station and then another of the open doors. Notice all the graffiti. Every single train is totally convered with it! In New York we call that trashy and foreboding, but in Italy I think it's called "art." And I think it qualifies. The trains do look sorta cool all covered in wacky graffiti stuff. Unfortunately the inside of the train is not as nice. No air conditioning and lots of sweaty tourists and Romans - and me. Fortunately the Spagna stop was only two away from the Repubblica stop, where I got on. If you want to know more about Roman public transport, here ya go. You buy tickets at random places, like the stations and at newsstands and tabacco shops. Each "BIT" ticket is 1euro and is good for one way on the trains or buses. (You can buy daily, weekly and monthly passes too but I am never that commital about things.) Since Rome is all old and full of dead buried old shit, they don't have much of a subway system here. Lots of buses - and I am working on understanding them (especially before my friends visit - and before it gets chilly out!) babington's tea room at piazza de spagna I got off at Piazza de Spagna and looked around a bit. Piazza de Spagna is know for the famous Spanish steps, which you can sort of see to the left here. More importantly, all the super fancy shops and stores are congregated around this area. One of the best known places to grab a bite up there is this place, Babington's Tea Room. This was founded over a hundred years ago by some English ladies as a place for English tourists to have their traditional foodstuffs. I checked the menu and they have a super yummy (although slightly pricey) brunch. They also have hazelnut gelato, which was what my mother asked me to find for her before she arrived. So, Mom, if you're out there: Done! (But you're paying!) piazza del popolo alien vs predator? Since I could not find the gyms where they were supposed to be, I decided to walk up to Piazza del Popolo next. I actually did not go there on my first visit to Rome - I just rode through it with the tour bus. The American University of Rome is supposed to be up around there though so I imagine I will have plenty of time to spend up there once classes start. (I am on a waitlist to audit a course on Postwar Italian cinema.) Besides the AUR, I think a lot of the schools are located up there because this area was very populated with youngsters, especially Roman type ones. I think school must be starting soon for them (obviously) because they were everywhere together. It reminded me of when I first went to NYU and was congregating with all my new friends in the hottest spots of New York City exactly 10 years ago at this time! While at Piazza del Popolo I took a closer look at the Egyptian obelisk that is in the middle of the square. As you can see in the picture it totally testifies to the storyline of Alien vs Predator! Look at the little people worshipping the big person (aka the Predator!) And I think that person in the middle totally has an alien busrting through its body! Just like the movie said! Alright, if you did not see AVP then you have no idea what I'm talking about - but if you did catch it, then you will appreciate that last picture. While the movie is pretty stupid and silly, it does make for funny references and inside jokes! That's that for today. Stay tuned because I have made plans to hang out with the Where's Waldo dude later this week. Sketchy? Perhaps. But, hey, he's turning out to be relatively interesting (and eventually I gotta be friendly to somebody, right?) Thursday (giovedi) Today I am going to be brief. There really hasn't been much going on in my world over the past few days, save writing. I got into a groove on Tuesday and Wednesday and so I pretty much let myself stick to it. As a result, there's really not much to tell or show you. I can say that yesterday I went up the street to a new restaurant that specialises in mushrooms year round. I had a ridiculously good, yet totally bad for me, special chef pasta with mushrooms, truffles and cream. It was so damn yummy and I am sure I will return to have it again and again. Also had a little wine which only cost me 1.50euros! What a smashing deal. Plus water at 1.50euros. But then the good deal went down the drain because I did not refuse the "pane" (bread) and so they charged me another 1.50. Altogether the meal was 14euros, said and done, tip and all. Not that bad, but not that great. I need to keep it below 10 and I'll be pleased. If I only had the pasta and the wine I could have. Will try that next time I dine alone and crave fattening creamy mushroom pasta! Today I wokeup with a good amount of energy, most likely because of the pasta last evening. (My running friends say that having pasta the night before a big run is the thing to do.) I had my breakfast and then went to do a couple laps at Circus Maximus. Yeah, Seriously! I went and did two laps at Circus Maximus!! I am like some old horse-racing gladiator chariot person or something. Except that I was wearing tech'd out running shoes and listening to my iPod the whole time. circo massimo (circus maximus) It was overall a great feeling to finally get some blood running through my veins, but deciding to go out for exercise at 11am at the end of a Roman summer made it a bit hot. Not humid sweaty disgusting hot like in New York or Florida, but just hot. Regardless I did my two laps and returned. In lieu of a gym, this whole laps-around-Circus-Maximus thing could become a semi regular method of exercise for me. And, just to make you all even more envious in any ways than you might already be, en route to Circus Maximus I have to walk by the Colosseum, the Constantine Arch and the Roman Forum. I am getting loads of exposure to great Roman historical stuff along with pretending to be a super fantastic chariot racer! Now I am going to try to do more writing before I go out for my large social evening. I am meeting one new friend, Guido, at 6pm at an Irish pub up the road. Then at 8:30 I go for wine with my neighbors upstairs. They are British and supposedly in the know about expatriate Rome. Then at 10pm I am to be at the Drunken Ship at Campo De Fiori to meet the Where's Waldo guy and some others potentially. Needless to say I should have some more good stories for the journal tomorrow! Oh, and one last thing. My pal Dave from New York is flying over on Saturday to play with me. He's here til next Friday so I am sure I'll be filling you all in on my adventures with him. Tentatively I think I have him convinced to attend the Venice Film Festival with me on Sunday, assuming I can get him a ticket too. Ciao for now! Amicos! (friends!) skylight to friends The other day I wrote to my friend Kyle in London and told