Sono a Roma. Cosa faccio ora?

Explanation

2007-04-14T22:53:00.000+06:00

If anyone's still checking this, here is an explanation for why I haven't updated.

Firstly, uploading pictures is a pain in the butt. I can only do 5 at a time and it takes about 10 minutes to do that. Considering the number of pictures I take... that doesn't cut it. At a certain point, this just feels like another chore I have to do, along with school work.

Secondly, and the actual reason I'm posting, I've been sick for about two months now. A week before Sicily, I got a cold, with one or two days of fever and sleepiness. From then, I had a cough and vague cold symptoms all week.

Then a cough throughout Sicily, though I felt better.

After the week in Sicily, which ended in two days of running around in the rain, I spent a week (week 3) in Egypt. My cough got worse, AND on top of that, when we returned from Egypt, all of us had some... troubles... which we blame on the water. That week (4) I had another two or three days of fever and various cold symptoms, spent more time in the cold and rain on field trips, and basically gave my cough all the excuse it needed to get worse.

At the end of the next week (week 5), I went to the doctor and got diagnosed with bronchitis. He gave me antibiotics, vitamin c and cough medicine. I got better for the course of the medicines (again, 1 week). The day after my medicines ended, my cough went back to normal badness. And what was slated for that day? Our departure for Campania, of course! In Campania, we trudged around all day and our first place to stay (the Villa Vergiliana, for all the classicists out there...) was FREEZING. Our last day there, I woke up with a horrible sore throat. Yesterday was our last day on the trip, and I spent it too tired to do much or think.

At this point, I still have a really sore throat-- I'm taking ibuprofen for it every few hours--, a lot of head congestion, and a rattling cough that produces little yellow friends of prodigious volume and texture. That's more than you need to know. This being Italy, I can't see a doctor until Monday. So I'm spending today and tomorrow more or less entirely in bed.

Here's the super fun part: I have been sick for 7 weeks, about to start the 8th, and I have 4 weeks left in Rome. During those four weeks I have to write a 12-15 page research paper and present a Greek project. As it stands right now, I don't feel like I can absorb anything I read, and it takes me a lot more staring at things to figure them out. I don't know if my Greek homework will be done for Monday because I am having a lot of trouble finishing thoughts. I have a first draft of my paper due a week from Monday and I don't have the brains to research for it right now.

So that's why I'm not updating my blog. Mostly I just wanted to complain. I know I went into more detail than you need, but it's frustrating, so I thought I'd let you all know just how frustrating it's been.

Sicilia! Ok, just a teaser, really.

2007-03-11T05:33:00.000+06:00

Hello!

I was in Sicily all this past week, and in a scant 4 hours a taxi is picking me and some others up to take us to the airport, and thence to Egypt for a week. So I have been busy and will continue so. I took many pictures in Sicily and south western Italy and I will post them someday, but not tonight. Oh god, so many pictures. Soo many temples. Anyway, just wanted to post SOMETHING so you all, whoever you are, won't think I've disappeared. Mwah.

Ellie

TRIP: Thursday, Feb. 22 - Forum Romanum + Capitoline Museum

2007-02-27T02:48:00.000+06:00

PIC: Basilica Aemilia. Wikipedia is here.

PIC: Casts of friezes at the Basilica Aemilia

PIC: Closeup of the first freize, depicting the rape of the Sabine women(I think)

PIC: Closeup of the second frieze, depicting the rape of Lucretia (I think)

PIC: Porticus of Gaius and Lucius, Augustus' grandsons

PIC: Inscription at the Porticus of Gaius and Lucius

PIC: Temple, such as it is, of Venus Cloacina. That is, Venus of the Gutter. Sweet.

PIC: The fancy opus sectile floor of the Curia Julia

PIC: A balustrade in the Curia Julia

PIC: The other balustrade in the Curia Julia

PIC: Interior of the Curia Julia

PIC: An inscription I thought looked interesting. It says Tyranno-- or something like that, which is interesting because it's a Greek loan word meaning king/tyrant.

PIC: Lacus Curtius

PIC: The rostra, such as it is

PIC: Temple of Saturn

PIC: Tabularium

PIC: Precinct of the Consenting Gods

PIC: Another view of the forum

Into the Capitoline museum we go!

PIC: It's a me, Antoninus Pius! I have clearly not been getting enough sun.

PIC: A reproduction of a cornice from a Flavian building.

PIC: An Augustan cornice from the Temple of Concord. The idea is that you compare the marble work on the two cornices. Well? Get to it!

PIC: Another forum view, this time from inside the Tabularium

PIC: Blurry pic through a window of the remains of the temple of Veiovis

PIC: Mm, famous shewolf statue.

PIC: Original Marcus Aurelius bronze equestrian statue

PIC: Constantine is like "hi guys"

PIC: Hercules, all gilded up.

PIC: Bits of the temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, one of the oldest temples in Rome. The museum is built over it.

PIC: More of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus

PIC: Bits of temple from "Mater Matuta" at San Ombono

PIC: A lion votive from the same temple

PIC: Faustina Maggiore, Antoninus Pius' wife

TRIP: Tuesday, Feb. 20 - Praeneste, Gabii + more

2007-02-27T02:31:00.000+06:00

Another catchup post. Sorry guys.

PIC: The Tomb of the Baker at the Porta Maggiore in Rome

PIC: The Porta Maggiore herself

PIC: Some bits of aqueduct peeking out of the Aurelian wall

PIC: A Roman bridge called the Ponte di Nona, 9 miles outside of Rome on the road to Praeneste

PIC: Ponte di Nona again

PIC: The Temple at Gabii. Probably to Fortuna, ultimately. There were other digs going on around, too.

PIC: Some cells near the temple at Gabii, presumably for storage or for pilgrims to sleep in. Mostly, a sweet view.

PIC: Temple at Gabii again

PIC: View from museum steps at Praeneste. The Museum is located on the very top of what was a MASSIVE temple work of concrete and such dedicated to Fortuna Primagenia. It was situated purposefully to have such a commanding view of the sea between two mountain ranges. It's fabulous. Here is a rather small and slow-loading 3d reconstruction of the temple.

PIC: Another view

PIC: And again

PIC: One of two hemicycles at the Temple of Fortuna Primagenia.

PIC: Early example of concrete coffers. This is a neat thing because they would build the wooden framework over which they poured the concrete EXACTLY the inverse of how they wanted the vault to show up, so they had to do it perfectly to get the vaults right. It's pretty fancy.

