Not for the faint of heart...

Raise your hand if you think walking up 122 steps sounds like a good time!! Yeah, so I'm assuming that nobody is raising a hand, because it was not fun nor easy! Today we visited the church right next to the Vittorio Emmanuele Monument, which is atop 122 big steps. My thighs were not very happy with me once I reached the top and we all took a moment to catch our breaths and check out the beautiful views. The church houses a golden icon of the baby Jesus to whom people continue to write letters, leaving them on the altar in front of his box. See how he glows!? I think most of us found it a little odd--not the idea of it, but just how he looks, glowing gold and covered in jewelry with an eerie and solemn face of an adult.

We walked through the Monument and stopped outside the cafe for a view of the Colosseum, Trajan's market, and Via Imperiale for Danny's presentation on the art and philosophies of Benito Mussolini. Mussolini barreled through the Forum of Augustus to build the large and always busy Via Imperiale that leads directly from the Colosseum to the Vittorio Emmanuele Monument, making a clear connection between the greatness of ancient Rome to Mussolini's politics and leadership. Can you imagine what the ruins had looked like before he destroyed part of them? It's hard to picture!

On our way to the church of the Capuchin Monks located on the infamous and expensive Via Veneto (thanks to Fellini), we had to stop once again at San Crispino for the best gelato in the world. I tried pear and if I didn't know better, I would think that I was eating an actual pear! It was amazing! Two and a half months just isn't enough time to try and enjoy all the flavors of gelato! None of us were exactly sure what to expect from the Capuchin Cemetery, but Lisa gave us fair warning that it would be creepy and gross. Yes, yes it was. The corridor and little rooms were decorated in lovely patterns and designs of flora, stars, etc., but with human bones--the bones of former monks! Some of the corpses didn't appear to be completely decomposed, but it didn't smell bad or anything in the cemetery--although it was pretty cold...I wondered what it would be like to be a Capuchin monk, incorporating death into everyday life in this manner. In some ways, it is nice--there clearly is beauty in death, for look what they can do with your old bones! -Whitney