Rome is a city of layers, you never know what it is you will find as you find yourself negotiating between one level and another. There is the historic city center, the amazing monuments and the tourism layered with the periferia of the countryside and rural suburban outer layers of the city. But within those two there are thousands of different layers of being, each one given a home on some street, some intersecting grid of life within the confines of a city that is so full of surprises, both good and bad.
I have been trying to learn the many facets of a city with limitless faces. The only way I know to go about doing this is by talking with Roman natives and exploring the different neighborhoods or rione of Rome to see the many faces myself, eye to eye.
Today after my typical weekly market visit to Trionfale, a friend and I headed to a new rione I had never been to before, the San Lorenzo area that is the home of La Sapienza, the main university of Rome near the main train station in Rome, Termini.
The rain had gone, and the sun was warm on our backs as we ducked into the dark underground metro station that would take us to Termini where we would then adventure out into the San Lorenzo area. When we emerged into the light again in an entirely different section of Rome, it was truly disorienting. It has often felt that way for me when I take the metro places because you emerge from darkness into a totally new, unknown area with a sense of overwhelming mystery washing over you. Even though it is the same city, it doesn’t feel like it. Everything is so different and varies so greatly from one metro stop to another. The air, the people, the buildings, and everything there is to a rione, it is strange to suddenly emerge into a world unknown when you had just started to understand the world you were currently inhabiting. It is like having the earth pulled from beneath your feet and replaced with shifting sand that fills your shoes with the weight of mystery, that simultaneously weighs you down but spurs you forward to discover and unveil what the mystery attempts to hide.
Walking through what I could only describe as a Roman Chinatown, my friend Natalie showed me to the Acquario Romano, a strange building full of different works of art. But we didn’t come for the exhibits; we actually came for the bathroom. Yes, you heard me right, the bathroom. Underneath the building where the bathrooms for the building are, there is a tunnel that is used to get to the bathrooms, is itself a fantastic work of art. Today was actually the last day to look at it before the slate was painted over and wiped clean for the next artists to come and work their magic. The walls of the tunnel had been fully painted in the combined efforts of two fantastic artists with a contrasting style of almost childlike monsters and the grotesque realism of the other that made for a disturbing, but also deeply fascinating artistic experience.
To try and get a feel of what San Lorenzo was like we just wandered around the streets of the city looking at street art, graffiti and trying to absorb the feel of a part of the city that was not the overly touristy yet fantastic historic city center of Rome. The art was fun, and great and it seemed like every single wall was covered in a variety of different graffiti tags and other works of street art. It gave San Lorenzo a gritty feeling that while beautiful was a strong reminder of the real nature of Rome as a city of turmoil, struggle, and real life not like the idealized and romanticized pictures of Rome that all the tour books and postcards paint.
But it isn’t all political protest and turmoil, we also had a fantastic time at the old chocolate factory S.A.I.D and got some really amazing hot chocolate that was more like pudding than a drink. It truly is a place of contrasts; to turn a street corner away from graffiti to an adorable little chocolate factory with a cafe inside full of beautiful chocolates and drinks.It was an intriguing transitional experience to see these two things co-existing in one space. That is the epitome of Rome I think, the co-existing of extremes. It was this that we glimpsed in San Lorenzo.
We stepped out of Termini into the real Rome. A Rome of gritty contrast, both beautiful and terrifying, eternally magnificent yet stricken with problems that run directly to the core of a city that was once the throne of almost the entire known world. Political slogans and words of grave protest splashed across every building, pictures of turmoil, hurt, and injustice screaming out of the cracks in the walls like the voice of the Roman people crying to be heard. The real Rome.
It is a strange thing to study abroad because you are neither a tourist nor a local and everyone can somehow see this. You try to fit in as a local, but you are treated as a tourist, which in many respects you still are even though you try very hard not to be. We are temporary residents, which often means we as study abroad students only have time, or only want to make time, to recognize the monumental beauty of a place by seeing the “Top 101 Things To Do in _________” instead of taking the time to get to know the city as it really is, turmoil, gritty truth and all. It is probably the most frustrating part of studying abroad, being neither native nor naïve tourist, while not being able to access the comforts of either. There is no security of a native, that is the comfort of the known and familiarity, while also being denied the peaceful naivety of a tourist who can come and go in a few days with only seeing the highlights, the best and greatest and nothing more or less. As a study abroad student, we have access to neither, but still we strive and try as hard as we can to fit in as a local even though I think it may very well be stamped across my forehead that I am an Americana and I don’t belong or don’t understand. It is a complicated and multifaceted experience to study abroad that serves to open the eyes of students like myself to that very fact, that life everywhere is complicated and more than just a few amazing monuments, or more than just history, it is a living, breathing work of art, intricately woven together. The complex intertwining of the multifaceted aspects of a city are never easy to comprehend, all we can do is try to understand instead of putting on blinders to the pain, misfortune, and struggle of those around us. Four months is not enough time to understand the political rifts or impoverished struggle of the everyday person. Nor is it enough time to comprehend the vast beauty that a place like Rome has to offer. Four months is not enough time for anything to be honest, but all I can do is try to see what it is the Roman’s see. What I saw in San Lorenzo was just one of the many layers of Rome that is the beginning of Rome revealed, the Rome that the locals know and the tourists try to ignore. I am beginning to understand the complexity of the living breathing Rome as the creature that it really is, one layer of its being at a time.
