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Published: August 6th 2007
The Trevi Fountain
Photo by: Michael Turner Ancient Rome and the Sistine Chapel
Sunday is a day of rest in any Christian country and Italy is no exception to this rule. While many of the sights are open, most of the shops and restaurants are closed making life a little more difficult for travelers. We find that we often lose track of what day it is but we always know when Sunday arrives.
Since the weather was fine and we wanted to spend our day outside we decided to do a bunch of walking on our Sunday. Armed with my tripod and both of our cameras, Kel and I set off for a walk through some of ancient Rome and a couple of the important neighborhoods.
We started with the city center and walked through the winding streets with a few key destinations in mind. Staring with the Trevi Fountain, we headed through many of the more famous sights that Rome has to offer. The Trevi Fountain, which was built in the late 1700’s, took advantage of Rome’s abundant water supply. This gi-normous fountain has over twenty spouts of water and stands over one story in height. It’s a good thing it’s big
Piazza Navona
Photo by: Kelley Turner too because the crowd that gathers around it is equally enormous!
We then moved in the direction of Pantheon and stopped in a few more deserted piazzas to capture pics of anything we deemed interesting. Piazza Colona offered up a huge column, similar to Trajan’s Column, which tells the life story of Marcus Aurelius via the relief carved all the way up its two story height. A few feet later we stopped in Piazza Capranica to capture pics of the Egyptian Obelisk which was plundered from Egypt by Augustus when he defeated Mark Antony and Cleopatra. It’s pretty wild to walk around in Rome and see objects that are directly taken from pages of our high school history books. Imagine the Romans transporting this huge object from Egypt across the Mediterranean thousands of years ago.
The Pantheon was our next stop and, once again, was swarmed with people. While this building has tons of historical importance, it isn’t the most attractive place. The stone has aged fairly poorly in comparison to other buildings in the area. With incessant motor traffic in Rome all of the major historical sites have suffered from the stain of pollution but it seemed
to me that the Pantheon has suffered more than most. We pretty rapidly moved from the Pantheon and headed toward the Tiber.
The Tiber River, which was the lifeblood of Rome in ancient times, has been both a boon and bane for Romans from the beginning of time. This murky green river was the major reason for Rome’s creation and allowed boat traffic from the Mediterranean to carry goods into central Italy. While this boat traffic fueled the economy of Rome and the whole region, the river was a fickle mistress for all who lived here. Quite frequently the river would flood and anyone who lived anywhere near its banks would find their houses flooded and much of their belongings destroyed. In order to stop this constant threat, the banks of the river were built up with huge walls which still exist today. Unfortunately these walls separate the city from the river and make the river an almost non-entity today. Unlike the beauty of the Seine in Paris, the Tiber adds little or nothing to the city’s feel.
Trastevere Once we crossed the river, we walked through one of Rome’s seedier sections of town, Trastevere. Just by
crossing the river, the general feel of the city changes. Buildings are in a lower state of repair and graffiti is everywhere. While during the day this area is completely safe for tourists, you feel just a little uncomfortable walking around.
We took less time in this section of town but still got a chance to see some beautiful old cathedrals which date back to the very beginning of Christianity. Santa Cecilia’s, which is a difficult to find little church, was built on the very site where Cecilia was killed by the Romans. They first tried to kill her by smothering her with steam in her bath. After three days of trying to kill her this way, in order to make it look like an accident, they became impatient and finally chopped her head off. Ouch! Unlike today, during those times it really didn’t pay to be a Christian.
We also stopped in the shade for a while in front of Santa Maria church in Trastevere. This site was used as an illegal place of worship for Christians shortly after Christ’s death. 400 years ago this basilica became the first church to ever be dedicated to the Virgin
Mary. The tiled frescos above the entrance way speak of the ancient Christians’ belief in Mary and show the beginning of the splendor that later cathedrals would take to a whole new level.
Despite the fact that we only spent an hour in Trastevere, we really felt that we had gotten a feel for a different side of Rome. This side, which is slightly more worn, is closer to the true Rome that people who live here see everyday. In contrast to some of the places we’ve seen in Europe, Rome is slightly dirtier, more worn and just a little shabbier. Yet, despite its worn down feel, you can still catch glimpses of grandeur around every corner.
The Jewish Ghetto Our final stop for the day was the Jewish Ghetto. Prior to the 1500’s Jews were spread all over Rome but were mostly centered in the Trastevere section of town which we had just exited. But with the Catholic counter-reformation and an increased scrutiny on heresy, the Pope finally ordered that Rome’s Jewish population be moved across the river into a ghetto which spanned only seven acres. (Kel Note: ghetto means any area where a
Near the Pantheon
Photo by: Kelley Turner group of people due to race/religion all live in high concentrations, often against their will. It originally just meant the Jews but over time, as people have been shuffled away and discriminated against, it has expanded to other groups in other countries) This piece of land, which was the worst piece of land in Rome due to its inclination to flood, housed Rome’s 4,000 Jews for the next 300 years. Think about the fact that the average home in the US is currently built on a third of an acre - that space in the ghetto would have housed close to 200 Jews.
By time we got into the ghetto we were pretty hungry so we stopped and got lunch in the first café we could find. While we dined on pretty decent food, the table next to us was celebrating their grandmother’s 91st birthday. It was incredibly cute to see the waiter bring out a small cheese cake for her with one candle in it. Everyone in the room stopped and sang happy birthday to her. She was so cute and just beamed with joy, it made Kel and I both smile. Kel managed, through her English speaking
family members, to congratulate her on her long life and wish her many more. More beaming ensued from her, more smiles from us.
