Day 4 - Rome

Day 4 – Rome

I woke up excited to start my final full day in Rome. I had a big plan today to visit Vatican and whatever else I wanted to see in Rome since the next day I was saying Arrivederci to Rome and heading to Florence.  I had an early 8:00 tour of Vatican booked with City Wonders, so after a quick breakfast I decided to take a taxi to the meeting point in front of the Vatican museum entrance. It was a quick ride, just about 10 minutes and only 9 euro, not too bad. I was there 5 minutes ahead of the check-in time of 7:55am and saw no sign of the group. After 5 minutes I started getting concerned that I was waiting at the wrong place and indeed after asking other tour guides around it turned out that my group was meeting across the street on the steps. I was still on time and all was well.

Our tour guide was a young Italian girl Laura who was 6 months pregnant. She was a good guide and worked hard but I ended up a bit disappointed with a tour for two reasons: I specifically booked this semi-private tour, which was more expensive because it promised that we will get to Sistine Chapel early before it opens to the general public. I remember that during our previous visit in 2011 Vatican was extremely crowded and I felt claustrophobic and was not able to enjoy the museum and Sistine Chapel at all.  So, I was hoping that with this tour I would enjoy and appreciate Vatican museum much more as it is one of the greatest museums on earth. I don’t know why the tour guide did not take us to the Sistine Chapel early as was promised in the tour description. Also, I did not get to see the beautiful spiral staircase, which I really wanted to see. Oh, well, there is always next time. At least I have a reason to visit Vatican again.

 The tour started in the courtyard with the most beautiful view of St. Peter’s dome.  We sat on the bench and Laura shared a lot of interesting information about Vatican and Sistine Chapel. The symbol of Vatican is two crossed gold and silver keys with the Pope’s crown above them. You can see those signs everywhere in Vatican. They symbolize that Jesus gave the keys to Christianity to St. Peter and appointed him a first Pope. Gold symbolizes heaven and silver symbolizes earth, so it is a communion of heaven and earth. Each newly elected Pope’s coat of arms includes that symbol. From the courtyard we could see the chimney of the Sistine chapel, where the Conclave (election of the new Pope) is held.  Conclave means “sealed with the key”. The cardinals who are electing the Pope are locked in the Sistine Chapel and cannot come out until the new Pope is elected. After each voting the smoke comes out of the chimney.  Black smoke means that the Pope has not been elected yet. White smoke lets the world now that the Pope was elected. 

Sistine Chapel was built by the Pope Sixtus IV as the place to hold special ceremonies and to serve as fortress. His successor Julius II decided to re-decorate it and commissioned the decoration of Sistine Chapel to Michelangelo, who at that time was already working for him. At first Michelangelo refused the commission, he was a sculptor, not a painter but the Pope insisted and made him do it anyway. It took Michelangelo 4 years to complete the frescoes on the ceiling and 6 years for the altar centerpiece “Last Judgement”, which he completed in a different period of time for the different popes. Michelangelo included many personal touches in that fresco. For example, the Pope’s master of ceremonies who was very mean to Michelangelo is shown as the bottom of hell as ugly monster squeezed by the snake that is biting off his private part. Michelangelo also included his own self-portrait  - he has shown himself as the skin of St. Bartolomeo (the saint who was skinned alive). Michelangelo probably did it for two reasons - he was very religious and probably wanted to partake in suffering of St. Bartolomeo and also, probably because working on this commission of decorating Sistine was so exhausting that he felt as if he was skinned alive. The central line of frescoes on the ceiling shows genesis. Especially amazing is the central panel depicting creation of Adam. The God’s hand reaches to Adam’s hand in order to give him a spark of light to make him alive. It is amazing how Michelangelo painted God’s hand as full of energy and life and Adam’s hand is limp and lacks energy.  Also it is fascinating to see that the God in that panel looks precisely the shape of the human brain if it was sliced in the middle. It is unlikely to be a coincidence and shows a deeper meaning.

