wet wet rome

the road to rome is not built in a day and it is not easy indeed. i have finally added italy as another destination i have visited after a lot of time spent in front of the computer.
it was a pure free and easy trip with no guide (damn...not even a guide book and i am bad at history) and a lot of walking.
it is early to bed and early to rise during this trip. thank goodness aunt could keep up with the pace and no mishap happened.
however, the pouring rain welcome we received in rome was not ideal to start the tour. it was horrible...the worst one could have on a wintery day. as soon as we checked-in at our hotel which was only 5 mins walk from the railway station, it rained. it got heavier in the afternoon accompanied by wind. brr....we had our waterproof jackets on and tried to explore as much as we could but to no avail. we then hopped onto one of those hop-on-off busses in the city and sat in the bus for more than one hour looking at the rain and wet city from inside. sigh,...i din even know what the pantheon looked like...shit...and did not enter vatican museum. really shitty.

our small hotel room. all those papers were taken out from my bag and we had to blow dry everything. i was sitting in front of the dryer for more than 2 hours blowing and blowing...papers, passport, shoes, socks, jackets, bags.
the train terminal and bus terminal, side by side.

streets of rome...typical buildings and small cars everywhere. i thought i was going to see a lot of alfa romeos and fiats (their own made right?) but nooo. lots of renault, citroen, smart, and all small cars u can think of lah. the traffic was ceaseless and there was congestion everywhere. well, in rome, if you see a road, just drive. the same goes for pedestrian, u dun have to wait for the green light, just walk or cross wherever u are. i salute their parking skills. the cars could squeeze in any space available on the street, well, any permissible available space. they could squeeze till there is no space for one person to pass through. salute.

before it rained. santa maria maggiore. on our way from the termini to colloseo.

the awesome colosseo. it had started drizzling at that time. paid 12 Euro to get in. all entrance fees are expensive here and most of the more famous sites need fees. they have a lift for us to go to the first level.


normal entrance fee was 9 Euro but they charged another 3 for you to see the exhibitions of statues. nope, u cannot say you dun want to see the exhibition. italians are leech!!! really sucked all the money from your pocket.

the arch outside, roman gladiators for you to pose and take photos with (u have to pay of course) and foro romano.

ruins, ruins everywhere. i could smell the ruins when i hit the street. no, no...not exaggerating. hhaha. this should be campidoglio along via dei fori imperiali. via means road.

piazza venezia. this is their monument to remember fallen soldiers i think. very impressive. it started pouring here and we had to get shelter at the back of the piazza at the entrance of the museum.

vatican city aka san petro. the bus brought us here, it would have taken forever to walk here, so far. the christmas tree was not even done yet. yeah, you do not really see many christmas decorations here unlike in germany. i heard the cathedral was unique inside...aaah...did not enter as it was almost dark already then. next time, haha...i will definitely go to rome again. this i promise.

last place we visited in rome, trevi fountain. very beautiful even as night fell. no one toss any coin. ppl said if you throw a coin, it means you will be coming back. gulp...and i did not but i wanna go back. well, i am saving that coin for my next trip.

walked to piazza barberini and looked for hard rock cafe...all in the rain. i saw the hrc there when the bus passed by...since i got order for a teeshirt, and i saw the hrc, i got it lo. we made hrc shop wet. hhaaa...water marks were everywhere trailing us. no wonder the sales were looking at us with a kind of look. die hard fan or what.

by the time we got down to the bus stop at the piazza it was already passed 6. and damn! the hop -on-off bus stopped their operation at 6p.m.! they did not tell us that. luckily, a kind bus driver of one of the buses who happened to park there with the door opened while waiting for the light to turn green, took a pity on us. the assistant was shaking her head saying "no, no, we finish". and when i asked how to walk to termini, the driver just waved for us to get in. it would have been a long walk. thank you kind bus driver.

italians are really friendly. it is something i realise. even if they do not understand english, but as soon as they understand certain keywords ie names of places u wanna go to, they will start pointing and using gestures to show u the way. they will stop for you as soon as you ask them and listen to you even when they do not understand. oh, how i love them. english is not widely spoken nor used nor understood here, but fret not, you will not get lost. the italians will help you.

it was a tiring and soaking first day.