Roma-Roma-ma-ah!

 Just so you know, it's October. CRAZY.

Let's see, I'll just start with some highlights since the last post.

I did my oral report on the Theater of Pompey for my Ancient Rome and its Monuments class... I think it went all right- I can't remember the last time I had to do an oral report!

On Thursday I visited Villa Farnesina. It was on the list my architecture teacher gave us of places to see, so I thought I'd check it out. I enjoyed it a lot more than I expected to! The villa was built in the 1500s and the interior walls are covered with incredibly ornate frescoes by painters such as Raphael. The frescoes all depict scenes and characters from Greco-Roman mythology and I had a lot of fun figuring out what everything was. When I was about to leave, I found a book by the entrance of the descriptions of what the frescoes were, and I was happy to see that I guessed most things correctly- I'm such a dork! Afterward I had some time between when the villa closed and my first class, so I had a had a snack at Piazza Trilussa and people-watched.

Friday I went to Tarquinia with API. I didn't get to go with my roommates (kind of complicated story having to do with a single make-up class) but it was still really fun. We biked through the medieval town of Tarquinia, which also has strong Etruscan roots, and made stops along the way to see churches and beautiful views of the countryside. For lunch we ate at an agriturismo, which is a farm that serves the food it grows to tourists vacationing there. It was dee-licious! After the lunch, I somehow got started talking with the wine connoisseur who talked for a really long time about wine tasting, and I told him my family was from Italy. He asked for the last name and where they were from, and I said Borgia and Cavallo, from Colliano. It's so funny telling people here Borgia- it always gets a good reaction!

I walked around with Claudia and Liat on Saturday, which was nice. We were heading toward the Crypt of the Capuchin monks, which was cool yet eerie- it's a crypt with several rooms decorated entirely of the bones of the monks from 1500-1800. I wasn't allowed to take pictures, but I'm sure Google has some.

On Sunday, I went to the Marino Wine Festival and hung out mostly with Catherine and Liat. I wasn't planning on going, but that morning, right before my run, I decided I might as well, so I ran, quickly showered, and went out the door to the metro station. We took the metro to Termini, then figured out our train tickets and took the train to Marino. As soon as we climbed all the steps to get to the town, the atmosphere was like bam, FESTIVAL! People were dancing in the streets, singing in Italian along with the loudspeakers everywhere, wearing inflatable crowns... there was a parade and then at 4:00 wine was supposed to flow out of the fountains, so I went with Catherine and Liat because they wanted to get a spot by the fountain early. Turns out so did everyone else- we were packed in a mob of people all crowding around the fountain, and I seriously couldn't move. It was crazy! When the fountain finally started spouting wine, I was trying to get AWAY from the fountain, but everyone else was trying to get TO the fountain, and no one could get anywhere! We finally made it out of the crowd alive, then walked around more and hung out on some steps in the main piazza, talking and people-watching. About a half hour before our train was supposed to leave, we went down to the train station and waited. There was much confusion about which tracks the train was going to come on. When the train finally did come, it was even more madness. I looked down the length of the side of the train and saw about four people's feet sticking out of the windows- people inside and outside the train were lifting/pushing lots of people through the windows, many of whom didn't even have tickets. Catherine, Liat, and I got crushed against the train and couldn't get to the door, so we actually missed the train and had to wait 50 minutes for the next one! So chaotic.  We finally did make it back to Rome on the next train! It was crazy and fun and we were all very glad we went!

Video of the madness:

Also, I am going to London this weekend!! I am leaving my last class on Thursday 30 mins early, walking and taking the bus to Termini, finding the Terravision shuttle, taking the shuttle to Ciampino airport, flying to London-Stansted on Ryanair, finding the bus, then ending up wherever Andrew is! Whew! So excited!

Another Rome album!