Colin's Visit

I know I've been MIA for a bit, but I've been busy entertaining my first visitor from America. After an hour of waiting impatiently at Fiumicino airport last Saturday, I finally caught a glimpse of red hair hovering at about 6'3" in the crowd of newcomers to Rome, and it was quite the happy sight. We started Saturday with the Italian staples of pizza and gelato, then kept it pretty low key, walked around my neighborhood, introduced the first of many bartenders to the American phenomenon of Jagerbombs, and spent the evening in Campo de Fiori until I mysteriously fell into my old trick of randomly breaking out in hives (possibly a SoCo allergy?).

Sunday was the grand tour of the different areas of Rome. Got off the metro at the Colosseum, which Colin was so keen on seeing and then embarked on our way to Villa Borghese, where I had read about a potentially romantic rowboat excursion on the little lake there. Stopped at the Vittorio Emmanuele monument, headed down Via de Corso, stumbled upon the Trevi Fountain, saw the Spanish Steps, and finally made it to our destination. The lake was quite small actually, but had a cool faux temple in the middle, and the rowboats were pretty cute. I even saw a turtle. Then we wandered around and caught a tram to wherever it was we saw a cafe we deemed worthy of providing some afternoon sustenance, then made our way back home. Colin was pretty keen on seeing the Redskins game and Erin was craving some American football too, so we met up with everyone at Scholar's Lounge. The football was eventually trumped by the Rugby semifinals, so we witnessed the victories of South Africa and England, then made our way back before the Metro closed.

Monday I had class in the morning so Colin got to sleep in a bit, then he met us at Argentina just in time to get some Kosher goodness in the Jewish ghetto. Love me some falafel. We spent the next couple hours in the area around school... Piazza Navona, the Pantheon, Campo de Fiori by day (Colin bargained for some scarves and a belt, and we indulged in a kiwi from one of the fruit stands), and made it back in time for Mythology. Colin proved his expertise in the area by defining hubris as "excessive pride" and earned himself some brownie points, and after class Lucia (the professor) gave us some advice for good dining venues. When we finally found the one it was closed, so we settled for an appetizer and bottle of wine in Campo de Fiori before wandering about to find a more appropriate dinner place. This came in the form of a really awesome pizza place right by my school, where we ate, drank, and met a middle aged couple from North Carolina and then a group of young Spaniards. The place was right across from Abbey Theatre, where Meghan and I had gone with Scott and Tom the Thursday before and found enjoyable, so we made a pit stop there after dinner. Who should we find there but Scott, Tom, and Brendon, so we had a few more drinks then headed back home.

On Tuesday Colin met up at school again, this time for Maurizio's Masterpieces of the Vatican class. Went to St. Pietro in Vincoli where Maurizio gave us a moving description of St. Peter's chains that allegedly are stored there and Michelangelo's Moses. Unfortunately in the time it took for him to prep us for what we were about to see, the church had closed. Reverted to Plan B: Santa Maria Maggiore. Came back to school, got some lunch, then headed to Ancient Rome. Despite his expressed desire to spool in the Colosseum, the 11 euro admission and long line was a deterrent (we tried to hop onto the back of an Asian tour, but for unknown reasons we were detected), so we had to settle for a gallivant through the Forum and a brief stop at Circo Massimo. I enjoy the free food during Apertivo time at Freni e Frizione so I took Colin there for dinner, then we went back to Abbey Theatre for Trivia Night, which turned out to be a blast. At first it was just Colin, Meghan, and I on the team that would win one of our three prizes of the night for best team name: "It's Not Wrong if She's Sleeping." I guess coming from Charlottesville gives you a nice advantage when it comes to winning the trivia name competition. We greatly enjoyed the Limoncello that served as our spoils from that victory, and also ended up with 2 bags of Wafer cookies for being the last to enter double digits on the scoreboard, and for being the most obnoxious team (surprise!). Despite the fact that teams had a 5 person max, I guess no one was really that threatened when Pete, Ben, Jeff, Hannah, and Kathleen joined in later.

