Three Islands and a Boot: Malta, Sicily, Rome

Phyllis Steen Tours and Travels is open for business - but be wary about taking the proprietor's travel advice.

She thought she was so smart, taking a Saturday night flight to Germany, thinking the plane would be empty, because who travels in the middle of a weekend? Well, everyone who is stretching their American holiday to the very last moment, damn the jet lag, that's who. So the flight was packed, the inbound flight an hour late and thoughts of the 2 1/2 hour layover in Munich were slipping away.

Finally, on the plane, waiting for the door to close, when another delay occurs - two people who checked in for the flight aren't on-board, so their luggage needs to be found and off-loaded. Now, how much of a ditz does one need to be to schlep out to Newark, check luggage - and then not manage to board? Were they, perhaps, in one of the swell airport bars? Spending those Euros at the duty free? I mean, come on!

Bags dispatched and so are we, with the crew promising that we'll arrive on schedule because the headwinds that delayed the inbound flight will be our tailwinds, blowing us across the Atlantic quickly, quickly. And there's probably some padding built into the schedule, to ensure on-time stats are high. But I don't care.

As always, I watched the weather forecast for weeks, to ensure that my carry on contained only the necessary clothing, with the right accessories to deal with dinner in Rome and nights 3000 meters up in Enna. I stuffed the 21 pockets of my electronics vest, sturdy black cotton that, when full, looked like something a suicide bomber would wear. And I chose my meds, wondering which mix of pharmaceuticals would maximize my odds of sleeping in coach. For this trip, I selected a fetching hot pink generic Benadryl, plus my normal bedtime baubles. As soon as I was belted in to my seat, I swallowed my potions, hoping for a few hours of sleep uninterrupted by an airline meal. And it worked!

For only the second time in my life (the first being prone, after being bumped to first class), I slept for the entire trans-Atlantic flight. Now, that is only 5 hours, but it is vastly preferable to spend those hours... unconscious... then to spend them strapped into a tiny seat on a packed airplane.

We got into Munich on time, and soon I was aboard Air Malta, an airline I had never heard of, much less thought about. I pushed back my even tinier seat and was rewarded by a stream of invective, in German, and a strong shove back up-right. I mentally rolled over, and snoozed for most of the 2 hour flight to Malta, where I was met by the hotel car. A short while later, I was at my very new, very lovely - and breathtakingly cheap - hotel, wondering how, when I had slept so soundly, I could be... tired.

The next morning, I awoke and, with breakfast, took the traveler's friend - 200 MG of caffeine - to help my body adjust to be wrenched into a time zone 6 hours off from where it thought it should be. I took one of the 1950's British buses to Valetta, Malta's tiny capital - 600 meters wide, 1,000 meters long - which the guidebook speculated was the smallest on earth, absent, perhaps, Lichtenstein. Hmm... I thought, has Andorra been considered? Does anyone even remember it is there, perched in the Pyrenees, the home of shockingly cheap duty free alcohol - and little else. But the sun is shining and I my mind is in overdrive wondering how I escape the hordes of tourists - and where I find light weight clothes, because Malta has suddenly, and unexpectedly, decided that it is summer, with the temperature hitting 90 degrees.

I am overdressed, in black jeans and a long-sleeve black sports top. How did this happen? It was 78 degrees in Malta on Friday and the temperature had been trending the way it should, now that Fall was upon us. Admittedly, Fall in the southern Mediterranean, but, still. I spied an Adidas shop and was soon dressed in the engineered fabrics that are a traveler's salvation. Since the pants, which I needed anyhow, have wide legs, I will be able to wear my favorite money belt in the Sicily, whose pick pockets my driver from the airport warned me about. I didn't have the heart to tell him that I prepared for Sicily by re-watching The Godfather I and II. Sicilians are not an unknown quantity to a native New Yorker.

The tourist horde question was easily answered - the very long line into the Baroque cathedral was the GROUP line - the INDIVIDUAL line was... non-existent. So I was inside a cathedral that re-defined my concept of Baroque - it was wondrously ornamented. Spectacular. And, as long as I avoided the main part of the church, where tour guides droned on in German, I was free to wander and look at inlaid floors with each rectangle covering, I assumed, some worthy citizen's remains.

There are 25 churches in Valetta, but, having seen the Cathedral, I was done with churches for the day. After all, I have the rest of Malta - and all of Sicily - ahead of me - and more churches than a Jewish girl should have visited behind me. So off I wandered, down the grid of streets that is peninsular Valetta - but a grid that rises and falls and ends at the sea.

