Italy

Rome-ing Underground. The Catacombs of San Sebastian

December 14, 2018 By Mark Chatham Leave a Comment

Dr. Frauzel and a disembodied arm take a breather outside the Basilica of San Sebastiano on Via Appia

The Catacombs of San Sebastian

Were The Beatles Italian their 11th album cover would have had them crossing “Appia Road.”

After a hairy drive from Palatine Hill we eventually turn on to the Via Appia, or what some may remember from school as the Appian Way. It’s the most famous, historic road in the world. I’m assuming they’re still teaching this stuff in school but I could be wrong. It’s been quite a while since I attended school.

There are a number of catacombs in Rome. Dr. Flavia suggested the Catacombs of San Sebastian as this is where she brings her grad students.

The first thing I notice on arrival is there aren’t a lot of people here.There are no gaggles of vendors hawking selfie-sticks and Saint Sebastian bobble head dolls riddled with arrows.

I take that as empirical evidence we’re officially outside the cattle crush of the main tourist rodeo in central Rome. We book one of the tours and we’re assigned a guide named Francesco.

K, I don’t actually remember his name, but I didn’t want it to be “the guide guy.” I did Google the most popular male name in Italy and the interweb decreed Francesco the winner with 28 per million babies in the 80’s… or something. I”m sure that it’s correct. It’s on the internet, right?

Anyway, prior to heading underground Francesco gives us a briefing on the rules. Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take pictures inside the catacombs. This could be a pretty long article if I’ve got to replace every photo with 1,000 words so I’ll give the discount version.

There are 40 catacombs of varying lengths at various depths around the suburbs of Rome. Originally they were Christian burial grounds and at times served as sanctuaries for Christians who were being persecuted.

The Catacombs of San Sebastiano are maybe a half mile long and we never go deeper than 20 feet underground. They’re mostly dim passageways with the occasional chamber for relief. While I hate to disappoint those hoping for the macabre, but there are no cobwebbed skeletons anywhere to be seen.

A Shallow Descent Through History

Definitely not bunk beds. Pagan interment chamber (photo: Patrick Denker)

While the lighting is adequate, you’re always aware of your subterranean status. The temperature is cooler and there are shadowy, human body sized niches cut into the rock in the passageways that once stored remains that left me feeling vaguely unsettled. It’s kind of creepy, but hey. It’s a crypt. I see dead people.

This place had it’s start in the 1st century as a pozzolan mine and I know what you’re thinking but no. It isn’t a cheese mine which was was my first thought as well. But apparently pozzolan isn’t an exotic Italian cheese but calcified volcanic ash which the Romans used for making concrete.

At some point in the first century it evolved into a pagan burial ground for both slaves and freedmen. The pagan burial chamber was naturally the last and deepest level we would visit.

At some point in the second century, this became a Christian burial ground. On occasion we would see the Christian symbol of the fish carved here and there in the surface of the walls. The simple artwork both pagan and Christian throughout the catacombs is surprisingly well preserved.

A Deep Ascent to the Present

Saint Sebastian as rendered by Bernini in the Basilica above

There were a number of chambers but one in particular stood out for me.

As mentioned in a previous post, the Colosseum provided a dark epiphany. Standing in a place where thousands of people were killed in the most brutal ways imaginable for no reason other than spectacle gave me a dark pause.

I was about to enter into a chamber which would offer a different type of epiphany.

There is a rather large Christian burial chamber which contains a bust of San Sebastian which is attributed to the sculptor Bernini. The short version of Sebastian’s third century story is he declared himself a Christian and upon chastising Emperor Diocaletian the despot ordered him tied to a tree and shot full of arrows.

Bernini’s last work was a bust of Christ: Salvatore Mundi

In fact, this did not kill him. He subsequently went back to the Emperor and admonished his cruelty towards Christians. The emperor had him beaten to death and thrown into a sewer, however his body was recovered and he was buried in this chamber in which we were standing.

An Unanticipated Reaction

Normally, I would read this and be left shaking my head at what seems to be an incredibly stupid act of senseless self-sacrifice. I’d be angry.

However, all I felt in that moment was a deeply serene warmth staring at that bust in this place where the first Christians sheltered from persecution. This is the chamber which held the bones of the apostles Peter and Paul.

I was overcome by the incredible amount of dedication and faith in the sacrifices made by these early Christians.

I’m not a religious man, however I do consider myself spiritual. Until recently I’ve always identified as an agnostic. Around a year and a half ago I become a Christian. I’ve told very few people because while I now consider myself a Christian, I am a “heterodox” Christian.

All that means is I have my own beliefs about Christ independent of religious influence. It’s personal so I don’t speak about it as a matter of course. I don’t feel compelled to proselytize. There are many Christians who would not even consider me a Christian and that’s fine.

Cancer as Catalyst

There’s no doubt that cancer has certainly been a catalyst for change in my life in pretty much every sense including spiritual. I tend to think that the disease provokes a spiritual examination at some point for pretty much anyone who receives a cancer diagnosis. I’m pretty sure even hard core atheists may have their faith in their beliefs challenged after a cancer diagnosis.

I bring this up because it was an unexpected moment of clarity in this place and it affected me. It’s left me with a different perspective to consider and it’s one in which prior presumptions are challenged. I guess personal growth is a perpetual motion machine.

That peaceful feeling stayed with me as we exited the catacombs through the Basilica above. The Basilica of San Sebastian contains beautiful artwork, including the last known work by the sculptor Bernini, The Salvator Mundi.

The tour takes about 40 minutes in total and costs 8 €.

That was a long stretch of a more sober type of reflection, so to lighten up before I leave…

One Last Vignette

146 words worth of explanation due left of this photo. It didn’t take 1,000 words after all.

Stefania drove us back to the convent. I can’t speak to any of the sights along the route as I had my eyes screwed shut and I was holding on to Joanne’s arm for dear life as we careened around the streets of Rome. I can speak to the “careening” part because closing your eyes doesn’t dampen your sense of motion.

When I was a kid we’d go to the exhibition and there was a ride there called the “Tilt-A-Whirl” and with my eyes closed… well, it certainly evoked that particular childhood memory.

The vintage ride itself was a teacup kind of affair that rotated in quick, violently sick kind of way. The cup itself orbited through bumpy revolutions on a segmented, circular and uneven track. That’s what being in Roman traffic felt like. Although I don’t remember the carnival ride being so fraught with terror.

