Rome [9-20-10]

I awoke without opening my eyes -- conscious but confused. The pillows did not feel like mine, because they were larger and the crisp pillowcases had probably been ironed. It had to be a hotel. Oh yeah, “I am waking up in Rome.” It was still early, and this day would be mine.

The three of us had arrived at Leonardo da Vinci Airport later than expected last night, I along with my old college friends Walt and Brenda. We were collected at the terminal exit gate by the hotel’s dashing driver, Massimo, who had immediately started chatting up Brenda as Walt and I trundled our luggage to his waiting limo. We zipped down the freeway to Rome and then slowly wound our way through the darkening city to its “historic center” (the “Centro Storico”), tired from the long flight from Dallas via London. Soon Massimo delivered us to the front steps of the Grand Hotel della Minerve – one of my favorite headquarters when staying in this, my favorite city in the world.

I remembered stepping out of the limo, glancing through the glass and polished brass rotating door of the hotel, and then, like a reflex, turning to look up at the great dome of Hadrian’s Pantheon to the left and then over to the front doors of the Santa Maria Sopra Minerva to the right … where Bernini's patient elephant still stood carrying his Egyptian obelisk inexplicably upright on his back. Minerva – Pantheon – Bernini's Elephant … all within a few feet of where I stood. I was in the center of the center of the Centro Storico, and once the center of the world. Home again.

I gathered myself and realized Walt was paying Massimo. I caught his eye: “Trip list?”

“Trip list,” he confirmed with a smile.

Anyone who has traveled with me knows that I always utilize a running total of who paid how much, for what, and who enjoyed the benefit, so we fellow travelers can settle up at the end of the trip with a simple application of math. It is called (by me) the Turbivillian Trip List, named for a great old friend who introduced me to the concept years ago on our fishing trips to Port Aransas. It basically means that, throughout the trip, it never really matters who pays for what, or who didn’t pay. It eliminates the traditional travelers' dialogue of “But you paid last time; I should get this one,” a roughly hewn process guaranteed to be unfair to one or more randomly selected participants in the conversation. Nonsense. Just keep simple records and settle up after you’re back home in the States. The “trip list” makes “who paid” irrelevant, so everyone can get on with the vacationing part of vacations.

We checked in, got our room assignments at the desk, and agreed to meet back in the lobby in 30 minutes sharp … enough time for a quick shower and change of clothes. The pretty receptionist asked if we would like restaurant recommendations. I thanked her and said we were going to the restaurant of an old friend nearby, “… ma tante grazie, nonostante!” Her eyes widened with a smile, and she replied, “Molto bene, signore.”

When the time came to meet back in the lobby, I arrived first. A group of very “highly dressed,” upper tier men and women, obviously together, had preceded me into the collection of plush sofas, so I found a chair on the far side of the grand room and became an observer. They apparently knew each other. The women touched each other’s hands as they made some particularly humorous point in a story. The men, distinguished and refined, gently patted each other on the shoulders as they talked. If someone had told me they were the senior members of the Italian Parliament, it would have immediately made sense. They did not, however, seem to be guests at the hotel, since new members continued to enter the hotel to join the group with warm greetings all around. Perhaps they were gathering in the lobby in anticipation of a large group reservation at the hotel’s grand dining room up on “the roof.”

Walt and Brenda then arrived and we strolled off to our more modest plan for a quick meal … and then bed!

The walk was short … just straight forward from the hotel door along the east side of the Pantheon, and crossing the piazza (square) at a northwestern angle. There was the little sidewalk café of Di Rienzo. I had eaten here a good number of times, but even Walt and Brenda had been here with me in six years ago in 2004. We stopped a short distance away from the tables and scanned the waiters to see if Salvatore happened to be on duty. In a few seconds, prancing out the main door balancing a tray full of flatbreads, there he was in all his cheerful, proprietorial glory.

After placing the dishes, he spotted us looking at him with big grins on our faces and came up to us with arms flailing. “Signonri, signori … buona sera!!”

“Signor Salvatore, sono io, Michele da Dallas!” [Note: My name in Italy is Michele, pronounced "mee-KEL-eh" not, for heaven's sake, "mee-SHELL"]

“Michele! Oh yes, I remember you so well. You send many people to me, and I take care of them per-fect-lee.”

He seated us at one of his tables, showing us the extensive menu, but promising to “take care of us” (as he had always done). He was distraught that the owner of the restaurant Michele Rienzo, was not there yet, but he popped inside and return quickly with Rienzo’s daughter, anxious to introduce her to his “old friend” Michele from Dallas, Texas. She was equally charming and spoke English with ease, wanting to know when we arrived (“Just an hour ago!”) and how long we would be in town (“Unfortunately, only two days.”). We ordered delightful pastas and salads along with the house pinot griggio (“vino di casa”) for Brenda and me. Walt ordered beer … "just a glass, not a pitcher." Salvatore returned with two large wine glasses with the good stuff swinging around inside … and then handed Walt a tiny glass of beer. Walt’s jaw dropped, and then he realized Salvatore was just having a bit of fun. Grinning widely, he offered: “You wanna a bigguh glass, signore? I’ll bring-uh you uh bigger glass of beer … subito!”

We settled in and agreed we could just sit there all night, at our little table on the Piazza della Rotonda, watching the world go by.

When we were finishing up, Salvatore noticed how we couldn’t take our eyes off the front colonnade of the Pantheon (this temple being the only fully preserved treasure from the Roman imperial era). “Michele, do you remember what means the words?”

I was so hoping he would ask. “Oh, yes, Salvatore. You taught me many years ago. "Marcus Agrippa, son of Luccio, consul three times, built this.” The inscription above the columns on the front of the temple is written in “abbreviated” Latin, and its declaration is not really even true. Marcus Agrippa was a close friend of Emperor Augustus, and he was given permission to build a temple on this spot honoring the “all-gods-in-one.” It was an immediate favorite of the Romans of the First Century. But a century later, Emperor Hadrian replaced it with a larger, grander edifice and central dome, so everything you see today as the Pantheon is the work of Hadrian and his architects, not Marcus Agrippa. In deference to its origins, however, Emperor Hadrian (my personal favorite Roman emperor) generously decided to repeat the words inscribed above the original temple, and thus the well-intended historical “inaccuracy.”

