Friday, 27 June

Friday, 27 June 2014

Siamo a Roma!  (We are in Rome!)  It feels surreal to be here, halfway around the world, in a place I've looked at all my life on maps.  We just arrived last  night, and what a trial the travel was!  Such a long flight (11 hrs to Frankfurt), a redeye, then a transfer flight. In the Rome airport we were supposed to get a SIM card for the unlocked cell phone we had bought in Seattle for that purpose, but it wouldn't take the card, so he tried to sell us a new phone "guaranteed to work"--we figured no option, but then once everything was added up, 160 euros!  No way, we said, and he was annoyed, but I think it was a scam. It meant we had no phone, though.  We gave up on the phone for the moment, figured out how to take a train, then it was just too confusing to figure out which bus to take so we gave up and took a taxi the last few miles.  The taxi driver didn't speak much English, and had never heard of the street our apartment was on--very reassuring... He did find the place, driving through cobblestone streets just wide enough for a row of scooters on one side and pedestrians avoiding the taxi as it came by.  It was 9 pm local time, about 22 hours after we had left our house in Seattle. No one got more than 2-3 hours of sleep on the plane, so we were pretty fried at that point.  The person who was supposed to meet us to let us into the apartment was not there when we arrived, which was just about the last straw for all of us. We were standing on a tiny street in the middle of Rome (Campo dei Fuori neighborhood, known for its nightlife), with all our luggage, not knowing a soul, and what would we do if Diego didn't show up with the key?  So, for now I will leave you there, waiting on the street with le valigie (luggage) and we will see how things end up.