Today we decided to sleep in because we figured if we didn't we wouldn't enjoy the rest of the trip. We checked out of our hotels and took our luggage to the train station to have them hold it while we went to the Colosseum.
There was another group that went to Rome and we emailed them and all decided to meet up at the Colosseum. The other group was Jordan, Steve, Jolynn, Andi, and Jay. It was nice to meet up with them and add some variety to the our travel group.
When we got the Colosseum we found the others and got in the line. We started reading "Stuff White People Like", the blog that is now a book, and we were having a lot of fun. It was funny because you could tell there were people around us who were not from America, but spoke English and were intrigued by us reading the book out loud. It was actually pretty funny because they are WHITE PEOPLE, but not American so most of it didn't apply.
Andi, Jolynn, Jordan, and I decided to get the audio tour that explained the significance and importance of different things in the Colosseum as you walked around. I was very glad I did because it was great to understand a lot more of the history of the Colosseum. It was also interesting to compare it to the recent "Hunger Games" I've been reading and the similarities.
Some interesting facts about the Colosseum. They estimate that it held somewhere between 30,000 to 70,000 people and that each person had an assigned seat based on their social class. The "Games" as they were called were held on every government holiday and originally began with wealthy Roman families sponsoring them. As popularity grew the government took it over and the Colosseum was built. The battles in the Colosseum were animal vs. animal, human vs. animal, and of course human vs. human. There were "Career" Gladiators which were very prestigious in their culture. Slaves could compete in the games, and if they survived they could earn their freedom. They also threw prisoners of war and those sentences to death into the arena without any kind of protection or weapon and many times they were the first to get killed.
Architecturally the Colosseum was way ahead of its time. There were a lot of trap doors on the ground of the main arena and many times they would do pretty amazing things through these doors. They would change the scenery and landscape through these trap doors. There were huge hills that were created in the middle of the arena and one time they even built a gigantic whale that emerged from the trap doors in the ground with 50 bears coming out of the mouth. The Colosseum had an air of magic to the spectators because of the things they encompassed into the scenery.
It was very interesting and yet horrific at the same time to imagine 70,000 people cheering two people who were battling to the death...all for entertainment. Unusual.
It was all very fascinating and to realize it had been around for hundreds of years was pretty amazing too! One other interesting fact was that the south wall of the Colosseum is basically gone because they would raid the Colosseum for building supplies and a lot of the rock from the south side wall was used in the construction of St. Peter's Basilica, Vatican City, and other buildings around Rome.
After visiting the Colosseum we decided to part ways and headed back to the train station to get our luggage and check into our other hotel. We decided to stay our last night in Ciampino which is about 20 minutes from downtown Rome. We stayed here because our flight was at 7 AM the next morning from the Ciampino airport and figured it would be much easier to get to the airport by 5:30 AM if we were closer. We took the train out there, checked in, and grabbed some lunch in Ciampino and headed back to Rome for the rest of the day.
When we got back we figured we'd head back to the Colosseum area and check out Ceasar's Forum, but we got there right as they were closing it to the public. So we decided to still walk around that area and look at the Roman ruins. We then went to their current capital building and went to this sweet terrace at the top. We took some great pictures of the city right as the sun was setting and it was very pretty.
We decided to head back up to the area around the Pantheon to get some dinner...especially some bruchetta. On the way we stopped by some sweet souviner shops, I bought a great Italian jacket and we continued on our way. When we got to the square of the Pantheon there was this amazing man singing opera with this boom-box like contraption. He was very good and we stopped to listen to him for a bit. I just loved all of the street performers who just create such an amazing atmosphere in Rome!
We decided to go up a block and found this great restaurant. As I sat outside eating delicious brechetta with a man nearby playing some romantic tune on the accordion, I thought: "This is perfect. It really can't get ANY better than this." I loved Rome for this reason, for the atmosphere and ambiance that engulfs you wherever you go. I will be coming back here again...hopefully soon.
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