PIC: Doric capital. These are neat because they're unique. Doric capitals? By no means. But Doric capitals carved in a tilty fashion so as to mesh with the slope of the ceiling they hold up, yes. Mind you, this one is upside down and on the ground. But you may or may not see what I am saying. Look, it's unique to this site, all right? Geez.

PIC: An actual olive on an actual olive tree. Who knew!

TRIP: Thursday, Feb. 15 - Forum Holitorium + Boarium

2007-02-27T02:05:00.000+06:00

Another catch-up post, so mostly pics. The Forum Boarium was the livestock forum, and the Forum Holitorium was the vegetable sellers' forum.

PIC: Ruins at San Ombono

Bits of the architraves of the Forum Holitorium temples of Janus and Juno Sospita. This is from the terrace next to where the priests live, so we got a pretty rare look at it. We also saw the Round Temple (purportedly of Hercules) and the Temple of Portunus, but we see them a lot and the weather was atrocious, so I didn't take pictures this day. Another time.

PIC: Temple of Janus

PIC: Janus again

PIC: Dammit, Janus, I love you!

PIC: Juno Sospita's architrave peeking out of some attractive pink stucco

PIC: Juno again, under a windowsill
PIC: Janus again

Next we went to the much-famed in song and story locale of the Largo Argentina, where all 250 of my furry friends live. But we went there for the temples. Bah!

PIC: Temple B. Probably to Fortuna Huisce Die

PIC: Temple C

PIC: Temple D

PIC: Temple A

PIC: The mushy wall in the back there might be some of Pompey's curia, or I could have misunderstood. At any rate, his porticus is there.

For those of you who expressed interest in seeing my other cat pictures, you can click on the link to my photobucket album over there on the right. There are numerous blurry pictures of cats and a video of like 4 of them trying to play with the same toy. Babies <3

TRIP: Wednesday, Feb 14: Roma

2007-02-23T18:54:00.000+06:00

PIC: The Emporium, by the Tiber. Goods shipped up the Tiber would be offloaded here.

PIC: Monte Testaccio! Monte Testaccio is a mountain of bits of pot. Specifically, oil amphorae. It's really tall and made of pots. So wikipedia it.

PIC: A hunk of amphora

PIC: Part of the path down

PIC: Sherds!

PIC: Some of the horrea, which was pretty much a gigantic warehouse, about half a mile long.

PIC: A fountain made to look like a pile of amphorae, near the emporium ruins we saw. Also behind it is a hilariously located Porsche store/dealership thing.

PIC: The cloaca maxima

PIC: Duckies on the Tiber! I hope their feet don't melt :(

PIC: The Pons Fabricius, the only still-functioning, whole Roman bridge in Rome.

PIC: The Pons Aemelianus, on the other side of Tiber Island from the Pons Fabricius, is also called the Ponte Rotto because it's broken and the Ponte Inglese because people drive on the wrong side of the road over it.

PIC: The prow of Tiber Island. Prow you say? Yes, they thought it looked like a boat, so the Romans faced some of it with stone carved to look like a boat. There was even a decorative mast and stuff.

PIC: Asculapius (oh god I cannot spell his Roman name) carved onto the prow, holding his staff with a snake wound around it.

PIC: The relics of St. Valentine at Santa Maria in Cosmedin, which, incidentally, is the church that has the Bocca della Verita on it, too. I don't believe in relics, but they thought it would be fun to bring us to see the saint on his name-day, and anyway, there were some nice mosaics.

TRIP: Tuesday, Feb. 13 - Cosa

2007-02-23T18:26:00.000+06:00

Cosa was a Latin League colony. Here are pictures. I am pretty much just going to put up pictures for this post because I am so behind.

PIC: View on the way up the hill on which Cosa was built

PIC: Another view

PIC: Wall of Cosa

PIC: Temple of Mater Matuta on the summit of Cosa's mountain. Mater Matuta was a dawn goddess.

PIC: The Capitolium at Cosa, which replaced a Temple of Jupiter of the Latins. A capitolium is a temple to the Capitoline triad, Jupiter, Juno and Minerva. By replacing a Latin-identified god's temple with a Roman-specific triad, Rome increased the visibility of its hegemony over Cosa and other Latin communities.

PIC: More Capitolium, with my Greek professor, Mr. Bucher, in the fore.

PIC: Cosa view. So pretty.

PIC: Wall of one of the three cellae of the Capitolium. A cella is a chamber in a temple, and of course the Capitolium had 3: one for each of the triad.

PIC: Gorgeous view

PIC: More gorgeousness

PIC: More bits of the Capitolium

PIC: One of the big houses on the edges of the forum at Cosa.

PIC: The Comitium at Cosa. I think I explained what a comitium was in the first forum trip entry, but I don't remember. Comment if you want me to.

PIC: Ruins. Delicious. You can see a terracotta pipe and also the fact that the arch is made of cement, not cut stone. And cement is what held Rome together. A ha ha! But seriously, folks, it was the foundation of a lot of Rome's achievements. Ha ha! Oh god I kill myself.

PIC: Cistern at Cosa. Water was hard to get at the top of a hill with no natural springs, so water supply was #1 for the people who lived there.

PIC: Another cistern.

Life and Love at ICCS

2007-02-16T14:42:00.001+06:00

For my boyfriend's peace of mind, the only love I've got goin' on here is for the food. To answer some people's question: yes, they do feed us well. Imagine 6 Italian mothers who think you haven't any sense. Yes, they feed us well indeed.

Some pictures:

PIC: The Centro, by day. I'll take a picture of it by night sometime so you can see the neon Madonna. There are two relatively major roads nearby, so we have plenty of places to do our shopping. Really, though, it's kind of in a suburban part of Rome, a family neighborhood, not the major city part. Still, definitely a city.

PIC: The front courtyard. The Centro is gated, like most apartment buildings and such are here. This is what's inside the gate. It's a place, yep.

PIC: The common room. Sorry for blurriness. I wasn't really trying. Here we play video games and watch dumb movies sometimes. Many Centristi have developed feelings for football/il calcio/soccer, depending on what you want to call it. The Centro are Roma Squadra fans, not Lazio fans, for some reason. We're in a Lazio fan neighborhood, though, so we're not supposed to wear Roma scarves and jerseys outside.

PIC: Our room! This is the view from in front of the door as you come in. You can see my unmade bed and laptop at the back, next to the window. This is the biggest double on this floor. Some of them look like Japanese hotel rooms. We're very very lucky. As you see, we have a sink and vanity. It's convenient since I'm lazy about teeth brushing. Now I have no excuse not to :P

PIC: Our room, again, this time from in front of the window. Now my bed is closer, but still awful looking.

