A Week of Peaks and Valleys

Wednesday may have been one of my favorite evenings since coming to Rome. Our school sponsored a Pizza and Gelato Crawl!  Four of the most delicious things I have had in Italy, FREE OF CHARGE!  It was so much fun!  We began by meeting Andrea and Michaela in Campo de' Fiori where we went to get our first pizza. 

While our clothes still fit us

I got bianca, a plain pizza without sauce, just oil and crust. This is the kind of pizza Italians eat for a quick snack. Kate and Michelle got rosso which is crust and sauce (I liked mine better!). It was a great simple way to start off our feast. 

Pizza bianca at Forno (bakery)

We then ventured to Largo Argentina for our next stop at Pizzeria Florida. This was our main meal. I was adventurous and tried one slice of zucchini and one slice of potato and porcini mushrooms. It was the best pizza I have had yet!

Best pizza place yet! 

Definitely going back there sometime :)

We then walked to the Pantheon where we had granita di caffe con panna (frozen coffee with whipped cream) at the famous Taza d'Ozo (it was mentioned in Angels and Demons). I had enjoyed this once before when we had visited the Pantheon during Orientation. It was even better the second time!

Unfortunately, this poor guy had to make 30 frozen coffees. I have never seen anyone move that fast before! 

As we were enjoying our coffee, we discovered Andrea, our fabulous housing director at CEA, had starred as Lumiere in Beauty and the Beast (which you may know is one of my absolute favorite things in life!) He then graced us with his Italian rendition of "Be Our Guest".

Our last stop was to Della Palma. Kate, Michelle and I had visited here before. It was number one on Phil Kronebusch's (my former professor who directed the Greco-Roman program last year) top list of gelatorias. It was for good reason! I decided to go with my favorite flavor combinations- something chocolatey and something fruity. My combo of choice for the evening- old reliable Fruiti di Bosco (a mixed berry flavor) and the mind blowingly delicious Roche (yes, as in Ferrero Rocher's chocolate). It was one of the best decisions I have made.

Definitely ranks in my top two

One of the four cases of gelato to chose from! 

Thursday night was... interesting. It had the potential of being another amazing night. Unfortunately, it seems we used up all our good fortune the night before. But I'll start at the beginning. We had the wonderful opportunity to see the Roma soccer team play Siena (girls tickets were only 6 euro!). Roma was sure to win, and it would be a opportunity to see the unique and exciting soccer culture! After a long walk and bus ride to the stadium, we finally managed to make it to our seats, just in time for the anthem.

Let the game begin!

The game was so cool! The crowd was chanting and waving flags and singing, and the teams were evenly matched bringing lots of drama. By halftime Roma was up by one point! Kate, who was sitting on the end, got up to let some guys in our row out, and suddenly had her spot taken by a random woman. Her husband looked concerned and went and got her some water. I didn't want to kick her out if she was going to faint or something, so we awkwardly waited to see when she would feel well enough to leave. Suddenly, I looked down at my right shoe, to see vomit splattering all over the front of Kate's seat. Horrified, I looked at Kate:

An accurate reaction

The lady got up and left and we were left literally to clean up her mess. We had no idea what to do, so we put newspapers over it, smooshed three of us into two seats, and spent the rest of the game trying to communicate to the many Italians attempting to sit in the free spot next to me what a poor choice that would be. This resulted in me getting many looks from men thinking I had vomited.


As if things couldn't get more stressful. Siena scored with one minute left to end the game in a tie.

Depressing

We then began the trek back to Nomentana.  We weren't sure where the bus stop was so we walked which got us more lost so we walked more. At one point we took a tram (first time) and then became lost again. After much map-looking, walking, and confusion we arrvied to our appartment 2 and a half hours after the game ended. I guess the night could have been worse. We could have lost!

Another brightside- I found the love locks for Rome!