Cliff Hangers Over Centuries of History

---

Wow! It has been a long time since my last post and I am very far behind now. I have many amazing things to write about but my weeks do not seem to afford me the time to sit down and write about them. The past two weeks have been a mix of lots of incredible adventures and fun times, and also some not so fun experiences. Most of my great experiences have been on my various trips. But when not traveling or having fun out in Madrid, there is still school. And this past week and a half or so have been midterms, which have been surprisingly challenging to keep on top of. Up until now, I have been keeping up well in my classes and getting good grades (which really isn't tough here) but midterms are now just stressful and taking up more time that I would like. On top of that, I have had to battle two severe illnesses in the course of two weeks. The first (basically travelers illness) I mentioned in my post about Morocco. That took a good three or four days to get over but that was nothing to the food poisoning that I just suffered through a couple days ago. Let's just say that I had never before felt the pain from throwing up for six hours straight and the weakness the body feels when it has absolutely nothing inside it. I had to miss a whole day of classes while I stayed in bed (my first missed classes in probably a year) and am finally feeling better after an all liquid and bland food diet for a couple days. These are the times that make you miss home...

But, enough of me griping. Let me share about an incredible weekend I spend in Rome!

I am taking a class here called the Origins of Christianity which is taught by the incredible Alex Medina. It used to be that as a part of this class, they did a field trip to Rome. Well, the trip became so popular, that they opened it up to the entire program and is now one of the most popular trips offered through the school. And it's popularity clearly is due Alex Medina. Alex claims he has visited or lived in Rome on at least 60 different occasion (at least that is when he stopped counting) and tells us before the trip that "I will show you Rome, so that you know Rome better than any Roman does". This is quite the claim, but he sure lived up to it.

The deal with this particular trip, was that the school gave suggestions as to where to stay and which flight to take, but we were responsible for making all those arrangements. Then we paid the school a small fee to have Alex come along, for the entrances to the museums, and transportation on the metro, etc. This could not have been better money spent. It is difficult to put into words how wonderfully Alex contextualizes and makes relevant all that we saw and visited (and we saw a lot!). But the man is an incredible storyteller who simply loves history and loves sharing all that he knows. He also had the help of two other professors. One was a very funny Italian (who teaches Spanish) who could turn anything into a joke, and another rather high strung but very nice history professor who worked hard to keep the group together and had no problem be honked at while holding up traffic in the middle of the street to make sure everyone got across.

One of the reasons that Alex was so engaging was that he always left his stories with some sort of cliff hanger (such as "but that is not why we are really here" or "but wait till you see what is below" or "remember this for when we are at the forum"). I swear the whole weekend was like an ongoing novel! But, one of the big takeaways that you begin to understand immediately is that Rome is built upon layers and layers of ancient foundations, ruins, and history. Everywhere you walk, you can basically be certain that you are walking on the tops of ancient ruins that have just been built over. One great example of this is the Church of San Clemente. From the outside, it looks like just another of many churches to be found in Rome. The church itself was actually built in the middle ages, which is impressive enough. But you are able to go below it to see the still existing form of a 4th century basilica on which the existing church was built on top of. You can even still see parts of the paintings that used to be on the walls. Yet, even below this, is the house from the 1st century believed to have served as an early Christian church. It even still has the running water which was most likely used for baptisms. It is absolutely incredible to know that all of Rome is like this! In fact, most of the ruins that have been excavated, have only recently been so. The Roman Forum in particular, among many others in the city, were only excavated on Mussolini's orders just before WWII. Before then, nobody really cared to excavate them.

Over the three and a half days we were there, we saw lots! And we walked a ton as well! The one thing about a group as large as ours was (about 40 people) is that it takes forever getting anywhere. And Alex is the ultimate Spaniard when it comes to time... he is always late! (9 really means 9:30). I guess you get used to this after a while though. I think my favorite places that we visited were the Church of San Clemente, St. Peter's Basilica (talk about impressive!), and imagining how ancient Rome really looked and seeing the small imprints from ancient Rome in the Forum (guided by Alex of course). We quickly discovered the area called Trastevere, which is great for cheap, but fantastic food and has streets upon streets of great restaurants and bars. We had at least three meals in this neighborhood. We also lucked out on an incredible hostel! It was not even a five minute walk from the train station (where we met every morning) and had great rooms, a fun and cheap bar downstairs, breakfast, and really nice staff. Although, I do have a couple stories from our stay there, but I will have to share those in person. I also was able to meet up with my friend Jessica from Santa Clara who is studying in Rome for the fall. After she gave me the absolute worst directions ever ("its by the Spanish steps, just ask someone) I managed to find her and her friends in a bar that I would not describe as near the Spanish steps. But it was great to see another SCU face and hear about her adventures.

