skip to main |
skip to sidebar
****WELCOME TO MY BLOG ON OUR TRIP TO ITALY - OCTOBER, 2007****
BUT ALAS, OUR TRIP LASTED BUT A SHORT 3 WEEKS! (And DON'T BE SURPRISED IF IT TAKES YOUR COMPUTER THAT LONG TO FULLY LOAD THIS HUGE BLOG! LOL - JUST KIDDING, IT WILL PROBABLY ONLY TAKE A FEW MINUTES. )
I know something about Italy, because I lived in Rome for 3 years in the early 1970's after 2 months spent in England, and have traveled and visited from top to bottom this beautiful country called ITALIA. I found the Italian people in general to be very friendly, warm, passionate and generous people. After marrying Settimio, my native-Italian husband in Rome, we've also made several other trips together back to Italy in the following years ----including one with our daughter and my mother in 1984. But THIS was the first time in the past 23 years, (for various reasons) that we have returned to his homeland. And it seems like for nearly ALL those years, Sonia has been begging us to fulfill her dream of visiting Italy together as a family again, which now in 2007 means all 4 of us, our son-in-law Claudio included!! So this trip, being very special to us, I thought I would commemorate it on my Blog in the form of a Journal with photos. You may want to click on some of the photos in order to blow them up. Then, it's ALMOST LIKE BEING THERE!
Further down (past the FIRST 50 pictures or so which introduce Italy, in general) you will find personal background information on my family and me, plus my comments about why and how I created this Journal, a few technical glitches that impeded it (almost ALL corrected now), as well as some tips on USING this Blog. For the faint of heart (OR EYESIGHT) you should know that I've written NEARLY A BOOK here (without meaning to - really!)...it is MASSIVE, (so I DO apologize for any repetitions!!) AFTER the "Introduction to Rome" and personal background info, etc. there are TONS more photos of Italy, (over 200 in total), most of them taken by either Settimio or myself. ALL the commentary you see was written by me. However, much credit goes to our daughter Sonia for supplying the FIRST 50 wonderful photos here, though late, AFTER this Italian Journal was already completed, which necessitated my re-working things quite a lot, and adding many more captions, in order to include them.
This Journal/Travelogue covers ROME, NETTUNO, VENICE & ANZIO, in that order....But that is quite a ways down yet!! Please be aware that I'm very 'opinionated' about everything I write here, ....about Italy, Italians, Italian food, our experiences, etc. so I sincerely apologize if anyone reading is ever possibly offended, for that was not my intention at all. I certainly welcome any comments about Italy or my Blog that you may wish to post here. So without any further "ado", (as they say), I'd like to introduce you to US, who made this trip from Wisconsin, USA, and also to a few members of our Italian family in ITALY. (You can skip this if you want, since we are all introduced later too!) FROM LEFT TO RIGHT:
SILVIA, our niece, ...SONIA, our daughter (in back), ...ROMANA, sister of my husband, ...MAURIZIO, our nephew (in back), ....SETTIMIO, my husband....IRENE, another sister of my husband, and JOANN - ME, on the far right.
.........ITALY , like so many other places around the world, is a country of great contrasts, in particular in the wonderful mix of OLD & NEW one finds here. And in Rome, the Colosseum and the Roman Forum are arguably the MOST FAMOUS of all the old ruins that still remain standing from the days of ANCIENT ROME. There's our daughter Sonia standing near part of the Forum, which by the way, we didn't enter this trip for lack of time ---and aching feet!! The sheer amount of ancient beauty in Italy is absolutely overwhelming.....but the modern world is also very much alive and kicking in Italy too, as we know! So amid it's rich history and ancient treasures we find......
..........THE OLD WORLD CHARM OF TODAY'S FRESH LAUNDRY HANGING FROM BUILDINGS THAT ARE MANY CENTURIES OLD..... AFTER ALL, THERE IS MUCH WORK TO DO IN OUR NEW MODERN ERA, THOUGH SOME FIND THE OLD FASHIONED WAY IS STILL THE BEST WAY!