Awake and Walk
Saturday, May 24th, 2014My third day in Berlin I was flying solo the whole day and decided to just walk my heart out. So from early in the morning I awoke and set out on foot to walk Berlin, guided by some great recommendations from Maiya.
I began by walking from Kreuzberg where I was staying and wandering back to where I had the tour the previous day in Mitte. I passed many people commuting to work, sitting on park benches drinking at 9am, kids playing in parks, and lots of people of bikes. Everyone seemed to be in some great state of motion, going somewhere, talking with someone, and always moving.
I went by Check Point Charlie again as I passed from old West to old East.
I even found a fun chocolate store that had massively impressive sculptures made entirely from chocolate including the Brandenburg Gate and several other famous Berlin monuments.
Also one of my favorite things about Berlin is the little street crossing sign guy called Ampelmännchen. They are the traditional and somewhat quirky street crossing signs that always make me smile every time I would see them.
And what is Germany without a man selling pretzels from his bike?
I revisited Museum Island with hopes to go into the Pergamon Museum but after some confusion and a lot of time lost waiting, I gave up on the idea and continued on with my walking.
The area with all the Museums on the island is pretty impressive and quite fun to walk around.
After museum island I headed over towards the TV tower in central Mitte ad then continued on to an old market area.
From there I wandered up the fun street called Rosenthaler Platz which was lined with adorable parks and shops.
I took a break in a quirky little coffee shop to dodge the rain and sat in the window for quite some time just enjoying the peaceful atmosphere despite an incident with a dropped cup and a resulting scream from the man who dropped it that was possibly the most German shout I have ever heard. I got another chai latte, keeping with my new found love of Chai Lattes that Berlin has made me addicted to alongside a homemade blueberry scone.
From there I made a long U-Bahn and S-Bahn trip over to the East Side Gallery where the most famous stretch of the Berlin Wall is, covered in art from contributing painters. It was a little odd honestly. This wall, such an intense piece of history carries such weight, but a majority of the art seemed somewhat foolish and more than a little crude with tourists scribbling their names on every inch they can find. Even the beautiful symbolic artwork was covered over with this ugly scriblles of marked territory that screamed disrespect behind my eyes. It made me sad. There is so much room on these walls for political voicing, room to air out the past and discuss matters of oppression, but in many you cannot see that in what the wall has become.
There really is a lot of beautiful art though, these are a few panels that are my favorites.
This panel was by far my favorite, the intricate detail and the vivid colors interwoven in the black and white. Faces stand out around images if you step back and look at the bigger images, but the small images hold their own beauty and magnificence.
The way color and the human image are lost but also displayed in this impressive piece really caught the eye and made you look closer to see what there really was to see.
These couple panels with political statements where also some of my favorites and the thumbs up chained into place was a good example of a piece that held up to its symbolic potential.
I took a quick break from the wall to hang my feet over the Spree and admire the bridge near by and watch the yellow U-Bahn snake across its upper terrace crossing from one side of Berlin to another as if there had never been a wall at all.
The inscription on one of the last panels of the wall did make me really happy though, despite having been graffitied over mostly by tourists that read
After the wall I wandered into a nearby area that seems to be home of the alternative scene in Berlin. It was pretty interesting, I wandered past the wall, past the graffiti and along the U-Bahn tracks up into the new area I hadn’t seen before.
A gritty but intriguing place full of people with long colored hair gelled up into spikes, or any other sort of interesting look. I really enjoyed wandering through the rain up and down the streets taking in the local color, feeling the trendiness and alternative atmosphere of the area.
Then after my long day of walking I returned to meet Maiya and we decided to go to a rooftop bar above a huge shopping mall that had the most amazing view of the city and the setting sun.
Over the rooftops of Berlin, we sat in the little garden with benches looking out across Berlin. It was a pretty magical place despite the cold.
The flowers in the garden were really amazing to watch the colors of the setting sun play off of as the light slowly diminished.
Drinks in hand we watched the sun go down in a fantastic array of color.
It was such a fun place to explore and definitely one of my favorite things that I did in Berlin.
The way the fast moving clouds blurred over the lights of the city as Berlin became the center of night life that it is so well known for made for some beautiful photos.
The moon was out, shining bright and full above the garden and we left sadly because we never wanted to leave it had been such a magical place at such a magical time of day. It is things like this that make me so unbelievably thankful for being able to have this opportunity to sit on rooftops above Berlin, drinking beer with friends, and watching a city transition between day and night, one life to the next.
I travel to see cities come alive in a way that photographs or postcards cannot quite capture. There is such a beauty in the cities of the world, each is endlessly different and I cannot wait to see more.
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