The pity of Sundays for me, is the inability to wake myself up early to go to church, now normally I would not really consider this to be a disadvantage, but the problem here was not so much my neglect of piety and regularity in my religion, but rather that I was in the city of the Holy Roman Catholic Church, meaning that this was the capitol of the church, and not to go would seem like a huge waste, especially on a Sunday. All the same, I did sleep in, and therefore found myself waking up too late, say to go to St. Peter’s to await the blessing of Benedict XVI in the square. Oh well, for this, I had to do something else, say something very pagan in nature, that’s right I went to see a sight that was immeasurably valuable to me, and probably completely overlooked by most tourists who visit the Eternal City. You guessed it, I went to the Circus Maximus, or rather the sight where it used to stand. It was incredible and very long and I took pictures of all of it, particularly the track, and the few remaining buildings and ruins that were left of it. For those of you unfamiliar with the Circus Maximus by the way, let me give you a brief history and meaning to it (as all I have for this is brief) if you ever saw the movie Ben-Hur, you may recall the most famous scene, that’s right the rowing on the trireme, but what I am referring to is actually the chariot race. The chariot race, took place in Jerusalem’s version of the Circus Maximus, and was for the Romans a far more popular event to see for entertainment than the gladiatorial fights of the Colosseum. How do we know this, because it was more heavily attended, plus there are accounts and documents of how much people loved the races than the bouts. The races were just as bloody (as you may recall from Ben-Hur) and they were very entertaining to watch. The Circus Maximus in Rome, as opposed to all of those Circi Media, and Circi Minimae out there held about 150,000 people during a game (versus the Colosseum’s 50,000 3X less than the Circus Maximus!).
So when I was there, I found it absolutely essential, like a divine edict, to walk about he length of the track where so many spectators in history watched back in ancient times, and for this divinely designed journey, I thought it more than appropriate to listen to the Parade March of the Charioteers from Ben-Hur, written by Miklos Rosza. I listened to this not too short of a track well over three times, maybe four, and I felt so noble walking around the field. After this great event, I found myself wandering around the alleys of some charming little streets that seemed to be unknown to most tourists along Rome. It was beyond enchanting, and the weather, though affectionately overcast, seemed to be all the more comforting for this journey. In fact I did this before and after my time walking around the Circus Maximus. I finally found myself walking up to the Forum again, and there I saw a couple of weddings throughout the course of my weekend, but I thought them so quaint, loving and Italian, that I was rather happy about the whole idea of them all. After the Forum, I found myself in a lovely little park, when it just started to rain, and it made me feel so happily melancholic, which was excelled by the music I was listening to, I found myself missing many people back at home, and thought it strange to be missing them here, in this great city of all places. I know not what it was, but it made me so happy to have so many great people in my life, and I was happy to think of them rather than sad, it only saddened me to think it would be so long until I could see many of them again, seemingly indefinitely in some cases.
At the end of my time in the park, I saw an old Roman amphitheatre where I am nearly certain (and I can check this later) where Julius Caesar was assassinated by the Roman Senate. It was quite incredible to behold, because it was just such a very crucial and important place for the reasons things are the way they are now in the world, and it was the ultimate turning points in many ways for not only, Roman, European, or even Western culture, but also that of the entire globe ultimately in so many ways. After seeing this little spot, I found myself wandering and eventually finding the best and most intact Ancient Roman monument, the Pantheon... the Pantheon was a church devoted to all the gods of the Roman well, pantheon, it was converted to a Christian church later on, and is completely preserved, only decorated with Catholic rather than pagan ornaments. It was so neat, and it was the world’s first massive and for the longest time biggest dome in history, or at least the first great dome of note. There is not too much to say about it, save to say it did look better inside than out, but that is certainly the Roman tendency with their buildings and that is why the Jefferson monument looks so much worse outside than the Lincoln, Jefferson’s is Roman, Lincoln’s is Greek.
Following the Parthenon, I decided to head back to the hostel, where I met up again, with Vanessa and Damien, and they told me all about their experience at St. Peter’s and how they saw and got some pictures of the Pope, and how he seemed so friendly, charismatic and instantly likable. I was again partly jealous but so happy for them that they were able to see this most notable and famous of people and one who, I hope, will help to preserve the Catholic church and assist people in need in future. Again, we went out to eat, and they needed to do their laundry so we went to a Laundromat (my spell checker just told me that word needs to be capitalised for some reason, I guess it is a brand name), and I decided to finally go get some gelato but found none so cheap as I wish it had been, but after a long time of looking (which was odd because I swore there were gelatarias all over the city), I decided just to get some at the only one I had found, and I got Nutella which was actually quite good. We also went out to eat again (I think) and so forth. We went back to the room, where they fell asleep somewhat early and there was loud obnoxious drunken table slamming and shouting out in the main room, so I decided to go check it out. Outside I found a very funny sight, and I thought it prudent or at least fun to join in with this. The event that was taking place was a drinking game played with cards. I was immediately invited in, and the staff which consisted of a nice Irish girl, another nice English girl (from Windsor) and two more Irish girls and an American one, a Canadian girl and of course our beloved Nacho. They were all very fun and quite nice, and were all very chatty with me, and it was just so fun, as it always is for me to speak to so many Irish people, as they tend to be quite nice as well as being fun to listen to, I think more than any other English speaking accent. We played very late, and then out came the Irish singing to traditional Irish folk songs. We finally wrapped things up around 3:00 in the morning and finally went to bed after that time.