We really needed a break today. Emily was exhausted, and her feet were very swollen. We slept in pretty late, and then stared blankly at the wall for a while after we woke up.
Daniel enjoyed watching Peppa Pig in Italian, and then he and I went for a walk. There is a park next to our apartment which has a large grassy area with random paths crossing it, benches with relaxing homeless people, and a fun wooden play set. Daniel was feeling adventurous and brave as he crossed the wobbly wood and chain bridge. The park is shaped like a C, and in the center are some old ruins surrounded by a massive, ancient stone wall. You can't see it, but you can read a sign on the street that it's some Emperor's mausoleum and it's waiting restoration. I'm guessing it's been waiting for hundreds of years and it will continue to wait for hundreds of years. There was a plump homeless (I'm guessing) woman who really liked Daniel as we walked past her. We stopped and I told him to say "ciao". She was gushing her love for him and literally on the verge of tears as she exclaimed "bello, bello, bello, bello...." This was not the only time a random Italian woman cried because of her deep affection for Daniel. They are so dramatic.
Coming back from our walk, we stopped at a koi fish pond in the yard of our little apartment building. Daniel enjoyed them very much.
Waiting for us in the apartment, Emi was ready to go out and see something. We decided to see the Colosseum, so I downloaded a Rome public transportation app on our tablet and figured out how to get there. The tram was full but we squeezed in with our backpack, stroller, and Daniel. I'm thankful that this stroller is so functional but it collapses so easily and to such a compact size. We arrived at the Colosseum just as the sun was setting, and the scene was very beautiful.
We were content to just walk around the Colosseum and look at it in its massiveness and oldness. Parts of it were covered in scaffolding, and it was obvious which sections were restored and which were "raw". I'm not sure how much of it is "original", and it's even hard to define "original" because I think the building has been continuously used and maintained for thousands of years. I think in the past it has even been a hospital and a monastery. The unrestored parts were covered in deep pock marks, like someone had been shooting at it with a cannon. It wasn't until we gone home to Tucson that I looked up what those are from-- there used to be huge brass "staples" holding everything together, and those were where the ends of the staples were inserted. We saw some similar, smaller (but still huge) staples at the Sao Jorge castle in Lisbon.
From the Colosseum we walked around Rome and saw many amazing ruins mixed in with newer occupied buildings. I had no idea what we were looking at, but it was beautiful at night with the colored lights and magical atmosphere. We were hungry for dinner, so we wandered down a side street and found a slightly fancy restaurant. The food was expensive; each course cost about what we were used to paying for an entire meal, so we ordered some pasta with bacon on it. Daniel scarfed it down, as did Emily and I, and so we ordered another plate of pasta (number three). After that, we were full, and I supposed the waiter thought we were strange because we never ordered a main course. But we are cheap. We thought the restaurant was small, but as we were leaving we noticed a huge plaza full of tables which the restaurant was serving as well.
Daniel had lots of energy and was bopping around happily as we walked back. To keep his movement in a forward direction, we let him play fetch with himself with a rock. It worked well, though occasionally we had to apologize if rock rolled too close to anyone.
Using my Rome public transportation app to plot our course home, we made it about halfway before we encountered problems. Actually, even before that point, we were having trouble figuring out when our stops were because it was too dark outside and too bright inside to see any of the signs at the tram stops. We made friends with an (apparently) Indian man who spoke English. He had the same stop as we did for our transfer, so he showed us when to get off and then stood waiting with us. It turns out he was from Bangladesh and spoke Tamil. His English was extremely hard to understand for us because he pushed his words together into one word. For example, he would say "Yufremware." And it didn't sound English until I thought about it and realized he was asking "you are from where?" Anyway, he was really nice and when our tram was 30 minutes late, he asked us where we were going. He explained that there was a strike happening and so not all of the routes were running. A tram came and he said "quickgetonthisone,itwilltakeyouwhereyouwanttogo!" It wasn't the one we were waiting for but we trusted him and got on it, and sure enough it went to the stop where our home was. We got home very late, but we weren't terribly tired.
Watching Peppa Pig and eating a big bag of raisins.
Sunset at the Colosseum
The restored side of the Colosseum.
The less restored side of the Colosseum.
And where the twain have met.
Watch out guys, he needs down.
Something cool in Rome.
Here we see the indomitable stroller which we loved and appreciated.
Something cool in Rome. Things like this were mixed in with the occupied buildings. But I had no idea what I was looking at.
Something cool in Rome.
And Daniel's highlight was being able to play fetch with himself as we walked back to the tram stop.
Something cool in Rome.
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