(Not Rated)

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Intro
As some of you might already know, two weeks ago I got the chance to spend three wonderful days in Rome, Italy. It all started back in September last year, when my oldest brother made me and my twin brother, as a birthday gift, an all inclusive round trip to Rome :).I must say, these cheap flights companies like Sky Europe make this kind of trips affordable. Very affordable. In fact the hotel for 2 nights there was double the amount we payed for the fight. So, this opens up very interesting travel locations in Europe ;).

Rome
Now, back to Rome… I think I saw lots of documentaries and movies about ancient and nowadays Rome, but I never thought the experience would be so profound. The city is simply amazing, everything is built at a gigantic scale, the old and new blends in perfectly, it’s like you’re in another world. No shiny metal, no rough concrete, no reflecting glass exteriors, only white marble and porous rock. Even the street names are sculpted in marble. At night everything is illuminated from different directions, it’s unreal … We walked till 4 o’clock in the morning on the streets, to see the wonderful baroque fountains at night, and above all the Fountana di Trevi.

In the morning we took a quick tour of Rome and ended up at the Vatican City, where we watched the Sunday mess and received the Pope’s blessing (said perfectly in 5 languages). I can’t say I’m a religious guy, but I was somewhat impressed by the power of his words and the whole atmosphere of joy and celebration coming from the huge crowd gathered there. The rest of the day was spent visiting the Basilica di Sant Pietro. This is the Pope’s principal church (or at least where almost every official Papal ceremonies take place). Within the Basilica, some 91 Popes are buried and among them is also Pope John Paul II. This was the only grave that was guarded by two “Carabineiri”. There was a solemn atmosphere inside, every now and then a voice made us aware we’re in a sacred place and we should pay the appropriate respect. Many people were praying, or just starring blank beside this great men’s grave. I don’t know why, but this was a very deep moment for me and I needed to stop for a moment, just stop. Not really thinking or seeing anything.

We also visited the museum inside, glanced at Michelangelo’s Pietà and climbed the ~320 stairs to the Michelangelo’s Dome, from where you can see the whole city. It’s been awesome and at the same time hard to describe. The feeling is overwhelming, there’s simply too much filling your senses at the same time.

In the evening we decided to walk to the Colosseum. I always wanted to see it and imagined how it would be … and I got my wish. The only downside was that we only could make pictures of the outside walls because it was somewhere around midnight. In the morning we decided to make one last run to the Colosseum and see how it looks from the inside. We’ve payed a lot to skip the line (we had to rent some small devices called audio guides), so that we wouldn’t miss our plane, but It was worth it. I found out a lot about how it was built and some about it’s history. It’s an amazing structure and I must say it’s a wounder it’s still standing today after all the abuse done in the past (some 300 years, it was used as a source of building materials).

Conclusion
As a conclusion, I’ve loved Rome and want to go back there someday, because I’ve only scratched the surface. Even if we had a week at our disposal, it would probably not be enough to see everything worth seeing. There is also a more grim perspective of Rome:

1. Beggars and homeless people are in quite high numbers and the city is not so clean as it should be.
2. Ancient structures are not maintained or repaired in a decent pace, degradation and pollution deposits are everywhere.
3. Rome itself is in my opinion in some ways a tourist-unfriendly city; there were many times we were looking at a monument or building and didn’t know what we are looking at as there was no description board placed near it (my hometown has such boards).
4. No bus ticket or food machines were actually working near the main train and bus station (Rome Termini).

As a final word, I’ve included some Wikipedia links in this post and also posted some pictures bellow. Rome is a city I highly recommend seeing!

Over and out,
The Lion.^[1]

1. The song to this post is: Matt Kearney – Where We Gonna Go From Here. Open “Lion’s Radio” and scroll down to listen to it. [»]