We said good night and promised to return before departing Rome. He said he would be waiting for us. Salvatore is living proof that when judging a restaurant experience, the quality of the food is only one of factors to consider. A beautiful meal can be ruined by a sullen, mumbling waiter with a scratch pad … or a waitress whose only mental theme is the cruel fate which forces her to work tables instead of enjoying “the good life” with those gathering in the lobby of the Minerve. Attitude rules everything else in life, and Salvatore is obviously thrilled to be playing the lead role as protagonist in his own story.

We returned to the hotel, and my companions suggested that tomorrow be a “late morning sleep in” so we could regain our own pep and vigor. Our tour guide was not scheduled to arrive in the hotel lobby until 10:30 A.M. We went to our rooms and literally passed out from almost 48 hours without sleep.


- - - - - - -

“Okay. This is Tuesday morning. We got in last night. We had dinner with Salvatore. And our guide won’t show up this morning until 10:30. What time is it now?”

I opened my eyes in the still dark bedroom. No clock. I felt for my iPhone on the bedside table, pressed the familiar start button, and a bright screed illuminated my face, declaring the time to be 6:05 AM. Perfect! I got up and showered, did some minimal organizing of my room, and by 6:45 AM I was walking out the front door of the hotel. It was time for one of my favorite pleasures: watching a great city wake up in the morning. I have done this in many cities I've visited over the years, London, San Francisco, Hong Kong, Singapore, New York City, Madrid ... but nothing surpasses Rome in the early morning. The angled light against the sides of ancient buildings, the baritone Italian "opera" of the early shop keepers opening their doors mixed with chirping kids collecting in front of schools, the incense of thousands of pastries coming out of their ovens, seemingly somewhere right around the corner.

I decided to walk again to the Piazza della Rotonda. Most of the shops and restaurants were still closed, but the morning deliveries were already well underway before morning rush hour would make the task all but impossible. I wandered down a side street, new to me, in the direction of the Piazza Navona, passing little alleys with cafés where people were already stopping in for their morning cappuccino and brioche. Nothing is better than this simple early morning fare in the middle of the Eternal City. This part of Rome restricts automobile traffic to a good extent, so cafés can simply put a couple of chairs in the street outside there doors, and there's always someone who will sit down for some form of caffeine and something sweet.

In a quiet inset, just off the street, I saw an elderly couple scooting their chairs back and getting up from their coffee, so I slowly moved in that direction to nab their table when they began walking away.

“Buon giorno, Signore,” said a waiter from inside the café … an Italian dead ringer for singer Tony Bennett, wearing a white shirt and narrow black tie, with a big white chef’s apron tied around him. Right out of “central casting.” I greeted him and asked him how his morning was going, then ordered my usual, a cappuccino and a cream-filled croissant I saw through the window. In a few minutes presentation was made. Before delving into the pastry, I lifted the large white cup to my mouth. The sweet foam touches the lips, the warm coffee underneath reveals itself, and the fix is complete. Only when I was about halfway through the cappuccino did I start breaking off parts of the croissant and enjoying both “insieme.”

One digression. Everyone knows that a “cappuccino” is a kind of espresso and hot frothy milk combined – only for breakfasts in Italy … for any meal in the States. What I think is interesting is where the name came from. The Cappuccini (the plural of Cappuccino) are an ancient order of Catholic monks. When the morning drink became popular, some clever person noticed that the mixture of espresso and milk resulted in a light brown color that resembled the classic robes of the Cappuccin monks - - so the drink became a “cappuccino.” This sign pointed the way to a nearby Cappuccin monastery. I wonder if anyone has ever thought it was pointing the way to a hot spot for morning coffee!

As the next hour passed by, I downed another hot cappuccino and saw an ever-increasing number of people passing by, collecting at street corners waiting for their busses to work, stopping and talking to old friends in the street. This “street culture” is something we have long since left behind in my hometown of Dallas. Our cars insulate us from even our closest neighbors. Romans seems to want constant interaction. There is something else, too. You might think that Romans today would be considered snooty by other Italians, since Rome is the capital city and the city with the most noble of all histories. But that's not the case. There is an expression common in Italy stating that "Romans carry their hearts in their hands." By that fellow Italians are acknowledging that Romans, as a whole, are open and welcoming of strangers to their city. They offer them their hearts freely. I like that.


When I returned to the hotel, Walt and Brenda were up and ready for our day of touring. We had retained a tour guide whom I had met briefly in 2007, named Tim Roberts. Tim has dual citizenship, was raised in the United States, and is married to an Italian woman. As much as I love Italians, I have to admit that there is an advantage in hiring a "native English speaker" for tours if you can find a really good one - - someone who truly knows and loves the city. I have had wonderful Italians leading tours in the past who were somewhat hard to understand. Tim arrived in the hotel lobby right on schedule and the four of us set off for the Jewish Quarter as our first destination, just a short walk from the hotel. Tim liked the history of the Jewish Quarter and gave us its chronology from early pagan times during the imperial period, on through the later Christian era.

This photo is of the Porta Giulia (“Julia”), one of the main gates through which the Jews of Rome exited in the morning when it was unlocked (so they could go about their business in the main part of the city), and through which they all returned in the evenings, when it was relocked. Through the opening of the arched gate (please excuse the construction scaffolding to the left) you can see the great columns of the Teatro Marcello (the Theatre of Marcellus). What makes both features of the photo interesting to me – well, one of the things – is that “Julia” and “Marcellus” were two individuals who were important to Augustus Caesar. Julia was his only natural born child (named for Augustus’s great uncle, Julius Caesar), and was a great disappointment to Augustus. Her lusty lifestyle so enraged him that he finally ordered her into banishment, exiled to the island of Pandateria in the Mediterranean Sea. He was serious. She was allowed no wine, and only women companions and guards – no men. She died in 14 A.D., but this one gate does still carry her name and memory.

