Rome #3

After my last blog, you may think I hate Rome. I don’t. I quite enjoy it actually; I’m just glad that I get to go visit it for a few days at a time and don’t have to live there. But when I am there I have a great time!

This weekend I went down on Saturday again to meet up with Madeleine. The only thing we had planned was shopping :) We met up in Termini Station around 1 (you can conclude from my last blog that I was not in the greatest mood when I arrived) and then decided to go back to her house to drop my stuff off. Madeleine has been in Rome since the summer working as an au pair but recently started working for a new family with five boys, ranging from age 2 to 18. When we got there, Mattia, the 16 year old, was cooking pasta on the stove while he was on the phone with his girlfriend. Madeleine and I chuckled at the thought of a very inexperienced sixteen year old attempting to cook pasta for the first time and then debated whether or not to eat at home or to go out. Mattia finished his pasta, put it on a plate, and Madeleine tried a bite. She almost spit it out. Apparently his girlfriend had instructed him to put a handful of salt in the boiling water. This measuring method may work if you are a girl with a very small hand, but for a growing teenage boy, a handful of salt is quite an excessive amount. Luckily, Nonna came rushing in to the rescue, dumped his pasta in the garbage, and immediately started a new pot on the stove. She told us she was making spaghetti for everyone. We stayed for lunch.

Over lunch, Alberto the 18 year old came home, so the four of us sat down to a wonderful homecooked meal of spaghetti, beef, greens, and fresh fruit from their garden. The rest of the family was out of town at their house in the mountains for the weekend, so Alberto informed us that he might be having a few friends over that night. His explanation of this get together was pretty vague, leaving us wondering what to expect when we got home that night. After lunch, Madeleine and I geared up for a trip to the Porta di Roma, one of the biggest malls in Rome (or Europe... not sure which). We weren't exactly sure how to get there, but hopped on what we thought was the right bus and figured that we would know when we got to the correct stop because it would be around an hour later and everyone else would probably get off too. Thank goodness we were right, and at the second to last stop of the bus' route, the whole bus emptied out and all the passengers headed into the mall.

OH my goodness.... I cannot begin to tell you how amazing it was to be in a mall!! I walked in and felt right at home again! Everything was sparkling, shiny, and calling my name. I have been on a hunt since I've been in Italy for stores that sell affordable clothes that people my age would wear. I haven't been real successful, but going to this mall certainly ended that streak! I found dozens of stores, just like American Eagle, Gap, Forever 21, Heritage, Hollister, J. Crew, and any other place with cute clothes that I might actually shop at. This was a fantastic thing, but also a very bad thing. I was supposed to be Christmas shopping for others, but you can't get much of that done when you're burning a hole in your own pocket ;) Needless to say, I walked away with just a few bags and the conclusion that shopping is a great way to build arm muscle. By the end of our trip, we were exhausted, beat, and totally ready for a relaxing evening at home.

Just a few bags to complete our shopping trip! ;-)

Before we even walked in the door of the house, we saw the cars out front. There were several unfamiliar cars that didn't belong to the family, so we knew that Alberto did indeed have "a few" friends over. We walked inside to find at least twenty high schoolers, booming music, and quite a spirited atmosphere. Madeleine and I retreated to her room and tried to come up with Plan B - because clearly our original plan of making pancakes and watching a Christmas movie was not going to work with dozens of people in the kitchen and music blasting through the walls. We knew we couldn't beat it - so we joined it.

It turned out to be a ton of fun, and we had a really great time. Finding English speakers in Rome is much different than finding them in a small town like Foligno, so we had no problem communicating with most of the people there. After meeting several of the high school students and hearing about their current preparations for college and studying abroad, Madeleine and I ended up outside with a group of Alberto's friends around us, asking us questions and making jokes about America and English. We spent the rest of the night making fun of ourselves and laughing at all the differences between Americans and Italians. We listened to music, heard the Italians sing every single word of all the American pop songs, and finally concluded the night with an Italian version of karaoke. Like I said... it was a blast. And there was no chance Madeleine and I were going to completely forgo out pancake craving. I don't know if I've mentioned or not, but it is impossible to find pancakes or even pancake mix in Italy. We basically possessed Gold in the eyes of the Italians because Madeleine's sister had sent her a Christmas package with Great Value Pancake Mix in it. Since the kitchen seemed to be the popular hang out spot for all the guests, Madeleine and I almost gave up our quest for cooking our favorite American breakfast, knowing that we'd have dozens of hungry and curious Italians to ward off. But you can't stare at a picture this amazing and just forget about it.

