From International Women’s Day celebration at Testaccio Square. The man singing owns Da Oio a Casa Mia, the Italian restaurant underneath our apartment. Wish it were his voice we heard at 3 am and not the drunkards leaving the discos. The women around him with dark make-up on their eyes and faces represent battered women. (Source: http://www.tripadvisor.com/)
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International Women’s Day Celebration in Testaccio Square
Happened up the celebration on my way to Varsi Gallery. My new friend Pierluigi explained what was happening and translated the speeches and songs.
Will he knock
This afternoon, I heard a knock on our apartment door. Charlie, dead asleep upon his return from Crete, certainly wasn’t going to answer it, so I did. Our neighbor-cleaner’s boyfriend Federico was at the door with a big, heavy package. He looked at my surprised and asked, “Were you expecting a delivery?” No, of course now. Who even knows my physical address (ok, it’s at the bottom of most of my emails). But who even … more
From the anti-nuclear arms exhibition senzatomica at MACRO in Testaccio, which I happened upon this evening. What was remarkable, and not particularly well captured in my video, is the credible sound and vibration – the actual sound of an atom bomb exploding with video reminiscent of the low frame rate scenes in Jacob’s Ladder, a visual metaphor for the chaos of the explosion and the human impact. It runs every 15 minutes, and when it does … more
Gallery
A new chemical reaction
Mix one part Prosecco Valdobbiadene, a beautiful light, dry, effervescent Prosecco, with one part pepato (pecorino cheese with peppercorns); swish softly; and wait patiently but not long at all, the Prosecco molecules will meet those of the pepato in a quite remarkable holy explosion of flavor. Really, why would one ever both with brie and chardonnay? (For future reference, I am reminded to click here for a delicious brand of Presecco. And we’ve been buying the pepato at … more
Italian stone (umbrella) pines of Rome
They’re everywhere. Stone pines, also called Italian stone pine, umbrella pine and parasol pine. Any wonder? Symphonies have been written about them (The Four Pines), and websites. Above are two that I captured today while walking through Villa Celimontana, a 16th-century villa & public park at the top of Caelian Hill.
A sobering day
Today is a sobering day, not just because Becky returned to California and Charlie’s flight from Crete was cancelled. In the morning, after Bruno picked up Becky, I left Casa di Alice to explore. Rain clouds gone, the sun arrived, startlingly bright, but with a cold wind like a slap. In the first block after my apartment, I ran into the first begger, an African man, or at least a man of African descent, in … more
Gallery
This gallery contains 2 photos.
Celebrating my 59th birthday at Felice with Becky, on her last night in Rome. Lovely dinner of puntarelle, carcoifi alla Romana, pasta cacio e pepe, braciola. Prosecco to start, amaro to finish, Syrah in between. Alex the Cuban-Italian-American adding a vest to the experience. Life doesn’t get any better.
I Cappuccini
Link
Today’s visit to Il Convento dei Cuppuccini di Vea Veneto, including the Capuchin Crypt. Imagine it must really liven up for Dia de los Muertos.
The Capuchin Crypt is a small space comprising several tiny chapels located beneath the church of Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccini on the Via Veneto near Piazza Barberini in Rome, Italy. It contains the skeletal remains of 3,700 bodies believed to be Capuchin friars buried by their order.[1] The Catholic order insists that the display is not meant to be macabre, but a silent reminder of the swift passage of life on Earth and our own mortality.[2]
Described by Frommer’s as “one of the most horrifying images in all of Christendom”,[3] large numbers of the bones are nailed to the walls in intricate patterns, many are piled high among countless others, while others hang from the ceiling as light fixtures.