Marcellus was Augustus’s nephew. Accordingly, he always had the favor of the emperor after he ascended to power following his defeat of Mark Anthony and Cleopatra. It was in this location that Augustus permitted Marcellus to design and construct (at state expense) his great theatre, which, as you can see in the distance, still stands today. Because he was the only son of Augustus’s only sister (and because Augustus had “only a daughter”), all Romans assumed Marcellus would be the natural heir to the supreme position of Augustus as “First Among Equals.” But Augustus’s new wife, Livia, had ambitions for her own son by another marriage (Tiberius). It is widely believed that Livia secretly poisoned Marcellus to remove him as a contender - - and that she later poisoned Augustus to seal the deal. Hence: Tiberius Caesar, the second emperor of Rome ... a competent administrator of a rapidly expanding realm, but (like several who would follow him) not exactly a nice person.

I wanted Walt and Brenda to see the little nook my family and I stayed in when we were all here together in 2007, so from the Jewish Quarter we walked back through the Campo dei Fiori (the “field of flowers”) and then on to the little Piazza Mattei and the Fontana delle Tartarughe (Fountain of the Turtles). It was first completed in 1588, but without turtles! Seventy years later, in 1658, the great Bernini added the four turtles during a restoration of the fountain. This is a favorite fountain for many Romans. Also for film makers. I don’t know how many movies I’ve seen set in Rome where the characters, at some point, stroll by the pretty little fountain. Matt Damon and Gwyneth Paltrow walked by it in “The Talented Mr. Ripley,” for example. It’s tucked away in this little piazza, not really on the way TO anywhere else, and so there would never be a reason to “stroll by it” in the real world, but it’s a great Roman focal point for the cameras anyway.

The “Forum” of Rome is a fascinating concentration of ruins still standing from the Roman imperial era. Tim took us through it, and I was happy to see that, no matter how many tours of the area one might have taken in the past, there is always something new to see and learn. Here is a carving on a pavement stone I never noticed before. As you can see, it’s a circle with the Latin word ORACULUS engraved within its circumference. An oracle (oraculus) is a kind of “soothsayer” or fortune-teller rather respected at this time, but for the sake of decorum, which was also highly valued, oracles of that time could only stand in specific places in the central plaza of temples. So, within this very circle stood a long procession of Roman fortune-tellers, warning of terrible events to come. I wonder if the guy who told Julius Caesar to “beware the ides of March” stood right here?

Here is another statement etched in the pavement stone, but this one must be visualized to be understood. They are engraved cart tracks, pressed into the stone as if it were soft clay. These streets became narrower over time as new temples were built and old ones expanded. The resulting constriction on traffic flow caused the iron-clad wheels of constant carts and chariots to traverse the same, limited traffic pattern, slowly carving out the hard pavement stone. Tim pointed out several of these time-worn tracks along the Via Sacra (the route into the Forum traveled by returning conquerors in celebration of their triumphs). If you go, be sure to put your hand into these tracks and feel the flow of a million wagons when Rome was taking over the known world.

After touring the Forum and the Palatine Hill, we were beginning to get hungry and in need of a good place to sit down. Tim suggested we duck in to a little restaurant he liked. I just wanted something simple (which most truly Roman food is), so I ordered the shrimp and tomato linguini. It was spectacular; I could have eaten five plates of it (but didn’t!). Look at this photo. I rest my case. It reminded me of some of the pasta dishes my cooking class studied at the Casa Innocenti in Tuscany in 2009. What made it so great? Two major things. First the tomatoes were Italian, which means they had about three times the flavor of what we've become tolerant of in the United States. Second, they know how to cook shrimp. Too many U.S. restaurants serve white, watery, virtually tasteless shrimp simply because the cooks either don't know what makes their flavors come alive, or they simply don't have the time to "do it right."

In the afternoon we spent some time in and around the great monument to the first king of “United Italy,” Vittorio Emanuele II (a/k/a “Victor Emanuel” in English). This gigantic monument (much larger than our Lincoln Memorial in Washington) has many nicknames, like “the Wedding Cake” or “the Typewriter.” It is loved and criticized by modern Romans. It was launched in 1911 (so, by no means an “ancient” structure) and completed by Mussolini in 1935. I actually like it a lot. I think it is “overly grand,” sure, but who cares. The Forum’s ruins are historic, but always fail to give a powerful impression of what it must have felt like to a first time visitor to ancient Rome, to gaze upon these overwhelming structures. Look up at the Wedding Cake, and you can get some of what that feeling of awe was like 2,000 years ago, in this very spot.

The Wedding Cake looks out onto a large plaza with plenty of traffic and broad boulevards intersecting into its great circle. This is the Piazza Venezia, named for its other prominent building, the Palazzo Venezia (the Venetian Palace). In 1564 the ruling pope gave this palace to the Republic of Venice (Venezia), and for many years it was used as a noble residence for the Venetian ambassador to the papal court. During this era, popes made no pretense of being only the clerical leaders of the Catholic Church. They were "earthly" rulers, too, commanding armies, waging war, collecting taxes, living in luxury, and lovingly burning people alive who disagreed with them on issues they found, for whatever reason, important. Quite a heritage. Today we can still see the mark of Venice on this building. Look up and you will see the stone emblem of a lion, with wings, and one paw touching an open book -- even today, the singular symbol of Venice, and, to the Catholic world, the symbol of Saint Mark, the patron saint of Venice for many centuries.

* * * * * * * * * *
Wednesday morning I woke up early again and started the day sipping cappuccino on the piazza in front of the Pantheon, and trying to read that morning’s Rome newspaper. Across the way I saw this man sitting on a stool, “minding his own business,” as they say, when a lady walked in front of him, asked him a question in Italian (so I changed my mind and assumed they probably were not tourists). He answered. She asked another. He smiled and answered again, and she apparently had a point of view to share on that point, because she sat down on a planter and went into what seemed to be prepared remarks, while her one-man audience listened politely. My eavesdropping skills aren’t what they should be, or I would have listened to every word!

