Playing tourist

Yet another eventful day. This one started out with a morning trip to a flea market a few blocks away from our apt in Trastevere. One or two girls were supposed to come with us, and thus call my new Italian cell phone when they were on there way around 10. Well, 4 girls showed up, and they did call but at almost noon. Somehow at that time I was the only girl awake--we blamed it on the daylight savings that happened the night before which we all ignored. So we threw on clothes and left without breakfast to go to this market. It was an interesting place, a cacophony of noise and language. It's much easier to ignore vendors calling at you when you don't know what they're saying. All I kept hearing was "Dai! Dai!" which I know means "give," but later looked it up and idiomatically it means "come on!" One vendor even looked at Kelsey and said to her "konichiwa!" which we thought was hilarious given yesterday's episode! We kept repeating it the rest of the day.

The market was mostly clothes, and my roommates and I didn't want to do anything but eat breakfast, so kind of a long morning. Plus this stupid market was at least a few miles long! It just kept going and going!! Thus the walk back was kind of rough, and it seemed like a sketchy part of town. We all grabbed some pizza on the way home so we didn't pass out--I have had pizza every single day for at least one meal, and I refuse to eat any more!! Then I led the way back to the apt and grabbed some apples before we headed back out on another bus tour.

We decided to use the bus to hit up the major sites that are furthest away from our side of the city, which turned out to be la Fontana di Trevi e la Piazza di Spagna. Trevi Fountain was magnificent, but packed. It's also kind of out of place, you are just walking down normal, narrow, insignificant streets and then all of a sudden there's a huge fountain in this tiny square. Of course it was packed, I don't know what possessed us to go on a Sunday afternoon. We all wanted plenty of pictures with it, so we claimed a spot on the stairs, and then went in shifts to throw coins in while the others took pictures for us. I have to say it worked out very well.

We went from the fountain to the Spanish steps, which I expected to be these grandiose stairs that took up almost an entire large piazza. Not so. I was shocked at how small they are!! Very disappointing really. The church at the top was impressive, called the church of Trinita' dei Monti (Trinity of the Mounts), but the steps themselves were a let down. They were also packed, tourists lining every step all the way up. While we were standing there deciding what to do, it started to rain a bit and people started to scatter. At that our hopes of getting good pictures on the stairs were lifted, but not for long. Then people began pulling out umbrellas and not moving, so we gave up and left.

On the way out of la Piazza di Spagna, we saw a McDonalds and decided to check it out. The most incredible McDonalds I have ever seen, way better than the Spanish steps!! It was literally a palace inside, with marble everywhere and statues. It was 2 stories and even had a salad bar, gelato bar, and caffe counter. I think we took more pictures in there then at the steps...

At this point we were utterly exhausted and decided to get back on the bus to go home. Unfortunately the bus had to make the rest of the loop before getting back to our stop, which would take about 20ish minutes with no traffic. Just our luck, the traffic was horrendous. And while we were sitting on the top of the full bus, it began to rain. Being Seattleites, we toughed it out for a bit, then when it started to pour we bailed an went downstairs--along with the rest of the top level. We were packed in that bus tighter than you know, Christina and I were shoved against the back doors, and when we stopped the first time the opening doors almost took us out.

But somehow we made that part of the ride enjoyable. There were a few people that stayed on the top in the pouring rain, and one of them was apparently a singer. He was belting O Sole Mio for a few minutes, and was actually really good. We were busy watching all the people along the sidewalk staring at the singers on top of the bus and watching their confused faces. Then at one point the bus hit a huge puddle that completely nailed a guy on a vespa next to us. And I mean he got soaked, like full wall of water in the face. I laughed so hard I couldn't breathe, that poor guy looked so shocked! I'm still laughing.

But otherwise I'm surprised we actually made it home, we were absolutely exhausted. Megan and Morgan looked like they were about to fall asleep at any minute, and the bus driver kept turning around and looking at them with this concerned look on his face. I guess he's not used to seeing tourists so spent. But we did make it, and even stopped at the McDonalds a few blocks from our apt for dinner. That's right, we didn't even last a week without American food. That's what pizza everyday will do to you! At home none of us would never eat at Micky D's, but here, today, it just sounded so good... Apparently they don't have ranch in Europe, and the ketchup is brown and tastes wrong. But otherwise it was marvelous.

Tomorrow is our first day of internships and class. Still don't know what to expect, and I'm definitely not ready to go back. I want to stay on break and keep playing tourist! But I guess the real work has to start sometime. Wish me luck!--btw, in Italy to wish someone luck you say "In boca al lupo" which means 'in the mouth of the wolf,' and one must respond "Crepi!" which if I remember right means 'kill it!' Now you know.