roma – collectif de cole

I’m sitting at the kitchen table, Reba and I are eating pesto pasta with a sunny side egg and sausage sautéed with garlic. Side dish of the day? A chive cheese concoction that I, literally, whipped up. There’s a fat, ugly pigeon on the roof next to our balcony and if it were to fly into our kitchen, I know that’d we’d probably scream.

My hair is icky, ticky- tacky and dry. Shampoo and conditioner have not fared me well. It’s course, losing its luster, and my waves aren’t bouncy. Back to vinegar! And my sister isn’t here to complain about the smell! Molto bene.

From the title, you can probably deduce where we spend the last weekend. Can I just say wow? Wow. Wowowowowowoowowwwwwww. I love Roma.

Shall I proceed chronologically? Hm.

HI MRS FONG! I HAVN’T TOUCHED A PIANO IN OVER A MONTH! It’s so weird. I miss it.

Okay okay hocus focus. It’s just challenging to articulate such an eventful weekend. Maybe I should just stick with photos. Yes, I’ll stick with that save for an introduction.

Our train would depart from SM Novella at 8 AM. Naturally, I set my alarm for an appropriate time seeing as I had packed. About 20 minutes before my alarm, I woke up. Brilliant- more time to talk to my Savior. Reba, being Reba, barged into my room 5 minutes after to make sure I was still breathing. Just kidding, she wanted to make sure I’d get ready. I have a set time of getting ready in under 15 minutes. Prior training has afforded me to be ready in less than 5 minutes( doesn’t count devotions). She still questions the process but really, multitasking saves time.

We live about a 10 minute walk from the train station. It’s about two blocks from the Duomo. So, we arrived at 7:45 and I lose my ticket. I lost it in my left pocket. That’s perfectly normal. My heart didn’t skip any beats because I firmly believed that nothing would go wrong, so God help me. Reba grabbed the ticket for safe keeping. Our friend, Jordan, a Cal alumni( woot woot) joined us on our trip but because our economical ticket had sold out, he road in the fancier cars where they distributed chocolate.

The train ride was really enjoyable, actually. It was about 90 minutes. Reba knocked out in 5 minutes. The people around me noticed the stickers on my lap top case and sparked conversation about my Oaklandish sticker! #represent I’ve received many comments about my United Nations sticker but never the Oaklandish one so naturally, I was enthused.

We continued to discuss the differences of education in Italy and the US. He was part of an initiative to encourage the utilization of online resources for research and filtered learning. Their program has a good percentage of national participation.

The man across the aisle was a professional opera critic. He, firstly, exclaimed that Andrea Bocelli cannot sing well. After his argument, I was thoroughly convinced and agree. A few of our other tastes amongst the professionals leveled. I love Albina while he described Angela G(Romanian soprano) as “a beautiful girl”. I laughed so hard. He then said that when you have nothing good to say, to either say “he’s a handsome man” or “she’s a beautiful girl”. I’m definitely going to be implementing that into my habits. Watch out.

The train ride was very fast noting that we did book the frecce. After a regional transfer, we made it to San Pietro and waited a good 10 minutes for Jordan. We proceeded to walk through Saint Peter’s in order to get to the Air b&b. It’s a majestic basilica. If you need to reference it to a visual, the newer Pink Panther’s sequel has a scene where Inspector Jaques puts on the “big, pointy hat” and greets the masses, in attempt to retrace the Pope’s steps. Another thing; the Pope was in Mexico. Uhh, tfti.

After settling, we walked 33,723 steps(according to the great fitbit) over the bridge, and to the Pantheon, Trevi, and Colosseum. Here are a few images from our journey.

It was beautiful weather! This is the street of our apartment.

We were fortunate enough to stumble upon the best place for pasta. It’s a block from St Peter’s basilica. The prices were ridiculous; 5-7 euro for a plate of handmade pasta with a good selection of sauces and pastas made to order. Even at home, a good pasta place would charge $15 for this quality. We ended up going back everyday, in the afternoon.