Rome Extras

Okay - July 19 and entrance to Rome This was a special day for me because these were things I wasn't able to see on my trip to Rome with Karen several years ago.

After we dropped our bags at our hostel, we figures out the buses and made our way out to the Catacombs of Priscilla. I think this ended up being the most moving part of Rome for me. They are underneath the house of what was an ancient noble family who let the outlaw Christians be buried there.

We arrived there just in time for the last tour at 4:30 and were taken so quickly through that we had to run to keep up with our guide. He was pretty gruff at first, but seemed to warm up as he realized that we knew the Bible stories that he was talking about and had a real interest in the early church.

I was in awe the whole time. It felt like such a holy place. Many of the burial chambers were not open. You could see where they had buried babies and adults. Each one had their own shelf of sorts cut out where they were then slid in after being wrapped in cloths. You could actually see the many ancient Christian symbols on the walls. (fish - acronym in Greek for Jesus Christ, Son of God Savior, anchor - disguised cross, dove, cross, etc.) They had what they said was the first depiction of Mary and Jesus (around 200 A.D.) on a wall frescoe. There were many Bible story pictures as well. Noah, Daniel in the furnace, Jonah, etc. There were also many pictures of the Good Shepherd and people in prayer with their hands raised up (the custom of the time). You could still see the places in the walls where they put their candlesticks and the bricks didn't even look very old. It was incredible.

After that for a total switch, we hopped over to the other side of the river from the main center to visit Trastavere. It reminded me of Colorado's city of Boulder. It was more free-spirited with markets, musicians, and artists all over. It seemed to be alive well into the night.

We had some great, simple pasta that night. It just had olive oil, grated cheese, and pepper sprinkled on. Yet, it was delicious. The Thomson's daughter (missionaries in Italy) told Jen once that the difference between having pasta in America versus Italy was that in America, the sauce is what we look for to make it good. In Italy, the pasta is the star. How true!