Wednesday started as another schoolday, and I was a little disappointed that Maurizio didn't take our Renaissance and Baroque Art class out on the town as usual, because it would have been a good way for Colin to get to see more of Rome. Instead it was an art lecture followed by a quiz, which Colin took, and at least humored Maurizio with his definition of art ("A form of expression, a three letter word, and a nickname for Arthur."). We had the great idea of biking the Appian Way and seeing some aqueducts and catacombs, but it turned into a more complicated process and a more stressful bike ride than we had bargained for, and we were getting hungry, so we returned the bikes after a short ride and headed back to town for some more, well, pizza. Somehow spent 5 hours on our own in Trastevere before everyone else met up with us, and had a great time. I really like that area, and if I ever am in possession of any kind of funds I'd like to spend more time there.

Thursday I decided to skip out on Roman Emperors so Colin and I would have more time in the Vatican. Did the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter's, which were both really awesome. The Sistine Chapel was entirely new to me and it really is incredible what Michelangelo was able to accomplish in both the ceiling and the Last Judgment. I had been to St. Peter's before, but by the time I had ascended the Cupola with my class and made it to the actual interior I was too worn out to really appreciate it, so I was glad to get back. We got a nice lunch in the Vatican, then we decided we should get back so we could get ready for the weekend, stopping in the Chiesa de Gesu (the first Jesuit church with another impressive ceiling) on the way. Colin got a haircut and 12 bottles of wine to bring back, and we were absolutely exhausted. The plan had been to do the Pub Crawl that we enjoyed so much for my birthday, but we started thinking it might not be the best idea before a 4 30 wakeup time, especially when it started raining. Instead we watched Wet Hot American Summer with Meghan, Erin, and Dan, then went to what was becoming our favorite end-of-the-evening hangout: the bar across the street.

4 30 came real quick on Friday morning, but we successfully called and caught the taxi and made our flight with no problem. We flew into Milan, where we spent a few hours (more than intended actually, due to some train confusion when trying to leave) checking out the Gothic Duomo there and walking about the city. When we finally made it to Como it was absolutely beautiful. It was a nice, brisk fall day and the lake and surrounding town was just so picturesque. We checked into the hotel, which we were pleased with, then Colin indulged in his first ever Doner Kebab (which holds particular relevance to all familiar with a picture I took in Spain that has sparked so much discussion on Facebook), and it was a very good experience for him. We took a ferry that stopped at a few other lakeside towns, and got off at the one where the posh Villa d'Este is found. I wasn't exactly sure what it was, but I knew there were gardens so we tried to go in and were promptly stopped by the Carabinieri. When trying to take pictures of the lake in another spot we found that we had once again caught the wary eyes of a number of Carabinieri, so we spent the rest of the afternoon scheming on how to break in and pretending that the Carabinieri were after us.

We wanted to make sure we made it back for sunset at the top of the Funiculare (the cable car that runs to the top of the mountain), so we returned and started our ascent to where we thought (going by what we had seen from the ferry only) it would start. We ended up walking up the steep streets for a good 20 minutes before finding out it started right from the lake. It still took another 15 minutes of walking around and asking directions before we found it (in what would have been the easiest place to get to ever if we had only known), but when we made it to the top and shared an excellent bottle of wine made in Como it was so worth it. The views were breathtaking, and we actually ran into one of the ladies (a Brazilian, actually, living in Italy and dating a German) who gave us directions earlier. Then we went back down and changed for a nice dinner in a restaurant run by the hotel.

The plan was originally to catch the 7 25 train to Venice Saturday morning, but I hadn't set the alarm properly and we didn't wake up til 7 40. There were later trains, but as we were walking to the train station Colin suggested that maybe we just return to Rome. He felt like he was coming down with something, and it would have turned into a lot of time on the train for not so much time in the city, especially when he had a whole day of flying to look forward to on Sunday. So that's what we ended up doing, and I think it was definitely for the best. Meghan had friends visiting over the weekend so we got to meet them for a second, Colin got another Doner Kebab, and we got to spend the last evening in our favorite hangout across the street.

Then we got up at 8 30 yesterday morning so we could get him on the plane. Everything went very smoothly, but unfortunately there was a police checkpoint before the line to even check bags so I had to leave him earlier than we had hoped. Did the hugs/kisses/"See you in 2 months" deal and spent the majority of yesterday doing absolutely nothing. Got a call at 2 in the morning saying that he got to Atlanta just fine so I guess it really was a successful visit. I had a great time and it was really nice to see Colin again:). Now I have midterms to focus on, but I'll get pictures up later.