Cinzia got us up around 8:30am and we were out the door an hour later headed towards Campo De’ Fiori where they sell produce and flowers in the square. Cinzia led the way, as she always does, with stops along the way for photos or to peek into churches. On the bridge over the Tiber you can take a nice picture looking down towards St. Peter’s Square and its basilica. Next was a look inside Santa Maria in Vallicella (Our Lady in the Little Valley) with its stunning altarpiece, ceiling, and pair of gilded organs. Across the piazza was the church of San Pantaleo e San Giuseppe with yet another amazing altar and ceiling.
For the past two days, we’ve seen plenty of Churches. There are 4 major basilicas (cathedrals) in Rome. Cathedrals are churches for bishops, and since the Pope is also the bishop of Rome he happens to claim 4 cathedrals. They are St. Peter’s, St. John Lateran, St. Mary Major, and St. Paul Outside the Walls. We’ve seen the first 3 and will hit the last one before we leave, but there are 120 other churches in Rome and we’ve seen several.
While Florence is a compact city with four main churches, Rome is a sprawling city with dozens and dozens of churches. So many, in fact, that you’ll see two or three of them surrounding the same piazza. On a city map posted in Rome it lists no less than 124 churches.
Our landlord, Roberto, is still working with the company that installed his Wi-Fi to determine why we cannot see a signal. I told him it's probably because they're broadcasting at 5GHz and we're using a 2.4GHz wireless receiver. In the meantime he's loaned us a small Samsung laptop which is able to connect to the Internet. The screen is tiny (maybe 5-6 inches tall), the keyboard is different, and the menus are all in Italian -- but we're able to use it. We're hoping he resolves the Wi-Fi issue this week as it's easier to use our laptop, especially to upload text, photos, and videos to our blog.
We arrived in Rome yesterday. The train ride on the frecciarossa (fast train) was nice. They hit speeds of 138mph on the straight-aways. A young gypsy girl was on the departure platform looking for tourists with lots of luggage (like us) and positioned herself in front of us as we were trying to get onto the train. Since we had 2 bags each Cinzia went up the stairs first and the gypsy girl inserted herself between us and lifted the other 3 bags onto the train and into the storage compartment. She then handed me a slip of paper telling of her plight and asking for a tip. Once in our seats I pulled out €2 (all the change I had), but she said she should get €5. Cinzia emptied her change purse and held out about €0,19 more in change. The gypsy girl was still frowning, but she took the change and headed off the train before they closed the doors on her. At least she was enterprising enough to do something other than beg for her tips.
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