24/11 Lazy Roaming in Rome

Thursday 24 November

A funny thing happened (and not on the way to the Forum). We heard the bells strike 12 but we knew it was 12.15 already. We realised that they strike the hour every 15 minutes and add a further *dong* (at a different pitch) for every extra 15 minutes. So 11 and 3 *dongs* is a quarter to 12.

We made a late start today after blogging and booking a hostel in Florence. There wasn’t a lot left to do – a slow saunter to Santa Maria de Maggiore, one of the four biggest basilicas in Rome. It was very beautiful and had some impressive artworks but nothing remotely like St Paul’s. Having said that, it was a busy working church with several priests taking confessions in various languages and groups of people sitting in various side alcoves. They even started a Mass in one of them – hard to tell how much of it was in Latin or Italian? Generally, it felt a lot more like a house of religion than all of the others we had seen. It was noticeable that the side areas where the “confessors” were kneeling were open to general view, and in one case the priest actually had a window open in the front of his box and could be seen by passers-by. This didn’t look like the way Al Pacino does it.

From there, we doglegged slightly to take in the Domus Aureo – the Gold Home area that Nero started after the great fire. Apparently it followed sensational new design principles and had radical new features but sadly none of it survives. There were only some very bare ruins that were fenced in although, ironically, some derelicts had forced their way through and were stretched out on their cardboard sheets in the corners.

We sat in the warm sun for a while, watching the passers-by and then turned left which, very conveniently, took us directly home! We had overheard Franco telling a new guest about the local supermarket, which is located right on the corner and is quite huge. Just not very well advertised at street level. Once again, bananas, grapes, apples, pears etc were all selling for less than E2 per kilo. Where is our money going in Australian shops?

We decided we were due for a treat and sat down in a local restaurant for lunch. We shared a plate of cold meats and olive/mozzarella/crumbed thingies and a very large pizza, rolled very thin but with a good topping of slightly hot salami, artichokes and olives.

J put in several hours sorting out photos for the last 3 days and adding some to the blogs. We strolled back to the station to confirm the details about catching the train tomorrow – our tickets didn’t specify the seat numbers or even the date. Having sorted that out we came home for an early night.