The American - In Italia

I've gotten published in a magazine!

For a writing assignment on voice, we chose an author to parody and apply their style to our own Roma experience. I chose Salinger's style in The Catcher in the Rye and it got published by The American!

As of writing this entry, it can be found on the front page of their website, but here is a direct link:
http://www.theamericanmag.com/article.php?article=2372

Midterm - Macabre Rome: A Cut Above the Rest

My first week in Rome was pleasant enough: puffy white clouds, songbirds in the morning, people smiling in the streets, and dozens of decaying human remains waiting to greet me in churches. In America, you are hard pressed to find a lifeless body on display anywhere outside of a morgue and even then you need a really good reason to see it. I was particularly interested in the heads: the most recognizable and psychological feature now just a mere object. I viewed many sites, but below you’ll only find the spots that were a head and shoulder above the rest.


Saint Valentine, Santa Maria in Cosmedin

I decided to visit this lovely saint’s decapitated cranium on Valentine’s Day, but was surprised to find the 4th century church nearly empty, even though a line wrapped around the building for pictures with its other famous attraction: La Bocca della Verità, or The Mouth of Truth. I guess some people have better things to do on the day of love than visit the dead.

Saint Valentine has got to be the tiniest head I have ever seen, living or departed. It seems at some point a creative monk thought it would be a good idea to shove some red roses on him, almost like Jesus’ crown of thorns. Poor Valentine sadly gazes out at his audience, completely embarrassed by this game of dress up. His missing tooth and jaw added to my pity for him, his golden display case resembling a gilded cage for this once rebelliously romantic saint.


John the Baptist, San Silvestro in Capite

Chopped off by order of King Herod Antipas after a night of drinking, the location of John the Baptist’s true head is claimed by seven places around the world. The church itself is enjoyable enough though, decorated in paintings of decapitations, assassinations, and suffering saints.

I found John in a blindingly white room off to the side and was terrified by what I saw. This particular head is mummified, with a black stone-like cloth tightly covering every inch of his skull and its tilt turning a missing jaw into a permanent scream. The glass case that covers him reflects a nearby red candle’s glow out from his eye sockets (at certain angles) and I was convinced those covered holes could still somehow see me. Where those floor to ceiling bars put there to keep us out, or John the Baptist in?


Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccino

Feng shui meets the macabre in this church’s unique crypt. In 1631, to save space, bodies were exhumed and, for some unknown reason, put up on the walls instead of in containers. There are entire walls filled with skulls carefully stacked upon each other, creating sturdy columns, cute arches, and delightful centerpieces to pelvis star designs. Some even have the skin left on to help you lose your appetite that much easier.

My favorite room was made clear when I was reminded of the true purpose of an idle cranium: the classic skull and crossbones. This piratey design was found in several places throughout the third area of the crypt, adorning the walls above a few lucky (deceased) monks.

For such a dark theme, the monks really did a good job of keeping the place cheerful, with ribcage flowers, hipbone fans, countless vertebrae lining the walls, and a jolly message at the end “What you are now, we once were; what we are now, you shall be.”


David With The Head Of Goliath, Villa Borghese

The last stop on our dark tour of craniums is the master of light and dark himself: Caravaggio. He seemed to have a clear grasp of what an actual decapitated head looks like for this painting, making it the perfect end for those that get lightheaded when viewing the dead. In a twisted decision by a depressed artist, Caravaggio painted the head in his own likeness as David sadly looks on. This was a point in Caravaggio’s life when he was desperate to go back to Rome, the city he was exiled from for killing a man, a feeling shown in this somber painting.


This is only a small sampling of the captivatingly decapitated heads to be found in Rome. And whether your visit takes you to catacombs or crypts, you can always rest in peace knowing that if the dead become a bit overwhelming, your exit to the world of the living is always near.

A Writing Assignment - Acting Silly In Portugal

You ever say a word or sentence and instantly know you’ve said something stupid? The moment of realization is always a millisecond too late, as everyone is suddenly paying attention, and everyone catches and repeats the unfortunate remark.

I usually think before I speak, but when asked if I wanted to travel for Spring Break my mouth blurted out “yes!” The last trip I had was to Boston, with my constant companion: homework. I’ve never had a trip where I didn’t bring along the extra baggage of a to-do list, and I desperately needed one.

I didn’t leave Portugal with a deeper understanding of something. I didn’t learn anything, I didn’t see connections, and I didn’t gain insight into myself. I had the first ever break in my life, and it was fun.

Three of us journeyed together to Cascais, Portugal, where we spent about a week relaxing and doing nothing, saying and doing whatever popped into our mind.