When Walt and Brenda met up with me, we set off for a day of just random wandering through the city. I suggested we start by taking a quick tour of the “Museum of Rome,” just south of the famous Piazza Navona (arguably Europe’s most wonderful public plaza). The museum was not as ancient in focus as I had been hoping (I had never been there before). It has some beautiful classical sculpture, but seemed to be principally devoted to the era of the Italian Civil War in the middle 1800’s (the same time our Union and Confederacy were slugging it out here in the United States). This bust and painting, quite beautiful, in a narrative sort of way, was typical of the holdings of this museum. It shows Garibaldi (the Abraham Lincoln of Italy, more or less) addressing the throngs in the Piazza del Popolo. He was the chief inspiration (instigator) of this war, which was really more a war of unification of multiple dukedoms and principalities than a traditional “civil war.” I have found monuments to Garibaldi in even the smallest towns of Italy. He’s everywhere. I wonder what he’d say about Berlusconi today, or even the Mafia for that matter.

The prevailing symbols of Rome are the most ancient ones. I can think of two that stand out. The letters SPQR (a Latin acronym for “Senate and People of Rome”) was once carried atop a tall pole at the head of all Roman legions as they went into battle. Today you can find these four letters embossed on just about every “manhole cover” in the city, and on the sides of government buildings, and ancient arches. [Interestingly, in modern Italian, a language barely 200 years old, the acronym would be something like "CGDR" - - but they will never take the place of the four original letters so beloved by the likes of Augustus Caesar.]

The rival symbol of the city is the “she wolf nursing the infant twins, Romulus and Remus.” This symbol has robust visibility as you walk the streets of Rome. In fact, you can even see the two twins and the wolf in the circular emblem above the SPQR (above). This is the legendary origin of the city. The twins were placed in a basket and sent down the Tiber River, only to be rescued and nursed back to health by a “she wolf.” When they grew up, Romulus killed Remus and became the first “king” of the very small city of Rome. He built his home, and the first hilltop village atop the Palatine Hill, and visitors today can visit that very location today. Modern historians always hasten to point out that in old Latin, prostitutes were called “she wolves,” so it may be that the twins were rescued by a human, not a canine. The legend goes on to say that the murdered Remus had a son named Senaeus, whom Romulus banished but did not kill. Senaeus traveled north with his family into the land of the Etruscans, and (so the story goes) founded the beautiful Tuscan hill town of Siena. More on Siena later in this blog (when we get there in a few days).

After the museum, we spent a good while in the Piazza Navona, indulging in a chocolate tartufo at the Tre Scalini restaurant, a gelato encased in a chocolate shell (something every traveler to Rome must have at some point). Once, in 1982, I found refuge here at the Tre Scalini, along with my travel companion, just a few minutes after it was announced that Italy had won the World Cup in soccer. The city went wild, and we had the best seat in the “house” to watch the insane celebrating pass by illuminated by a full moon rising over the piazza.

Three large fountains in the central area, all designed and executed by the great Bernini, grace this oblong “racetrack” plaza (built on the footprint of a great public stadium built by Emperor Domitian in the First Century). If you have read “Angels and Demons” (the sequel to Dan Brown’s “The Da Vinci Code”) you might recall that one of the cardinals is drowned in the largest of the three fountains. I love them because of the constant energy they exude from the large volume of water that constantly passes through them. The large central fountain, completed in 1651, is called the Fountain of the Four Rivers of the World, each one represented by a unique, colossal human figure. The central pedestal of the fountain supports one of Rome’s most beautiful obelisks, pilfered from Egypt by Emperor Caracalla in the First Century.

From the Piazza Navona, we took a short walk along the river and over one of the beautiful bridges to the west bank. This whole area is called Trastevere, meaning “across the Tevere” (the river we call “Tiber” is actually “Tevere” in Italian, and it’s their river, so you’d have to say theirs is the “real” name). We then walked several blocks to the entry into Saint Peter’s Square, one of the great spectacles of Rome. The line waiting to be admitted into the basilica was too long for us travelers for whom this would be the final full day in Rome, so we contented ourselves with the exterior glories. Each of us had been well introduced to the interior of this great church on prior trips to Rome.

Everyone knows that Rome is a city of cathedrals, monuments, fallen ruins, stunning plazas and uncountable sidewalk cafés. It is vast in scale, but also a very intimate city, at the same time devout and raucous, proud and indifferent. But the thing that captivates many Rome-lovers is its deep historical layering. What period of the march of Western Civilization has this city on the Tiber not been there to play a major part? I can’t think of any. Turn in one direction and soon you will be confronted by an ancient statue which, if your home town had such a thing, it would be a tourist attraction all its own; here they are so plentiful they are hardly noticed. Turn in another direction and soon you may be wandering aimlessly down some charming street of dining spots lining the black stone pavement on either side where you can pause and take pleasure in a proper Roman lunch from an unknown chef who, if he or she blessed a restaurant in your town, people would flock in from seven counties to get a taste. Perhaps Rome is the perfect city for those with "attention deficit," because in each direction lies a new seduction of the senses ... full of contrasts and even humorous juxtapositions - - like this graceful archangel, providing a resting place for a lucky gull who has come in from the coast to see Rome on his day off.

This “layering” of time, ancient supporting medieval supporting Renaissance supporting "today," can even been seen physically. When you walk the circumference of the Pantheon, it appears to have been built up from inside a 20-foot deep pit … but it wasn’t. It was built at the street level of its day; it’s just that the streets of Rome were substantially lower 2,000 years ago than they are now. Why? Well it probably wasn’t (as I was told once) the collection of 2,000 years of dust, one granule atop another until the whole ground area had risen 20 feet here, 50 feet there. The commonly accepted explanation is net effect of the flooding of the Tiber over those centuries. The river has a nasty habit of occasionally departing its own banks and filling the city with water and silt from upriver. When it has receded, it has sometimes been easier just to build new structures and streets over those that have been deeply buried. When archeologists later excavate to get back down to “the imperial level,” they sometimes make later structures look funny, with the front door to a church seem (post-excavation) as if it had been built to open into thin air – suspended high above the newly establishes “street level.” A great example is clearly visible in the central part of the old Forum.

