Rome - Day 1

So far so long. Again the Rome experience delayed. Not to mention, the work is getting hectic coz the production release is nearing.

It was jus 2 weeks before that we had been on a Swiss trip and now, we were getting ready for the Rome trip. As usual tripadvisor is the best source for any planning. Kusuma in her free time investigated more about Rome to make our trip more fruitful. She proposed that we could either travel to Venice/Pisa on Saturday so that we also get to see one more city in Italy.

So, the itinerary was finalized. Our flight to Rome was on Friday evening from Brussels via Brussels Airlines this time. We reached Rome at around 10:40 PM and by the time we walked to the train station at the airport, it took some time. There was a huge queue in front of the Ticket Vending Machines and we missed the 11:00 PM train. Managed to get tickets before the next train at 11:36 PM.

The funniest thing that happened when we were in the queue to get the tickets from the Vending machine. The Vending Machine (atleast when I selected English) clearly mentioned that it does not accept CASH. Either Credit/Debit card. But there was this group of people who were trying to force the Vending machine to accept Euros.

Later, when we got the tickets using our card; they were so surprised and they looked at us like we’d just discovered something no one there knew!! How could people be so dumb? The vending Machines are very very user friendly. Again, ladies and gentleman; I selected ENGLISH. I know not of other languages messages on the Vending Machine. I understand only ONE international Language and that’s ENGLISH.

Given that it was Easter that weekend, Rome was packed to its limit; hence we’d booked a room for 4 people near termini. I repeat. It was ‘a room for four’. Yes, we wanted to stay near termini as it has great accessibility when you are entering Rome as a visitor and that too jus for 2 days/2 nights.

It was a very short sleep. Next day, we had to wake up at 4 AM to get ready to leave for Pisa. The Hotel guy had managed to give us some “breakfast” last night when we asked him. We just managed to gulp the over concentrated Orange Juice and a Croissant and leave for the station. The station was jus a couple of mins walk from the Hotel. Oh yes!! The name of the Hotel was Cherubini.

Kusuma and I left 15 mins (by 5:45AM) early to get to the vending machine to buy the tickets to Pisa for the 6:09 (not very sure about the minute) AM train. Arun and Vinod made it in no time and meanwhile, I was in another queue to buy cappuccino for us. We managed to get into the train jus a couple of before the scheduled departure. The cappuccino I must admit was truly amazing.

Ah! I had forgotten to tell you one important thing. By now, we were “Feeling Home at Rome”. Why? Rome is dirtier than India. Atleast the surroundings of the Termini Station. The trains here make almost the same sound “Tuk Tuk.. Tuk Tuk” as their counterpart back in India. The people more importantly are like India very Warm, Friendly and yes, they do understand and speak good English.

We met Vikram in the train. Who is he?? As usual, we 4 (Vinod, Arun, Kusuma and I) talk a lot doesn’t matter where we are. He heard us talking in Kannada and he came searching from the other end of the coach. He’s a Banglorean who works in Copenhagen and he alone knows how much he was yearning to talk to people in Kannada. We had a nice time talking and talking and talking and taking some pictures ofcourse. We never realized we were in the train for 4 hours.

We were on the streets of Pisa walking towards One of the many attractions in the City(err.. should I say World); The Leaning Tower of Pisa. By now, we were quite hungry and hit an Italian restaurant on the way. All we ate was just Pizza. Sluuurrpp.. It was very very delicious. My mouth starts watering just remembering the Pizza taste. It was full of cheese and the sauce was not much, the crust was very thin; as thin as that of our tandoori roti.

We got to the Tower after a heavy lunch. Shot some pics and roamed around; bought some souvenirs. Ate ice cream. Slept on the grass bed in front of the Tower. We were in Sun after a very long Winter. It was just amazing.

The walk back to the station was tiring as the mercury was at 27 degrees. It was worth the long train journey back to Rome. All of us dozed off to sleep after some coke and were glad to realize when we woke up that we all had a sound sleep and our pizzas had digested making way for another long walk in Rome and then planned an Indian Dinner at Guru.

Once back in Rome, we left our bags at the hotel and then walked all the way to the Colosseum. On the way, witnessed a ceremony at the Mother Mary church a little distance from the hotel. We were there at the colosseum finally after a long search and the shutterbug in me started capturing this Giant Arena in various angles.

All people said to me usually was “Have your passports handy while not in your native country”. When we were at the Colosseum, we realized why. The crowd was sparse and unknowingly we had entered the Colosseum from behind. We never had realized that there were Police who were also watching people. We were wondering why people were not in sight in this part and thinking that it might be well late and tourists were all gone. But after some time, a couple of Police officers walked up to us and started questioning. They demanded our Passports. Atleast I was frightened when he asked me to show my wallets and stuff. Known and heard of “Mugging” while in the US, I got apprehensive. Later once he was fine with our identification, he said that lot of drug-trafficking happen in Rome and he let go us off. We were walking towards the exit and then we realized that the whole crowd was at the front of the monument and that we had entered it from behind.

Then we walked all the way till Piaza Venezia, then to the Trevi Fountain. We had decided that we would have an Indian dinner and Kusuma had researched and decided that we would dine at “IL Guru”. It was an amaaaaaazing dinner. The spice and taste was just superb.

So, Rome, it was night and we took a walk back to the hotel as it was just a couple of kilometres. The walk back in the night was good with the Easter setting for the next morning.