In Rome without a Selfie

Last week I had the pleasure of traveling with a friend to Rome and the Amalfi Coast. It was crowded with many Americans and Europeans, but pleasant and sunny. Technology has provided us with apps to get around and phones to photograph every site and antiquity we see, but we stuck with our maps and our guide books.  Everywhere one looks there is the endless “selfie.”  As baby boomers, we are accustomed to thinking and defining our world according to the self, but enough about me. I am more interested in the people and the place I am visiting.

I was fortunate to travel with a friend who has a great facility to learn new languages and an even greater talent to absorb the “soul” of the language and to speak it. A few weeks ahead of the trip she took some lessons and she was able to speak with many Italians. The Romans loved it: “If she was not Italian, then she must be at least half Italian.”  Although I do not possess this gift of language, I found myself emboldened  by her example.

I believe this is the best of what travel allows us to do.  It takes us out of the world we know and places us in a new world of  culture, architecture, and people to see. I tried to see and enjoy Rome as though I lived there. Living in Rome is very different from New York and where I live now. I loved the architecture of the 11th, 12th, and 13th centuries and the churches and statues. As we walked around 7 miles or a bit over 11 kilometers a day through Rome we discovered the city through the soles of our feet. We also smelled the beautiful gardens in the heat of the day giving off fragrances of wisteria, jasmine, lavender, honeysuckle and rose. This trip has taught me to keep open to people, their expressions, churches, museums, and neighborhoods . Stay connected through our attempts to communicate and integrate.  Ciao!  Tanti auguri a tutti voi (best wishes to all of you).

(Aventine Hill (Upper Left) and Amalfi (Lower Right)/Sally Hamilton)