Vatican museum consists of two main wings: Belvedere Palace and Papal Palace. We started our tour in the Belvedere Palace near the Egyptian room. We saw the Candelabra Gallery with lots of ancient Egyptian objects and two massive candelabras (hence the name). Next was the Tapestry Gallery decorated with beautiful tapestries. The tapestries on the left side were woven in Italy and depict the scenes from the life of Jesus. The tapestries on the right were woven in Brussels and show the scenes from the bible.  Afterwards, we got into the Maps Gallery. It seemed to be the longest and the most visually stunning. The frescoes on the ceiling were simply amazing. Walls on the left and right are decorated with ancient maps of Italian regions, which are pretty close to reality considering that they date from the 16^th century.  They did have some quirks such as occasional sea monsters shown in the places of unknown. It was fascinating.  We saw beautiful papal apartment (although I can hardly call them that – more like a palace decorated by Rafael), as well as the scandalous Borgia’s living quarters also decorated by beautiful frescoes. Finally, we got into the Sistine Chapel. It was crowded but not too bad and I really enjoyed seeing the Michelangelo’s masterpieces. I was able to grab a seat one of the benches that line right and left sides of the chapel. My seat was right in the middle of the room with the best view of the mid-panel showing the God creating Adam, probably my favorite fresco in this room and I spent some time just admiring and contemplating the beauty around me.

The last part of the tour was the visit to the St. Peters cathedral. Michelangelo’s “Pieta”  - his earliest and most likely his favorite work (it is the only one that he signed) is truly magical. It is protected by the glass because some time ago mentally ill men attacked it with the hammer and damaged the precious statue greatly. St. Peters cathedral is overwhelming. The baroque style is beautiful but can be over the top – too much. I guess this was the intention – the catholic church wanted to display the grandeur and its mighty powers to attract masses under its wing. I’m not surprised that the Protestant movement appeared in order to counteract all the excesses, corruption and this outrageous display of wealth and power displayed by Catholic church and bring back such quality as modesty, humility and accessibility to the bible and God.

After the tour completed I felt tired and a bit hungry. I decided to explore and get lunch at the colorful neighborhood Trastevere. At first I planned to get a taxi but was not sure how to go about it – there were plenty of taxis standing on the square but I couldn’t figure out how to go about getting one. I know, sounds a bit silly. At last I decided to walk. Google maps came in handy yet again. It turned to be about 20 - 25 minutes walk along the shady river bank. Even though I was tired, I still enjoyed my walk. Trastevere is a really colorful typical Roman neighborhood. A bit rough around the ages but trendy and charming. I found some small obscure place for lunch, which was sort of recommended by Yelp. It was tucked away on some side street and there was only one person eating there. I had my doubts but still decided to sit down, as I was really tired and hungry. The food was good – delicious home-made pasta with tomato and bacon sauce but I didn’t enjoy the atmosphere too much. There was construction work going on nearby and loud drilling sounds bothered me. Also, it was a bit chilly outside and I only had a light jacket on. After lunch I lost myself in the neighborhood (on purpose of course!). It was a pleasure to wander around hidden streets and explore. I took some nice photos – I especially like the cat sleeping in a very colorful window.

It was time to get back into the heart of Rome again. There were a few more sights I wanted to explore. After about 10 - 15 minutes walk I found myself on Campo De Fiori – famous market square with the monument to Jordano Bruno, famous heretic who was burned on this spot in 1600. Coincidentally, Campo De Fiori is the starting point of the “Heart of Rome” walk suggested by Rick Steves. Perfect! When I was looking around, trying to get oriented my gaze fell onto familiar word “Grom”. What a great coincidence! “Grom” is our favorite gelateria from the previous visit in 2011, which we discovered in Florence. We fell in love with their gelato and since then are on the Gelato quest – where do we find the best Gelato and can it be better than Grom’s .  After some deliberation (so many flavors to choose from!), I settled on Baccio and something that sounded like Coco Choco combination and savored it while resting on their comfortable couch. What a nice and delicious break!

My next stop was beautiful piazza Navona with its famous fountain “Four Rivers” by Bernini and the typical Egyptian obelisk. Rome harbors the most number of Egyptian obelisks in the world and they grace Rome’s most important piazzas (typically in they are located in the middle of the piazza in front of the important basilicas). Piazza Navona is a great people scene with street performers, artists painting caricatures and portraits, young lovers passionately embracing (although you can find those all over Rome). I sat there for a while drinking it the scene and moved on to get to my next destination – the Pantheon.

I really regretted that Alex was not with me in Rome, since he is working on the MineCraft model of the Pantheon for his Social Studies project “Night in the Museum”.  I think he would have really enjoyed and appreciated the real thing.  Oh, well, he will have to make do with my amateur photos instead. Pantheon is the epitome of Roman engineering. It is staggering to contemplate how they were able to build it without the use of modern technology – and with such perfect geometric proportion (the whole interior could fit exactly inside the cube).

After visiting Pantheon, I was ready to go back to the hotel for some much needed rest. My feet were killing me but I was happy that I have seen everything that I intended to see during this visit to Rome. I hope to come back to visit Rome again one day soon. It is an eternal city and even though it is extremely crowded, hectic and touristy it is well worth the visit time and again.