No matter!

The ladies dropped us off and we said our reluctant farewells. They had given us such a delightful day and we were richer in so many ways for having met them.

However, my stomach cares little for such schmaltzy sentiment and was clamoring for attention. We headed for a light supper at the Trattoria Pizzeria.

Ali Baba

We’d become good at waving off street vendors hawking tourist goods, but initially it was difficult. I’m a guy who likes to talk too much so it’s counter-intuitive to avoid eye contact and not engage.

That being said, we had six vendors approach us the first time we ate at this sidewalk restaurant so I adjusted to the new paradigm of snooty tourist quickly. The only other place I’ve seen street vendors match Roman aggression are in Manhattan and Hollywood.

On this particular evening, we encountered a fellow from Ghana named Ali Baba. Yes, that’s right. Ali Baba. I don’t really think it’s his real name, although if you’re hawking wares on the street you might want pick a name that isn’t immediately associated with “40 thieves.”

He had an infectious smile and his manner didn’t really feel aggressive. He was just full of joy. Ali Baba had a gift for remarkably engaging patter. He’d come from Ghana with six of his cousins who lived with him in an apartment where they hand made these collapsible wooden bowls he was selling.

Right. I didn’t buy the story, but we did buy a couple of his bowls. However, we weren’t really buying bowls. The charm of his entertaining company alone was worth the price of admission and we consider the bowls were a bonus gift. He certainly did weave quite the tale.

The meal arrived and Ali Baba departed. As we ate we decided that rather than heading to Venice the next morning, we would stay in Rome and see the Vatican. We’d have to come back to Italy some day if we were to take in Venice.

Last time on TTWTH: P-Rome-nade on Palatine Hill

P-Rome-nade on Palatine Hill

October 31, 2018 By Mark Chatham 4 Comments

The Arch of Constantine built in A.D. 312 under which emperors triumphant in battle would pass. I suspect that wherever the loser’s arch is located leads directly into the Tiber River

Palatine Hill Would be a Good Name for a Rock Band

As we start up Palatine Hill crowds already begin to gather at Constantine’s Arch to celebrate my victorious return from conquering the rigorous 40 meter climb.

We slowly made our way to Palatine Hill after leaving the Colosseum. The Colosseum is at the base of the hill. It’s a leisurely stroll through history once you’re on the path. Kinda sorta.

The fact the word “hill” was in the title should have tipped me off that there would potentially be a considerable expenditure of energy. At least on the uphill leg.

The tour would be more work than I anticipated.

Palatine Hill is so named because in 27 B.C. Augustus built his palace here and the site served as the residence for a number of Roman emperors.

On one side of the hill was the Colosseum. On the other was the Circus Maximus. It appears the palace was centrally located for the emperor’s convenience to the carnage and mayhem which passed for entertainment at the time .

Ruins with a View

The Baths of Maxentius. There is currently no chance of catching athletes foot in these public baths

The ruins are extensive and the sheer scope of the site and what remains is impressive. Much of the structure acts as retaining walls to contain the slope.

It would appear they function in the same manner as pants and a belt do for me. However, Roman engineering has been much more successful than myself in respect to “slope containment.”

No matter. This is just brick foundation. My imagination runs riot at the concept of “excess” in ancient times when these buildings were covered in the finest marble.

Marbling Doesn’t Have Me Thinking of Steak for a Change

No amount of buffing with Pledge will get the scratches off the floor of the Flavian Palace

The Palace of Flavia is now little more than a marble floor outline on the ground. However, the the intricacy and aesthetic qualities of the marble craft are still here despite 2,000 years of weathering.

I read a plaque that says Emperor Domitian had the walls constructed of pink and white marble. It had a courtyard pool with an octagonal island and a sculptural fountain.

Domitian, ever fearful of assassination, had the marble walls polished like a mirror to reflect what was happening behind his back. Did it work?

Nope. As it so happened, Domitian was stabbed in the groin while signing papers at his desk in 96 A.D. Oooch! That didn’t kill him so the plotters stabbed him several more times.

Instead of polished marble walls he should have perhaps invested in a marble cup and jockstrap. That might have at least left him the will to fight back after the initial stab. Moving on quickly now!

The House of Romulus

At one point in our journey we came upon the Casa Romuli. Romulus was one of the founders of Rome and not an enemy of the United Federation of Planets as the producers of Star Trek would lead you to believe.

Apparently it was originally a mud hut with a straw roof but now on the site are iron age hut foundations from 700 B.C. Before I had this information I thought I’d wandered into where they manufactured cinder blocks, or baked bread or something.

Flavia tells us Romans throughout history have attempted to maintain this site as it’s been destroyed numerous times by fire. The last recorded fire on site was was apparently set by some crows which dropped pieces of burning meat, snatched from an altar, onto the thatched roof.

I hate when that happens to me. I’m on the deck grilling lunch for the family and I go inside for a second to grab the BBQ sauce and crows have snatched burgers off the grill and now there are fires all over the neighborhood.

I think historians need dig a bit deeper than that flimsy story.

Some of These Things are Not Like the Others

Joanne ponders peculiar ancient Roman housing arrangements

We’re walking through the ruins of Domitian’s palace and arrive at the emperor’s private stadium. It’s particularly interesting because there was a building that looked completely out of place.

It looked like a picture from a children’s book with illustrations by Picasso. Apparently there was an art exhibit taking place on Palatine Hill while we were there. I’ve just got to say the pieces were beyond ugly and did nothing for the historic ambience. They were going for Dali but got Daffy Duck instead.

The city had set up a number of art installations. Not knowing the situation, it was quite jarring to wander among structures that are two millenia old, turn a corner and see a life size, paper mache (or is it papier-mache? Does it really matter) Soyuz/Apollo linkup.

The Romans were more ambitious than I’d been led to believe. I hadn’t an inkling the Romans even HAD a space program, no less landed successfully on Palatine Hill. Eventually we arrived at Circus Maximus.

Circus Minimus Nowadays

The awe inspiring Circus Maximus we’ve seen in so many movies is now just an outline and a traffic… oval. I daresay it was much safer when it was used for chariot race given what I’ve seen of contemporary Italian road safety. After taking some pictures we depart.