The staff ladies come in every Monday and clean, and we leave our linens and towels out in the hall on Tuesday morning and receive clean ones that afternoon after the field trip. Mostly we're frightened of them, but it's pretty awesome that they clean our rooms and do our sheets. They also empty the trash can whenever they want, come in and tidy most every day.

PIC: The view out our window. I intend to freak someone out when they come in the gate by saying their name eerily, but I haven't managed to succeed in their hearing me yet. We can see whenever someone comes in or goes out, so there's a sort of stalkerish fun in that.

PIC: My closet. It's too tall. See that really full coat rack? Even when it's tilted, which it usually is, it's taller than I am by a few inches. So I definitely can't reach the pole in my closet. But that's okay. I just use the drawers.

Meals!

We're fed breakfast, lunch and dinner every weekday. Breakfast is at 7:30 sometimes, 8:00 on non-field trip days. At breakfast there's usually yogurt (including such flavors as "blueberry and carrot", "mango and pumpkin" and "strawberry and tomato". I've had the first one, and it was pretty unfortunate. Others seem to be able to stomach them, though.), some cereal, fruit, rolls and either croissants, scrambled eggs, or french toast. There's also coffee and not-hot-enough water for tea, plus milk, juices and water.

Lunch is a bag lunch 2 days a week: Tuesday because of the field trip, and Friday because I don't know. Bag lunch is usually a roll, some cheese or a little container of roasted vegetables, a piece of fruit, a little thing of cream cheese, a juice box, a water, and sometimes some cookies. I don't really pay attention to what the non-vegetarians get, but it's similar except they get meat as well as cheese or a little container of some kind of meaty food. Normal lunch varies, but it's usually pasta of some sort for the first course, then something confusing for the second course. For some reason most of us have trouble remembering there IS a second course at lunch. And rolls, of course. Lunch is at 1:00.

Dinner is at 7:30, and consists of the two Italian courses, dessert, and of course, rolls. After, there's tea and coffee. The first course is usually pasta but sometimes risotto or pastafied soup, and the second course is usually meat or fish, and some sort of cheese for vegetarians. One night, they served hamburgers, and we vegetarians got little boxes of cream cheese. It was weird. Anyway, it's almost always delicious with the exception of the time they gave everyone tomato slices with ricotta on them for the second course. Wouldn't be a problem, except the tomatoes were unripe to the point of crunchiness... when you could bite through them. The pasta is always amazing. I did turn down one pasta dish, but only after trying it. Why? CHEESE SHOULD NOT BE MOLDY.

The professors eat their lunch and dinner with us, usually, and one of them has a little girl. The director has three kids ages 4.5-13ish, so there are usually some munchkins running around.

As I've mentioned before, they don't feed us on weekends, so we usually go out for dinner and grab some food for the other meals. There are a few nice, cheap restaurants and about a million pizza places around here, but we go into Rome proper, too, just to get out of the neighborhood.

So, some basic things about Italy:
1 - The doorknobs are crazy. They don't turn to open the door, but there's a button on top. You push it down and it unlatches. Craazy.
2 - This you may not have noticed, but when you enter a store or a room in the US, usually the door opens towards you. In Italy, you push. It's very confusing.
3 - Some things that aren't in the grocery store: cheddar cheese (that I saw), peanut butter, bagels (but there are 87238 kinds of cream cheese), microwave ANYTHING, and probably lots of other things.
4 - The flushing device for toilets is a button on the wall, not a handle on the toilet. A lot of the time the flush doesn't really work well. Public bathrooms (not really public, but you can go into bars and ask to use their bathrooms so it's public I guess if not officially) go on a scale:
-- 1. Nice: Seat, toilet paper.
-- 2. OK: No seat, toilet paper.
-- 3. All too common: No seat, no toilet paper.
-- 4. Special Stadio Olympico category: hole in the ground. I haven't seen this one, but it's in the soccer stadium and it traumatized many a Centrista.

Ok I wrote most of this ages ago, but I'll do a PART TWO eventually. I hope you enjoyed it.

Wednesday, February 6 to Friday, February 8

2007-02-16T03:55:00.000+06:00

Sorry I haven't updated for so long. It is not terribly interesting. I've been spending my time online mostly watching episodes of HBO's Rome, which is more and more screwed up with every episode. Still, it's interesting, and I'm a sucker for classically-inspired modern stuff. Anyway, here's a hazy account of the last week or so.

Wednesday - Normal Wednesday: Greek in the morning, Latin in the afternoon. I don't remember what else I did, if anything.

Thrusday - Thursday was a field trip day. I believe this was Forum Romanum day 1. We'll be going there a lot. Here are my pictures, which pretty much sum up what I saw.

The Sepulcretum - The grassy plots mark where iron age tombs were dug up. The swampy area between the Palatine and Capitoline hills was used in the earliest Roman settlements not as the center of city business, but as a graveyard.

PIC: Just the slope of the Palatine into the forum, looking gorgeous.

PIC: A view of the forum. There will be more of these. The light was great because it's sort of on-and-off rainy here a lot. This day was sunny, but started out rainy so it looks really beautiful in pictures.

PIC: The arch of Titus, because it was there.

PIC: This is through the window of the Forum Antiquarium, a small museum with the grave goods from the sepulcretum. We were lucky to be able to go there, since it is closed to the public. I have a few pictures from the inside, following. This, however, is the Temple of Venus Roma, which was a two part temple that faced the forum on one side (Roma) and the other side (now the colosseum) on the other (Venus). I mostly took a picture because it's not something you get to see very often, what with the museum being closed.

PIC: This is an atrocious picture of the block found under the Lapis Niger (Wikipedia it if you want. I am lazy.). It is extremely important because it's often used as evidence of the regal period of Rome, since it says REGEI at one point. That's a form of the word rex, which means king as all you good dinosaur fans know. Can't remember if this is a copy or the original.

PIC: This is a model of the Sepulcretum layout when it was dug up.

PIC: Hut urns! The early inhabitants of the Palatine (and Etruscans, for that matter, among other early Italian civilizations) often buried the cremated remains of their dead in these urns. Okay, actually, an urn like this and a bunch of grave goods would be inside ANOTHER urn, which was a big pot. What's interesting is that these cremation urns were made to look like the houses of the day. Remember the Etruscan tombs, with the roof beams and the house-like designs? Mmmm, cultural continuity.

PIC: More hut urn. Okay, back out of the museum and into the forum.