him that I was anxious to meet people here and see what kind of person I was going to be in Rome. This struck him as funny and in his reply he said he was quite curious to hear "what kind of person you are." Yes, it is silly perhaps for me to think that my identity and personality changes from place to place, but experience how shown that sometimes that is indeed what happens. Depending on the environment, the people I engage and other criteria I think I can present myself in a variety of ways. In Florida I remember believing I was social, but looking back realising that I really only had a small number of friends and that together we did not fit the mainstream teenage image. At NYU my first year I was completely different. I knew every single person in my dorm - and that is saying a lot since it was a building with 16 floors and at least 10 dorm rooms, usually with 2 people in each room, on each floor. That is a lot - and I thrived. Then the next year I stayed in the same dorm but all my friends took apartments so I had only a few remaining straggler friends that second year. Then I met Evan and had a bigtime boyfriend and became that horrible girl with a boyfriend who pretty much abandons all her other friends. Anyway, the point is that I don't always believe I can just slide into places and turn up with a bunch of fun people to know and play with. Part of moving here was testing myself again, in a new environment, to see if I do in fact become a different person when I relocate myself. It's sort of like a game I can play with myself. Or rather a trick I can play on myself. Let's pick me up and land me someplace where I know nobody, don't speak the language and have no knowledge of anything whatsoever. Then let's see if I can survive. What I learned last evening is that Rome seems to be a place of easy survival. At least for me. And it makes sense. People have been surviving here for almost 3,000 years. Why should I be any different? I left my apartment at 5:30pm with almost no friends and by the end of the night I was hanging around in a group of more than 10 people, all of whom were friends indirectly through me. It was quite a thing to see and internally I laughed at myself for being so very "me." I first met up with Guido at an Irish pub on Nazionale. While there we met Andy, Simon and Mark - all British travellers in town for a friend's wedding. We got to talking and drinking and I invited them out to the pub with me later that evening. After I left Guido I came home to attend to the invitation my upstairs neighbors extended. Had lovely conversation, a glass of wine and some cheese and crackers with them on their outside garden. Turns out they are a very nice retired couple from London, who've also lived in Sydney for a time, and now they have retired to Rome, where they've lived for the past six years. It also turns out that their very large outdoor garden space covers the area of my apartment, with my skylights illuminating their outdoor space. We sat in their main area outside and I saw that they have transformed rather nicely one of the skylights in my apartment into a sort of dining/conversation table. That means that as long as I leave my lights on they have a very unique and pretty centerpiece table to enjoy. I promised them I'd leave my lights on for them as often as I could! After a very pleasant time with them, I had to pop off to Campo de Fiori and the Drunken Ship to meet Simone - my Where's Waldo guy, and another new pal from online, Dario. (A fantastic Italian name, I must say!) Dario also brought along Paul and eventually Antonio. While we all chatted, the Brit travellers I had met earlier arrived, with them in tow a whole nother handful of friends. It was fantastic! So many people that I knew and could talk to. I was very pleased. So that was my first foray into the Italian social life and I must say that it was rather fun and successful. Today I wokeup with a horrible hangover (mixing gin and tonics with red wine can do that) and to the now regular sounds of pounding, hammering and other sorts of things in the creperie behind my bedroom. I think they are re-opening soon and so they are refurbishing the place, but I really wish they would hurry up with it and stop banging away incessantly at such early hours! (And those crepes better well be damn good!) my daily garden At present I am resting before I welcome Dave tomorrow to Rome. This picture shows you better how my garden looks. I bring out this comfortable red chair and I rest my feet on the tiled shelf outside. I've rolled back the bamboo cover so that I can see the sky, and at night the stars. I bring a large bottle of water with me, my laptop and my books and I settle in that place for hours. Most of the time Mao sits out there with me. He's such a good writing companion kitty. Today, behind the chair you can see my laundry hanging out to dry too. Italians do have washing machines in their homes, always located in the kitchen for whatever reason, but they do not have dryers. This leaves me to use clothes pins and let my personal items hang out to dry. Very peculiar and old-world style of me. Since I still have not found a hair dryer I am beginning to suspect that Italians have some personal distaste for hot drying air. They have no clothes dryers and apparently no hair dryers. The thing about the garden and about Rome in general is that you can hear everything that goes on around you. Over wine last evening my neighbors and I compared our lives to "Rear Window." There is an older Italian women who lives next to them and never leaves her apartment. Apparently she is quite lonely since her husband died and so whenever the Brits go outside to talk, she comes to the shuttered window and tells them how nice it is for her to hear people's voices. Across the way from my apartment, in the building on the other block, I am attuned to the cat fights that have become a regular daily ocassion. Every day one cat chases the other and the little gray one hops up on the ledge and hisses at his attacker (who I've never yet seen). Eventually a round older Italian woman stumbles down the stairs, mumbling and chanting something in Italian to them, and then hushes and shuffles them off and back upstairs. Right now, upstairs from me, I can hear the Brit neighbors having another little wine party. They must have a rather fun life, welcoming friends over all the time and sitting outside having splendid conversations for hours. It makes me hope that when I am older I will manage to have such a fortunate comfortable existence. That reminds me! I need to go switch on the lights for them! Ciao! << back to where it all began... Content & Photos © 2004 Laura Laytham, laura@girlsaresmarter.com.