We make our way back down the hill to the car. As we drive through the busier sections of Rome my eyes are screwed tightly shut and I clutch at Jo’s arm. I detect no bumps which would indicate we’ve hit pedestrians and managed to rack up points in Death Race Roma 2017. Bonus!

Cruisin Through Rome

Rome’s ancient city walls. Built to keep the Ostrogoth riff raff out.

I open my eyes to discover we’ve left the area around the ancient city and are driving through more contemporary areas of Rome. We pass through Rome’s Chinatown and I wonder if there’s a Little Italy in Beijing.

There are two things I hadn’t anticipated prior to visiting Rome. The high numbers of tactically armed police and obelisks. What’s an obelisk? The Washington Monument is the most famous example. Anyway, Egypt is all over the place in Rome.

Why, Rome even has its own Egyptian pyramid built in 12 B.C. as a tomb for some guy named Gaius Cestius. At one point it became noticeable that there are gigantic phallic symbols all over the place, almost as though Rome itself were compensating for something. Truth be told, I think Rome is envious of Paris and maybe Berlin too, if you know what I mean.

It’s also a little unnerving to see so many police tactically armed with assault weapons. The only place I can recall this heavy an armed presence publicly on this trip was in Berlin. But that’s a post for another time.

Wasted Away Again in Mussolini-ville

Ice cubes are so rare in Italy I think Mussolini ordered them all confiscated and stored here in this building, the Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana or “square Colosseum”

My apologies to Jimmy Buffet for that subtitle. Can I plead stream of consciousness? Margaritaville… Mussoliniville… same number of syllables.

Stefania drives us to an area called the Esposizione Universale Roma (EUR) which was designed and rebuilt by the fascists under Mussolini. You don’t often see this much white concrete outside of a dystopian sci fi movie.

Stefania wanted us to see Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana as she had mentioned it earlier in the day at a display on the Colosseum’s architectural influence.

It’s still a concrete box, but then this would appear a to be the most popular form of fascist architecture.

There was one more place of interest to visit before calling it a day. We stopped for a quick lunch at a nearby restaurant and recharge before heading to the Catacombs of San Sebastiano.

Random Photos

The controversial Altare Della Patria which houses the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. American soldiers in WWII nicknamed “the typewriter” because it’s easier to pronounce. Alternatively, the Italian nicknames are “The Wedding Cake” and “The Set of False Teeth.”

Wow! To think a Caesar may have urinated on these very stones when stumbling back to the palace from an orgy! TMI!!!

There’s a word for stereotyping that this photo suggested… pigeon niche? Squab hole? It’ll come to me…

Hey, this isn’t the way to Winners! What’s going on?

Those of us who may be about to die in Rome’s traffic salute you!

Huge amounts of aqueduct tape will be required to repair this structure…

My pet peeve in respect to Italy is tepid drinking water. Even restaurants do not refrigerate water. So yes, drinking water in Italy is generally the temperature of bear spittle which makes this photo pertinent. I like the irony.

Last Time on TTWTH: Ready to Rome-ble at the Colosseum

Pompeii and Circumstance Parts B, C and 4

September 12, 2018 By Mark Chatham 10 Comments

**Derrierivus. The Roman god of bare bums maintains a constant vigil over contemporary Pompei**

B. The Journey Continues

Fortunately for us, the weather started to co-operate after the deluge of rain on our arrival in Pompeii. As we left the Grand Theater the clouds were clearing and and the sun began to tease.

Roman doctors were cutting edge when treating toe stubbing injuries and those techniques are still used to this day

We emerged onto a side street with cobblestones the size of an Easter Island statue testicle… assuming they are anatomically correct and have testicles underground. You can extrapolate the size of which I speak from the size of their ginormous heads.

At regular intervals, there would be Chubb safe sized cubes of granite poking up and stretching across the road. Were they ancient speed bumps to slow down inconsiderate chariot drivers? Nope.

It would appear that Roman roads in Pompeii had two purposes and the first was transportation as you’d expect. They also doubled as sewers. When it rained raw sewage would wash down the roads and the granite blocks were there so pedestrians could cross the street without getting their feet brown.

Domus L Volvsi Favsti, which is latin for “House 50 Fred Volvo.” Fred lived here after his children moved to Sweden to start a sled company

B.1 The Journey Continues Some More

Along the way we pass the Domus l Volvus Flavius, which translates to “House 50 Fred Volvo.” Fred Volvo lived in Pompeii and made the safest chariots in the Roman empire.

They had both driver and passenger side flamingo feather bladders to protect in case of head on collisions. There was blind spot warning which consisted of a parrot tied backwards onto the handrail, trained to squawk if another chariot were coming up to pass.

Eventually his children decided to branch out and moved to Sweden to make very safe sleighs. In 1927 they began producing cars and became the Volvo motor company. That’s my “Slumdog Millionaire tour guide” explanation.

C. The House of Menander and Other Stuff

A Roman parking meter. You pull your ass up, tie its rope through the hole and Tiberius is your uncle

Eventually we made it to the House of Menander. Now that I’ve provided a link to actual historic information, I can just make stuff up as I go, as is currently popular with politicians and dating sites.

For instance, I’m actually 6’2″ of sculpted muscle with a luscious head of blonde hair and work as a hand model for Rolex. Yeah, I know you’ve seen pictures but are you going to believe me or your lying eyes? Hey, it’s a well known fact that the camera adds 63 pounds and blonde hair can easily be mistaken for no hair if the light’s not right, okay?

A major politician from Rome named Quintus Poppaeus Sabinus was the owner; a relative of Nero’s second wife. I guess I can understand why he wanted to live in Pompeii. So why isn’t it the house of… that guy’s name? Because there’s a well preserved fresco of the playwright Menander inside. That’s much easier for tourists to remember and pronounce.

It’s a very big house at 19,000 square feet and as a picture is worth 1,000 words it may behoove me to give readers a tour of Casa Menader using the powers photographic journalism.

Photographic Evidence of a History Place

The Romans were every bit as concerned about hygiene with their potable water as they were with their sewage system. Water would fall from a hole in the roof and would drain into a cistern below the floor. There was no fluoridation

People in a room that hasn’t been painted in 2,000 years

Many Roman homes had altars in their home in which they would place ancestral action figures. However, I’m pretty sure this is an umbrella stand.