Needless to say, we followed our ravenous stomachs and somewhat crashed the kitchen party with a frying pan, a whisk, and a plate waiting for hot, freshly made pancakes. It turned out that our bag only made about 8 or 10 pancakes, so we had no problem hiding the evidence from the rest of the guests in the kitchen. As soon as a pancake came off the pan, it was quickly buttered and topped with Cinnamon Sugar (you weren't expecting a country with no pancake mix to have syrup were you??) and went straight into one of our mouths. By the time anyone noticed what we were doing and came to beg for some, they were already gone :)

Madeleine and I had promised ourselves that we would take pictures of our delicious American meal, but in light of the perilous situation our pancakes were in, the only memory we have is the savory taste of buttery, fluffy goodness melting in our mouths.

The next morning was painful. No one wants to get out of bed after only three hours of sleeping, especially when it's freezing outside. We had made plans to meet Jess and another friend for coffee before church, but when the alarm sounded at 8:00, we grunted, laughed at our misery, and rolled back over to go back to sleep. But as much as I wanted to sleep for the rest of the day, I knew I needed to get up and make the most of my time in Rome, especially since I don't get very many chances to go to church in the first place. I fought against my mind and my body, reminding myself of all the hundreds of times I've had to get up after three hours of sleep for Glowing Heart and somehow miraculously made it through all those days, and I got myself up, ready, and to the church - only 15 minutes late ;-)

I'm glad I went. I have to admit - I don't remember a whole lot that the pastor talked about (most of my concentration was going towards thinking how horrible I felt after sleeping so little), but I ended up meeting some really great people as soon as the service was over. I love the community of Rome Baptist Church. It's such a wide variety of people from all over the world, and I think it's great to be able to worship, still in my own language, with such a diverse crowd. Jess, my friend from Australia, introduced me to another guy from the"Land Down Under" after church. I asked how they knew each other and was informed that David had met our friends from Iowa while in Spain over Thanksgiving and was traveling on his own for a few months, so he made his way up to Rome for a visit. There he met Jess and was invited to come to Rome Baptist by her and the Iowa girls. It was his first time to church. We made plans to go to lunch with him, along with another friend named John who grew up in the Ivory Coast and is now a University student in Rome, and set out to find the perfect Sunday afternoon restaurant.

As we walked, it started raining and we knew we couldn't wander for forever. We walked around in circles for about 30 minutes before finally deciding on a cute restaurant that Jess had been to before. I ordered spinach ravioli and we all shared our food and tried each other's... just the way I like to eat! Madeleine joined us eventually (feeling much more rested than I did) and we set out to enjoy the rest of the rainy afternoon in Rome.

 

 

I forgot to mention - the main reason I went to Rome this weekend was to see the new Narnia movie, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. If I was ever excited about Harry Potter, I was ten times more excited about the Dawn Treader. Apparently it's not quite as popular as HP (this is news to me) and people don't really understand my obsession, so let me take a minute to explain. A lot of people grew up reading the Chronicles of Narnia and were familiar with the tales of Aslan and the Pevensies, but not me. I was not introduced to C.S. Lewis' collection until my sophomore year of college when a friend started reading through the series and encouraged me to do the same. I know the books are written for children, but they are so much deeper than that. C.S. Lewis has an incredible way of taking the hopeful and loving story of Christ and illustrating it in a beautiful, creative, and inspiring story of Aslan the Lion and his mighty and powerful reign over the land of Narnia. Perfectly knitted into Lewis' creative stories are precious lessons and pieces of wisdom that can apply to people of all ages, not just children. It is these lessons and these reminders of truth that have greatly impacted my life and shaped who I have come to be, which is why these books, particularly the Dawn Treader are so significant to me. The stories give me hope when things in my life seem a little too dark. The help me remember what I'm living for, what to fight for, and who I can be.

Sadly enough, even though my heart was yearning to see the cinematic approach to this inspiring story, I guess it's not popular enough to play in English in movie theaters, so I came and went without ever seeing it.

My first trip to the movie theaters when I'm back in the U.S. is going to be a special one. :)

We unsuccessfully searched for a theater that afternoon until we ran out of time and Madeleine and I had to hurry off so I could catch my train. After a very long two hour journey on the train, I arrived in Foligno and Aurelio picked me up from the station so I wouldn't have to walk home in the rain. It was good to be home, but I certainly had a great weekend.