Tuesday, August 22, 2000
4:05 p.m.
Boarding our plane in Florence.
I wrote this last section on the flight back to the United States. Ian and I visited Rome after the Assisi trip the day before.
Ian and I went into Rome, which was great. He and I took the train into Rome, meeting a guy who Ian thought was a mule in the drug trade.
We headed to Barberini Square to eat at the Hard Rock Cafe. Ian had lunch there, saying he paid $15 for a steak. He had taken the day off from traveling [to Assisi] because his mother Anna, who runs the St. Teresa group, let him because of all his work Sunday marching everyone back.
Ian wanted to visit the Colosseum because he had not had the chance to see it. Unfortunately, it and the Modern Museum of Art were both closed because it was Monday.
We waited to be called to our table in the Hard Rock bar. A couple of American guys gave the bartender a hard time because he was not serving drinks with ice. The ice machine was broken.
Ian ordered a pork dish with spicy sauce, I a house salad and jambalaya chicken and penne pasta. We both stuffed ourselves, which was great because I knew breakfast would be our usual paltry bread, butter and jelly.
It was weird to speak English in Rome. When I ordered the house salad, they did not have Italian dressing, so I ordered honey mustard.
"What do you call Italian dressing in Italy?" I asked Ian.
Ian asked a cab driver outside the Hard Rock how much he charged. The guy said it would depend on the meter. We settled on 90,000 lire, or $45.
I rolled my window in the rear of the Volvo all the way down, and I stuck out my elbow. It was after midnight, and Rome had become cool. We passed Trajan's Column, the Victor Emmanuel II monument, both lit up at night. The Colosseum was lit up as wellm which was great. Even the inside arches were flooded with light.
We zipped around a rotary in front of it and I got a little nervous at how close we came to another car.
People sat on walls near the Forum during our taxi drive. Lots of people were still walking.
Ian said, "Rome comes alive at night." The reason is everything has cooled down.
After passing the Forum, our driver told us about the road named after Christopher Columbus, which leads directly to the sea. On the righthand side of the road, Ian saw a woman flashing her breasts. Soon we saw lots of women at bus stops and corners. One stood wearing a white bathing-suit-type tank top and bottom. She had a sweater or come jacket on.
Ian asked where the women were from. Our driver said Albania, Romania and the former Yugoslavia. Nice girls, he said.
I drank a lot of water and Pepsi at the Hard Rock because I could tell I was starting to come down with a cold. As a result, I started to feel the need to piss badly.
"You all right, man?" Ian asked me.
I told him what was going on. Ian noticed I had quieted down all of a sudden.
Ian paid our driver 100,000 lire to pay for the trip and the tip. He noticed if we went by the meter, we would have paid less. He was unsure if the driver would take the long way and charge more, though, so he set a price earlier.
After hitting the men's room near the bar at the Country Club, [a nickname for a building at the campground], Ian hd a beer and I had a Coke. We watched a father leave the outdoor, stone-covered area outside the bar carrying his young son.
That's one thing about this country, Ian said, people do everything together.
After walking back to my cabin, I tried to quietly take a shower and prepare for bed. I slept less than three hours, but felt good. I spent a final night in Rome, something else to cherish.
7:40 p.m.
"Erin Brockovich," the first movie of our flight, finished minutes ago.
This morning's drive to Florence was uneventful, aside from the fact that I felt like I was driving through a postcard. All sorts of fields lay along our highway, and although Florence does appear to be more industrialized, I still like how factories and office buildings do not overwhelm the landscape.
The other surprise was Florence's airport, about the size of the Portland International Jetport. Brian said it was so small we all could just wave and be seen from one end of the airport to another.
I bought a bottle of wine for Ian because he paid the taxi bill, as well as a bottle of wine with an oil and vinegar set for Mom and Dad. I got it all at the duty-free shop.
The strange thing was by Sunday, at Tor Vergata, while lots of people swooned, I turned to Ian and said, "You know, I feel pretty good."
"So do I," Ian said.
Ian did a great job Sunday gathering people together to tell them what to do because of the heat. Ian and Brian, along with students and chaperones like me kept getting water.
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