I never want to sleep here. Its like I don't want to miss even a minute of anything. Nothing feels mundane. I have flown dozens of times but I don't remember the last time I flew overseas since I was 7. I love the giant boat of a plane. I really liked it. By hour 4 though I was getting pretty uncomfortable. Hard to fall asleep even when I tried.
We arrived outside of Rome. We took a private chartered bus thing into town that took us straight to the hotel which was really nice, actually the bathroom was really nice, the room was about the same size as my bedroom and supposed to sleep 3.
I did not feel like getting lost around Rome first thing. While the drive indeed did look different than that of any other city, it also didn't look that different. Actually reminiscent to me of driving around parts of Mexico, although the trees here are of course much different. Your going to laugh at me but one of the first major differences I noticed was the sounds of the birds. I suddenly realized I would get to see non-north American birds. I am beside myself at this. Yep, im crazy (later I would find myself next to the Colosseum staring intently at a black and white Mediterranean crow.)
The language shock took a little to get used to. Because even when I leave the country in my experience I expect to be able to communicate. Here I found myself smiling dumbly and nodding a lot. Even though I knew the words for hello, good-bye and sorry/excuse me, I found them difficult to come out of my mouth at the right times.
Once we got to the hotel we came inside and took a short nap before heading out around 3pm. We took a city express bus to the Emmanuel Vittoria. This massive structure with gaurds guarding a couple flames near the middle. I honestly don't know much about this structure, and was too dumbstruck still by the whole thing to investigate more.
3-29-10
WE got back after nightfall. I slept like a coma.
3-30-10
We woke up and headed to the Colosseum and surrounding areas. We killed most of the day just seeing the ruins. I was pretty sure we would from the beginning. I really wanted to pay for a guide so we ended up finding a pretty decently priced one that also got us through the very long line with the purchase of the guide. Well worth it. Not only did we get an hour long guided tour of the Colosseum but the ruins below for another hour. The ruins were really neat. I was really happy to have a guide that told the story of Romulus and Remus as well as the story of the beginning kings of rome.
The day ended walking to visit the Spanish steps. I now have a small aversion to roses, ask me why later.
I am learning I don't much like Italian food. Not what they call “real” Italian food anyway. I really like all the little sandwich shops with various sandwiches and gelattos. Sit down Italian noodles though so far I have found quite distasteful. Not inedible... as I will pretty much eat anything, but not enjoyable.
4-1-10
April fools. I think I wont be able to fool anyone in Italian :) and even if I could, im sure they wouldn't get the jest. We are on our way to Pompeii by way of Naples. It actually was not
