20 March 2011: Rome Day Three.

Up early again this morning and down to our local café to have our usual café latte and pastry breakfast. Been eying those Sicilian cannoli's for a few days now and wondering if it’s appropriate to pig out on sweets first thing in the morning.

The first day I visited the café, I asked Michelle to order me 2 cups of café latte thinking (don’t ask me why) that they would be much smaller than the one’s we have in Melbourne and that two would be the equivalent. Seems that’s not the case and I have amused everyone in the café with my order. I’m a stubborn man, or so I’ve been told, and so I’m going to stand in this café and drink my mistake as if it was how I intended. Michelle and the coffee maker guy seem to be really amused….damn that language barrier thingy.

Anyway, back to the cannoli, didn’t have the courage to buy one after the two-café lattes the day before, but vow to do so before leaving Rome.

The public bus system is really good here and you can pretty much go anywhere in the city for 4 Euros per day, the equivalent of $6.00. What we didn’t realise was that today was the Rome Marathon and many of the inner streets had been blocked off for the event.

Our bus came to a cross road right near St Peters where Police were redirecting motorists away from the city as the roads had been closed off due to the race. I was amazed to see people drive their cars and scooters up to the middle of the intersection, thereby blocking all traffic, get out of their cars and have a debate with the Police about the inconvenience they were being caused by the redirection. What was more amazing is that the Police engaged them in the debate……..only in Rome!

The Marathon was a great opportunity to stroll the city without the traffic, we were able to amble along the roads and stop periodically to clap the runners. Made me want to get fit and come back and do it myself next year…. or perhaps just do as some people did today and reserve a table on one of the corner Restaurants and eat, drink and clap the participants from there. Either way, I think I might be back to see it again next year.

Michelle had the whip out and cracking in the afternoon and boy did we cover some territory, the girl likes to walk! In the afternoon, we visited some really wonderful buildings including the church, Saint Agnes at the Piazza Navona where we lit candles for my very good friend Andrew and for Gabriel. We also visited The Pantheon. which was the one that struck me the most. This is an amazing structure some 1,950 years old and perfectly built and preserved. Because it is clad in brick, it was completely protected and prevented various popes, emperors etc from robbing the temple of its most magnificent marble. The construction’s foundation is also made up of concrete..…yes, over 1,950 years ago the Romans were laying foundations of concrete for their buildings. We came, we saw, we concreted!

That’s all very interesting and I’m sure you’re impressed, but what followed at the Stazione Termini is far more interesting and entertaining. We had to go there in the late afternoon and purchase our tickets for the train trip to Cinque Terre in a few days time.

There are plenty of shady characters there and I can tell you, Michelle was not at all comfortable going there. She gave some pretty good advice about watching my bag (yep, have taken to carrying a man bag, but that’s another story) and really had my sense of awareness heightened.

We tried to purchase the tickets via the self serve machines that are positioned around the station and were immediately approached and watched by several guys only too willing to “help”. In the end, Michelle was operating the machine and I stood behind her watching the scammers. They were brazen and fearless in their approach and I witnessed 3 people being ripped off within the space of 5 minutes.

In the end, we felt so uncomfortable that we left the machines and queued to purchase the tickets from an operator. The line was long and the patience of some of our group of travellers (not me) was running very short. We were very close to the counter when I glanced over at Michelle and she was very much taking up the space around her and shooting sideway glances at me. Behind her was a rather agitated looking gentleman with two train tickets in his hand and he was leaning all over her trying to push past. I motioned to her to move over to where I was standing and she gave me a very resolute nod, no way.

As I moved closer to Michelle she said, “this guy is leaning all over me and is trying to push past, I’m not letting that happen…” A few more minutes passed and he continued to push up against her to the point where I turned to him and said, “hey, don’t push her, back off” He stepped back but still looked agitated.

After a few more minutes, this guy leans into me and starts waving his tickets in my face and speaking in Italian at me. Michelle had armed me with one phrase that she said would get me out of any trouble at any time so I decided this was that time, “Non parlo Italiano/I don’t speak Italian” This didn’t seem to help, he just kept on his barrage at me until I turned to a very silent Michelle and said, “can you help me out with this please…” She and the guy then had a very heated exchange of words, which seemed to be about his tickets. Michelle was shaking her head, pointing at her watch and standing her ground so that this guy couldn’t pass.

He was not a happy chap, he started to engage people around us and even I didn’t need to understand Italian to know that he was being very disrespectful. Finally, we reached the counter and he was called up to the one right beside us. We finished our transaction and it appeared that his endeavours to exchange his tickets had failed and he was looking for retribution. As we passed him to walk out the door he said something that I didn’t understand but completely got, it had only been 2 days and a few hours and one of the locals had told me to get f….d.

Still unsure of what had transpired, I stopped and turned to Michelle and said, “did he just swear at me?” “he sure did” came the reply but we were already on our way home.

Outside I said to Michelle, “what the hell was that all about? I trotted out that phrase you taught me, non parlo Italiano, and he just completely ignored me”. She had a bit of a giggle and said, “I know, when you said that I thought, gee that sounds like you really can speak Italian, your accent was perfect….” So my only defence is going to get me into more trouble…..its been abandoned.

It was a long day and a fairly quiet bus trip home, but every now and then we caught each others eye and had a giggle about my little friend at the Stazione Termini, he wont be forgotten.