There’s even one church that one can tour that has three layers. Today’s church is, naturally, on top. But you can take a tour down below and visit another now-abandoned pre-medieval church below it (and supporting it), and then continue your tour further down and visit the ancient pagan temple at the bottom, whose great columns support everything above.

The church just outside our hotel doors (the “Santa Maria Sopra Minerva” … or, in English, “Saint Mary’s, on top of Minerva”) takes its name from that layering of time. I remember once, many years ago, I was in Rome and had just read “Galileo’s Daughter” (a popular book club book that year), and I sought out the “Santa Maria Sopra Minerva” on account of its bit part in the persecution of Galileo. I found a priest inside sitting next to a display table and asked him if he happened to speak English. He said he did, with a big smile. I asked, “I have read that this is the church where Galileo was brought by the Holy Inquisition in order to show him how the church would torture him if he did not recant his belief that the sun was the center of our solar system. Is that true, and, if so, does the torture area underneath the church still exist for tours today?” By the time I had asked my perhaps profane question, his big smile had departed. “Signore, that area is not open to the public. That was long ago.” I thanked him, but thought “When did ‘long ago’ ever stand in they way of tourism in Rome? They could reopen that area and charge admission.”

Another visible testament to the great passage of time is the way various clepto-cardinals and popes of the past stripped away many of the fine materials used by the emperors and used them to build their own palaces and self-congratulatory monuments and tombs. Look up at the Coliseum and what you see today is an exterior wall of stone (mixed with brick repairs and restorations), not the brilliant white, polished marble of 2,000 years ago. What it must have looked like then! You will also note numerous divots or pockmarks in the stone all the way around the outer wall, which once held the metal brackets that were used to secure the giant marble tiles to the side. Various palaces inside Rome and in the outskirts proudly announce that their marble floors and walls were “mined from the ruins of the Coliseum.”


The Coliseum has an interesting story beyond all the gladiators and staged battles conducted in its arena. In the era of Emperor Nero this area was a man-made lake designed for his immense palace garden (called the House of Gold). A great, oversized statue of the sun god Apollo stood on its grounds and the lake was built beside that “colossus.” When Nero came to power after the assassination of Claudius, he had Apollo’s head altered in shape, morphing it into the likeness of himself. A “colossus” is a giant human statue (as in “The Colossus of Rhodes”). After the Romans killed Nero, ending the dynasty of Julius Caesar’s descendants, a new, fairly sane family came to power in Rome … the “Flavians” (the series of emperors: Vespasian, Titus and Domitian). During their imperial reign over Rome, Nero's garden lake was filled in and, in its place, the amphitheater we now call the "Coliseum" or "Colosseum" (after the colossus of Nero) was built. The Romans called it the Great Flavian Amphitheater, and it has stood as the arch symbol of Rome for almost two thousand years.

Varese & Lugano [10-9-09]

All packed and ready to move north (and definitely conscious of the reality that my trip to Italy was on its final leg), I went down to the port area of Vernazza on Friday morning for my final breakfast there. Antonio, the waiter, gave me that priceless "nod of recognition" and brought out my cappuccino with a little smiley face drawn on it, as if he knew I was sad to leave and needed a spiritual lift. The croissant was warm and crisp, and the air was slightly cooler than usual. I’d miss this town. When I was done, I said farewell to the Cinque Terre and jumped a train back down to La Spezia, then a taxi to my car in Portovenere, and then began my long drive north toward the Italian Alps.

The weather was turning. Ever since I had arrived in Italy on September 25, the weather had been basically “glorious.” Now it seemed to be ready to turn the tables. I checked to make sure I knew how to flip on the windshield wipers and found my way to the highway to Parma (the land of the world-famous Parma “ham” called prosciutto). There I merged into the northbound superhighway of Italy, the A-1, bound for Varese north of Milan.

The rain was intermittent, never a real deluge, but I could see dark skies in the north that said someone was getting it in buckets. My cell phone rang, and it was Simone, the ex-foreign exchange student I would be sight-seeing with over the weekend. Simone asked me if it was raining where I was, and said that Varese was getting heavy rain. He was concerned because he didn’t know how that might affect our plans to see the local lakes and to go up into Switzerland to see Lake Lugano. I just told him, “We’ll see … don’t worry, maybe I’ll bring the sunshine with me from the south!”

By the time I reached Varese (pronounced “var-REH-zeh”) it was still raining, but the storm had passed and all we were getting at that point was the “left overs.”

My GPS got me to the right street and block easily enough -- which is saying a lot, because Varese, like most Italian cities, has few street signs and a good deal of traffic, leaving you with the impression that you are the only one in the city who doesn’t know where he is or where he’s supposed to end up. I was looking for the street address Simone had given me. His family knows the owners of a great “bed and breakfast” near Simone’s office, and Simone had arranged for me to stay there during my visit. The address was on Viale Borri. The only problem was that I had found street and block easily enough, but where the bed and breakfast should have been there was nothing but a large vacant lot. Thinking I might have written the street number down incorrectly, I started exploring in both directions, up and down the street, even getting out and walking with an umbrella at one point, but I couldn’t see anything that contained the B&B's name or street number, nor anything that remotely resembled a personal home that might be used for a B&B.