PIC: This is the lapis niger, a "black rock" that the Romans put down in the forum in the late republic (probably Julius Caesar when he repaved the forum. Yes, he did it all by himself. He lifted the rock himself, okay? Aeneas helped.). Ahem. Anyway, the Romans by that time had forgotten what was under this site, but they knew it was of great significance. They'd decided it was the tomb of one of three figures: Romulus, the shepherd who fostered him, or someone else I've forgotten. Go me. Anyway, they knew it was important, so when they repaved the forum they put a special rock over the place and bordered it with marble balustrades (not stair rails, just pretty marble trip-on height blocks.). Modern archaeologists are dead sure it wasn't a tomb, but they are still really interested in it because it's where that REGEI block came from, among other things. Guess I explained it after all.

PIC: The temple of Vesta! Those columns at the right back of the picture are largely reconstructions, so don't be too impressed. The temple proper is the mess in the foreground-- all that's left is tufa and cement, but that's about typical for ruins. People in Roman, post-Roman, medieval and post-medieval times liked to use the marble bits and marble facings off older buildings for new projects. It's pretty funny because whenever we go into an old church (which is at least once an hour. You can't turn around for stubbing your toe on some old church, here.), the columns don't match and the capitals (top pretty bits on columns) are clearly from other columns than the ones they've been placed on. Well, they do always tell us to recycle...

PIC: The temple of Vesta, with the temple of Castor and Pollux in the background. As I say, those Vesta columns are nonsense, but it does make a lovely picture.

PIC: A vague look at the Regia. It was mostly a sort of governmental-religious building by the time we have records, but people like to say that the kings lived there. it's next to the temple of Vesta and the house of the Vestal virgins, and the idea is that originally the Regia and the House of the Vestals were one big palace, and the pontifex maximus (head priest during historical Roman times) was a modern equivalent of the kings' religious role, and the Vestals represented his daughters. Or something. Good lord, if you found me on google because you're writing a paper, do NOT use me as a source.

PIC: House of the Vestals. I don't think all that brickwork is from the House of the Vestals, but I could be wrong.

PIC: House of the Vestals again

PIC: House of the Vestals more yes more

PIC: The Temple of Castor and Pollux. There's a colorful story about them and the battle of Lake (Regillus?) but I can't be bothered. Anyway, temple. This time the columns are original.

PIC: The temple of the Deified Antoninus Pius and Faustina (his wife). Firstly, the columns are the temple. It's all boring church inside with the brick, so ignore that. Modern rubbish. Anyway. Antoninus Pius is important because he's MY EMPEROR. We do roll call here by (ready for it?) calling out our emperor names, which are in chronological order according to our last names. Antoninus Pius was one of the five good emperors, so that's something. Unfortunately, one of our text books describes him thus: "... born T[itus] Aurelius Arrius Antoninus, at Lanuvium (SW of Rome), who was to rule for another twenty-thee years, his reign a byword for peace, prosperity, and tranquility, in fact one of the dullest figures in Roman political history."

Know what, Amanda Claridge, author of the Rome edition of Oxford Archaeological Guides? Maybe YOU'RE the dullest figure in Roman political history. Oh well. I make up for my emperor's 'dullness' by making fun of my friend who is Caligula because HE didn't get deified. Well, he says so anyway. I haven't looked it up, but I'm willing to take any excuse to feel like a more important emperor :(

PIC: This is the long-awaited picture of my and Kori's room!

... Okay, fine. Actually it's the Tullianum/Mamertine Prison. It was a jail cum execution chamber for many a moon. This picture is dedicated to Maureen Ryan, my Latin professor from last semester, because Sallust told us all about how Cataline's conspirators were killed here. Though not nearly as filthy as in antiquity, it was pretty dank. Could have used some vindex. Ha ha ha! Okay sorry. Anyway, I suppose those of you who aren't huge classics nerds want to know that it's now a small shrine to Sts. Peter and Paul, who were supposedly imprisoned there.

PIC: Here's a picture of the church they built on top.

Friday - Friday is a no school day, so in the morning I went to the Vatican museum with a few people and looked around. It was nice since there were relatively few people there-- we went early and it was raining. We got sort of lost looking for Laocoon, who was hidden in a special exhibit right near the entrance. I didn't bring my camera because I thought it wasn't allowed. Turns out it's only forbidden in the Sistene Chapel :( (Which is still big and painty and full of tourists, if you were wondering). We had a guidebook that told us a lot about the various paintings and frescoes and stuff, and since I was with 3 other classicists, we had a LOT of fun finding the little classical allusions (and the gigantic ones) in all the art, especially the Raphael rooms.

In the afternoon, I went to the cat sanctuary and played with the kitties more until we'd been there three hours. I have lots of pictures of this but I am too lazy to link them unless asked.

I'll update again in a bit. I have to upload my pictures from this week still.

Sunday, February 3 to Tuesday, February 5

2007-02-06T21:35:00.000+06:00

Sunday
On Sunday, I failed to go outside until dinner... again. Oops. I ate for the second time at (Hannah, ecco qui!) Il Vascello, a nice little restaurant down the street from me. It was largely uneventful. Then there was the torture that is Greek homework, and sleep.

Ah! I did have a good idea for lunch! They don't feed us on weekends, which is why we went out, but on Sunday for lunch I had fresh mozzarella and peach jam on one of the ubiquitous bread buns they give us.

Monday
Monday I had my classes. In Ancient City lecture we learned about the Latins and some early Roman history, especially their relationship to the other Latins and groups in the area. Greek was as it is, lunch was delicious probably even though I don't remember what we ate, and Latin was itself. I did nothing useful and failed to go outside, but I did spend time with other people. We had fun making several of us Centristi in The Sims and watching them slack off.

Tuesday: Field trip day!
Today we went to 4 places (2 of them were right next to each other so really 3 locations, but 4 points of interest).

First was the heroon and altars at Lavinium. This heroon is supposedly the tomb of Aeneas, but our extra-skeptic teacher informed us that there WAS no Aeneas at the beginning of the trip. He was disappointed that no one broke down crying at the destruction of their dreams. Any way, it was mostly about a foot or a foot and a half of tufa-brick walls. If you're really interested, google it, because today was a day of bad camera karma. Digression!

So first, I left my camera on the bus when we went to see the heroon and the altars. That was annoying, but whatever, I'll just be extra careful to remember it on the next trips. Which I did. Except it turns out I'd left the memory card in my computer's card reader, so I only had space for 3 pictures at Diana's sanctuary at Nemi, so bad luck there. That is the end of my digression, and the reason there aren't any pictures here.