2,000 year old artwork caught my eye before I got back to the serious work of room appreciation

A room in which a pizza oven was converted to a family shrine

That’s no pizza oven! We conclude our photo tour of the *House of Menander* with a shot of the bathroom. I daresay with this simple design you could have an eight bathroom home no matter what your budget

The bakery. You could give the baker a Sestertii for a loaf of bread and still get back 3 As in change! Try doing that today. Talk about value!

C (1) Other Stuff

After departing Menander’s crib the tour stopped at an ancient bakery as we made our way towards Via Abbondanza which was the main street for Pompeii and led to the forum.

I mentioned that the oven looked like a pizza oven, but the tour guide corrected that notion. They only baked bread. Tomatoes are indigenous to South America. It would take another 14 centuries before tomatoes would make their way to Italy via Spain. It would take yet another three centuries before they’d be used as food. Huh?

Yes, it turns out that they were used for decorative purposes until the late 17th century before somebody became desperately hungry enough to eat one. Yet Satan’s fruit, the the vile and despicable grapefruit was used as food immediately without having a three century, decorative shake down period which we’d still be enjoying. Yeah, like sticking a cherry in the middle makes a grapefruit half even remotely edible. BAH!

At this point Jo and I had to bail on the tour. It was getting late and it would be a three hour train ride back to Rome so we struck out down the main drag on our own.

C.2 More Other Stuff

Centaurs would provide rides to the train station for a small fee

Had we stuck with the tour, the brothel would have been our next stop. Very popular with the tourists, at any point in history up until this writing. After doing a little research, I’m kind of glad we missed it. It’s tossed off as naughty and fun.

However, I don’t care I don’t care that male genitalia engraved in stone provided road signs. The reality was stark as the prostitutes were slaves and lived and worked in tiny stone cells. Life was dismally brutal and without hope. Moving along…

We were moving briskly and eavesdropping on other tours to glean information on what we were viewing and almost blew through the forum without realizing it. The forum was the “town square” of ancient Roman life.

Below is a quick video of the forum. The video is exactly eight seconds long or the same amount of time needed to ride a bull. Given the amount of huffing and puffing I was doing and the style of our travel… I think that was inadvertently appropriate.

C.3 The SEO God Commands that I Conjure Subheadings to Produce a Green Happy Face for Readability and I Comply

Our last stop prior to the visitors center was the Forum’s public baths. There’s a tradition I’m glad we no longer carry on as a culture. Fortunately for the women of the time, men had separate baths and entrances.

The Romans in Pompeii had cold baths (frigidarium), lukewarm baths (tepidarian) and hot baths (calidarium) so even Goldilocks (Caputaureum) would have found a bath that was juuuuust right in Pompeii. The hot baths were heated by fires in bronze cisterns rather than thermal energy from Vesuvius.

Pompeii was about the size of Summerside, Prince Edward Island with a population of approximately 15,000. I don’t think Summerside has three Tim Horton’s, never mind three public baths and I found myself wondering if perhaps Pompeii was the birthplace of OCD.

Well, I suppose if your streets run brown with raw sewage when it rains and your toilets are wherever there’s room to squat, there might be a need for more baths. As we left the baths we realized we were going to have to book it to catch the train on time.

4. Return to Rome via the “Scenic Route”

We had to run the obstacle course called The Visitor’s Center in order to leave the grounds. I blindfolded Joanne so she wouldn’t see the many shopping opportunities we’d be passing. I took her hand and ran her through the center and we reached the platform with minutes to spare. It was like running through a pottery barn with ceramic artifacts all over the place.

The side of Vesuvius we didn’t want to see. The side facing towards Salerno.

The train arrived and we hopped on, glad we made it just in time… for the train to Salerno in the opposite direction. D’oh! This would add about three hours to our return to Rome. We hadn’t much time when we arrived at the platform to get oriented and when we did, we had oriented ourselves in the wrong direction.

The upside was this was the Amalfi Coast we were traveling and it lived up to it’s billing of beauty. We didn’t see much of Salerno from the train station, but with mountains on one side, and the ocean on the other, it looked beautiful and I’d love to visit Salerno if we ever get back to Italy.

Fortunately, we didn’t have to experience the wonders of the Circumvesuviana for the trip back. We caught the bullet train for Rome which would take around three hours for an 8 p.m. arrival. We’d had glimpses of Vesuvius through the day and as the weather had cleared off I finally had an excellent view of the volcano.

4.1 Vesuvius

I’m glad I don’t have one of *those* in my backyard. The volcano I could handle.

Mount Vesuvius is impressive all on its own and it’s unsurprising that the story of its eruption in A.D. 79 is still a famous world event today.

It produced 100,000 cubic yards of magma per second – the equivalent of 2.5 Washington Capital rotundas – during its massive explosion in A.D. 79. and it lasted for three days.

I know that’s still less hot gas than is actually released from the Washington rotunda over the run of just three hours, never mind three days, but it’s still very impressive.

It was around 10 p.m. by the time we made it back to our room in the convent and we crashed immediately. We were meeting Steve the Translator’s daughter Flavia in the morning . She was a tour guide and would be taking us around the Colosseum and other sites the next day.

My apologies to Robert Ward for stealing the “parts” gag of the title.

For those who don’t know, SEO stands for “Search Engine Optimization.”

A Hilltop Church then the big reveal. Now for my next magic trick…

Seeing more of Italy than we anticipated

Last time on TTWTH: Pompeii and Circumstance Part A

Florence and I are Best Firenze Part I

June 22, 2018 By Mark Chatham 1 Comment

All Aboard for Anaheim, Asuza and Cucamonga… and Florence

K, for the sake of complete transparency, the header is a gag from a Daffy Duck cartoon involving trains (minus reference to Florence). What does that have to do with Florence? Nothing really. I just like Bugs Bunny and trains.

After spending the morning in Lucca, Steve drove Joanne and I to the station for our afternoon trip to Florence, or Firenze as its called in proper Italian. I’m still unconvinced that there wasn’t a model of car called the Firenze in the 70’s. No matter!

Our first encounter with the Italian rail system went smoothly. It went smoothly because Steve the Translator did all the work and arranged the tickets at the station. We had been lucky until this point. With Steve the Translator accompanying us there were no challenging language problems. Ever. Even his entire upper torso was fluently Italian; hands and arms waving, fingers pinching the air, head bobbing, all with utter authority. Now we were about to leave the comfort of my linguistic hero and strike out on our own. Jo and I headed out to the platform and with a wave Steve headed home. I was excited about this hour and a half trip because we were taking one of the “bullet trains” I’d been reading about since I was a teenager.