We subsequently spent about another thirty minute in the Jewish Ghetto taking pictures. A large part of the area is covered in some of Rome’s most ancient ruins which are currently being excavated. More than anything the ancient writing on walls which must be hundreds of years old hearken back to this darker period in Rome’s history when thousands of people we made to suffer just purely because of their religious beliefs. (Quick note: Pope John Paul II took huge steps to improve the Catholic Church’s relationship with Jews worldwide. He even stated that the Church should have done more to protect the Jews during the holocaust.)
The rest of our day involved resting and getting ready for dinner. Since we had walked more than 5 miles in the midday heat we were both pretty exhausted and Kel was starting to get a nasty sun burn in the part of her hair. If coming this way during the summer, be prepared to get sunburned, the sun here is HOT!!
Our Final day in Piazza Capranica
Photo by: Kelley Turner Rome: Attempting to se the Sistine Chapel
We had only one thing left on our list of things we really wanted to accomplish before moving on from Rome, the Sistine Chapel. Given our difficulty getting into St. Peter’s a few days earlier, we were prepared to go to extra lengths to ensure this particular sight got checked off our list.
After a quick breakfast in the hotel, we caught a cab directly to the Vatican Museum and upon our approach we knew we were in trouble. The line stretched from the museum all the way to St. Peter’s which is easily a mile or more away. We had been quoted that the time would be ten minutes long for every 100 meters of line length and that it would be two hours or more if it made it all the way to the basilica. Ouch!
We weren’t about to give up on this particular sight but realized that if we stood in line for two hours that we would enter the museum just around lunch time. We would then be tired and hungry and would be unable to really appreciate what we were seeing. Instead we
Piazza Navona
Photo by: Kelley Turner decided to return to the hotel to get some work done and come back to the museum later in the afternoon, closer to closing time.
Back at the hotel, Kel worked on our future travel plans in Scandinavia. She worked for about an hour booking some hotels and working on our travel plans in Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Estonia and Norway. I relaxed while she worked and read my book patiently until lunch time. We decided to grab a take away lunch and took a quick moment to stop in a grocery store to replenish our corn starch supply knowing that it’s always good to have a decent supply of corn starch before heading to a new part of the world - no more repeats of our Vietnam situation, thanks!
When we arrived back at the Vatican we were disappointed to see that the line was just as long as when we left. Instead of chickening out this time we went ahead and got in line along with a huge portion of a Disney Cruise ship’s tour group. While it was a little strange to be surrounded by thousands of Americans and their kids, I think it actually worked
Ruins in Jewish Ghetto
Photo by: Michael Turner in our favor to have so many tour groups in line. Each line moved through the line very rapidly which made the line disappear much quicker than we had expected. The line, which appeared to be a two hour or more line, turned out to only take a little more than an hour.
Once into the museum with tickets in our hands we decided to head straight to the star attraction, the Sistine Chapel. Sadly our troubles were not over yet. The walk to the Sistine Chapel is long, confusing and very crowded. We did enjoy the pieces of art along the path but were worried that the Chapel would be closed since some rooms are closed early. The journey through long crowded halls, up stairs, down stairs, through completely bare galleries and ones filled from floor to ceiling feels like a never ending path to the end of the universe. Finally, you enter a small door into the most crowded room you’ve ever seen. The Chapel itself is daunting in scale when you think of all the hours of painting it would have taken to fill all the walls and the ceiling, but somehow this scale is dwarfed
by the huge number of people who are standing around.
The paintings themselves are masterful and varied. Your neck tends to get sore as you stand with head tilted back staring at the ceiling. The colors are still so sharp and the paintings so impressive that you just wish for a quiet hour to lay on your back and stare at it all. However, that is not to be. While you’re in the grip of the beauty of a painting, you are doing your best to not get trampled by the myriad of tour groups and people milling about. This room is literally a security guard’s nightmare. My guess is that the guards draw short straws everyday to see who has to be the poor guys stationed in here. People are always talking loudly which causes the guards to try and shush everyone. People are trying to sit in places they shouldn’t which causes the guards never ending grief as they try to usher people onward. Despite their work, a constant flow of people are pushing their way inside and then trying to negotiate the crowd to get out. I would suppose that the guards in these room must
Santa Cecelia
Photo by: Michael Turner go insane and have to hospitalized at least a couple of times a year. Theirs is not a job to be envied.
By time we were done with the room, the museum was getting ready to close so we headed back to the hotel. Since it was the last afternoon my parents would be around we went out into Villa Borghese park and took some pictures as a group. It’s always fun to get pictures of the whole Turner clan, even if we are missing Kel’s parents. (Hi, Bruce and Leslie!)
Later that evening we had dinner at a really nice restaurant right across the street from our hotel. This would most likely be our last super fabulous dinner for a while so my parents let us go hog wild, which we did! After dinner we said our goodbyes since they would be leaving in the early morning and we wouldn’t be leaving until late morning. It’s been so great having them with us even if the constant travel was tiring for them. We may be lucky and get to see them one more time before this year long excursion comes to and end, here’s hoping!
Well,
tomorrow we are off to Scandinavia (Copenhagen, Denmark). Hope you are all well back home!
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