Allow me to explain my fun-filled, adventure today.
After my Italian class, it was time to begin my first Field study assignment. Marisa Aschetino, Andrew Speer, and myself, had to metro to Piramide, only look at the map once, and then follow our senses the rest of the way home. If this journey takes you any less than 3 hours, you did something wrong.
Piramide is, well, a pyramid, located a bit south of Circo Massimo. Though I havnt researched its significance yet, I can tell you that all three of us were hungry, and had to pee, right from the getgo. We strolled through a fairly residential neighborhood until we finally stumbled on something to eat. Just a simple pasta dish in what felt like the italian version of a diner. After that, we stumbled upon an obylisk, and where there is an obylisk, there is a basilica. We walked inside (what I now know was Basilica di San Giovanni in Laterano) and entered from the transept entrance. Kinda weird, but at least we were now had a beautiful basilica to admire.
We exited from the front basilica entrance and saw another (what looked like a) church just across the street. Doors were open, lets go in. The first thing i saw was a stairwell and i got confused. Then Speer rushed in, he knew what it was. It was the Scala Sancti (Holy Stairs). Their significance: Pope Sixtus V had these stairs relocated to this location from Jerusalem because they are THE stairs Jesus walked up, was judged by Pontius Pilot, and then descended from, and was soon to be crucified. Holy. Crap. The only way you can go up these stairs is if you pray your way up (there is a certain prayer i found online that you must say on each stair). I have to say, the place had an erie presence. Like, not like being in a church or a grand basilica, as much as those are silent holy spaces, this was like, beyond silence. Most of the spaces, once you got up the stairs, were dark rooms. I could hardly make out the series of pieces hanging on the wall, but i knew they were the stations of the cross. It was a neat experience though, I’ve never been so close to a relic before, at least not of that grandure.
We blessed ourselves with holy water and made our way back into the sunlight. Accidently stumbling upon Santa Maria Maggiore. We saw this the other day, so we continued detouring, stopping in another small church and Speer stepping in 2 separate sets of dog poop within 3 minutes. This is when we found the ruins, and then managed to get lost again, but then we found Sant’Ignatio, and stopped in there as well. Finally, after 3.5 hours of straight walking, we found gelato. The one thing i had to complain about this entire walk was finally corrected. We sat on the fountain in front of the Pantheon, and enjoyed our gelati and discussed our epic journey. We knew how to get to our destination, so the game was almost over.
After a zillion flights of stairs, we made it to studio and shared our 4 hour trip with everyone else. I just sat down on Photoshop and GoogleEarth and attempted to map out exactly what we did. Boy do I wish we had a pedometer.
No comments:
Post a Comment