Ciao from Salerno! I am now in the south of Italy, and man is it ever beautiful here! I'm snugly sandwiched between the mountains and the sea in this beautiful little city. The night before last, after I last wrote my blog, I took place in the most dleightful social custom: an Italian dinner party. Giovanni had a dinner party for about 8 of his friends, and I was of course welcome to join them. We had pasta, frittata, carrot salad, a traditional vin brulé (from Milan) where you heat wine and prepare it like cider, a traditional fruit-cake type dessert (also from Milan) and chocolate. My goodness, will Italy ever make me fat! Dinner was delicious, and Giovanni's friends were really nice (a different group of friends from the night before), and they all made an effort to speak to me in English (thankless English pig that I am, not knowing their language). After dinner, wine, Italian martini (a drink made from wine, sugar water, and something awful), and dessert, we all sat around for a while talking, then played a big game of clue. I now know the Italian word for revolver, very useful! Anyway, it was a wonderful night.
Yesterday I left Giovanni's pretty early, dropped my stuff at Antonio's, and set off on my own for some more Roman sightseeing. I started at that fountain again, because I wanted to see it in the proper daylight. I also finally found out the name- Fontana di Trevi, and I spent awhile juststanding and absorbing its beauty. After that I really rocked Roma, walking to the Pantheon, the Piazza Navona, the Palazzo di Giustizia, the Castel S. Angelo, over the Ponte S. Angelo, and finally back to San Pietro square, where I actually went inside the church this time! Words cannot possibly describe the lucious, dripping decadence of the church, so I will just say gurble, gurble, gurble. That is the sound of me being reduced to a stumbling, drooling idiot from absolute beauty overload. This is by far the most opulent church I've ever seen, and it knocked me flat.
After all the sightseeing I fed into my horrible gelatto addiction, and walked down some random roads eating my gelatto and being one with the city.
That evening I returned to Antonio's, and we were supposed to go see a one man concert show, but when we got there all the tickets were sold out. So instead we walked over to the University area, and went to a bar there. It was a cool atmosphere, and they played great music. Afterwards we were hungry, so we went and got pizza, then gelatto. I have a serious gelatto problem, and I refuse to seek help! This morning I had to wake up pretty early because Antonio was heading to morning work. I took a train to Napoli (Naples) then transferred to a train for Salerno, about an hour south-ish of Napoli, and very, very beautiful. I met up with my new host Cesare, and I'm at his place now, about to make some pasta dinner. The train ride wasamazing, because it was a beautiful sunny day, and I got loads of mountain, sea, farm, and orchard views on my ride.
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