On Tuesday we went on a trip to the Vatican City Museum and Saint Peter's Basilica. My roommates and I decided to walk to the museum instead of taking a cab. It was a good thing we allowed a lot of time to get there because it took us 45 minutes and several stops for directions to get there. (The two most important Italian words I have learned are "dove," meaning "where," and "grazie," meaning "thank-you.") It was a nice walk, despite the distance because we got to walk along the Tiber River.
Once in the museum we received headsets so we could hear our tour guide. She took us to a courtyard where I got to see a giant sculpture of Augustus' head as well as a bronze sculpture that was a gift to Saint John Paul II. Our guide told us all about the Sistine Chapel and explained why we can't take pictures in there. Apparently when the Sistine Chapel needed to be cleaned the Vatican received the funding from Japanese television companies who to this day own all video and photographic rights for the chapel. From there we started to walk through some of the galleries. The Vatican Museum is enormous, and there are always some exhibits closed for restorations.
We saw many works of art from the classical period. I was able to see my favorite classical sculpture, which depicts the priest Laocoon and his sons as they are being attacked by a sea monster. The scene it depicts is from the Aeneid, which I studied senior year of high school as well as this past spring. Everything in the museum was beautiful, from the mosaic floors to the painted ceilings that looked three-dimensional. I loved seeing the classical art preserved in the same building as Christian works of art. It was a reminder that despite different beliefs, everyone appreciates beautiful things. Preserving the past of other cultures is much better than simply destroying anything that represents something different from us.
Our tour of the museum ended in the Sistine Chapel. I wish that I could have taken pictures, but even then there is no way to capture the magnificence of the paintings. I can't imagine the amount of work that Michelangelo put into that masterpiece. The ceiling has the power to make you feel so insignificant as you try in vain to see the whole of it at once. The Sistine Chapel was so captivating that I didn't even notice the crowds that normally would have made me uncomfortable.
From there we went to Saint Peter's Basilica. Saint Peter's is a work of art, and a very large one at that. The building is enormous and is elaborately decorated with mosaics composed of tiny pieces of stone. After seeing the inside, we were able to climb the dome on top of the basilica. Some of the group opted to take an elevator part of the way up, but I wanted to climb all of the stairs, despite the fact that I was wearing a maxi dress. The climb was totally worth it as the view from the top is spectacular. I could see all of Rome, including some of the sites I have been to on my class excursions. It made me appreciate living in Rome even more because I get to explore the city I was seeing from high up on the dome.
I don't have any classes on Friday and there was no planned excursion for this weekend, so on Friday I decided to go to the beach with some of my friends. We caught a bus to the metro station in the morning, and from there we caught a train to Ostia. Ostia was the port of Rome in ancient times, and I hope to be able to make a trip to Ostia Antica before leaving Rome. The beach at Ostia was beautiful, but the sand was unbearably hot. I felt like I was burning my feet when I would dash from my beach towel to the cold water. I alternated between cooling off in the water and reading a book in the hot sun while laying on my beach towel. I made sure to apply sunscreen every hour and I managed to avoid getting badly sunburnt despite being out there for a few hours.
A friend who has been to Rome before recommended to me that I visit the catacombs, and others on the trip had been wanting to visit them, so on Saturday a group of us went to the Catacombs of Priscilla. Priscilla was a noblewoman who converted to Christianity and donated her home to the Christians to be used as a burial site. Thousands of Christians were buried there from the 2nd to 5th centuries. The catacombs were carved out of volcanic rock that is radioactive, so we were limited to 30 minutes on our tour. Most of the bodies have decayed to dust by now and most of the remaining bones have been removed since the tombs were vandalized for the marble after the rediscovery of the catacombs.
The catacombs were rather creepy and smelled awful, and I felt like I was intruding on people's final resting place, even though most of the bodies are gone. Nevertheless it was an interesting experience. The catacombs contained several frescoes that are still visible. One of the images is the oldest depiction of the Virgin Mary, which is dated to around 220 a.d. Other images were of Jesus as the Good Shepherd and the Three Wise Men visiting baby Jesus. I was very glad I made the trip to the catacombs, as I got to see something that not many people who visit Rome get to see.
This week I have two midterm exams for which I have spent all of today studying. This weekend, however, I get to travel to Pompeii! I have been looking forward to visiting Pompeii all summer, so be on the lookout for a lengthy post about my experiences there.
Until then,
Allison
Laocoon and his sons being attacked by a sea serpent
I had to fight my way through a crowd of other tourists to get this picture.
St. Peter's Basilica
On top of the dome
I took off my shoulder wrap after the lengthy (and hot) climb.
The beach we went to in Ostia
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