130 arrivederci

Well, I made it home safe and sound and am writing from my home in DC right now. It was a pretty miserable travel experience due to the new no-liquid and no-cream regulations for aircraft. The security people tried to take away my asthma inhaler in Rome and my ink pen in Newark, but I managed to negotiate for both of them. Insert comment about common sense here.


above: one of Rome's hundreds (thousands?) public drinking fountains - guaranteed to have cold, clean water. See the hole on top where the water spurts out if you plug up the main hole? It was always funny seeing tourists crouch down at the bottom like dogs because they didn't know how to use the fountain.

Last Friday, I was really looking forward to coming home. My presentation went well, and on Saturday morning, I began to pack with happy thoughts of coming home again. And then, right around noon, it just hit me. I was really leaving Rome, and I got really sad. Bipolary sad.

So I set off that afternoon in wandering nostalgia through the winding streets of the centro: I visited the Pantheon, of course; I even discovered new streets (very rare after 11 weeks of exploring); I made some shaky movies on my digital camera; I heard an accordian player (the Italian stereotype that isn't even true in the tourist areas) and even snapped a photo of this lovely couple looking for a restaurant on a very typical Rome street:



One final bonus tip for if/when you go to Rome. Go to the lake in Villa Pamphili with two apples: one cut in small pieces and the other whole. Throw the pieces in slowly to give all the turtles equal opportunity to swim over from all parts of the lake. Then, when you have enough swarming turtles in the water in front of you, throw in the whole apple. One of the big strong turtles will grab the apple and dive, but he will lose control, and it will bob back to the surface after a few seconds. The turtles will continue to attack the apple until it's all gone. It is hilarious and I guarantee it's not in any of the guidebooks.