About to be shot out of a cannon from Lucca to Florence. Very low ballistic arc. They issue rubber underwear for this trip.

Trenitalia is the state run railway and part of the Eurail network and I’d acquired a Global Eurail pass for Jo and I in a game of chance… no wait. That was how I acquired my pod racer. I had to pay for the pass and cost about $900 CAD all in. It was a 16 day pass for the two of us and we had to be together for it to be valid, but it was painless travel for the most part. Europeans do rail right… mostly. Eastern Europe not so much, or at least not as consistently.

A couple of caveats. There can be ancillary costs. If you’re reserving seats ahead of time, there’s an extra cost and high speed rail require reservations in Europe. There are fees for sleeper cars on overnight trains. On the plus side, the Global pass is automatically 1st class travel, so you’re always comfortable. It’s pretty much hop on/hop off. The pass covers ferries and in some centers will cover regional rail. For instance in Germany the Eurail pass covers the S-Bahn or above ground municipal rail but it doesn’t cover the U-bahn, or subway system.

With a Global pass, you’re supposed to fill in information on the current trip itinerary in the pass folder and show the conductor when he passed through the car, which we did and the conductor checked the ticket and everything was tickety-boo. However… I couldn’t help but notice that we never saw a conductor for the rest of the trip, despite multiple stops and changing passengers. They’re pretty casual. There were other train trips we took in Italy where we never saw a conductor… at all. Ever. I like the “honor system” and all, but it strikes me as a curious business model. Maybe we’d get lucky and find a chocolate shop that followed the same business model. No matter, we were covered and we were on our way to Florence.

Riding the Rails

I’ve long been making an argument for mountainside escalators and I think this proves the necessity.

High speed rail was exceptionally smooth and as this was 1st class travel there were complimentary bags o swag. Biscotti, crackers, cheese and a bottle of water. As I don’t like pasta, I relied on these bags to sustain my life almost our entire time in Italy. The windows were huge and the view out the windows at times was incredible, just not on the line from Lucca to Florence. That’s not quite true. We passed a few beautiful mountain villages and the occasional small, knob like hills that always had a church at the top and often a town built around them which always drew my attention when we passed.

The closer you got to a major center, generally the more blighted the view as you were rolling through economically depressed areas on the way to the station, close to the center of old Florence which is always the way of things. You won’t see Amtrak Central in Beverly Hills. For brief moments, I’d catch glimpses of the dome of the Duomo in the distance through the morning haze. Come to think of it, even when we were pretty close it looked hazy. Perhaps it was more a smoggy than a morning haze. It didn’t matter, I was still very excited at the fact we were in Florence.

Follow the Cobblestone Road

We stepped onto the platform into a frantic press of Italians in a massive hurry, so we waded into the current and got carried along to the end of the platform and into the main station. We cut ourselves adrift to check my phone for directions to the Ponte Vecchio, which would be the furthest point in our travels in Florence. Oriented, we stepped out the door onto Via Lungarno degli Acciaiuoli. Yeah, that was the name of the street alright. Let’s agree to my not having to name any more streets. Okay? Thankfully, the blue line on the phone trumps all. Or so I thought. That would not always be the case, but in this instance it worked like a charm as we made our way down cobbled streets.

I was never once tempted to drive in Florence

What struck me immediately was the aroma. Every city has it’s own smells, usually bad, but not in this case. There was an earthy tone which felt warm and familiar, but which I just couldn’t immediately place. Then it hit me. It was the smell of leather. Sure enough a block later and we hit a line of leather shops. Joanne immediately took command. This was her tactical scenario and I was just along for the ride.This particular street was closed off so the vendors had open air stalls lining the lane outside of their brick and mortar storefronts. Jo was browsing and I was suddenly hit with an intense, irrational desire to own a leather jacket.

Jo shows her disappointment at the distraction of blundering into an open air market

Owning a leather jacket isn’t on my bucket list. It’s never really even been on my “slightly interested” list. Given my shape, I’d be rockin that medicine ball look, but for some reason… the smell of leather… the surroundings, owning a leather jacket became important in that moment. Joanne was on board and we hit a shop and engaged the proprietor.

Operation Haggle Jacket

He was good. I was in and out of five jackets in under two minutes. Seriously. I felt like Katy Perry in that Hot n Cold live performance where she goes through eight costume changes. They were nice jackets and he offered great patter but in the end, sanity returned and I decided a leather jacket wasn’t for me. The haggling was one sided. As my interest waned, he kept dropping his price. Joanne felt I needed something, so she bought me a pair of leather sandals which I love and I thank her for that. After Jo found a leather bag that could double as a backpack we were back on track for the Ponte Vecchio.

The walk to Ponte Vecchio was in no way boring. High end storefronts with the occasional trattoria lined the narrow streets. Occasionally, cathedrals and piazzas would offer a bit more open space, but overall the old city feels somewhat claustrophobic. Crowd density scaled up markedly the closer we got to Ponte Vecchio and for a moment I held out hope that maybe Bruno Mars was playing on the bridge and that was the reason for the crowds but apparently this was just the typical tourist crush. Within 20 minutes we arrived at our destination.

Has Anybody Seen the Bridge?

Ponte Vecchio: I don’t want to know how the plumbing works.

Ponte Vecchio. Sounds so sophisticated, elegant and erudite, doesn’t it? In English it means “Old Bridge.” It spans the river Arno and it’s covered in shops. Small wonder Joanne didn’t mind leaving the leather market.

The bridge was built during roman times and was first mentioned in documents in 996. Twice it was destroyed by flood and rebuilt (the last time in 1345). Apparently the shops have always been there. I have no idea how it’s zoned by the municipality.

According to Wikipedia, the concept of bankruptcy was created here: “when a money-changer could not pay his debts, the table on which he sold his wares (the ‘banco’) was physically broken (‘rotto’) by soldiers, and this practice was called ‘bancorotto’ Not having a table anymore, the merchant was not able to sell anything.” After a half hour of Joanne browsing, I figured I’d better find a way to lure her out or I would be bancorotto. I told her there was a Winners at the Duomo and we headed for the most famed landmark in Florence. You may have seen a drawing of it in Hannibal Lecter’s cell in “Silence of the Lambs.”

