Pantheon, Pinocchio, and Piazza's

on wednesday, i went to mensa caritas, which is the soup kitchen i'll be doing service in while in rome. it's all the way on the termini stop on the metro line and is a long walk down a scary road. we will be put into different stations, depending on what needs to be covered, but this week we started in la sala, where we would fill up water jugs and assist anyone who needed anything. we were told that the sorta of people that come into this soup kitchen range from young to old, immigrant and italians. we went with a bunch of semester students and Antonella, who is the woman in charge of all community service activities. it was very scary at first. mostly because Antonella told us that some men will definitely try to hit on you. and it's not that i'm scared of getting 'hit on', it's more like..'well, i don't know what you're saying to me'. the language barrier is still my biggest issue. it was difficult trying to have a conversation with someone who knew very little english just as how i know very little italian. i learned words like sale (salt), mi dispiache (i'm sorry), non è possibile (it's not possible), and più (more). it was a very tiring night and i have no idea why. i'm able to walk all over Rome but standing around and getting water for tables was much more exhausting for some reason. it was quite an experience. camay went to go get a frappe which is sort of like a milkshake. i'm going to get one soon. then to end the night, we watched mean girls. i mean, it was wednesday (oops, we forgot to wear pink).

thankfully, we didn't have class the next day. we woke up around 11am on thursday and headed to the Pantheon! we walked passed the People's Square, beginning our day with a trusty self-timer taken picture. we went into a basilica (I need to find out it's name) on Via del Corso and it was gorgeous. every inch of the basilica was covered with splendid detail. after the basilica, we walked along and turned when the sign pointed us to another street. on the way, we stumbled upon Temple Adriano. we weren't actually planning on it, and i accidently mistook it for the Panthon (ah, don't shoot me) but it's quite a sight in itself. we took some pictures, went on our way, and found...PINNOCHIO! i completely forgot Pinnochio is an italian story. so we made some kissy faces with pinnochio and a few steps later, the Pantheon unfolded from behind the corner and i found myself saying loudly, 'oh my God, this is it! it's amazing!'. i quickly ran, skipped, and hopped to get a great picture (and even had enough time to snap a picture of italian nuns in there habits scurrying along pass the Pantheon. there were "roman" guards in full gear outside the landmark yelling, 'Photo?!' i didn't do my research, so i was surprised to see that the Pantheon is actually Basilica di Santa Maria ad Martyrs. i said a little prayer and took some pictures inside this enormouse, historic building. i also didn't know that Raphael, the italian artist, was buried there (oh yeah, along with the first two kings of Italy).

outside the pantheon is a fountain and we stole some pictures from there, as well, and then we were on our way to Piazza Navona. or so we thought. we actually went in the opposite direction and found ourselves in front of other glorious, unplanned (for the day) sights of rome! we literally were looking for a sign or street leadin to Piazzao Navona and I turned and saw a green courtyard with the doors widen open to the building. i grabbed my 'when in rome' book and saw that it was Chiesa di Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza, which was built into the original sight of Rome's first university. after some really awesome pictures, we walked along the street and found we were heading to Campo de'Fiori instead. so, we let out wanderings bring us to the open are street market (which was unfortunately already packing up and cleaning up). we attempted to find the remains of the theatre of pompeii but i forgot to read the bottom of the description in my book where it says that the buildings in the area are curved because they were built OVER the remains. big fail.

we headed back, determined to reach piazza navona, and we did! i love how the litte streets are always so packed with people and stores and motorbikes and little smartcars and then the huge scenery unfolds within seconds. Masterpiece sculpture/fountains by artists Bernini and Barromini filled square along with local artists trying to sell their pantings. after this, we decided, 'what the hey, we're out here anyway, what else can we stumble upon'. well good lookin' len and camay 'cause i found a vodafone which sells sim cards! unfortunately, i found out later, everything was in italian and only works in italy, contrary to what i thought before. from there, we went all the way back, bought a pinnochio souvenir (because i absolutely had to), and looked for le pain quotiediene. what we actually found was la baguette, formerly le pain quotiediene. we bought some coffee's (gasp, i drank coffee) and some desserts. after a long day, we scurried back, taking another self-timer picture at the same spot from earlier in the day, and then headed back to the dorms.

we were supposed to go to sleep early because we were going to head to Tivoli (a city outside Rome, in the moutains) but we ended up staying up late, again. i was definitely steaming that morning because the peoply coming back from clubs and bars were yelling and screaming when they came back, as if no one was asleep. gaahh. anyways, we woke up early and i ended up falling asleep on the bus while en route to Tivoli. thank goodness i brought my scarf because it was very chilly up there. in rome, it's been a very nice and steady 50-60 degree weather. tivoli, as dominico, our student affairs coordinator, had said, we were going to go to villa d'ete, which was apparantly one of the most beautiful villas in tivoli. and he was right.

my first impression of the villa is that right outside of it was an awesome fountain (pictures to ensue) and that right inside, the bushes were all wrapped with white linen for the cold season. i've always been a sucker to go see mansions, old historic houses, and villas because all this grandeur and design was made so that someone could LIVE in it. i cannot believe that people used to live in those beautiful rooms, rooms for every occassion. the garden was one of the best parts because it had fountains everywhere you turned. just absolutely splendid.

after villa d'ete, we strolled through the streets of tivoli and it was so quaint. it's just such a quite mountain village and everyone was doing their business on this very slow friday morning. after everyone on the tour, except camay and i, grabbed something to eat, i thought we were going to head to villa gregoriano, but we were vetoed by the people that said they wanted to head back to the dorms already. i was already mad at most of them for waking me up because of their screaming and yelling at 4am, but now they were bitching and moaning because they were tired and wanted to head back. what about the people that WANTED to still look around. sigh, what's done is done.

i slept through the bus ride back to rome and once we got back, camay and i walked on the other side of our neighborhood and discovered new places to eat and filled up our water bottles again. we've finished laundry and i hope we get to watch enchanted tonight.

ciao for now.

ps, get SKYPE so that we can voicechat (since my webcam doesn't work) online. my skypename is lenelilove.
and i have some pictures from tivoli on here, but more the next entry since camay has the some good ones.