After St. Peter's Basilica, we decided to go to Trastevere. We visited the "Villa Farnesina":http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villa_Farnesina. This was on the B-List of tourist attractions in Rome, but ended up being one of my favorite stops on the trip. There were several works by Rafael - an artist that I had never had the chance to admire much before. Most of the works were of Greco-Roman myths, so it was fun to stare at the images and place the parts of the story they were telling.
It made me want to have more of our rooms in the house hand-painted. Of what, I have no idea.
After that, we were ready for lunch. It was pouring down rain and no one was open yet. The guidebook said that all of these places were supposed to be open, but every time we walked into a restaurant, they smiled and said to come back in 15 minutes. In effort to get out of the rain, we looked in the guidebook and went to a church called "Santa Maria in Trastevere":http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basilica_di_Santa_Maria_in_Trastevere. And I'm so glad we did. It was like walking back into the Byzantine age. The front of the church was covered in mosaics. The colors were so intense, that it was like wandering into a treasure chest full of jewels.
They were setting up cameras and audio equipment. I suppose they were going to broadcast their Christmas mass.
I saw an image that I was unable to take a picture of - a black wall with two very large eyes. I saw the image later in another church, but I have no idea what the significance of it was. I will have to ask Benji about it sometime.
There was also a statue of a monk holding the Baby Jesus. It was covered in prayers that people had left. I always love those places that people have made sacred with their wishes and devotion. I am a strong believer in the principle of "darshan":http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/151828/darshan.
After hanging out at the church, we made it back to one of the restaurants that had not been quite open and sat down for a meal.
I realized that Italy is a great place to be a kid, because they are perfectly happy feeding children a big plate of pasta or pizza. In the U.S., that's all that kids want to eat and it seems like parents go crazy trying to feed them veggies and meat.
We stopped off to get an Italian pastry to take back to the room for later.
We tried to get to another church in the neighborhood, but it was closed. Seeing that it was the afternoon of Christmas Eve and shops were closing left and right, David and I went back to the hotel for the afternoon.
That evening, we went to a place in our neighborhood for dinner that we were unable to get into the day before – Sagro del'vino. I found it on the web. It was a small, family owned restaurant. There was a small boy working there, a man in his early thirties working the cash register, and an older man delivering food. They all looked extremely related. David told me later that there was a woman working the credit card machine that must have been related as well.
Everyone that came in knew the owners. They all talked exuberantly in Italian, getting caught up on the news before sitting down for dinner.
The walls were covered in white tile, and the tile all had stickers from the 70's and 80's on the wall: mainly for radio stations, sports team, and engine parts. The floor had sawdust on it.
There was no menu. A couple minutes after sitting down, they put a bowl of bean soup in front of us (delicious). After the soup course, we got the pasta course of the day - also delicious. I threw my vegetarianism out the window for that meal. They put red wine on the table without asking us if we even wanted any. We got a choice of 3 things for the main dish - so we were allowed one small choice. And for dessert, we got a bowl of tangerines.
It was heaven.