Red, White and Green. The Duomo

I kept looking for the Duomo but it never came into view until we passed the last corner and it exploded into view. As always, I’m impressed at how such huge scale structures could be built with such limited, archaic technology. However, like most federal government infrastructure projects of the time, it took 150 years to complete and the decorous exterior took a further 400 years and was finished in 1887. Huh. I’m somewhat less than impressed now that I’ve discovered this fact.

There are essentially four sections, the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore, Brunelleschi’s Dome, Giotto’s Bell Tower and the Baptistry of San Giovanni. We only visited the interior of the cathedral proper, because the price was affordable. Free is very affordable. It’s the only thing that was free at the Duomo. You can do the entire site (cupola included) for 45 euro. While that would have been nice, we’d be risking bancorotto to try to do everything on this trip so we opted for economy.

The white and green marble draws the eye and the intricacy of the carvings and statues keep your eye wandering. The interior of the cathedral itself was pretty much the same as the cathedral in Lucca, except bigger. The murals and stained glass were gorgeous but by now it was getting late and time for supper so we left to stalk the piazza for food. I should mention that English was easy to find in Florence as tourist traffic is high so shopkeepers are multi-lingual, at least in our experience.

We found a trattoria and I don’t remember what I ordered, but I shall choose this moment to voice my primary complaint about Italy as a whole. There are NO ICE CUBES. ANYWHERE. You’ll have an easier time finding Papal yoga pants than you will finding a cold drink. Occasionally, you’ll find a vending machine with bottled water, but that’s just blind luck. The fellow serving us was charming and when I asked for ice he went to a freezer and pulled out one of those Baggie like ice cube moulds that makes ice cubes the size of a little finger cut off at the first joint. My, how he struggled with that cellophane! I was completely dumbfounded. After a couple of minutes he managed to extricate a single cube which he dropped in my drink and sent me on my way.

I like cold water so this was the greatest irritant to me in Italy. After we finished our meal, we had an uneventful train ride back to Lucca. The next morning, we’d be off for Rome, then Pompeii.

If you’d like more information on the city and its attractions, check out “Hannibal Lector’s Florence.” and yes, that’s a real thing.

Previously on TTWTH: Lucca Both Ways Before Crossing the Cobblestone Part II

The detail work by these artisans is incredible! But enough about Jo’s new purse. Love that Duomo!

There were seven on the pew and the little one said move over, move over. So they all moved over and one fell off…

Ponte Vecchio as seen from another ponte on the river Arno

Lucca Both Ways Before Crossing the Cobblestone Part II

May 6, 2018 By Mark Chatham 2 Comments

Grocery Spoor

Day one in Europe had been a smashing success so I started our second day in Europe the way I always greet the morning in new and exciting places. I open my eyes and stare slack-jawed at the ceiling assessing the energy states of various portions of my body. After multiple systems tests (Toe wiggle, check! Eyes can blink independently, check! Nostrils flare…) I was ready to start the day.

Breakfast was indeed an international affair and the kids… whew. It’s hard to fathom just how MUCH energy small children can bring to the table. Any table. Breakfast table, dinner table, the periodic table of elements, a table of contents… it just doesn’t matter, they bring it full out. I love it as I’m little more than a large child myself, but I’m old. I participate until I don’t, then I just have fun watching.

Jo and I decide that we’ll head into town with Anastasia and the kids for the morning to get a closer look at the town by light of day and let Steve work. After that I wanted to try our Global Eurail Pass in controlled circumstances so we’d take a train ride to Florence to spend the afternoon. Before that, Steve and I headed to the grocery store across the street to pick up some staples.

The concept of un-refrigerated “meat shelves” is alien to me, but to be fair I’m in a foreign land

It’s a grocery store and aside from the language, I figured it couldn’t be that different than home. I mean, aside from the product quality, prices, selection, range and variety of product, regulatory regime and storage methods… the procedure for self-service of produce and bulk items, method of payment, currency and local customs, it was exactly like home.

There was a hand held device with which you tracked your purchases and this was new to me. I draw the line at wearing electronic ankle bracelets. Italy must be two generations ahead of Nova Scotia in respect to grocery store technology. The deli case was particularly fascinating with an incredible assortment of meats and cheese. I helped Steve load up the cart with staples and then paid for the groceries when we went through the cash.

Later on Joanne and I would make the mistake of thinking we could just shop there which proved not to be the case. Had I understood Italian, I might have realized this was an Italian Co-op and we weren’t members. However this trip to the grocery proved a success. After we arrived back to the house, Steve the Translator retired to his office, to translate things. Anastasia and the kids piled into the car with Jo and I and we headed in to the walled town of Lucca.

Shop Til You Drop

After we parked, the girls decided to walk around and Joanne wanted to shop. Our shopping styles are vastly different. If shopping were athletics, I would be Usain Bolt. On your mark… get set… and I’m already back. I know what I want, I get it and I’m gone. Joanne is more like Rick Swenson, six time winner of the Iditarod, the two week or so dogsled race held in Alaska. If you lined that 1,000 mile course with shops, I wouldn’t be surprised if she could check out every store and snaffle up every rare bargain.

My feeble frontal lobes cannot wrap themselves around this phenomenon so I often tend not to go on safari with her when she’s shopping, at least when we’re at home. That being said, I have had a lot of fun shopping with Joanne when I pick the right moments, so I can appreciate why she enjoys it as a pastime and finds it relaxing. I fully endorse her shop till you drop philosophy! From the man cave easy chair mostly. In this instance she and Anastasia were comfortable so I begged off and broke off the group on a mission of my own.

Smoke Shop Culture Shock Therapy

Confession time for those who don’t know me personally, but I’m a smoker. This isn’t a monkey on my back, it’s Mighty Joe Young I’m carrying around. I’ve quit for varying amounts of time but at some point I end up going back and stress is the trigger. For Joanne’s part, she approaches this with equanimity so long as I don’t invade her space. I’d stopped smoking a few days before we’d headed to Europe and had been doing okay up to that point, however Mighty Joe began gently roaring into my ear. What now?

