Day 1: Roma

I was more disoriented than expected when I got off the plane. First I went into the EU national line at customs but realized my mistake when I only heard Italian spoken in the line. The customs guy stamped over another stamp on me passport which really irked me. I went through the exercise of getting my pages in my passport for nothing apparently. The train station was exactly how I remembered it and I was the last one on the train to Trastevere.

I got to the B&B Trastevere Relais without a hitch despite not being able to say a word of Italian beyond grazie. Any remnants of knowledge from my Italian 101 class 7 years ago, was completely wiped away by the Spanish I practiced on a daily basis in Buenos Aires. It has been a long time since I’ve been in a situation where I cannot understand anything that is being said to me. I started to rethink my itinerary and long for Spanish speaking countries.

With no plans for today, I set out on foot across the Tiber. I remember it being a brown mud color, yet today it resembled a liquid wasabi (thanks in part to my Ray-Ban style Prada sunglasses that help me fit in). It looks like they had cleaned the river up a bit but the graffiti is OOC. I don’t remember Rome being so gritty and grimy. I pondered the possibility of Buenos Aires knocking Rome out of its 1st place spot but I was tired from the plane and I don’t want to be hasty.

As I got to the right side of the river, I remembered Becca’s favorite pizza place and made a stop. I wasn’t hungry but the pizza with eggplant was delicious and clearly Pizza had to be 1st on the agenda. Next I found a grocery store and bought a bottle of red and a bottle of white, shopped a little, looked for a restaurant for Liz’s birthday feast and then grabbed some gelato (though still not hungry after the pizza). Pizza, vino, shopping, gelato, check, check, check, check.

I wandered back through Trastevere where I used to walk home everyday from school. The little map and globe shop where I bought Justin a hand-made globe was still there. It brought back memories of 7 years ago and why I thought that a globe was an appropriate anniversary gift. Ah, to be 21 again and all the things I would have done differently.

After a much needed nap, I was reunited with Liz and her mom and then took a shower in a crazy shower capsule that rained water and pumped techno music. It was amazing. Liz and I got dinner near Campo dei Fiori and we started with my favorite: zucchini flowers. Following that was octopus salad and linguine with guinea fowl and black truffles. Not bad for a first dinner but I have expectations that they will only get better.

Buona notte amici