Let's Talk About Italy

Last year at this time I was putting in my letter of resignation and AJ was working 48 hour shifts. Fast forward to April 2017 and we were making wishes at the Trevi Fountain and eating our weight in pasta and pizza. What a difference a year makes!

Rome reminds me of a much older version of New York City. It’s a hustle and bustle city filled with mostly grungy, graffiti laden buildings, and not so friendly people. I have dubbed it the smoker capital of the world with more cigarette smoke per square mile than anywhere else I’ve ever been.

Rome is a nice contrast from Kuwait with its fresh food, pleasant climate, and rich history. Getting to see monuments and churches that have stood for many centuries is dreamlike. But the ultimate dream was being able to live out my Lizzie McGuire fantasy. (I may or may not have watched the movie twice before the trip)

Here’s the mostly short version of how the trip went down:

Day One:

We woke up early to catch the subway to our cooking class.  This was an authentic Italian cooking class in which we cooked/prepared a full 3 course meal. We met the Baratta family at their home just outside of downtown Rome. We were invited in with open arms and strong espresso. It was an extremely special experience to spend the day with this sweet family. We started the class by taking a 10-minute drive to the local farmer’s market with our instructor/chef, Pietro. We spent about an hour walking through the many aisles and stands to find all of the ingredients we would need to prepare our menu. Just to let you know, AJ and the cooking instructors created the menu. I really had no idea of what was to come. After the market, we went back to their house and started on dessert followed by two additional courses. Then we sat down and ate with the mom, dad, and son (chef). The food was really good despite me being so outside my eating comfort zone. Through our travels over this last year, we have noticed that food is one thing that is universal. Even though you might not be able to understand the words that come out of someone’s mouth, you can understand the love and effort that is put into a well-prepared meal. It is a powerful medium that joins families and strangers. I love that the Barattas have turned that love into a family business!

 

 

 
 

Later that night, we went to a soccer match between AS Roma and Empoli. It was a cool experience because fans are so much more amplified than any game I’ve attended at home. I know that I am constantly throwing shade at America, so here are a few things that America is actually great at:  1) No smoking in public places; this is a small rule that has such a widespread impact for sickly people like me. 2) Even though people are super competitive, we tend to find an ounce of empathy when a player on the field gets hurt. During Roma's match, we noticed people heckle opposing players as they laid on the field after an injury. 3) Concession stands at games are everything! Snack variety is important at a game. (Ok, that’s all for America.) The game ended with the home team, AS Roma, winning 2 to 0.

 

 

On our way home from the game, I managed to get a seat on the city bus. This is no small feat since Rome’s public transportation is consistently crowded, so I took this moment to give a shout out to Rosa for paving the way. All the praises were short lived because as we rode along taking selfies and having a good time, we suddenly hear a loud screech and then crash. Somehow, throughout all of the congestion leaving the game our bus managed to collide with a Vespa. Initially everyone was very confused about what happened and why the bus stopped so suddenly. We saw the bus driver jump out of the bus to check on the Vespa driver. The Vespa driver got up and did not have a single scratch on him…which was obviously nothing but G-o-d. I just wanted to touch the hem of his garment to see if a blessing or two would come my way, seeing that the man seemingly had nine lives. Since the bus and Vespa driver had serious business to resolve, we hopped off the bus. This was the beginning of our 2-mile trek to the nearest subway station at midnight. 2 miles and a 30-minute train ride later and we finally made it to the flat. This was only the beginning of our 1,000 miles that we walked during this trip. AJ says it was about 40 miles total for the week, but it felt like 1,000.

P.S. I hope you got a check, Vespa driver!

 

Day Two:

On Sunday morning, we woke up early to go see the Pope. Apparently, he does a blessing service where he comes out and waves to the crowd. He was not in town that day, so we stood in the masses and watched the live stream of his service. Interesting note: his message was in Spanish and Italian. So we understood….nothing. But we received our blessing from the Pope…allegedly.

 

Shortly after the service, the skies opened up and dumped rain on the city for several hours. Cold and wet weather mixed with hunger makes for an unhappy Amber. I have to say that I was not super impressed with the food in Italy. It was just okay to me. I should also mention that the only thing that I ate for the entire week was pasta in its many forms. It sometimes sucks being such a picky eater, but I’ll probably never change…ugh. Something that never got old though: gelato! Gelato never gets old.

The coolest part of Italy is stumbling upon restaurants. Literally everywhere you turn! We found one of our favorite retaurants across from the Pantheon. What a view for dinner, huh? Oh and Europe has a 2 hundred bill...that no one wants to break for you.

 

 

 

And all the pasta:

 
 

 

Day Three:

Has anyone seen Rome in one day? The Johnsons have via Segway tour that lasted 7 hours. We arrived outside of the Colosseum to meet our tour leader and learned how to operate a Segway. Even though this was not my first time on a Segway, I felt super uncomfortable and I was ready to give up and let them just keep my money. Over the seven hours the tour took us to Palatine Hill, Aventine Hill, Capitoline Hill, Caelian Hill, Trevi Fountain, Four River Fountain, Circus Maximus, Roman Forum, Pantheon, Colosseum, Campo di Fiori, and some other things that escape our memories.  