Anyway. Even though it wasn't probably Aeneas' tomb, it was important to the ancients in the area, and that's pretty neat any way. Next were the altars. There are 13... or 14? or is it 15? of them. My cloudiness of detail is because reality is more or less like that. They have 13 definite altars, a 14th that's probably an altar but it's way later than the others and quite apart from them, and some bits of rock that may be a 15th. They were built over several hundred years, and even the Romans weren't really sure what they were for or who had built them. But they were pretty cool, and I learned somewhat about sacrifices.

The tour guide informed us that the oldest altars were oriented towards the east, the sunrise, but that between 600 and 300 bce east "changed" and the newer altars were oriented to the new east. Or something. I asked him about it and what I gathered from his Italian was that it was some scholar's theory and he just worked there, essentially. Apparently the guy who believes that east changed was a dude named Parker who worked on Stonehenge. What do we think of him, Mum? Dad? Classicists? (Parents are former British volunteer archaeologists; I'm not just asking them to show filial piety.) That means I expect ANSWERS, progenitors! Anyway.

Next we were on the bus for another hour to Nemi. Where is that in modern Italy? Albano, I think. Anyway, it's the site of two things for us 1) cute stray cats and 2) lunch. Okay, okay. While both of those are true, we ACTUALLY went there to look at Diana's sanctuary and the Museum of the Ships.

Link about Diana's sanctuary:
-Wikipedia on Rex Nemorensis, the priest of the cult based there.
-I also found a site called "religioromana" that had a little bit of information, but I'm not including it because its information is dubious, its web design outdated and juvenile, and its tendency to refer to the Roman gods with capital-lettered pronouns forces my eyes to roll nearly so far out of my head as to make me dizzy. Anyway.

Aha! After a short intermission from writing this, I have figured out how to get pictures off the internal memory of my camera. Hurrah! Here are some from Diana's sanctuary, since I have them, then we'll get to what it's all about.

PIC: A column on which you can see the different layers of materials

PIC: More columns!

PIC: Not an altar, despite what the neopagan vandals think.

Any way. So the sanctuary. Firstly, it isn't really Diana's. It was someone else's long, long before Diana came around. This was a threefold (?) goddess somehow related to the moon (?), called something I've forgotten because I didn't take notes. God I'm informative. Anyway, it became associated with Diana later, after the Romans came into power there, and the sanctuary was built. What remains is probably mostly from Augustus' sort of time, that is, late 1st century BCE/early 1st century CE. The neat thing about the cult is that its head priest had to be a runaway slave, and had to have killed the previous head priest, at that. There is some thought that the sanctuary served as asylum for escaped slaves, as well. Its main festival was on the Ides of August (the 13th I think), when women (ONLY women) would walk the 15 miles (or was that km?) from Rome carrying torches and probably gifts and probably there was a sacrifice. I'm afraid I was busy looking at the layers of material on the columns because we've just had a chapter on building techniques and I wanted to understand. Anyway. Neo pagans!

When we got there, there were holes in the fences, a cyclamen (potted plant) with a stalk of seedy grass in it, and a tea light. There were also two graffiti that said "DRUID", one with a swastika under it. Apparently neo pagans break in and 'worship Diana', though I contend that she'd rather have a nice plump bunny than a damned supermarket plant. Anyway, so they burn candles and have lovely little ruin-ruining rituals. Extra cute is that they use the thing in the third picture as an altar. One of the "druid" graffiti is on it, and it was covered in soot and had a burnt tea light on it. The cyclamen was in front of it. I was like "Man, I've seen altars today. That looks like a Christian altar, but not a Roman one." Anyway. They'd also evidently been climbing on the columns and had broken off a bit of the painted stucco on the one in the first picture. Good job, guys! Diana will be SO happy with you!

Anyway, they suck, ruining my ruins. Bah. I am a-okay with pagans in general, but anyone who worships something they don't know anything about at all is, in a word, lame. More importantly, they're messing up an important and rare historical site. Anger!

Next we went to the ship museum and had lunch. I talked to some lovely stray cats. They looked well fed enough and were very sweet tempered, so I'm not too worried about them. The ship museum is a museum for two large Roman ships that were taken out of the lake next to it. Wikipedia. There were a lot of votive offerings from the Diana grove there as well, and I actually spent all my time there looking at those and didn't get a chance to go over to the ship side. Oops! It was pretty neat, though, and most of the ship finds were destroyed when the museum was bombed during WWII anyway, so I'm going to pretend I didn't miss much.

Next we drove another hour to Tusculum! It was on top of a very high mountain with a lovely view, and was not only the site of a Latin city eventually incorporated by Rome, but also a great place to have your villa if you were a wealthy Roman like Nero, for one prominent example. The real reason we were there was to climb around the villa that probably wasn't (but let us dream!) Cicero's. Someone took a picture of me there, so hopefully I'll have some evidence of that for you all later. Anyway, I was very happy and excited. "I'M IN CICERO'S HOUSE!" type excited. It was sort of stupid since I don't really LIKE Cicero-- he was kind of a jerk. But that's how I can tell which Latin authors I like best, I think-- who's the most fun to mock. So Cicero and Catullus are up there. Tusculum was neat, if windy. Then back here.

Now I need a cup of tea, again. Oh! Some notes, before we leave:

1) None of the websites I link to are mine. I find them through Google. I don't want any one to give me more credit than is due. Pictures I link to directly from the blog, hosted by Photobucket, are mine. If they aren't, I'll credit.

2) Please comment if you're reading! It sends an email to me when you do, and it also makes me feel loved. So even if you're a stranger, or my teacher (and Classics teachers are always stranger than any one else. ♥), feel free to comment. It makes me happy to know people are bothering to see what I'm up to.

3) If you have requests for a picture of anything, comment and let me know. I know that some of you need fresh, non-slide pictures of some things in Rome, so I'd love to be of service. And yes, Mom, I know you want a picture of my living quarters. I'll post some one of these days, along with a description of daily life. Okay? Okay.

Ok, tea time. Ta ta!

Week of Sunday, January 28 to Saturday, February 3

2007-02-03T16:35:00.000+06:00

Yes, I am a bad daughter. I did not update all week. What a terrible child I am.

That out of the way, on to the week!

Sunday
I woke up at 2pm. I don't know how that happened, but it did. I did reading for my Ancient City class for a while. What else did I do? I don't know. Nothing significant. Probably got lost trying to find the grocery store-- I've done that a lot, recently.