There are no 7-11’s or Needs in Lucca. In fact, there were no convenience stores of any kind, anywhere in Lucca.
For some odd reason, Italians don’t see value in a shop that’s open 24/7 and sells everything that’s bad for you and legal in one location. As it turns out, cigarettes are only sold at a tabaccheria, or a tobacco shop. It’s worth noting these shops are only open from 8-5 in Lucca. It struck me that pretty much everything was only open from 8-5 in Lucca with the exception of restaurants. I had no idea what to look for as the shop fronts all looked the same and I couldn’t read the signs. Fortunately, I was in the piazza in front of the San Michele cathedral and upon which operated numerous buskers. Hmmm….

Mission accomplished. I smoked two and dumped the pack. I’d only give in to the temptation once more in Berlin. That tally would be twice more but for the fact the only other time I was tempted was after our return from Rome. I went into deep search mode of the surrounding area of Steve’s house and found a shop which was closed. These shops have cigarette machines out front reminiscent of the cigarette machines of long ago in North America with the exception they don’t take coins or cash.

If I hurry this smoke I’ll have just enough time to see the Cathedral then meet the girls

There’s nothing quite so pathetic as a Jonesing smoker trying desperately to read and comprehend the instructions on an Italian cigarette machine using the Google translate sign reader app thing as one’s only tool. Oh, how I tried to make it take a card, any card! Pleasepleaseplease… well. It wasn’t pretty and I lost in the end.

What made it all the more ridiculous was the fact I had an inkling from what I’d gleaned that an Italian government I.D. proclaiming your incorrigible nature was required but I was in deep, deep, denial and tried anyway. However, all of that was a trial yet to come and at the moment I had about an hour to kill before meeting up with the ladies.

San Michele from the Inside

Anonymous bowlers awaiting registration at the local alley

I thought I’d check out the interior of the San Michele Basilica which we’d passed the evening before on our way to restaurant. It was a well lit interior, which wouldn’t prove always to be the case in other historic locations. I can also say it was a striking interior.

I have a passing knowledge of the Catholic church, but in my experience I do have a sense of its value on deep tradition and the importance of ritual and all of that was in evidence here. There’s something about polished marble and wood that resonates and is compelling not just aesthetically, but on a deeper emotional level. I have mixed feelings in respect to how religious organizations use their resources, but on any level I can appreciate the beauty in the moment.

I’m still kind of awestruck with the work that goes into these structures given when they were built. That sense of awe would become magnified as we visited more metropolitan areas where the sheer scale was seriously mind boggling. If you stacked four Costco’s and put a couple of spires on them, you’d get a sense of the size of the 337 foot tall St. Vitus Cathedral in Prague.

Even though San Michele was of a modest size, I still have difficulty wrapping my head around the comprehensive display of craftsmanship by medieval artists, artisans and masons. To essentially stack stone like this successfully and with such precision using 13th century technology is quite the accomplishment. I’d really appreciate this fact after visiting Florence and seeing what treasures 13th century medical technology held at the Da Vinci Museum. Yikes! Their priorities were sure messed up. Less church building, more R&D on medicine stuff that doesn’t involve leeches and the eye of a newt would have served them better. No matter, it was a beautiful church and after taking it all in, I was off to meet the girls. and from there to the train station to head to Florence.

Previously on TTWTH: Lucca Both Ways Before You Cross the Cobblestone Part I

Next Time on TTWTH: Florence and I are the Best of Firenze Part I

A Pisa My Mind After Arriving

February 6, 2018 By Mark Chatham 2 Comments

Arrival Florence

I watched the patchwork gold and green Tuscan countryside scroll beneath the aircraft as we make our approach for Florence. Now I worry that a Star Wars aficionado whose spelling is sketchy and got here accidentally might see the word Tuscan and begin hyperventilating. So to clarify, this is Florence, Italy and not Florence, Tatooine. No Tusken raiders here! We don’t need to see your ID. You can go about your business. Move along! Move along!

The landing was uneventful and Florence airport is a much smaller airport than I anticipated. Looking out the window after we stopped, I noticed a couple of guys rolling what looked like an antique set of airstairs from movies in the 50’s across the tarmac towards us. Wow! Florence really is historic, maybe in every sense! Perhaps my friend Steve the Translator was picking us up in a 1929 Hupmobile! I would have thought by now that we’d at least have portable Air-escalators given the current millennium.

1950’s stewardesses vote aye for the Airstairs over previous rope ladder technology.

I didn’t mind the fact there was no jet-bridge because there’s something to be said for taking that first big breath of air absorbing the sights, sounds and smells of a place you’ve never been unfiltered through airport air conditioning.

Despite the fact the sun was covered in a cirrus veil, the heat smacked me in the face as we crossed the tarmac to the terminal. I had to stop to take a couple of pictures of our surroundings. What struck me immediately was the airport sign said Firenze. Firenze? Wasn’t that a model of car? Didn’t Ford make a Firenze in the 80’s? The Ford Firenze, I was sure of it. I tucked away a mental note to ask my brother in law Bill about that next time I saw him. He knows everything there is to know about cars. Like Mona Lisa Vito in My Cousin Vinny except he’s old, and a guy, and you don’t want to see him in a leotard. I just hoped Florence wasn’t far away.

Firenze! We’re supposed to get off at Florence! Did we miss a connection?

We had decided on backpacks rather than suitcases as we had done in the past. We were taking over gifts for Steve the Translator and his family and so we were taking an additional duffle bag as a carry on along with extra… stuff. As became the fashion for much of the trip, we were immediately confused. I thought we had to check out bags through customs here as well and after chasing an official around I learned this wasn’t the case. We picked up our bags and off we went in search of Steve The Translator.

Me and The Translator at the Florence Airport. The shirt had me wondering if he was moonlighting as a gondolier in Venice but it turns out not to be the case. I’m doing my very best Bruce Willis Die Hard impression cause we’re at an airport

Next Stop Pisa

After our meet n greet at the airport, Steve asked if we’d like to see Pisa which was about an hour and a half away and only 10 minutes from his home in Lucca. Lack of sleep mattered not at this point and we readily agreed. We hopped in the car, pulled out of our parking space and stood stock still for 10 minutes in our first skirmish in the great campaign of the great war that is Italian traffic. It appears there are no personal vehicular space bubbles in Italy in urban environments, rather everyone is trying to nose into gaps in a barnyard suckling fashion.