Fortunately, I found a quiet alley near where the B&B should have been, and I called Simone on my cell phone. He said he knew what the problem was and told me to wait for him on the sidewalk (under my umbrella) so he could pick me up in his car. That all worked out. The address I had was correct, but the house was “out of place” down the street and had no sign out front except for a small plaque which said “B&B.” Anyway, I was soon being welcomed by Carmelo and Rosa, the owners of a grand old house on Luigi Borri, where I would be staying. My room was spacious and beautifully appointed with antiques and a great balcony. This photo is with Carmelo and Rosa, and their daughter-in-law on the left. Maybe it was just because I knew the Piccini’s, but they certainly made me feel like part of the family -- and they spoke only Italian, which kept me on my toes. They were always greeting me with questions about which restaurant I had eaten in, how I liked it, what I ordered, how did it compare to food in Texas. I loved chatting with them (food is an easier subject to discuss in a foreigh language than a good number of others).
I unpacked my bags, settled in, and in awhile Simone picked me up to take me out to dinner with his girlfriend (who was up from Milan to say hello and have dinner with us). The three of us walked the streets of the central city until our table was ready at the Albergo Bologna, and then we sat down to yet another feast. It was still a bit damp outside, but inside I enjoyed the lively conversation and laughter with these two young English-speaking Italians from the great city of Milan.

On Saturday, the weather had done a complete turnaround, and was once again crisp, clear and glorious. At last I could actually see this seldom-visited city in the far north of Italy. Simone and I walked around the town center (where he took this photo -- showing Varese as the sport-biking capital of Italy) and then jumped into my rental car and headed to the Swiss border, which is just a few miles away, to spend the day in Lugano and Lake Lugano. I thought it was interesting that the Swiss border guards spoke only Italian, as did all the people we ran into that day. I was expecting German. Once safely parked, we covered the scenic part of downtown next to Lake Lugano. I was fascinated by this bronze colossus head in one of the lakeside parks. Was it of a Roman emperor? Why the head wrap? I discovered that it was created by a famous Polish sculptor named Igor Mitoraj, and it is called "Eros Bendato" (Eros blindfolded). Since the banding affects both the eyes and mouth, it is said to symbolize that passionate love ("Eros") is often blind, and even unspoken. We walked the town, ate at a sidewalk café, and then after lunch caught a boat to a lakeside village called Gandria -- yet another ancient town for us to explore. We even visited the Lugano Casino (twice), and were entertained by watching other people loose their money to electronic gaming machines. What trust these guys (mostly) have in the fairness of the computer programs that are telling them whether they have won or lost each electronic “spin of the wheel.” What I don’t understand is the need for all the showmanship of the machines, with outlandish themes and artwork. If a gambler is willing to let a computer decide his fate, why not just drop all the bells and whistles, have one big keypad with 100 buttons, and have the digital voice tell the visitor, “Insert your credit card in the slot and press any one of the red buttons. We will then let you know if you have won or lost.”

That evening Simone’s father arrived in town from Milan to spend the rest of the weekend with us. It was a great joy to see Claudio again. We had met in 2008 when I was visiting the family in Milan for a couple of days along with my friend Linda Young. They are a charming, intelligent, generous and fun-loving family. Claudio is now retired from a large oil & gas company based in Milan, and has shifted his energies to a small computer company venture with his brother. As we spent time together for the next day and a half, we had many great conversations about the impact of the recessed economy on start-up businesses. He’s still optimistic about the future, though. Our Sunday excursions were ambitious. We drove up to the top of the Sacra Monte of Varese, which contains a great church at the top, and descending the mountain from there, a long pathway for pilgrims to climb, linking from one rotunda to the next as they ascend, each one containing on the inside a life-size “diorama” of the events of the crucifixion, resurrection and ascension of Christ - - not to mention a grand view of the Varese valley below and the Swiss and Italian Alps in the distance.

Simone feels fortunate to have a permanent job after graduating from Bocconi University in Milan. I know his family is very proud of him. Apparently, not all of his classmates have been so lucky in finding good employment after university. Simone works in sales for a manufacturer of advanced tools for the construction industry. He has a great loyalty to Italy, and to family, but he is also toying with the idea of going to the U.S. and building a career there. Any company, in Italy or in the U.S., would be lucky to have him ... bright, articulate, and ambitious, with a great ability to relate to people in all walks of life. I think he will do great wherever he goes.

I think that is one of the touching things about the modern Italian. This irony was bouncing around in my head for several days, and then, on Sunday, as Simone, Claudio and I walked the streets of Varese, I happened to see, and photograph, this random shot that expresses it visually. It is of a modern Italian woman sitting behind a street-market table which proudly displayed a bust of Benito Mussolini. They both seemed to stare into the distance … What were they contemplating? One, the Italian of today - - the other, an Italian of the past, who devastated Italy in his brutal drive to bring this nation back to its former greatness.
Italians are conscious of their own grand history of conquest, domination, achievement, cultural advancement, and honor among nations, but they worry that this might not be enough any more. For many centuries, they ruled Europe, and, at the same time, lead the way for other nations to rise and achieve greatness in their own right. Italy was once the single great “superpower” of the Western world. Today its citizens constantly find themselves just trying to stay up with Germany, France, Great Britain, and now even Spain - - not to mention the industrialized nations of the Americas - - and also not to mention the emerging powerhouses of the Far East. How is this relatively tiny country (roughly the size of Arizona) to find its way to recognition for new achievement, new breakthroughs, new contributions in a competitive, and ever flatter, world? No one wants this amazing country to become little more than a historical amusement park for tourists (although today most Italians do want tourists to continue coming to Italy -- the money they leave behind is simply too critical to the economic viability of the nation). The question will be whether Italy can continue to share with the world its past and its extraordinary natural beauty, and at the same time find the hard-earned leadership position I believe it yearns for within the community of nations. Perhaps that is what these two were pondering in the fading sun of this quiet afternoon in the town of Varese.

Well, the next leg of my journey is on tomorrow's American Airlines flight home to the good ol' USA. What uncommon hours I've spent here. I have to say, though, I'll be glad to get back. Like I wrote at the beginning of this journal, I’m lucky to have loved ones to go home to. So I'll end with that wonderfully, let's say, reassuring Italian farewell: "Ci vediamo" ... “We’ll see each other again.”
Ciao!

