Day #15 in Orvieto (Roma trip)

 March 9, 2013 – Saturday

On Saturday morning we caught an early bus to the other side of town for the Catacombs of Priscilla. I didn’t really understand what this would be like, but we arrived at a beautiful reddish-orange house/building where we waiting for our tour guide. We were lead underground and spent over an hour learning about these underground cemeteries. The Catacombs of Priscilla were rediscovered in 1591 and there are over 64 catacombs in Rome. This one was not the biggest but there were 40,000 tombs there (3 different “kinds” of tombs depending on whether you were rich or poor). We learned that contrary to what we learned in high school about how Christians fled to these places to hide, the catacombs were built out of a simply, practical need for more cemeteries and burial sites. They needed authorization for the emperor to create the catacombs, so obviously the emperor knew what was going on and this wasn’t a place for Christians to hide. “Cemetery” also means “dormitory” and they believed that this is where people were sleeping before the resurrection, so it was important to preserve the bodies. Previously, pagans would cremate bodies rather than bury them. There were some martyrs buried in the catacombs and because of this, even a few popes wanted to be buried here to be closer to the martyr’s bodies and the saint’s bodies. Diocletian and a few other emperors destroyed most of the tombs, so we mostly saw what was left of the tombs (lots and lots of holes or “shelves” in the walls of the caves). The more I thought about how many bodies used to be down there, the more I started to freak out. It was very cramped and dark in the catacombs, so I did my best to not to be anywhere near the back of the pack. It didn’t help that some people in our group would hide and then jump out! Like I said, I was kind of freaking out. There was an awkward moment in the tour when our tour group bumped into another tour group and then our tour guide left. We were momentarily lost before Prof. Doll went up to complain (in a nice way, of course) that we were abandoned. Then the best thing happened: the people in charge of the tours made some calls and then all of a sudden, a little nun appeared with a big ring of keys. She smiled at us and then lead us back down into the caves, and took us into all of the off-limit tombs and rooms in the catacombs. Prof. Doll was about to faint of excitement and he told us to catch him if he fell down. He said that this has NEVER happened before. Anyways, I don’t have any pictures because we weren’t allowed to take any, but just imagine a lot of twisty turn-y caves that have secret rooms with beautiful paintings of Biblical scenes. There was even one painting that is the first representation of Mary and baby Jesus, dated back to the year 230. This stuff is OLD.  This little nun (we called her Sister Mystery) because we never knew her name was SO CUTE. We were all trying to get to the front of the pack to be near her and listen to her speak. She spoke English but it still sounded like Italian – Professor Doll still had to translate for us. Even though the Catacombs were mildly creepy, it was easily the best part of the day!

The Catacombs took up the majority of our morning (since we went on two tours!) and then it was soon lunchtime. We went back to the market from the first day and had some more pizza (see the picture in my Thursday post – the white pizza with little tomatoes on top). We then walked for a while to reach the part of Rome with the Roman Forum, the Colosseum, and the Arch of Constantine. We then had a few hours to explore before we met at the Arch at 5pm. Jenna, Lydia, and I decided to lounge in the grass by the Colosseum while others in our group either paid to go into the Colosseum or went to different museums. It was the best weather I’ve seen so far! Beautiful blue skies with some clouds. We watched people for a while (which was definitely entertaining) and then I pulled out my sketchbook to draw some of the trees across the lawn. An Italian family sat next to me (a little too close actually – I was annoyed that they were intruding on my face) and the little boy, probably six years old, leaned over and peered into my sketchbook. His parents immediately yelled at him but he ignored them and continued to look. I pointed to the trees in my book and then the real trees and I was like “See? Trees!” (Impressive Italian skills, I know!). He started waving his hands around, pointing to my book and the trees, earnestly talking in Italian while I stared at him with wide eyes, trying to understand but I didn’t recognize any of the words he was saying. His mother learned over and was like “English?” to which I replied, “YES.” She then said, “He said you are so clever to make the trees look like that. He says that you really captured the freedom and reality of the trees.”

WHAT????? I swear he was like 5 or 6 years old. I had a huge, goofy smile on my face as I said thank you to him, and his mom whispered say you’re welcome to him and he looked up at me to say, “You… Welcome.” Anyways, I was dying of happiness on the inside and as I continued to draw (keep in mind that I probably was sketching for only 5 minutes total – it was super quick). As the family got up to leave, he looked to me and said “Bye bye.” He was wearing an “I <3 NY sweatshirt” so Jenna and I thought that maybe the family has been to the U.S. before… now even though I just told you that the catacombs were the best part of the day, I forgot that THIS was actually the best part of my day. :)

Roman forum 

The Arch - such beautiful weather!

Cheesin' in front of the Colosseum

The trees that I was drawing :)

We then met together as a group and traveled to see Michelangelo’s Moses, which was in a nearby church (of course). At most of the churches we went to, you had to put a Euro into a little slot (like a gumball machine) in order for a light to come on and then you can properly see the painting or statue. It’s the most bizarre thing. I mean, I guess it makes sense because they need money for the lights but this sign cracked me up – the “put in money to light up Moses.” Like… so odd.

So strange. So so strange. 

Michelangelo's Moses

The rest of the evening was free time (my favorite… just kidding. It was actually really fun!). We split up into a few groups and then went to different restaurants. The food was great and the waiters even gave our table free drinks! Then we went to get gelato, again. I decided to branch out and get different flavors. This time I ordered coffee and Oreo but it wasn’t as good as my dynamite chocolate/coconut combo. It was still good though, of course.