Fern e Mike en Roma — Giorno 7

Tutto Buono –

Hello from Rome

Began the day with a taxi to the Trastavere neighborhood. (Our hotel is pretty much outside of the center of town, and given the heat a taxi seemed like the logical choice, since we’d need to do a lot of walking once we got started..) The Trastavere area has very narrow cobblestone streets lined with medieval houses… The unique character has attracted artists, expats, and also many famous people to its midst. Today, the neighborhood is also filled with restaurants and cafes and is the home to several foreign academic institutions including the American University of Rome and the American Academy … and our own alma mater (Pratt Institute) also has some kind of study abroad program based in that area.

We started our walk at a little square and wound our way through scores of tiny and narrow streets that one could hardly believe a car could get through.. eventually winding up in the old Jewish Ghetto section — which for many centuries was the site of persecution and also indicative of the pride and solidarity of an unusually tight community. The neighborhood abuts the Tiber River which frequently flooded.. and was the forced home for Jews for more than 300 years. Most of the infrastructure of the old ghetto has been demolished, but still some reminders remain and in recent times the Ghetto has been yuppified a bit with restaurants, cafes and small shops. Still the area respects Jewish law and shops are closed on Saturdays.

We walked all through the area and then meandered our way to the Pantheon — built during the reign of Augustus as a temple to all the gods of Ancient Rome.. The building is circular and has large Corinthian columns.. but the real draw is the central opening to the sky… Today, about 2,000 years after its construction, it is said that the dome is still the worlds larges unreinforced concrete dome..  Since we’ve been to Rome before, we had seem most of the monuments but the Pantheon is worth seeing multiple times as is Piazza Navona which we also strolled to after the Pantheon. We stopped a little bar for salads.. and to replenish the water and fight off dehydration. It was in the 90s and humid… Somewhere near the Piazza Navona we hopped a taxi to immerse ourselves in contemporary Rome.

We headed to the Maxxi — a museum built in 2010 — which is sort of a building that is just all about itself as a building. Can’t complain since photographing in the building is lots of fun.. almost can’t find any way to shoot something that isn’t interesting.. but I don’t think it’s much of a museum and it was probably very expensive to build. From the looks of things, the people must not feel it’s worth going to as it was really empty — especially when compared to the throngs at the Pantheon (where you also cannot possible get a bad photograph!.. So maybe ordinary people really do have taste in that they opt for the Pantheon over the Maxxi??

From the Maxxi we walked to the 1960 sports dome built for the Olympics and on to the Renzo Piana Parco Della Musica which was a real gem… We meandered all through the first floor of the multi-function public music complex… about 1/2 mile from the Maxxi. The complex houses three really large concert halls. Each is structurally separate but joined together through a very large and very interesting lobby — in which the passageways are all graced with wonderful quotes and sayings in neon — some in English; some in Italian; some in French; some in German.  There is actually a fourth concert hall — an open air theater that reminds you of ancient Greek and Roman theaters.. This is all framing a central plaza where today kids were riding tricycles and skating and playing peewee soccer. The music hall structures look a little like blobs of beetles… or some say they look like computer mice.  During construction, many archaeological remains were found, and the story says that Piano redesigned the building to accommodate the remains and the ruins and created a small museum to house the artifacts from the site.. this added a year to the construction. The information sheets say that it is the world’s most visited music facility with more than one million people each year.

By now we were exhausted having walked a total of about five miles in awful heat.. so we got a taxi back to the hotel and jumped into the shower to freshen up before meeting up with Mike’s brother for dinner.

Dinner was at Settembrini… a twenty minute walk from the hotel. They serve very modern Italian fare.. like duck breast with carrots and a licorice sauce.. Cannot even remember the amazing dishes.. We ate outside (it was still in the 80s at midnight when we left the restaurant…)

I’m hoping it cools down a bit. Two more days in Rome, one day in London and I’m back.

Take care…

Fern