Monday
Monday is a classes-only day. After breakfast, we had our first Ancient City lecture. We learned that Romulus and Remus probably didn't exist. No one had to be carried out of the room crying, however. They told us about the Roman kings and that they really don't know much about them, then did the same for the Etruscans. It was pretty interesting, I guess, but I think I prefer more concrete history.

My other classes are Greek inscriptions from Rome and Cicero's De domo sua. In Greek, we were given the syllabus and an assignment, then freed. Latin was after lunch. It was okay. Our teacher is very very excited about Cicero, which is great. We learned about his life and what the speech is basically about (which, as usual, is how very awesome Cicero is). Then I was done with classes for the day! So I wasted time online, of course, and did nothing useful.

Tuesday
Tuesday was our first real field trip. We had to have breakfast at 7:30, instead of 8, and get on the bus at 8. Bleeargh. The itinerary was thus: the Etruscan museum at Tarquinia, Etruscan tombs at Tarquinia, and the Necropolis at Cerveteri. We went too quickly through the museum and I was grumpy about it, being at the back of the group and hard pressed to see the things the teacher was talking about.

Next, we went to the tombs. The entire site smelled of urine, and there was a large group of schoolchildren there at the same time as us (7 year old Italians with cellphones). So it could have been more pleasant. However, we were let loose in pairs with an audio tour thing to share, so it was better than the museum. Each tomb had a shelter over its entrance, and we had to go down some narrow stairs to an even narrower space to look inside the tomb chamber itself. We couldn't actually go INTO the tombs because the paintings were protected, but we looked through a window on a door. It was not terribly satisfying, but the paintings were interesting and the audio tour was done by a stuffy British man who is hilarious. My camera is the spawn of the devil, so I didn't get any pictures, but you can see some here ish:
The Etruscan Tombs at Tarquinia
Etruscan Tombs - This has a lot of pictures and information on the tombs at Tarquinia and Cerveteri both.

Unfortunately, neither of those has the BEST tomb, which is the "Tomba della Fustigazione" (Tomb of the Flogging). There aren't any fabulous pictures online, but oh well. Anyway, scenes in that tomb include the usual dancing (indecorous, and certainly inebriated, as our British narrator informed us.), and the only slightly less usual explicit sexual scenes. Ah, here's some info on it, but you will have to scroll down:
The Etruscans and Sexuality

Anyway, it was extremely amusing, especially with the sniffy British man, who was evidently offended by the copious indecorous dancing and the obvious inebriation of many of the participants on the site's frescoes.

My other favorite one was one that was painted to look like it was the interior of a hunting tent. Most if not all of the tombs are made to look a bit like houses, complete with carved roof beams, but this one struck me as especially amusing.
PIC: A nice view from the mounds at Tarquinia

PIC: Another nice view from roughly the same spot.

Right, so after we had our lunches at the picnic tables, we went on to Cerveteri. It was REALLY COOL. I felt like Indiana Jones. We were set free again, and my group was all people who wanted to climb around, so it was extra awesome. We were told we could go into any tombs we wanted, and they actually meant any. There were a few we HAD to go to, but otherwise we had about an hour and a quarter to run free and explore. I only have one picture :( The ones I took inside the tombs sucked.
PIC: Some of the tombs at Cerveteri. It's a very big necropolis, though, with many different sorts of tombs, so this isn't really representative.

The insides of the tombs, though, were mostly the same. 3-6 chambers for sarcophagi. Some were arranged to be a bit like temples, with one main room, then three at the back. All of them, I think, had small rooms on either side of the entrance to the main room. The sarcophagi were gone, of course, so these were just empty tombs for the most part. Still, you could tell whether a man or a woman had been buried in any given spot by the carving of the place where his or her sarcophagus would have been placed.

The Etruscan afterlife was viewed as a sort of extension of the pleasures of life, so sarcophagi were shaped like couches, generally, with a sort of statue (not really, because they're not separate from the 'couch') of the occupant reclining.
Several pictures of the most famous Etruscan sarcophagus, the Sarcophagus of the Married Couple. I saw this on Thursday. It is beautiful. Anyway, it's a lovely example of the style. So these 'couches' would be placed around the 'room' of a tomb, which as I said was designed to look a bit like the inside of a house or sometimes a temple. The walls would be decorated with pictures of revelry or banquet scenes or things that the tomb's occupants might want in their afterlife.

So we climbed around a lot of musty tombs and scrambled and sidled into the less easily approached ones. It was distinctly awesome. My favorite tomb there was definitely the tomb of the reliefs. Some pictures and info. Terrible job showing the color, though, which is really quite amazing. This one was blocked off by a door with a window like the painted tombs at the other site. All over the walls and beams were reliefs of objects that might be there in a house, like food and tools. Ornate carved couches for the sarcophagi line the edges of the room, complete with carved pillows painted with stripes. It was really beautiful. I'll look for better pictures, but I'm not having any luck right now.

That evening I did Latin and Greek homework. The Greek was murderous and took 3+ hours, working with someone else. This tells me I should start my work for Monday, probably.

Wednesday
Wednesday was not a field trip day, so all I did was go to class and mess about online, I think. I don't recall doing anything of note except going to class. Latin is way too lax on grammar for my taste. That's pretty much my only comment.

Thursday
Thursday we had a half day field trip to the Servian Wall, Veii (modern Veio), and the Villa Giulia, the premier Etruscan museum. The links are just to relevant Wikipedia articles if you're interested.

The Servian wall was supposedly built by one of the last Roman kings, Servius Tullius, but probably not. It goes around much of very ancient Rome, but is mostly missing. We learned that it's made out of stone from Veii, which indicates Rome's expansion beyond the borders of its city at the time. Mostly they wanted to show us things called headers and stretchers, which is a technique for making walls thicker or something. My pictures:
PIC: The Servian wall. The arch was built later than the rest, though.
PIC: The Servian wall, showing headers and stretchers.

Next, we went to the Portonaccio site near Veii, which is now called Veio. Veii was the southernmost of the Etruscan league cities, and had a rivalry with Rome for a while because they both had good trade positions on the Tiber. Obviously, Veii went under the hegemony of Rome eventually, and was a major city until the late republic, when a bypass off the Via Cassia put it out of the way of most travelers and it became a bit of a backwater. We went to Portonaccio, a site just outside ancient Veii in something like a national park. We looked at a temple that was probably to Minerva, whence the famous Apollo of Veii statue came. My pics:

PIC: What remains of the side wall
PIC: A view of a bit more of the temple. They've put up sort of scaffolding stuff to give one an idea of what it may have looked like before the hill it's on fell down (a quarry below undermined it, and oops, there goes the temple...)

