Last night was spent in Travestere, and the lessons learned was that A; One cannot buy tickets on the tram, those needs to be bought in advance. B; Travestere seems more popular among youths, as well as tourists – not that much focus on Bella Figura. And finally C; Italian male waiters generally prefer flirting above working and were almost in the same league as their South African colleagues.

Sunday mornings differ a bit from the other weekdays we learned, we found a lot of places to simply be closed to our dismay. Both Forno, our favorite pizza takeaway, and the nice coffee bar nearby preferred sleeping over serving customers, well well. We found substitutes and headed off to Travestere again, in daylight this time to stroll the streets. However many sights were closed as well so we ended up having a chat with some artist who had a garage sale, and drinking more coffee before returning to check out from our flat.

We were instructed to take bus 40, leaving conveniently just a block away to get to Termini, this was true but the amount of people inside of the bus reminded me of some metal concerts in my youth. Well at Termini we realized that we were far from alone to want to get on the shuttle bus. We got to the ticket booth after waiting in line a good two minutes before the bus was scheduled to leave and must have gotten the very last tickets. Always fun with a little bit of excitement 🙂 Well safe, sound and checked in at the airport we had our last Italian dish for this time before getting on the plane back home.

I’ve been in Egypt, and while they have a few obelixes left it seems that really the lot of them got carried off to Rome. Don’t get me wrong, they are stylish, symmetric and generally impressive but couldn’t you have left some? I know there’s a few in Paris, and some in Istanbul as well but Rome got to be leading by far. Another thing that Rome have is good cheap coffee and pizza, which this morning served as a perfect take-away breakfast to enjoy at our favorite flower square.

Speaking of food, yesterday’s dinner was nice, again the starter won although this time it was a lovely cheese platter, the pasta with vongole clams was a close runner-up though. After breakfast we headed towards Colosseum but started with Forum Romanum which turned out to be free today and tomorrow due to European Heritage days or something, nice surprise. Mona got an audioguide and then summarized for me while we walked around the wrecked temples and various ruins – great teamwork if I may say so myself. Pretty amazing architecture and some dedicated labor as well as engineers to construct the arches and temples – I assume poor Egypt had to supply the marble and stone as usual though. After detailing the (short) lives of various emperors and their monuments for a few hours we ticked off Colosseum rather quickly.

We then took the Metro to have a short view of Fontana di Trevi and threw some coins in that fountain – we skipped the Swedish tradition of swimming there though. A short walk from there we finally got back to 7camicie where I picked up my two shirts and a also found a third, which I managed to get straight from the mannequin. Despite getting slightly more than 10% off due to my mad haggling skills I have now depleted this month’s budget for shirts. Tonight we plan to head off to Travestere which should have fewer tourists and also being hipper according to one source and more popular with the (drunken) youth according – no idea what to dress in order to be bella figura but what could possibly go wrong?

This statue is placed at the piazza just a few meters from us, Campo de Fiori, and was not as I first believed a monument to honor the Assassin’s Creed computer game series but some Giordano Bruno. He was a philosopher and scientist who proposed around the late 16th century that the sun was a star and other crazy ramblings – fortunately authorities sorted this out and he was burned at the stake 1600 thanks to the inquisition. Anywho, we enjoyed a tall glas of fresh fruit and some coffee for breakfast while basking in the sun.

After breakfast we went strolling in the area and found Pantheon which was rather impressive, it should be noted that the excess of basilicas and buildings who at least look like they’ve been around a millennia dulls your mind a bit. Rome really is a sight to behold, and not only the buildings – the people seem to take care to look their best with a sense of style. It seems that being in your late sixties is no excuse for a man not to wear cool sunglasses, a stylish suit and shine like an original player. Somehow it seems that most women are a generation younger though, I guess this is a good place to grow old. Apart from looking good the Romans know to treat themselves, be it cigarettes, ice-cream, fashion or food but it’s a rarer sight to see someone working hard, a rather healthy attitude. Then again, their infrastructure and general maintenance could sure use some upgrades…

We went for some shopping at Via del Corso and I found two rather nice shirts, however not my credit cards so we will have to go back before we have dinner – we have made reservations at Osteria dell’ingegno, which is close by. This is supposedly a favorite spot for politicians and their glamorous entourage so we better suit up. Now it’s time for siesta though!