Rome: The Monumental City

Europe is so tiny. 

We were able to skip from France, down to Spain and catch a flight to Rome in a day. It’s so cool to be able to zip across to another country and experience a completely different culture.

The Monumental City. It’s such an apt tag. There are ancient buildings, fountains, statues, museums, gardens and archaeological sites up to the yin yang. The history of this place is completely mind-boggling. If you really think about the events that have taken place in the city over the past five thousand years, you begin to feel very insignificant, very quickly. We are just are dot of ink on single page of an infinite book. It was a privilege to get some insight into times gone by, and soak in the incredible artistic and architectural achievements the human race is capable of. Plus the food is incredible. 

Tara stuffed herself to bursting with antipasto buffets, while I gorged on the soft Italian pastas, gelatos, red-wines and pizzas. I even had my first coffee in 10 years, which I’m pretty sure they laced with cocaine.

It was 35 degrees plus every day we were in Rome. Without the reprieve of the seabreeze it was sweltering during the day, the heat is a clamping vice. The only chance you have to escape is to dip your head in a fountain, or find refuge in one of the thousands of cool churches in the city. 

The first church we entered, we actually got knocked back by the bouncer at the door. At first I thought maybe he had read Hellbound, but then he explained that Tara’s skirt was a bit risqué for a place of worship. She was then directed to a spot where you can wrap yourself in a white paper-material sheet, so you can cover up. Luckily we learned this before hitting the Vatican, or we would have had to buy a shawl from one of the many Moroccan street hawkers, who make their living making sure unsuspecting tourists meet God’s dress code. 

We checked off the list the typical tourist sites: The Colosseum, The Trevi Fountain (amazing at night), The Spanish Steps, The Pantheon, etc etc etc etc. It was a bit of a whirlwind.

The biggest day was a pilgrimage to the Vatican City. We are up before dawn, bought some fruit at a street-market, which was setting up for the day and caught the first tram to the world’s smallest and richest country. Normally Saint Peter’s Square is teeming with tourists, but at 6am it was deserted. The occasional nun walked by on her way to work, and as the bells chimed for 7am, heralding the opening of St. Peter’s Basilica, we went through the metal detectors to experience the seat of Catholic power on earth. 

The biggest thing that sticks out is the wealth of the place. There is more gold foil, precious historical objects and priceless art than I could have even imagined. While we found ourselves overwhelmed with the sense of beauty, you can’t help but think that all of these riches should be going toward helping the poor. We must have passed a half-dozen homeless on the streets on our way there in the morning. The phrase ‘sell the Vatican, feed the world’ really seems to ring true when you’re standing agog at the sheer volume of artefacts in the city. It all adds to the experience, and we both wondered, if there is a God up there, would he prefer art and monuments dedicated to his wonder preserved in one place, or humanity preserving a sense of equality in the world? It’s a debate that is too big for one little blog.

Nevertheless we were floored by the achievements of the renaissance. Art is truly something that makes humans unique. It’s breathtaking to behold centuries-old works, whose magnificence haven’t been dimmed over time. They are still genius. The symbolism embedded into much of the art gives it an even wider dimension once you learn of it. The Sistine Chapel, was packed full of people, like stunned little sardines, all looking up at the ceiling, mouths open in wonder at one Michelangelo created essentially on his own in just four years. There is reason it’s so popular.

Pictures hardly do any of the Vatican or Rome justice, and neither do my pitiful words. If you ever have the opportunity to see the place, seize it with both hands.