.........Yep, you guessed it! The portrait of a Persian Cat in costume we saw in Venice, because I adore Persian cats, in fact we share our lives with several of them at home. Rome is full of animals - especially felines. MOST of them are feral, (wild like this big fellow below) running the Roman streets --- their own personal 'jungle', and raising their young inside ancient ruins like the Roman Forum.....We all know felines come in BIG PACKAGES.......
...............AND SMALL PACKAGES!Anyone who knows anything about me knows how much I love ALL animals ---even the scruffy flea-bitten ones!
.......but more than the cats, it's the PIGEONS who are out-of-control and taking over Italy, especially in Venice. So much so that the city of Venice sells pigeon food to the tourists to feed them which is laced with a "bird birth control" drug, in an attempt to keep their numbers down, and the statues and monuments as CLEAN as possible!! I LOVE ALL BIRDS, too, so I enjoyed seeing the way they mobbed the tourists here in St. Mark's Square. Way down below in my "Venice Chapter", I told the story of a very funny incident involving the pigeons and 2 conniving seagulls!
......BUT IF CARS ARE MORE YOUR "SPEED".... ANOTHER SMALL PACKAGE!! Settimio told me not to forget to upload his favorite miniature car he wants to show all his co-workers and friends. It's probably the tiniest car we saw in Italy, EVEN smaller than the Fiat 500 he drove in Rome in the 1970's!! (Can't really do much in this car below, except drive it! And it only fits at most 2 (very small) people!
..........IF YOU LIKE MODERN CREATIONS AND ATTRACTIVE PACKAGES, there are definitely some pretty WILD fashions in Italy too, like we saw in this Roman shop display window. ROME in particular is a city of many contrasts, and SEX definitely DOES sell here! So we have the SEXY....... and the opposite of that for many here might be.....
..........And then there's the Downright Disrespectful ! (Well, what would YOU call 2 lions spitting at you??
......AND GRAND PALACES ON THE GRAND CANAL
This one is the Ducal Palace (Also called Doges Palace) at St. Mark's Square - not sure why there are 2 names!
...........AND FOUNTAINS GALORE ! ! ... I just adore fountains! ! And Italy has some of the BEST ones in the world!! Rome, instead of the "Eternal City", could well be called "Fountain City!" Our photos in the "Rome Chapter" below include the "Trevi Fountain" --probably the most famous Roman fountain of all. Sonia and Claudio are standing near a LOVELY one in Nettuno, (an hour from Rome) where we visited family. The interesting little fountain below that was located just a half block from our Rome apartment.
..............OTHERS MAKE IT THEIR LEGACY TO TAKE BEAUTY AWAY, by painting and scratching their ugly "macho" symbols of youthful rebellion, dissatisfaction and/or "artistic expression" all over everything that is good and right with the world ! (See also the picture below.) Not only lovely flowers like this are flourishing and overflowing in Italy, but also so is sad and obnoxious GRAFFITI - virtually everywhere you look, and far more so than in any other country I've ever been, including my own. But then, I don't hang around in the "ghetto" areas of town, so perhaps I don't know how bad it's gotten in America too. But this is beautiful ROME & VENICE we're talking about, and even away from urban areas inside the countryside of Italy, the graffiti problem we saw was just as bad! It is particularly sad to see many irreplaceable, artistic and historic buildings and monuments disfigured in this way.
More later in this Journal regarding the reasons the Italians believe are behind this social disgrace, caused in part by non-Italians we were told. There is also information about the political situation and system of government in Italy in the "Nettuno chapter", along with another photo of the graffiti. But we tried hard to avoid taking pictures of anything scribbled on, (these few slipped by us) because we wanted to remember Italy as the gorgeous country it really is!
.......VENICE, whether at sunset or sunrise, and more than any other city in Italy, in my opinion, cannot ever be done full justice by mere words alone. So I'll let these additional pictures do the job for me, this time! (Besides, I must have used well over a MILLION WORDS to describe Venice already below, along with many more pictures (after the Rome and Nettuno "Chapters"). I tried to describe life there with all its beauty, magic and charms, as well as all its struggles.