PIC: A pretty waterfall on the way down to the site.

Next was the Villa Giulia, where we couldn't take pictures. We were set loose in groups with a worksheet to do. There were many, many great Greek vases (Etruscans = rich from trade... with the Greeks. And Phonecians.), some temple bits (amazing!), lots and lots of votive offerings, and other stuff. The big attractions there are the aforementioned Apollo of Veii and the Sarcophagus of the Married Couple. It was great, and I will go back some time to get a chance to actually look around a bit better.

Friday
On Fridays, I do nothing useful. I didn't even get up for breakfast. Wasted time till the afternoon, hung out downstairs a bit, went to a lecture the Latin teacher was offering on the house in Roman literature. It was quite good. She was practicing for giving it at a university this week as a job interview. Fun! It was good, though. By the time that was over, 2/3 of the Centristi had left to go to Florence for the weekend. I could have gone, but so sue me if I didn't want to go in such a crowd. Another time.

At night we watched The Professional (aka Léon). It was odd; simultaneously disturbing, horrifying and hilarious. I do recommend it.

I did not go outside, showing that I am the same here as at home.

Saturday
Today I am updating my blog. I might have gone to the Villa Borghese if someone else had decided not to, thereby relinquishing his ticket, but no dice. It's okay; I've been before and I will go another time. This afternoon I will probably show the BBC miniseries of Pride & Prejudice to someone who wants to see it, and maybe I will leave the house some time.

Friday and Saturday, January 26-27

2007-01-28T04:29:00.000+06:00

Friday I didn't do a lot. We didn't have class except for art history people. This will be the case every Friday. 3 day weekend, yay! Extra night of people coming in at 4am... not so yay! anyway I don't remember what I did except wander around the neighborhood a bit and pick up the money my parents wired me. Yay, cash.

Today I woke up at 12 (I'd been up in the middle of the night reading for 2 hours after I was woken up by the returning partiers.). I went to grab a piece of pizza for lunch with some others. It was, of course, delicious. Then I watched some Pride and Prejudice (the keira knightley one, not the good one) and a little bit of Love, Actually before some people were going to go see an exhibit of stuff from Turkey. There were 2 rooms, and we waited for a bit over 20 minutes. Not that bad, on the whole. It was some nice stuff, but not very interesting when I couldn't read most of the background information that was posted. Though really, there wasn't much of that. Then we went by the Trevi fountain to the Pantheon area and visited St. Igantius on the way. I have some terrible pictures:

PIC;: Someone dressed as the Statue of Liberty. Creepy. There was someone dressed as King Tut's sarcophagus and someone dressed as a Venetian carnival... person, too.

PIC: A better picture of the Trevi Fountain

PIC: The ceiling of San Ignazio, near the Trevi Fountain

Near the Pantheon we had some gelato. There were like a million flavors. Also it was a candy store, and there were some lovely candies shaped like male members, complete with cartoon faces on the heads. I was too cheap to buy any though. Maybe next time if I get requests. Then we walked to the tram and accidentally lost 3 of our group. The girl leading us walks too fast. Anyway, they made it home shortly after us. I hung out with some people I hadn't talked to much for a bit and then went out to dinner with them. Mm, more pizza. Delicious. Then tea at a cafe, then home.

Thursday, January 25

2007-01-25T17:51:00.001+06:00

Today we had transportation practice. Only about half of us went since it was optional. Anyway, we rode trains and busses and trams around Rome for about 3 and a half hours. It was good to get more familiar with the system.

On the way, we visited the cat sanctuary at Largo Argentina. Their website is here: Roman Cats. But, pictures!

PIC: Some of the cages at the Cat Sanctuary of Largo Argentina

PIC: A very sweet kitten playing with my hair

PIC: The same kitten. Very fierce.

PIC: A view of the outdoor part of the Largo Argentina cat sanctuary... which happens to be Roman republican temple ruins.

PIC: Cats in the mist at Largo Argentina

PIC: Closeup of the same cats

Next we went to Piazza Venezia to catch the bus home. We came out of a normal street and were greeted with these in view. Quite a shock!

PIC: Vittorio Emanuele II monument in Piazza Venezia

PIC: A view of Piazza Venezia

PIC: Vittorio Emanuele II monument again

PIC: A pretty building in Piazza Venezia. Don't know what it is.

I did not do much the rest of the day-- took a nap, read a bit. I did go to a lecture on Augustus' social laws, but it would have been better if I had more background in the subject.

Wednesday, January 24

2007-01-24T22:30:00.000+06:00

Yikes. Today was a roller coaster, to use a cliche. How about a "mountain range"? That goes up and down too. Anyway, yikes.

So today we were supposed to be taking the "Obelisk walk" in which we see all 13 obelisks in Rome... plus two others in Rome. I don't know why they said 13 when they meant 15, and one of the original 13 isn't even there anymore. People are freaking weird. Anyway, so we did that, starting at 8:30. We took the train to the Circus Maximus area and saw where an obelisk used to be in front of what used to be the Italian territories in Africa building or something. Then we saw one on the Caelian hill.
PIC: A view of the Palatine from the Caelian hill

Then we saw one by San Giovanni in Laterano, which is on the site of the oldest church in Rome. It as rebuilt in the 17th(?) century, since the original burned down at some point. It was really ornate and insanely fancy inside.
PIC: The altar

PIC: The apse, evidently. The thing behind the altar.

PIC: The nave

Next was the one by Santa Maria Maggiore. I think it used to be at Augustus' tomb at some point a long time ago. Then one by Termini, the main train station in Rome. Next it was lunch time at a small, old church on the Via Nazionale. We ate our bag lunches, and then went off in small groups to bars (bars = coffee bars, not pubs). I bought a cup of tea and talked with another student for a bit, paid, and left.

As we were walking to the next stop, I realized I was missing my wallet. I had dropped it (not been pickpocketed) when I tried to put it in my inner coat pocket and missed, putting it in the lining instead. I was very upset and took a taxi back to the Centro, called all my cards and cancelled them and got new ones sent to Mom's house, emailed my parents, and lay down for about 5 minutes before one of the administrators came up to my room. They'd found my wallet! It was at the police station not a block away from where I'd dropped it. She didn't know yet if everything was in it, but about 10 minutes later she called them back and it turned out everything, even the money, was in it. So I took a taxi there, got my wallet, and found my way home on the train. Unfortunately, the card companies can't reopen my accounts, so I'm still out of luck in terms of money, but the Centro says they'll lend me pocket money, and Mom and Dad offered to wire me money, so I may do that. And that's why it was such an up and down day.

