Pisa & Rome - Italy feel of being @ home

I must say that it was a well planned trip to Pisa and Italy to cover the wonders of the world.
Our planning started almost 2 months before to this place. We booked all our tickets and room as we were going during easter and one can imagine the amount of people and rush in the Holy Catholic city during easter.
Yes!! Yet again that was a long weekend. A long weekend in the mid of April. We were all set and ready at the airport. Contrary to our trip to Swiss, the flights were in the evening. Good that we did not have to strain ourselves early morning to get to the airport. Huh!! We were relieved of all these tensions the moment our tickets were booked.

Our flight departure was at 20:45 and we arrived at Da Vinci airport in Rome by 22:55.

We went out to enquire taxi fare from the airport to the hotel and the taxi drivers charged an extra amount. we were warned by the hotel receptionist that we have to bargain for the right price with an indication of what the right price could be.The last train from the airport train station to the Rome city train station called Roma Termini was at 11:36. We missed the one at 11:06 cos of ticket vending machine and cluelessly operating dumb people in front of us in the long queue. People selected their own mother tongue to operate the vending machine that was so obvious and easy to operate and still finding it so difficult and wasting everyone's time. Do you think this is the first hint of feeling at home? No I still think common man in our country is not so dumb given a choice of operating in their mother tongue.

The actual feeling started when we boarded the train and the train started. That was an electric train like all European trains and was called "Da Vinci Express". Express train here in Italy covers a distance of 30km in 30min with the same sound and movement a train would make in India like a mom swinging the child in the cradle. For a moment when we closed our eyes we could not think that we were out of our motherland.

As we got closer into the city we could see filth and garbage dumped everywhere in large lumps in one corner. The houses were painted with colour shades that are used in our country too. There were many buildings with patches of painting as they were I believe painted decades ago. A feel of being @ home. Our journey begins.

We got out of the station and set our foots onto the street to discover our route to the hotel at that odd hour and there were so many people on the street. Italy I feel is an indifferent European nation.

hmm.. We could easily find our way to the hotel and were off to bed as we had to wake up early morn for our 6am train to Pisa. Next morning I woke up at 4:30 and was ready by 4:45 giving time for other 3 people to get ready. We were earlier in the station to buy our tickets (how can we forget the previous night's ong queue in front of ticket vending machines?). So we were all set to view the leaning tower of Pisa. That was a regional train to Pisa from Roma Termini. The difference between an Express and Regional train is the usual difference in stops and cost. It was 10 euro fare difference and a time difference of 40mins. We had a very very very tasty cappuccino in the station. the quantity was not enough for others. But the taste of it lingers on my tongue even today. I suggest you not to miss out coffee anywhere in Italy. Another fact that I would want to share is that I used to wonder why people pronounced 'cc' in capu'cc'ino as 'ch' rather than 'c'. Its here where I realized that every 'c' in Italian is pronounced as 'ch'. Enlightened! :)

We boarded the train and I thought I could sleep well in the train as I had slept for just 3.5hrs the previous night and I am so concerned abt sleep. I must say that God has gifted me "sleep". Unfortunately, I did not get sleep in the train. It could be due to the excitement that was pervading inside me without being unveiled to others that I am gonna see one of the wonders of the world. By the way we (I) spoke in the train in our native language rather mother tongue as I/we usually do, we attracted another fellow national Vikram who was of same language and who seemed to us like someone who was craving to speak to someone in the same language in Europe. We could see that he was so delighted to exchange hand shakes and exchange views with us on his experiences and the lifestyle particularly in Europe. Since then, we could not realize how time of rest 3hrs flew :)


We reached Pisa and were hungry for traditional Italian Pizza. On our way to the tower we found a local restaurant and had yummy pizzas for absolute cheap prices.Each one of us had one whole pizza. Mind you that the Pizza here in Europe or Italy is thin crust (Dont compare it to the one in the Pizza Hut / Dominoz in India). The cheese over the Piza had melted and was smelling just like the "ghee"(reminding home.. Ahh!! yes:) ). The fragrance had half way filled our stomach. I tried a pizza margharita and my hubby n his colleague tried mushroom Pizza and the other two tried Pizza vegetale. The look and feel of Pizza vegetale(costliest in the restaurant) was not so good. It had topping of Brinjal, cabbage, tomato and onion. And the drink? Not wine yet.. We still did not follow 'Be a Roman in Rome' to dine and wine. But we had to definitely drink coke to digest this fat :)