After lunch, I watched commercial Valetta close down, for its 1 - 4 PM siesta. Since I was hot and jet-lagged, I wandered over to a park on the ramparts and found a small tree with a bench under it. The ramparts are called bastions, which is one of those words whose meaning you both know and never think about. I would have said "refuge" - but here I am, up behind the town walls, in what is clearly a defensive fortification.

Now, dear reader, gentle friend, I have had jet-lag in many places - I have been nudged by a solicitous guard at the Louvre, while sitting on a bench, merely closing my eyes - but nothing looked as welcoming as that park bench and soon, shoes off, I was lying derelict upon it, watching windblown white clouds in blue sky. Under my tree, it was cool and breezy - though I longed for a hammock, I really couldn't complain - and there I whiled away my siesta, watching the sky and listening to a group of Maltese youth who were hanging out on a bench nearby.

Malti is a Semitic language, related to Hebrew and Arabic - but the Maltese (people, not the dogs - or the falcon), are not fond of people saying their national tongue sounds like Arabic - because it doesn't. Sometimes it sounds like Italian. Sometimes, especially in the guttural H sounds, it sounds like Arabic, but, mostly, it sounds like the language of an ancient isle located just south of Sicily and north of North Africa in an area that has seen lots of action over thousands of years. And, since it is written in Roman letters, it makes Polish - and Welsh - look comprehensible.

The thing about Malta is that it keeps reminding me of other places. The ancient capital, Midna, is short for Medina, the Arabic word for city. And outside the walls of Midna, and on Gozo, is Rabat - the capital city of Morocco. The stone enclosed upper windows on the 2 story houses remind me wooden Egyptian ones, the winding streets of Midna speak to me of Fes.

The blocky buildings remind me of blocky buildings in many places. And then, of course, there is McDonald's - Pizza Hut - KFC- Ben and Jerry's - and Burger King. But that's what's interesting about Malta (the country, not the Caribbean beverage) is just how much of a blend of cultures it is, while retaining its identity.

Historically, most people know of the Knights of Malta. sea farers from the north, but, in walled cities like Midna, the life of the Maltese aristocracy is on display. It is a tiny, beautiful city on a hill. It is, alas, also the first time I was charged a Senior Citizen's entry fee - the cutoff age is 61, so I actually qualify, saving 5 Euro. I am depressed none-the-less. I thought I had several more years to prepare for it. OMG!!!

I am staying in St. Julian's, a coastal resort city towards the north. My hotel is on the edges of Paceville, where the young come for cheap drink and hard partying. So while the hotel is great, the transportation convenient and there are a lot of restaurants, which mostly remind me of Greek diners, except Greek diners in England serving Italian food - and there is a generic beach tourist feeling to the place. Various places advertise "10 tequila shots, 9 Euro" and similar deals and, late at night, the sounds of drunken revelers can wake the dead. Last night, a voice was screaming FUCK for a very long time, with his girlfriend screaming back to keep things lively. And, in the morning, the sound of construction starts smartly at 8 so, despite the cool evening breezes, keeping the windows closed and the air conditioner on at night has a lot to recommend it.

On the positive side, my hotel room has a tiny terrace, an amenity that I have grown extremely fond of when they're shaded, breezy and have a view of water. Why repair to a cafe, when I can watch the rituals of the street below? the woman who comes to visit at 6 each night, welcomed eagerly by the household's two small white dogs. The elderly woman who sits on her terrace, writing in a journal. The small front yards, barren of plans and soil, because water in Malta comes from desalinization or, in the old days, from rainwater collected in cisterns.

Like most southern Europeans, the Maltese are a compact people - if you think about Picasso late in life, you have the type. Older women tend towards grandmotherly stoutness. Here and there you see a ten year old en route to a well padded life.

It is a good thing that the Maltese are the size they are - otherwise, they could not ride their buses, which barely accommodate my legs. It is painful to see tall young Germans board one - if there are empty seats, his legs won't fit, if he has to stand, his head won't fit. The buses are destined to be replaced next year, with handicapped accessible ones and, one would hope, air conditioned. I learn this from the man seated next to me on the ride back from Valetta, a divorced grandfather, which means he's a contemporary. We are discussing politics, and he mentions that his sister-in-law is such a strict Catholic (98% of Maltese are Catholic) that he cannot bring a girlfriend to holiday dinners, so he doesn't attend. Though he says he loves Christ, he hates religion. We could be friends.

These observations about body sizes ignore the Neolithic statues unearthed from sites around the island. These women were very, very zaftig - those Sicilian farmers who settled the island thousands of years ago, liked women with AMPLE hips and boobs.