The Cinque Terre [10-6/7/8-09]

I arose Tuesday morning with the excited anticipation of heading north by boat to a magical area called the Cinque Terre (the “five landings” or "five towns"). This is a series of five old fishing villages lined up north and south along the Ligurian coast of Italy, and they’re pretty special. Italy turned the entire area into a protected national heritage park (like the conservation districts found in older cities), and the United Nations UNESCO declared it a “heritage of mankind” zone. I’m not sure what that means exactly, but I’m sure they meant it as a compliment.

The first (and most southern) of the five villages after heading north along the coastline from Portovenere is the tiny port of Riomaggiore. I remember having my first pizza with anchovies in this little village on my first visit to the Cinque Terre in May of 2001. Riomaggiore is also a popular starting point for hikers. Each of the five villages is connected by a hiking trail. Starting at the “bottom" or southern end of the trail leading out of Riomaggiore, the trail becomes longer and more physically demanding as you proceed north from town to town. So between Riomaggiore and the next village up (Manarola), the hike is fairly simple and easy … more like a walk along a paved pathway, with few heavy “ups and downs” along the way. Little children and older walkers seem to manage fine on this leg.

Of course, this is no ordinary walk. The height above the sea gives enormous perspective of the coastline, and the sights are breathtaking. From the surf crashing far below the trail, to the grape vineyards clinging to the 200 year-old terraces above the path, it’s an amazing experience. Even the rock that forms this coastline is amazing … with twisted strata and up-ended monoliths, you can put on your amateur geologist’s hat and clearly see the torturous pressures at work here -- pressures that at one point pushed the Alps up into the sky. The layers you see in this picture were perfectly flat and horizontal when they were first formed.

Why all the geologic commotion? Africa. Really! The tectonic plate that supports the continent of Africa presses against Europe with a force only a floating continent can deliver. It gains only one inch per year in its struggle to merge with Europe, but over eons of time that annual progress of compression has definitely left its mark on Italy, as it juts south into the Mediterranean in its eternal attempt to keep Africa in its place. The continual earthquakes and volcanoes of this country are the direct results in our times. You might say Vesuvius erupted because of Africa.

Anyway, back to the “trail” -- everyone visiting the Cinque Terre should at least do that first leg heading north out of Riomaggiore. It's truly an easy (but breathtaking) walk to the next town to the north, little Manarola. Continuing north from Manarola, the trail does become a bit steeper, so continue walking only if you have time, energy and strength. If you do continue your hike, the next stop will be the “Number 3” town of Corniglia (“cor-NEEL-yah”), which is set high up on a sea cliff and is the only one of the towns without some kind of port area. The families of Corniglia are better known for their wines and olive oils than their seamanship. If you've had enough hiking, you can take the northbound train out of Manarola, which will stop next at a station immediately below Corniglia.

My boat’s next stop was my destination town (and personal favorite): Vernazza. I first visited the Cinque Terre in 2001, and then again in 2007, but this time was different, because I was going to be staying for three nights in a little apartment right in Vernazza. What a privilege. I would eventually trek on up to the most northern Cinque Terre member town (Monterosso – the only one of these towns that allows cars in its streets), but first I wanted to settle into my new home.

My landlord, Bartolo Lercari, met me at the dock and happily led me up to my new abode in the town as he pointed out various points of interest along the way. Bartolo is a distinguished, articulate, and energetic person, and I immediately felt like I had my first ally in this town. As we passed by an old man sitting in the sunlight on the main road up the hill, Bartolo said “Ciao Babo” and then turned to me and said, “That’s my father, he’s 87 years old. His name is Ercole, and for many years he ran the best pizzaria in town. Now he’s retired and he just enjoys life.”

Bartolo’s family has been part of Vernazza for many generations. I saw evidence of this in the town cemetery where there are a good number of Lercari tombs. He now owns most of the vineyards on the slopes above the town and continues making his highly regarded local wines: Perciò, Sciacchetrà, and DOC Cinque Terre, all delicious. He hosted this wine tasting party for a group of 50 visiting Sweeds and invited me to join, which I of course did. His wife, Lisa, is the actual seller of the wine, and she speaks Swedish, so I hope they sold a lot. It was a fun wine tasting, with various Sweeds in the tour group wondering who I was -- this stranger who didn’t “look Italian at all.” I spoke at length to one 50 year-old cardiologist who said he had been to several medical conventions in Dallas over the years. When I complimented his perfect English, he said that, of course, most of the medical literature of today is written in English, so it’s essential for specialists to know the language fluently. “The New England Journal of Medicine is not translated into Swedish,” he quipped with a big grin. His favorite thing in America? California wine. “It’s much better than Americans think it is. I like it much better than French wines.”

There really isn't much “to do” in Vernazza, but I don’t think activities are what draw people here. It’s a storybook setting, and what a lot of visitors are doing is nothing in particular. I was okay with that, especially after my week-long touring of Tuscany. They know that the world beyond this coast is a frenetic place, but here one driftes into letting the angle of the sun mark the time of day. Here they still honor the national creed of Italy . . . “Il dolce far niente” (the sweetness of doing nothing).

That doesn’t mean all of this “nothing” is effortless, mind you. This town clings to a mountain side. Down is easy; up take some huffing and puffing. The side streets are all “stepped” to make climbing a bit easier (although it’s not a lot of help with wheeled luggage, which you end up picking up and carrying). They are narrow and endlessly mysterious. The buildings are more like individual towers lined up side-by-side, with archways high above the street, connecting the buildings from one side of the street to the opposite. It’s sort of like the buildings are saying “I’ll hold you up if you hold me up … together we’ll be fine.” Maybe that’s the nature of the residents of those buildings, too. People who reside in small, remote villages seem to understand that their neighbors are "all we've got." They live lives propping each other up, making for a happier village life. You see this everywhere in the Cinque Terre.

All of the up and down treading requires concentrated fuel, so gelato is always available in all the flavors you could ever ask for. It’s no secret that gelato is one of the best reasons for coming to Italy in the first place. Made strictly with milk (not cream), the fat calories are few. And the sugar will be burned off in the unending climbing and descending.