Tuesday, January 23

2007-01-24T05:12:00.000+06:00

Today we woke up properly to the beeping alarm and got ready for breakfast in plenty of time. After breakfast, all of us students and 4 teachers went for a long walk. We started at the Centro, went to the Villa Aurelia (in the American Academy in Rome) and looked at Rome from its roof. Our teacher pointed out all the 7 hills of Rome and various landmarks. Apparently it is the mark of an educated person to be able to name all the domes in Rome. I do not aspire to that level of education.

PIC: A view of Rome from the roof of the Villa Aurelia on the Janiculum

We walked down from the Janiculum, through Trastevere. We passed a lot of things on the way, including the Spanish and Finnish academies and Garibaldi's monument. We also saw Anita Garibaldi's monument (Dur, Garibaldi's wife.). It was a statue of a lady on a horse holding a baby and pistol. That's pretty badass. What else... We went into the temple of San Pietro something Montorio, the supposed site of his crucifixion. Apparently it's almost never open, so that is cool I guess.

After a break in the outskirts of Trastevere, we continued. We saw the smallest campanile (bell tower) in Rome and walked over the island in the middle of the Tiber. We passed what's left of the theatre of Marcellus, nearly got run over by an ambulance, and passed some ruins. When we asked what the ruins were, the teacher replied, "Medieval crap." Might have been "useless medieval crap." I'll ask, because it was awesome.

We went up the Aventine and looked through the keyhole of the Sovereign Military Order of the Knights of Malta (an actual, tiny country consisting of a monastery). Standing in one country (Italy), looking through another (Knights of Malta), at a third (St. Peter's in the Vatican). It was all terribly exciting. Right.

Then we saw a very old Christian basilica (~425-430ad) and looked at it, then went into a garden next door and played with the stray kitties. Actually, most people looked at the view. I and one other played with the stray kitties. Cute :D

Then we walked to a bus stop and got home just in time for the lunch bell at 1:00.

In the afternoon, I took a short nap to get rid of my headache (dehydration is a good idea, really. no it isn't.) and then did some homework reading. Then I walked around the neighborhood a bit and came home just in time to miss a torrential, if brief, downpour and thunderstorm. I played video games by myself and with others a bit, then dinner! Which was very tasty. There are about 6 vegetarians among the students, so I'm not alone. After dinner I played on my computer, chatted with Matthew and played computer games. Then I updated this thing. So we're up to now, which is when I am going to bed.

Good night!

Monday, January 22

2007-01-24T05:08:00.000+06:00

Monday morning my roommate and I woke up 8 minutes before the breakfast bell rang because my alarm clock was having performance anxiety. Luckily someone came and got us. We got dressed and presentable and had breakfast, then went to the orientation meeting at 9. They told us a bunch of rules, introduced us to some of the teachers, talked and joked a lot about the program. After that, we took walks around the neighborhood in groups.

In our walks, we learned how to cross the street! And to always look down when walking, because Roman dogs are prolific in their social commentary. We also saw various little shops and the bus stop and parks and things.

Didn't do much else that day. Took a far too long nap and failed utterly at social interaction. Lunch, dinner, sleep.

The trip

2007-01-24T04:50:00.000+06:00

I got to Logan at 3:45 for my 6:55 flight. At 4:05, I was at my departure gate twiddling my thumbs. I played computer games until the battery went out, then read, then got on the plane.

Here is what I wrote my parents after the first leg of the trip:

Zurich is fun to say. Zurich is also where I am. I have paid 6 francs for an hour of internets. I have no idea if that is cheap or what, though I rather doubt it. But it was the cheapest offered. Except my battery will run out soon, and naturally I haven't brought any adapters in my carryon, and anyway the only outlets I've seen were in the bathroom by the sinks. So it's a moot point.

The flight was okay. I sat next to a woman who only spoke French and a boy who was also going to Rome, to the same general area, who had taken both Latin and Greek. He did not seem to be going to the centro, though. I got a little sleep on the plane. During the last 15 minutes, forsooth, I managed to throw up all over myself. I am glad that you are making me a new sweater, Mum, because my favorite is now gracing a Zurich airport litter bin. I've got my first souvenir- a pink t shirt with a cow on it, reading "Spirit of Switzerland." That's because my other shirt was wet with bile.

I slept about an hour and a half total, remarkably well, really, in one of the lounges in the Zurich airport. Now I am at my gate, waiting for my flight that doesn't leave until 2 hours from now. I am not actually in an awful mood. I'm sort of dazed, I think. Also hungry, but I don't want to eat anything because I've got another takeoff and landing ahead of me. Joy!

I smell awful and I want a shower. I hope your days, when you wake up, go well. Say hello to my various cats for me.

The second part of my journey was fine. I fell asleep on the plane while we were still on the runway and woke up in clouds. The landing was not nearly as unpleasant as the previous one, but really, how could it be?

At the airport, I met the other Centro student who was to share a cab with me with no problem. We got a cab-- an unmetered one, oops-- and eventually got to the Centro, after being lost a bit and trying to communicate directions to a place we'd never been in broken Italian. The driver was very nice about it all, though, and we were only a little swindled, price wise.

The Centro is a pink convent (There are still 3 nuns sometimes.) on the Janiculum/Giancolo hill in Rome. The attached chapel's door is watched over by a thoroughly unremarkable Madonna relief, who is outlined in blue neon at night.
[pic will be here when I am not lazy]

I have a double (boo) but it is a big one (yaaay) and I already knew my roommate from Smith (yay). I unpacked, emailed the parents and the boyfriend, and I think I tried to socialize. Then about 20 of us went out to dinner. It ended up taking 3 hours because we let the man just pick a bunch of dishes and share them around to us... So we had a full Italian meal, antipasto, 2 courses and a dessert. Yikes. Came home and slept.

I suppose most of you don't know what the heck this "Centro" nonsense means. Okay. "Centro" is short for the Italian for "The Intercollegiate Center for Classical Studies." There are 36 of us classics students, 6 faculty, 4? admins and 6 staff. The meat of the program is a course called "The Ancient City" which is sort of half historical/cultural and half topographical/archaeological. We go on at least two field trips around Rome every week, and spend a week each in Sicily and Campania (where Naples, Pompeii, Cumae, etc. are). I am also taking advanced Latin and advanced Greek. The Latin is Cicero complaining about his house's destruction, and the Greek is inscriptions from around Rome. Other courses are intermediate Greek, intermediate Latin, beginning Italian and art history.