The only hiccup of the trip was getting back to the airport to catch our flight home. Rome has to be the most disorganized, chaotic European city I have been to. As such, the buses back to the airport were not at all running on time, and no one seemed to have any idea as to when they would be coming. Luckily, after some begging, running, and a couple taxis, everyone made it to the airport (either on the bus or in a taxi) but with only 15 minutes till the flight was supposed to leave! But, we needn't worry because we were flying Ryanair, and of course the flight was almost an hour late.

FUN FACT: One of the things I love about traveling is meeting so many different people. Here is just a sampling of some of the more memorable ones I met on this trip:
- Elio Garcia - I sat next to him on the plane. He is a layperson and disciple of Mother Trinidad de la Santa Madre Iglesia. He is probably one of the most devout Catholics I have ever met and he talked for more than an hour to me (in rather broken English) about his faith and the Saint he has chosen to follow. His story was very interesting, though got a little long listening to not so good English for that long.

- Our Venezuelan friends from dinner - the first night there, we ate dinner outside at a nice little place with a decent priced menu. We were lucky enough to have sat next to a very lively bunch of people from Venezuela who were celebrating a birthday. The invited us to join the celebration and even bought us a bottle of wine. Probably was the most memorable meal of the trip!

- Jose from Mexico - This guy was in our hostel and showed up at like 2 in the morning. He didn't speak any English and I tried to help him with a few questions he had about the hostel in my limited Spanish. I got talking with him at breakfast more the next morning and found out he was only 18 and his mother had sent him to Europe by himself for 3 months to travel. It was rather incredible to hear about his stories!

- Hostel guy from Brazil - We ran into one of the guys that we recognized as working in the hostel at a pizza place close by. We ate lunch with him and he told us about how he had been working in Rome for only about 6 months (his grandparents are Italian) but was heading back to Brazil in December. He was what I would describe as a 26 year old hippie with no real worry in life. He was super chill and told us which pizza to get... which is really tasty!

---

Photos

Group Photo Looking Back Over Vatican
This is taken on top of Castel Sant'Angelo

Sacra Argentina
This is the location of the Pompey Theater where Julius Caesar was killed. It currently in the home of hundreds of stray cats that are tended to and cared for by a single woman.

Alex With His Map
Our professor Alex showing us a map of ancient Rome

Piazza Navona
The entire plaza is built over the ruins and using the foundation of Diocletian’s Stadium

Pantheon
the scaffolding kind of ruins the picture

Della Palma - the best gelato in town
This Gelato store had an enormous number of flavors to choose from. For 3 euros, we got to choose three flavors. I went with pistachio, lemon, and some of cookie flavor. This awkward combo resulted in a funny look from the guy scooping it, but I figure they have seen it all.

Looking down the spanish steps
The street leading away from the steps, is the equivalent of the 5th ave of Rome, with all the high end and designer shops.

After dinner with our Venezuelan Friends
Not sure how this came about, but Julia from our group is join by the birthday boy in the Venezuelan group for this strange challenge.

Michelangelo's statue of Moses
This is part of the tomb of Pope Julius II that was never really finished as was intended. The Moses statue has two faces depending on which way you look at it. From one side he looks worried, and the other more hopeful.

Interesting Story about this street
Mussolini had this street made after clearing out hundreds of homes and small shops. He wanted to be able to take Hitler down a grand street with the very impressive Colosseum at the end in order to show him that Italy has a history of greatness and power unmatched by anyone.

Notice the game board?
This can be found outside the steps of the courthouse where parents often made their kids wait without moving for hours at a time while they handled issues inside the court. To pass the time, they played board games... or you could spell that "bored" games... I love historical connections!

Look at the top of the columns
This is on the still standing structures, simply because they could not bring down the columns. You can tell they tried to tear down the columns because of the marks at the stop where they would have tried to install a stopper of some sort to stop the rope from sliding down.

Comments

[Annabelle Lane]

Rome memories
We've read all the entries but this one on Rome brought back wonderful memories for me. Especially the Colosseum, Forum and Spanish Steps. Our apartment was 21/2 blocks up the street from the colosseum and we saw it every day when we walked out our door for a week. Wonderful, even if it was 90+ degrees. Can't wait to talk to you when you get home.

[Aunt Cheryl]

Roma
Todd, We are enjoying seeing Rome again thru your eyes and the enthusiasm and knowledge of your prof Alex. We stayed on the same street in 2 apartments as the Church of San Clemente and visiting it I remember seeing a 2 sided stone 'sign' that could be rotated to either a pagan or Christian greeting. The gelato pic brought back sweet memories of a dark chocolate gelato (among many other fav flavors). Thanks so much for sharing! Another quote that Tim sent to me awhile ago....."Nations write their autobiographies in three manuscripts—the book of their deeds, the book of their words, and the book of their art. Not one of these books can be understood unless we read the other two; but of the three, the only quite trustworthy one is the last." _ John Ruskin Enjoy all the art you can (and wash your hands regularly!). I hope you threw a coin into the Fountain Trevi for a return visit.