Then we went to the tower and were amazed by the way the tower was built. From whichever angle or direction u see, the tower looks leaning. Thats why an apt name "Leaning Towere of Pisa".
we took some pictures and went around and had yummy ice cream and of course not to forget souveniers shopping fr us and our sweet friends in Leuven (Mr & Mrs Prashant) as they could not make it.
We were back by the train to Rome by 8pm. We stepped into a Mc D opposite to the station and had a tasty spinach and cheese frite. Taste was unimaginable for me as i was trying this kinda food for the first time. Had I tried fondue in Swiss, I would have probably felt it similar like others.
Then we went to our room and refreshed ourselves as we had to explore "Roma" during night. We started to Colosseum at around 8:30pm. We were there in abt 20 mins as the distance was less than 2.5km from our hotel.

Colosseum was lit with different lights. At first I could not really make out what it was and what was the purpose. I did not know that it was another wonder of the world. I had made this mistake of not reading about the history of the famous architectural monuments and the Roman Empire itself unlike how we used to do earlier for other trips. I regret a lot about this. I think I should have been prepared. But not to forget to warn you that there is a lot of history about Rome and Roman empire and its hard to remember or recollect what you have read. Still... "Something is better than nothing" Right?
Past is past. A lesson learnt. So we will make sure that we know about Venice before we go there in about 12 days.
Ok..Lets not get lost in these philosophic thoughts. Back to our exploration story.
We passed through the temples in Rome. The temple of Venus, Mars and Augustus. There were excavations going on through out Rome. I am unaware of since when its on or till when its on. But the places were all dug up prohibiting entrances to places. It was a good watch.

Then we strolled by to piazza venezia where we could see the famous Roman Emperor.


We went on to visit the famous "Romantic Fountain" - "Fontana de Trevi" in Rome. We spent some time there and went to the Indian restaurant we had searched prior to our visit to Rome. We went to IL Guru. I must say that the food was excellent. I have not tasted this kinda Indian food here. They say "if the quality of food is better then the quantity of intake increases". This was true with us also. We had stomach full and walked back to our hotel for peaceful sleep. Yet again, we slept at 12:30(it was second consecutive night). Thankfully, we could wake up by 7 and get ready to go to the vatican city on easter sunday.

Next morning we woke up and got ready as per our plans and reached vatican city. All the metro trains were so full of people. Every one wanting to be there for the mass on Easter Sunday.(kannadadalli helbekandre hindu hindu janara gumpu) We were all prepared to witness the rituals of the holy catholic church. But the crowd discouraged us to get inside of the crowd as we feared getting out of the place asap. We still had to shop for souveniers, wine and dine in Rome :)
We witnessed the mass from far. Thanks to the video camera's zoom which made us see the rituals from close.

Not surprisingly, Romans(Catholic) do circle around and bend before Jesus (like our Pradakshine Namaskara to God), they even use kinda dhoopa to spread the fragrance around. They purify the place with holy water(for us its the Ganges water). I had seen this fragrance kinda thingy in Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris too. Please excuse me for not being aware of the catholic rituals and for not using appropriate terms.
We were out by around 12:30 and then we were at the Restaurant to taste the Italian Sphagetti and gnochchi.
We ordered varieties of sphagetti and the taste was not too high standards. But not too low either.
Then we headed towards the market in the vatican city and shopped for "Argenta ear rings" - silver ear rings and (uff!!!!!!!!! the list goes on) many other stuff.
Then we were ready to have some snacks or light dinner. We tried in a close by restaurant near our hotel. Those were horrible Indian restaurants. We did not like the food. Though we ordered very few items we could not have it completely and had to pack for our trip. We paid them cursing ourselves for going there and left to the airport.
We had our return flight at 8:30pm from Rome. Saying "bye for now" we returned from Rome. But the moments of experiencing Roman traditions/lifestyle will be cherished through out.