Otherwise, you will see a lot of sitting on benches and just watching the sunset, reading a book, chatting with neighbors, or taking pictures of kids in the square kicking around a soccer ball or zooming by on in-line skates. As the sun sets in the west, over France, the lateral light continues to illuminate the colorful umbrellas in the town square, making the people under them glow with the same hues.

This is one of the ring leaders of the town kids. Little Mateo is one of my next-door neighbors, and he only knows how to speak at full yell. I saw him delivering some kind of paper notices to various doors along our narrow street after school one day, and I assume it pertained to some upcoming school project. He’s a good example of “free range” kids in this part of the world. After school he has permission to be anywhere in the town with his friends, as long as he doesn’t get in people’s way and is home by suppertime.

I wish I had been able to snap a picture of one little tike the second night I was in Vernazza. In a restaurant a toddler had been eating with his parents. When they finished his mother lead him by the hand to the front door to exit, while he, dragging behind her, with his pacifier firmly clinched far to one side of his mouth so he could continue talking, was saying “Ciao tutti, ciao tutti, ciao tutti” to every table he passed (meaning “good bye everyone”). I guess he realized we’d all miss him. It was about as cute as it gets.

During the daylight hours, I was driven by good weather. If it’s cloudy or raining, there’s no reason to rush to get out into the town and snap photos, but if the weather is sunny and beautiful, you’ve got to (as Janis Joplin said) “get it while you can.” Tomorrow may be a lost cause if the Mediterranean starts storming up, as it can do.

On Wednesday my main objective was to hop a train north to Levanto (very nearby) to meet up with friends from Hawaii. As I got ready to go, I discovered that my camera battery was dead. Then, after furiously searching for the spare battery and the charger, I realized that I had left them in my car in the garage in Portovenere. I emailed my friends and told them I might be a tad bit late, but I was not coming to visit them without a functioning camera. They understood completely.

That is one of the best lessons I’ve learned traveling in Italy over the years (this is my 13th trip). It’s not a question of whether or not things will go wrong on the trip. They will. They always do. The question is how well and how quickly you can recover.

Instead of heading north, I hopped on the next train heading south to La Spezia (a large port city). From there, I got a taxi to Portovenere, had him stop at the garage, fetched my extra battery and charger (feeling foolish for having forgotten them when I was “packing light” for my three days in the Cinque Terre), hopped back in the cab, got back to the La Spezia train station ($60) and got the next train heading to Levanto in the north. I had recovered.

Denny and Debby Wright met me at the train station in Levanto. It was a joy to see them again. Debby and I were law partners back in the early and mid-80’s at Passman & Jones in Dallas. In 1987 she and Denny, and kids, picked up and moved to Maui just because they wanted to, and they’re still there today. They are two people who seem so full of happiness you just can’t get enough of them. They joke around, they ask questions, they’re interested in everything! We had numerous glasses of local wines and finally ended up at a restaurant in Levanto, joined by their son Doug and his wife and two little angel daughters. It was a wonderful evening. It had probably been almost 20 years since I had seen them. They had changed very little. How random to have had our paths cross in Italy of all places.

On Thursday I decided to take a train up to Bonassola and see what Hemmingway’s favorite city on this coast was like. I didn’t see what he saw and was happy to head south again toward Monterosso. Waiting for that train, I met a troop of German scouts (3 girls and 4 boys, all in full scout uniforms) who were trekking through Italy for a couple of weeks. They seemed like exceptional kids. My only inwardly negative thought was “I wonder how much these very German-looking kids resemble the Hitler Youth of the 1930’s and 40’s.” I don’t know where that came from, but the point is … how wrong our impressions can be. As they asked me questions about Texas (I'm sure for the purpose of practicing their English on me more than any actual interest in Texas), I noticed the patch each of them wore on their uniforms at the left shoulder. I couldn’t believe my eyes at first. Their troop was named for Martin Luther KING (i.e., not just Martin Luther, which I would have understood immediately). I pointed it out to them and asked “Why Marting Luther King?”

“Be-cass … well … zee I Have A Dream … You know it?”

Yes, I did know it. Maybe there’s hope after all.

I visited Monterosso briefly and then hopped the next train south to Vernazza again for my last evening in town. I think the people of this town are very interesting. They are very hard working.
I found this one local laborer using a gas motor driven “tank” to carry buckets of gravel (weighing a ton, I’m sure) up the steps of a narrow side “street.” I can’t imagine what it must have been like for the builders of this town to do this all by human labor alone. Otherwise, “streets” in Vernazza are for pedestrian traffic. They do permit garbage trucks and delivery vehicles into the town at daybreak, but once they depart, there’s nothing but human beings. The town has very nice cafes and restaurants, but I think the people of Vernazza cannot escape their heritage any more than the rest of us can. They are, so often here, families of fishermen. Going to sea has been in their blood for centuries. That’s why the service in the plaza or in the tiny restaurants along Via Roma can seem a bit rough or abrupt at times, lacking finesse. They are fishermen making a more profitable life for themselves in catering to the needs of tourists, but it seems not to come “naturally” to many of them, as it might in Rome or Milan. They don’t have a lot of patience for the tourists that bop into town every day, and that is understandable. Tourists present to them all that is chaotic: questions they don’t quite understand, requests, demands, frustration, obstructions to foot traffic, constantly stopping and taking pictures in the middle of a busy pedestrian street, all that is odd and frustrating. And the tourists never really stay. They will be on the next boat or train to “elsewhere” - - so there isn’t much chance to “see” the real person inside that tourist “figure” standing before them. No real connection, just the prospect of income for goods and services sold, clumsy interaction and then POOF … they’re gone.

That’s why I wanted to stay in Vernazza for three days. I wanted to see the same waiters day after day, so they’d recognize me. I wanted to see how that might change things. Predictably, it did. I started getting those “knowing nods of the head,” and that meant I was recognized for being different from the mob. I was in. I liked that.