Italian traffic or an M.C. Escher piece? Italian traffic. There’s internal logic to Escher’s work

Eventually we broke free from the traffic and hit the highway which had relatively light traffic and Steve the Translator turned on the CD player and we were cruising down the highway to The Doobie Brothers Listen to the Music enroute for Pisa. I was pretty happy in that moment. The Italian countryside had relief now that we were on the ground and the haze turned the dark sap green of the distant mountains into degrees of pastel shades. Suddenly, Steve says something that I don’t often hear on drives in my experience. “Castle coming up on the left” and sure enough, off in the distance there was a castle. Then on the left of the A2 again… was that an ancient stone Roman aqueduct? As it turns out, it was the Nottolini aqueduct which was built in 1823 but was still impressive. Just before we arrived in Pisa Steve suggest we eat and suggested a nearby trattoria which he recommended as having excellent food.

We pulled off the road and into a… I want to say parking lot, but it was a twisty, narrow lane with parallel parking on both sides. It felt like we had wandered into the Monte Carlo of go cart tracks given the surroundings. In the moment it was still kind of magical like a Disney ride despite being somewhat overwhelming given the involvement of sleep deprivation and a deep hunger hangover. Once inside the trattoria the smells and sights were agonizingly intoxicating. Steve taught me to order in a rudimentary fashion and the lady behind the counter was a sweetheart, nodding encouragingly at my mangled Italian the way a waitress might nod at and smile at a toddler whose indulgent parents are allowing them to order in the restaurant for the first time. Then she and Steve had a polite exchange and we took our authentic Italian pizza to the seating area outside to eat. I imagine their Italian conversation went something like this in English:

Steve the Translator: Yeah, about this guy. They’re in Italy for the first time and he’s just trying to learn a little Italian. He had no idea he was offending your family and your ancestors when he said he wanted to eat your cousin’s liver with fava beans and a nice Chianti.

The Unknown Waitress: No problem! I realized the situation when he wanted his muffler clamps extra soggy.

Lesson number one when traveling in non-anglophone countries. Hook up with someone who speaks seven languages!

The Pizza was incredible. The burrata cheese used was unctuous, a brilliant white with a beautiful texture and that deep tomato sauce with notes of basil. PLUS MEAT! BONUS!!! Now this may seem strange, but I do not like Italian food. Pizza, sure, but I’m just not a big pasta eater. But being in ITALY and eating AUTHENTIC ITALIAN FOOD??? Nope. Sorry, nothing changed. I still don’t like pasta as a general rule, but this pizza was delicious.

While we were eating I was shocked when a bullet train blew by on the rail overpass across the street with a hurricane roar and then was gone before I could close my mouth. Incredibly fast… I’d never seen a bullet train before and hadn’t anticipated that velocity this close to a populated area. We had a Global Eurail Pass so I knew we’d be experiencing the high speed train soon enough and taking the train in a foreign land for the first time was an unknown stress yet to be endured.

I took this in Belgium. The very famous leaning tower of Brussels. It’s great and we’re gonna get it fixed up and straightened and it’s going to be the best tower ever! You’ll see! It’ll get even better ratings than the one in Pisa!

Pisa

When we arrived and being this is the first time I get to stand in front of an actual, ancient, historic, European monument in glowing white marble in the flesh, the first thing which strikes me is the selfie-stick salesman to tourist ratio seems pretty high, but they pretty much leave you alone which is nice.

History Alert

Construction of the Tower of Pisa was started in 1173 and was finished 199 years later in 1372. You think they’d have slow walked it that last year just for the sake of symmetry… although I suppose this is more appropriate. Especially given it started leaning by the time they’d gotten to the second floor due to “unstable subsoil” on one side. At that point they couldn’t just pick it up and move it over 50 meters to the left, so they stopped building to rethink the situation and fight wars and stuff. Nearly 100 years later Giovanni di Simone comes along and figures it’s a good idea to keep going. They’ll just build the sinking side taller than the stable side to compensate! Work stopped in 1184 due to some battle only people who care about history or live near the Islet of Meloria remember. They added the seventh floor and in 1372 added the belfry because, well, you may as well just finish it up, eh.

Wow. This already this reminds me of when I used to work for the federal government.

From then on, It just kept tipping further and further until 1964 when the Italian government decided to act before it toppled. They promptly studied the problem for a further two decades until another tower collapsed in Pavia in 1989 killing four people which pressed the issue. Look, I know Italy is the seat of the Catholic Church but I’m going out on a limb and say that despite the clashes with science over the centuries the Vatican accepted the law of gravity by the time 1989 rolled around. Although… it wasn’t until 1992 when the Vatican reprieved Galileo. Anyway, I would expected the government to be ahead of the church in respect to the science curve but I guess not.

After Parvia the tower situation was getting ridiculous so the government finally closed the tower for renovations in 1990 and reopened to the public in 2008. The manufacturer’s warranty is good for a year but they opted for the extended warranty for another 200 years. Somewhere in the three year period from 1589-92 Galileo is said to have conducted his gravity experiment. But more on Galileo when we reach Florence.

Great shot of the service entrance to the Baptistry. This is why I’m not a National Geographic photographer!

What is incredibly striking when standing in front of these iconic structures is the intense brilliant white of the marble. It’s not a polished marble, but it almost shimmers nonetheless and draws the eye wherever you are in the plaza. We walk around the area for the next hour or so but don’t enter the tower due to the lineups. There’s no need to wonder about the history because Steve the Translator has a lock on that and I’m being transported listening to his stories on what happened here in the past.

After an hour or so I just have to go for the gag forced perspective photo of Jo with her finger on the top of the tower and after a couple of abortive attempts we abandon the effort as fatigue takes its toll. After a gelato from one of the many vendors dotting the perimeter of the grounds we head back to the car. It’s a short but scenic drive 10 minute drive back to Lucca and we hit our last, very welcome stop of the day when we arrive at Steve the Translator’s in Lucca in mid-afternoon and have a nap to recharge.

The forced perspective gag as demonstrated brilliantly by @ahmad_alhilmi

Marissa Kjos states this was the best gelato of her entire trip

What’s that girl? RVS Photography has fallen down and this tower is about to fall on them? I’ll go get help right away over at that gelato stand! Good girl!

You can find the other 17 best Pisa forced perspective gags here.

Next time on TTWTH: Lucca Both Ways Before You Cross the Cobblestone Part I

Previously on TTWTH: Europe: Stampede of Unicorns