“Sinestra.”

Actually it’s Sintra, but that didn’t stop me from incorrectly asking baffled locals about it. By the time I got the actual name down, my friends made sure confuse me again.

Sintra is a historic wonderland of castles and shops, but what interested me most was Quinta da Regalerira, an estate created by an eccentric millionaire in the late 1800’s. It turned out he basically created a Discovery Zone for adults complete with a secret laboratory, trick mirror floors, and underground tunnels in the maze-like park. We were little kids again: scaring each other, searching for caves, climbing up medieval-looking towers. By the time we saw everything here it was well past closing time and we had to head back down to Cascais, the foreboding Moore Castle on the top of the mountain would have to wait for another trip.


“Do They Shoot Each Other?”

My friend Maggie posed this question while we watched a sporting event on television. Skiers raced cross country while stopping to shoot targets, and unfortunately Maggie thought targets might have a more menacing definition than a bullseye.

Television took up a lot of my time in Portugal. Comfy beds mixed with a plasma television tuned to American broadcasts were the perfect recipe for many lazily spent hours as the Cascais weather turned sour. Early on it was realized that this was not a vacation to be spent running from place to place, we chose the beach because we wanted relaxation, and as long as the stress of studying abroad in Rome was forgotten, the trip was a success. Silent hours, talkative ones, even hours spent snacking on groceries instead of eating out, the hotel room became a sanctuary we could return to at any time without the guilt of missing some must-see attraction.


“I Thought There Was a Roller Coaster.”

Having gone the whole week without a memorable verbal error, Allie joined the ranks while looking through a pamphlet at a Lisbon hostel. The three musketeers were now down to two as we spent our last night in a new city. The pamphlet in question was about Go Cars, a fantastic way to announce to the world you were a tourist, and the cover featured a giant city-wide roller coast that my friend momentarily took for real.

We wanted to be tourists. We wanted to see the sights. And we wanted a talking Go Car. Luckily, all three dreams came true in the form of a bright yellow three wheeled scooter/car that I had to sign my life away to obtain after I chose to not purchase the auto insurance. The appeal is its internal GPS that triggers recordings telling you where to turn and the history behind what you are seeing. An hour or so after angering our car with wrong turns, we received the silent treatment from her after her wiring came loose. Either way, it was well worth the money to speed through Lisbon at half the height of the cars surrounding me.


Now I’m back in Rome. This morning I woke up in Lisbon at seven o’clock, went from taxi to plane to bus to metro to elevator, and hauled my luggage back into my room to unpack, learning just how unfortunate it is to combine European daylight savings time with a Portugal to Italy time zone difference. I thought about my Spring Break all the way back to Rome, trying to find some hidden jewel or life changing message behind everything I’ve done in the past week, but the first thing I keep thinking about is all the fun I had talking, listening, and goofing around with my American friends in Portugal.

A Writing Assignment (aka homework) - Wandering

Walking through Rome is always a tale of discovery. The roads twist and turn with the flow of the city, losing you in its comforting maze until suddenly it opens up and you are awestruck, faced with a bright piazza containing some grand fountain. This could never happen in the United States. This couldn’t happen anywhere else in Europe. Only in Rome do the streets suck you in and lose you, hiding its treasures within a labyrinth of city life.

Most of the days I’ve been here have been gloomy and full of rain, until suddenly, at the end of February, the clouds opened up and warm breeze brought out the people of Rome. It was amazing to see how quick a city could change: windows opened, clotheslines were filled, and every eatery was empty as people opted to eat outside in the sun. I had wandered through Rome before, feeling a little like a tourist my first two weeks as every monument and fountain surprised and delighted me, though I couldn’t help but panic a little when I somehow saw the Pantheon three times on the way home.

Thankfully now I can walk a little slower through the streets, vaguely knowing which way my apartment is and becoming familiar with the main roads. Each landmark is a polite reminder of the area I’m in, telling me which way I need to go if I’m lost, or where not to turn if I feel like exploring a little more.

I always prefer to take side streets over the larger roads when I’m not in a hurry. Crowds there are quick, having no interest in their stunning surroundings, but keeping their goal in mind as they charge at you. People don’t stay to a certain side and they always have more of a right to the path then you do, playing a game of chicken as a group walks straight at you till you are forced to jump off the sidewalk, narrowly missing a speeding car.

And the city changes throughout the day too. A nice stroll in the morning is the ideal time to see the ancient landmarks of the city. As you walk down Via dei Fori Imperiali the area is practically deserted and people are even able to jog in the streets. The sun basks everything in an orange glow making even the ordinary beautiful. On the weekend the silence is only broken by a few birds or a car slowly driving by while the city sleeps in.