For the first half of the tour we shared our tour guide with a French family. The guide gave us very detailed information about Rome and all of its wonders in English and then in French. AJ loved this part. I was bored. For the second half of the tour we shared a different tour guide with a British couple, Ellie and Jim. It was nice to be with people our age. It made the excursion a lot more enjoyable.

 

 

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day Four:

Another early morning as we headed south by train to Pompeii. Now may be a good time to mention that I did not plan this vacation. I actually left the whole thing to AJ “Go With The Flow” Johnson. We bought the tickets for Naples that morning and boarded the train without a plan. Y’all…I went somewhere WITHOUT a plan. Upon arrival in Naples, that no plan thing kind of set us back a little as we really did not know how to get the rest of the 35 minutes down to Pompeii. We roamed the Naples train station for about 20 minutes searching for a train or bus or any mode of transportation that would get us in the right direction. We eventually found the subway to Pompeii…or so we thought. Our brilliant plan after boarding the subway was to follow the pale people with backpacks and cameras that looked the most touristy. Turns out the pale people were not going to the Pompeii ruins. They were going to hike Mount Vesuvius. Dark people say no to hiking a volcano, dormant or not. So, there we were sitting at the wrong subway stop, waiting an eternity for the next subway to pick us up. I remember looking around, through the cloud of cigarette smoke, at the view which screamed projects and thinking is this the beauty that everyone references when they gawk about Europe. I didn’t see the beauty. Then again, I was starving and choking on smoke. Surviving solely on teddy grahams and Advil.

 

 





When we finally got back on the right subway and got off at the right stop, I found Jesus in the form of a blue Powerade. This is my beverage of choice and of course it cannot be found in the Middle East. So, there I was excited about a drink while AJ stood in awe of the location that he’s read about in textbooks and finally had the chance to see. Pompeii is HUGE! We spent about 3 hours getting lost in a maze of ruins and excavated buildings, and we only saw a small portion of its entirety. It was surreal to see how close Mount Vesuvius seemed to the city, and even more surreal to the see the 14 ash encapsulated bodies of former residents. It was like dragging a little kid out of a toy store to get AJ to leave that place, but it is definitely a place that words can’t properly describe.

 

 

 

 

 

Day Five:

We packed our bags and left our cozy Roman flat and took the train north to Venice. The train, after you figure out how everything works, is actually a very efficient mode of transportation. It was super clean and very fast, and it had chargers and trash cans at each seat. It is sort of awkward that you have to face someone random since the seats are grouped in pods of four. Nevertheless, this was how we finally saw the great views of Europe that people fawn over. The countryside is absolutely beautiful!

 

We arrived in Venice after about 3 hours of travel. This was another situation where AJ didn’t quite plan out how to get from the train station to the hotel. Some of the signs are a tad bit confusing and it all can make you feel really uneducated. Trying to find someone who speaks and understands enough English is no easy task in Italy. Standing in line at the ticket counter was when we discovered that Europe is the real MVP. Their ticket prices are based on age and they consider 6 to 29 to be a youth ticket. Slow claps all around for understanding that we are not fully adults yet. Oh, and 0 to 6 were free! (Get it together, America.) Once we got our bearings straight, we found a water taxi that stopped near our hotel. Thank God for Google maps because Venetian streets are narrow alleyways that unless you know your exact location can be quite difficult to navigate.

Venice was built on a cluster of islands in a lagoon in the Adriatic Sea. There are no cars or roads, just thousands of canals. The buildings are close together and arranged Maze Runner style. Our hotel was in San Marco, a small “suburb” of Venice. The hotel was precious, except unbeknownst to us it did not have air conditioning. Perhaps it is that we are new to traveling on this side of the world, but it seems that no AC is a thing. Not a thing that we like being a part of it. Yes I know…first world problems, but we like air!

 

 

Day Six:

This was our first full day to really get out and explore Venice. We took a ferry to two small islands, Murano and Burano. Murano is home to a large population of glass blowers. Burano is known for its brightly colored houses and lace making. Aside from glass blowing and lace, there was not a whole lot to see on these islands.

 

Burano was by far my favorite part of the whole trip. I would feel as though I accomplished something in life if I could retire in a cuuuuute, bright pink home on that little, charming island. I loved it there!

 

 

After returning from the islands, we thought we’d get back on another boat…a gondola! We met up with our friends, Kelsey and Paige, and split the cost of the gondola because that’s what cheap, poor people do. I actually think we got duped by the gondola driver because we paid for an hour but we didn’t keep up with the start time, so I guess that’s on us. It was fun to say we rode in a gondola down the Grand Canal in Venice though. Semi-romantic ride with two of our favorite people.

Day Seven:

We started the day before the crack of dawn. Our goal was to make it to St. Mark’s Basilica to watch the sun rise. Too bad it was a cloudy day and the sun never actually made its appearance, but it was nice to spend time exploring without the massive crowds of people. The pigeons were still there though. We had a little time to kill so we headed to Rialto Bridge for the last photo ops before we left.

 

 

Later that day, we were travel rockstars. We travelled by boat from our hotel to the train station. By train from Venice to Rome. By plane from Rome to Cairo and then from Cairo to Kuwait. By car from Kuwait airport to our apartment. In one day, we used four modes of transportation on three different continents. Exhaustion was an understatement when we arrived at home at 5 a.m. after 19 hours of travel. The ultimate rally was going to work the next morning.  #lifeofatraveller

Next up for the Johnsons: Helsinki, Finland.