My first day in Rome and I was exhausted.
Got there on the Tuesday night at about 11:30pm and after picking up my bag and clearing customs I was chauffeured into the city by the lovely Alberto. He drove well and at the end said “ok bye bye!” which was very sweet coming from an old Italian guy with a Cheshire grin all over his face. I'm staying at a bed and breakfast in the centre of Rome which is essentially a converted apartment. We're on the fifth floor and the other apartment's are occupied by either residents or shops. I think one might be a hair dresser because on the first day, when I walked downstairs to go to breakfast, I saw they had this beautiful etched art deco sign of a Victorian looking lady with an elaborate hairstyle in profile. Unless of course its some kind of time travelling prostitution service I can see no other context for it.
So yes, where was I, ah arriving at the Bed and Breakfast I buzz up and the guy says to me “The lift is broken, you will have to climb up the stairs”. He says it quickly in the way that people do when they imagine saying things fast enough mitigates argument. Five flights of stairs with my suitcase. Climbing five flights of stairs with a suitcase in and of itself is probably not a great feat but try doing it while trying to be quiet so you don't wake everyone else in the building. As I climbed up the last stair with my case, like it was Everest, the reception guy said “Oh sorry, I didn't know that you were on your own or I would have offered to help”. Really? The fact that I booked a single room didn't clue you in? I had that happen a lot too, people being puzzled about me travelling alone and with the benefits of the post editing process I can tell you that in the time that I stayed there the lift worked only once, when I was leaving to go to Venice, poetic no? Though I suppose I cant expect a great deal from something that cost me under 200 euro for 3 nights. I even had my own bathroom, and it was clean. No matter, I was there, and it all felt happily surreal. Its hard to place Rome in one category because there is so much going on there and such a convergence of everything, time, places, people. This must be what they mean when they say all roads lead to Rome. Have you ever had a dream where you were in a place that was at once familiar but indefinably so. One of those rambling dreams that start with you saying “Well, I thought I was in my old house but then I was in a market and you were there but you weren't you you were someone else....” That's what Rome feels like in real life. Parts of it feel like Abu Dhabi, parts of it feel like Melbourne, parts of it feel like London, one part reminded me of what Beirut must feel like though I have never been and it has to be said the reference only sprang to mind because I had the distinct feeling I might be shot. Then in the middle of it, like some strange episode of Doctor Who where the Tardis has a period and the wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff goes haywire, there's a giant ancient ruin or some big fuck off marble building that screams “I AM A BUILDING AND I AM AWESOME!!!” For 34 centuries people have lived in Rome, and all of them leave something behind that gets absorbed into the identity of Rome, squished in with the renaissance and fascism and gladiators. A giant wad of civilisation. It would be an interesting experience living here and if I was ever given the opportunity to I would if for no other reason than to try and get a handle on what beats at the heart of Rome. I'm glad I've had the experience of living in London for a while before coming here, because what I found there could probably be applied here too, your experience of London and your perspective on London is very much centred around where you live in it. After coming to Rome I'm beginning to develop a theory that all iconic cities have that going on with them. I'm willing to bet that if you were living around the 'La Dolce Vita' bit, that your perspective on the place would be rather set a certain way, that Rome might seem much simpler. I went around Rome on one of those hop on hop off sight seeing tour buses, this is generally not me but damnit Rome is a tourist machine and this is not a place I could just do my normal wandering around thing in. I'd get lost and sold to gypsies I know it, they're out there, they accost me if I stop moving for too long and ask me for euro like cats weaving round my ankles hoping to be fed. So, nice open topped tourist bus. I got on at Termini and it took me around the city, down streets that looked familiar and then dear god the colosseum. There is so much to see here that I went round on the bus once, so smacked in the face by all the things I was seeing that I forgot to take photos so I had to go around again. Lucky I got a pass that lets me go around and around as many times as I want for 2 whole days, 18 euro, bargain. So the bus came back to the starting point, I jumped off and grabbed some pizza (the only way I can describe it to you involves an awful lot of swearing, its good, and I have a feeling its one of those things that can only be made well there, sorry) and went round a second time. I noticed more detail the second time around. The theatre of the gypsy beggar woman near the Roman Forum in her yellow socks and sandles, bent over on a walking stick doing a kind of pained and exaggerated bhuto walk, shaking a tin with some coins in it and a picture of the Virgin Mary on it, crossing herself at intervals and kissing imaginary rosary beads before asking passers by for money.
Hard to know whether its real or entirely theatre which probably means that its both. All her props seem calculated, and she had a brand new brightly coloured back pack which made me think she cant have been doing too badly for herself all things considered if she can buy herself a spiffing new backpack.
In Melbourne I have a favourite statue I used to pass everyday on my way to work. Its the statue of Justice George Higginbotham, third chief justice of Victoria, I used to smile each day as I passed that statue because there was some thing in his eye, something in the way that he lifted his judicial robes revealing just a little ankle that was frankly, quite saucy. Predictably there are statues in Rome and I think I have found my saucy equivalent. Given that the Italians are a passionate people its not just some scanty ankle on show in this statue , its of one man standing with his shirt open revealing a rippling chest while another slightly smaller man appears to be dry humping his leg.
This might just be me, I was sitting in an open topped bus for a lot of that day and did get rather sunburned but I took a picture so you be the judge.
Then there was the crazy old man shouting something that sounded both joyful and obscene in Italian at the tourists while they passive fluttered around him taking photos of the fountain at the centre of the Piazza Barberini, when they didn't respond he decided to balance on the edge of the fountain pretending to fly and singing.
There is a Rome for tourists and a Rome for locals and this can best be illustrated in the economy of sunglasses. The ones that sell to locals you buy in the little markets that crop up in side streets the same way the have for centuries, they cost about 1 euro, I still have mine, my 1 euro specials, they work perfectly well and make me look all sophisticated. The ones that go to tourists have little signs saying latest Italian styles and cost 30 euro. I have also declared it a rule not to go into any restaurant claiming to sell real Italian pizza. If I'm eating pizza in Rome I only want the fake Italian pizza, the stuff they import from Bulgaria.
You know I thought this trip was going to be mostly gastronomic, I mean its Rome after all, but I just haven't had the head space for food. I had some brilliant coffee and a cornetti for breakfast, I had a slice of pizza with tomato, mozzarella and basil on a nice thin base for lunch, a blood orange granita while I wandered around the Campo dei Fiori and a tirimisu gelato while I wandered around looking for a bank that would accept my non Italian bank cards so by the time I got to dinner all I wanted was the strawberries I bought from the market next to where I'm staying.
Another brilliant thing about Rome is the drinking fountains, grazie Roma for the drinking fountains. The pipe beautifully cold spring water down from the mountains and they are everywhere, you just fill up your bottle and go better than paying 1.50 euro for a little bottle in a shop.
So at the end of my first day I know where things are roughly, and had begun to cross the road without believing I'd be killed. What delights await me on day 2? Tune in next time.......
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