Roma 2

Day three of our Roman adventure dawned as warm as the previous day.  Pat and I had heard that the markets were not to be missed, so we got our free-with-hostel-booking breakfast of cappuccino and a pastry, and braved Roman public transportation to find the markets.  I am excessively wary of public transportation in crowded cities.  My friend Fleur had her bag cut open and all of her important stuff stolen in a metro in Madrid, and Rome is notorious for pickpockets.  Therefore, you can imagine how tense I was for the whole ride.  That tension did not ease as we entered the marketplace.  I held on to my purse and camera with all my might as we wove through the maze of booths.  You have never seen such a hodgepodge of stuff.  Booths of nice leather purses were side by side with booths full of bags of used clothing and booths of toiletry items.  Smells of delicious street food mixed with the smell of sweaty people; tourists and locals, young and old searched for....lord knows what.  We found some man with three cups and a pea, or peanut, and marveled at the gamblers who lost fifty euros at a time betting that the wrong cup contained the pea.  And the whole time I was too afraid and awestruck to pull out my camera.  Sorry about that.

Naturally, as we left the marketplace we got a little lost.  Some days, it's clear I'm related to my grandfather (whose directional sense is impeccable), others it's horribly obvious that I am my father's daughter.  Let's just say that my Dad, even with a GPS or map or navigator, is capable of getting lost just about anywhere.  We give him a lot of flack about it.  This was, unfortunately, one of the latter kinds of days.  To make matters worse, as we tried to find a certain part of town highlighted in Rick Steves or Lonely Planet or whatever, it started to get colder.  And then it started to rain.  Luckily, the illegal street vendors are everywhere and some of them popped up at just the right moment.  Pat and I bought some crappy umbrellas that promptly broke, but kept us reasonably dry, and I bought a very low quality cardigan-type thing for ten euros, which Pat made fun of me for.  But I was cold!!  After all this, we found someplace to have lunch, and then continued on our way.

Our next stop was the Pantheon, which Pat explained to me was a super advanced piece of architecture, due to its domed roof.   It was pretty cool, as were the surprise ruins that we found on our way there.  The area around the Pantheon provided tons of entertainment, too, in the form of beautiful architecture and winding streets. Too bad it was so rainy!  By the end of the day, Pat's shoes were entirely soaked through (though not as bad as they would be later in Florence).

That night, after a long walk back toward our hostel, we stopped to have some delicious pizza at a recommended restaurant, and ended the day satisfied and exhausted, with plans to see the Vatican in the morning. 

Some ruins we found.  I'm sure they're important and recognizable, but we found that the most exciting thing about them was the large amount of feral cats that lived within the crumbling walls

One of the feral cats.  There are actually a ton of calendars at the kitschy souvenir stands called "Cats in Rome"

Pat checking out the cats in Rome

Cats in Rome...Pat in Rome!  Pat and I found this rhyme extremely funny the whole trip long

Pat in the Pantheon

The roof of the Pantheon, which makes it an incredibly advanced architectural feat for its time

Me in the Pantheon

The front of the Pantheon

Another piece of art that surprised us around a random corner.  Like Horny Moses, I never would have known this was important if it weren't for crowds of people and Pat's art history knowledge.  To be honest, I still have no idea what it is...

Enjoying Roman hot chocolate and beer while staying out of the rain

Pat imitating the man we saw in the market.  He put a peanut under three cups, moved them around, and took bets on which it was under.  Pat and I couldn't figure out the trick, because we could find it every time.

"...what's the trick??"

Hey look, Dad!  Hats!

Trevi fountain by day

Too bad the flash was on for this picture.  We got some nice American tourists to take this, instead of one of the gypsies who says he (or she) will take your picture and then demand money for it or run away with your camera. 

Pizza time

View of our pizza restaurant