Day 2 - Coliseum, Roman Senate, Palatine...First day of class :)

5-15

Today was the first day of class. We went to the Coliseum this morning. We got an early start in an attempt to beat some of the crowds. We went in and heard one of the presentations from a guy who had chosen the Coliseum for his topic. That was interesting but then we got to go explore on our own for two hours. I just loved the brickwork and the arches. There are arches everywhere. At this point in the day they were still novel, but by later they I wasn't so impressed. I do really think we don't give ancient people enough credit for the things they accomplished. That thing is amazing!

I got in a couple sketches which was good. I actually really enjoyed the sketching. All the people who walked by would see me sketching and my favorites were the ones who would double back to see what I was looking at. Some of them even decided to take pictures of the doorways I was drawing. I am not sure but I think a few of them might have taken pictures of me too. That makes me laugh just thinking about it. I did feel awful official standing there with a sketch book looking at architecture. 

The Arch of Constantine was close so we saw that next. We spotted a wedding party taking pictures in front of that. We tried to go to this place Dr. Erdogmus remembered for lunch but she couldn’t find it. So we ended up going on this half hour walk through some of the back street-type things and that was cool. We just stopped and got sandwiches in the end. Lots and lots of walking today. 

We also got over to the Roman Forum. That was harder to picture since it's all ruins. I was a little disappointed because I learned that the senate building is not where Julius Caesar got stabbed. Apparently they (the senate) were temporarily relocated at that time to a place whose ruins are now the home of Rome’s cats. We saw that place yesterday. We saw the Palace of the Vestal Virgins today which had a beautiful garden out front and you could tell it used to be an impressive building. The girls who lived there were chosen when they were 10 and had to serve like 30 or so years in the temple of Vesta. They had to keep a fire going and keep a vow of chastity. If they didn’t do both, they were buried alive with a piece of bread. Apparently most of them ended up with this fate. Sad day, right? But they were really esteemed socially and got to live in what looks like it was a sweet palace.

We saw some people statues today! I actually saw some yesterday but I think I forgot to say that. The two I liked best were a tree-lady and (my favorite) a guy who looked like a green bronze statue except he was blinking! I also learned that Michael Jackson is not dead, he is just street performing here in Rome now. THAT was unexpected. 

So I wore my white shorts today. I did not spill on them or sit in anything, no sir, but I had this sinking feeling when I packed them that the day I wore them it would rain. It did. Fortunately not long enough or hard enough for me to get soaked but still. Just my luck. J I think it finally hit me this morning that we are in Italy. It’s not fully there but it’s starting to sink in. I love that the people don’t speak English here. They know it, but I just like walking down the road and hearing conversations in foreign languages. The little kids running around speaking Italian are so cute!I think I mentioned that we walked quite a bit. I suppose we really did not but we stood a lot, at least I did. I didn’t sit down all day for fear of getting these pants dirty! I think my legs are fine with what we did today but my feet are a little upset. We had free time this afternoon so I went ahead and uploaded my pictures and just kind of sat around. I had my first official Italian dinner. Meaning it was 4 courses. It was pretty good. I liked it. We had tiramisu and that was interesting, I liked it even though it had coffee taste all up in it. We walked around the center city after dinner and I threw a penny in the Trevi fountain and made a wish. That was sweet. We made it home just fine. We get to start late tomorrow which rocks. Tomorrow is just a museum of stuff from the sights we saw today so that is nice. It is pouring outside now. Glad that didn't happen this afternoon.