WHEN IN ROME

That's right! First weekend in Italy...obviously we spent it in Roma! My roommates and I, along with 16 or so others took the train late Friday night to Rome. We checked into our Hostel called "Hotel Beautiful 2". The man working at the desk was a complete creep and had no clue what was going on. He kept messing up our reservation. I will NOT be going there again! Aside from the hostel, our first hour in Rome was amazing. The train ride was easy, the hostel was easy to locate, and we went on a search for some Discotecas soon after we got situated in our rooms. Unfortunately, we didn't know that nightlife in Rome is treated like fashion week in New York; if you are not dressed in an extremely nice outfit you will be turned away from every club! It was disappointing because we all just wanted to dance, but we made our own fun and the night turned out to be interesting anyways.

On Saturday we woke up at 10am, showered, and ran out the door to go to the Colosseum! We took a cab because it was far from our hostel. The drive was fun because our cabbie was playing American music that we had never even heard before, but LOVED! Me and Colleen are already planning on downloading the songs. We didn't know what to expect of the Colosseum, but as soon as we turned left onto a street, it was standing right in front of us. It was hands down the most amazing moment of my life. I've taken many art history type classes and have spent months learning about the Colosseum. To see it just standing there in all it's brilliance was mind-blowing. I got so emotional I thought I was going to cry. It was SO BEAUTIFUL! Colleen and I were disappointed when we found out that the rest of the group didn't want to go inside of it, but we are planning on going back in a few weekends, so we're planning on seeing the inside of it then. We were all starving so we stopped for pizza on our way to the Trevi fountain. We went the wrong way once on our journey to the fountain, but quickly realized our mistake and turned around. The Trevi Fountain was gorgeous. We treated ourselves to some gelato and sat by the water while eating it. And of course, we threw a few coins in the fountain for good luck :) From there we walked to the Spanish steps, which just so happen to be by the fashion district/streets of Rome. We walked by Gucci, Jimmy Choo, Louis Vuitton, and so many more. We were all in awe of how many people we saw walking down the streets actually holding these designer name shopping bags! Wish I had that much money to go shopping with! We did eventually make our way to a store called Zara (kind of like an Italian Forever 21, but a little nicer). I let myself splurge a little and got a very cute trenchcoat that I'm obsessed with for 30 euros...a very good price I decided! After shopping, we walked to the Vatican City which is a very conservative Catholic city. We had to wait in security lines for a while and go through the whole airport security procedure. People who aren't dressed conservatively enough are turned away, but luckily all of us were dressed appropriately. We went into th basillica of the church. It was beautiful! Mass had just started so we stood and listened to some of the hymns for a little bit, and then stopped at the gift shop and got postcards.

After the Vatican we took the Metra (like a subway) back to our hostel. WHAT an interesting ride. We got our tickets and waited for it to come. I'm not 100% sure, but I'm pretty sure a man tried to pick-pocket me!!! We were standing waiting for the bus/train and i felt something at my waist. It coul've been a water bottle or something, but when I looked to my right there was a man standing there with a jacket over his arm that was kind of covering my purse. I grabbed my purse and walked away. I instantly checked my purse and my zipper was opened! I was pretty sure I had zipped it right after getting my ticket because I was so nervous about taking the Metra. I checked and everything was there still. I think I caught him right before he was going to grab my wallet, which was on top, but all of my money, passport, cameras, etc. was still in my purse. Phew! Needless to say, I held on to my purse very tightly for the rest of the day. There was some big rugby game in Rome that day because there were tons of people from Ireland repping their teams' jerseys. One stop after we were on the Metra, about 20 fans shoved themselves into our tiny car. We legitimetly couldn't move! It was so jam-packed we didn't even need to hold on because of all the bodies around us. The man with the big belly by me was being of great support. But we got home with no navigation problems, so the Metra was a huge success!

Rome was absolutely amazing!!! I can't wait to tell you all about our field trip to Florence coming up on Wednesday. Until then, ciao!