The middle of the day brings out all the tourists, crowding areas as Romans push past the stationary people studying maps. This is the best time to visit the countless churches of the city. It is always a relief to walk into one as the cool darkness covers you and the chaos of the city is shut out the moment the door closes. These are proud places, each one adorned with beautiful sculptures and paintings, sacred relics hidden away in niches and a grand nave and apse designed to take the breath away of everyone who enters, religious or not. Even if I have a destination in mind, it’s always nice to step inside for a moment to relax when the crowds and twisting streets become too much.

At night quiet piazzas turn into noisy hangouts as people crowd areas like Trastevere, populating hip bars and cozy restaurants and crowding the streets as they yell across to one another and vendors fight to sell their wares. As I walk through the brisk night air the warm smell of roasted chestnuts on every corner near Spagna reminds me of Christmas songs and suddenly the vendors seem so out of place without snow. A nighttime stroll becomes more about the people as light allows darkness to fade away the tops of buildings and statues and chooses instead to illuminate a person twirling in the distance.

It’s easy to lose track of time when walking through Rome. The constant changes keep your interest as a street you’ve been to earlier in the day is transformed when you find it again. It’s fascinating but exhausting, and by the time night falls you realize just how badly your feet hurt from the uneven cobblestone. It’s only then that I realize I should start heading back to the predictability of my apartment, as I see Basilica di San Giovanni in Laterano in the distance, the last reminder that I’m on my way home.

The Roman Catacombs

I visited the Catacombs of Domitilla at the beginning of my time in Rome. It is the largest of Rome’s catacombs, containing over 450,000 bodies and the only one to still contain bones. Amazingly, the entrance is through an underground sunken basilica that was rediscovered in the 1500’s.

The tour is pretty straightforward: you get a tour guide, he tells you about the church, the history of the catacombs, and gives you a basic run through of Christian symbols you’re about to see before taking you into the maze of tombs itself. The great part about Domitilla is it’s infamous for having funny tour guides. I guess they figure if you’re already going to be spending an hour below ground amongst the dead, you’re bound to appreciate a little bit of morbid humor.

I wonder what it would be like, leading people through a place like this everyday. When you are hired, they have you wander around the catacombs, granting you access to every floor, every room, so you can familiarize yourself with the area and choose the paths you’ll lead people through. This also serves as a mini-initiation to their group, as most people get hopelessly lost for hours in the beginning and the experienced others leave them to find their own way out.

The actual catacombs are cold and damp, which for some reason came as a surprise to me. Water dripped off the walls even though it was a warm and sunny day outside. This is actually a result of all the people that go into the complex daily, as the moisture from our breath has no where to go. The unfortunate side effect of this is that it creates the perfect atmosphere for moss, which in turn is destroying many of the perfectly preserved frescoes. I was lucky enough to see a beautiful fresco in a wealthy family tomb, as our tour guide informed us that it would be closed to visitors forever starting in March. In the top corner of the room was a huge green mass was creeping into the more colorful parts of the artwork.

Many of the tombs are unsealed and empty. This is a result of various invasions of Rome, when invaders opened thousands of tombs looking for valuables. Unfortunately for them, Christians at the time believed in being buried as Jesus was: wrapped in linen with no possessions. For some reason, after discovering numerous tombs like this, the invaders reasoned that they should continuing opening tombs, as the first couple hundred that contained nothing couldn’t possibly mean the next hundred wouldn’t as well. This is amazing logic for people who just successfully toppled an empire and managed to conquer its capital.

I think the part that stuck with me the most though was the air shafts. Catacomb workers were pretty much their own bosses, deciding where to dig and how many people they could fit into a wall. This lead to a series of unorganized, maze-like pathways that went deeper and deeper underground. To get supplies in an out, and to keep the area livable, workers carved out large shafts to the surface to let in air, light, and to provide a means to lower down supplies. The curious thing is, they also used these as a shortcut to get outside. Within the air shafts are carved small holes for feet and hands so they could climb out. It is mind blowing to think about the skill and lives of these workers, carving holes in wall as they climb up, spending their days in the dark with the dead, and figuring out how to fit another body in an already cramped section as if they were bottles of olive oil on a shelf.

Each catacomb of Rome contains something different from the rest, whether it be ancient papal tombs or the first depiction of a bearded Christ. They might not be as grotesque and flashy as the Parisian catacombs, but their subtle charm and humble modesty, combined with a good sense of humor, is sure to bring me back before the end of my stay.