Malta's Neolithic past significantly predates the pyramids and Stonehenge - I don't know how it stacks up against new discoveries of "old Europe" in Romania. But these people, who little is known about, were quite sophisticated builders, sculpting the walls of mass underground communal graves to look like they were assembled from stones. And large carved spheres thought to be ball bearings, used to move large stones. The underground grave site was painted with red ocher circular designs, as were the bones buried in them. At another site near by are carved stones, some with the same circular patterns, some with bulls. It is known that these early people traded across the sea, these thousands of years ago.

When I was in Sarquaa, Egypt last year, the site of the first attempts at pyramids, there was a museum to their builder that had signs proclaiming "the first project manager" "the first stone transom." I wondered what other cultures they had included in their claims. Now it is clear that they skipped Neolithic Malta. Admittedly, the building of the Hypogieum was built in stages, with new chambers dug as more capacity was needed for bones. But a look at the chamber called "The Oracle" makes it clear that a people of real sophistication built something here, maybe not as grand as the pyramids but far older.

The underground chamber admits only 80 visitors a day, in groups of 8, out of concern for the effects of carbon dioxide emissions on the structure, which is encased in a climate controlled glass enclosure. These burial chambers, which were discovered at the turn of the last century, are very humid and damp. The floor is wet and water drips upon you as you listen to the audio guide. At one point, I wished that the tape skipped the long segments of atmospheric drums so I could get out of there quickly. But the group is carefully managed - woe to the person who is late, because you'll be denied entry - and tickets must be bought months in advance. A nearby, ground level site, Taixien, has no such restrictions. These sites are clustered in groups across the Maltese islands.

Since all buses on Malta end up in Valetta, generally requiring you to transit through it when coming going or coming from other places, it is simply a matter of ensuring that you're going in the correct direction and hopping on for your return trip. I am in Valetta for lunch and another wander around the town.

A normal tourist, eager to see all there is as quickly as possible, can do Malta in three days, seeing far more than I intend to. My sightseeing is more measured - a few hours of the main sights, a long lunch, then off somewhere to read or blog. That little fishing village in the far south? The boat trip around the island? I am sure they are lovely - but I am long past my need to see it all. I have the feel of the place, and that is sufficient. (I must admit to a real fascination with Jeep safari's in Malta or Gozo, which stress going where no tourist has gone before - and the fact that your driver will be in constant radio communication with the team leader. Safari? Radio contact? You simply can't get lost on these isles.) In any case, I have given myself 4 full days here, with plans to visit the Gozitans of Gozo, the small island to the north, tomorrow. Now I am watching Australian true crime TV and reading about sex machines - mechanical, not male - in Mary Roach's hysterical book. I still there, clutching my iPhone eReader, howling with laughter.

Gozo
I must admit - with great trepidation because my neighbors are from there - that, prior to planning this trip, I had never heard of Gozo, the middle of the three Maltese islands. In fact, I had no idea how many islands Malta had. Fortunately, I bought the informatively titled "Malta and Gozo Guidebook" shortly before I met my neighbor, who told her youngest daughter "Anna is going to Gozo!" And today I did.

Gozo is a 24km bus ride from my hotel, which, with wait time, translates to about 45 minutes. Then there is a 30 minute ferry ride - which, plus the roughly 8 Euro fares, is why I stayed on Malta instead of Gozo. But today I will visit my neighbor's parents and get a guided tour of Gozo. The only other real option is to take the dreaded blue "Hop On, Hop Off" double-decker bus, because public transportation is pretty limited.

Gozo turns out to be everything I had hoped Malta would be - a series of small - sometimes very small - villages, with a majestic church dominating each one, surrounded by cliffs and sea. How long Gozo will remain unspoiled remains to be seen - there has been quite a lot of residential building in a couple of places, with soul-less 4 and 5 story towers lining the streets in lieu of the typical 2 storey dwelling. "Fortunately" it looks like the global financial crisis has slowed this development, because everywhere there are unfinished buildings, some with "for sale" signs. But some developments have sold out completely, which means that, when next the financial wheel turns, this rare unspoiled island will be doomed.

Of course, if you look closely, you'll notice that not all of the buildings are old. Villa Big Apple is dated 1998 and clearly says New York City above the date. There are other buildings that easily look a century old, but have dates ranging from 1966 through the late 1990s carved into them. But these buildings are fine, because only someone as accustomed to looking at architecture as I am would notice.

If anything, those buildings are truly Maltese, because the families have gone abroad to work for decades, as have my friends, and her parents. Aside from the obvious economic incentives, there is also the problem that, in each town, everyone is related to everyone else, so you need to go elsewhere - albeit not abroad - to date. Even if you don't go abroad, you go to the big island to work.

While I can imagine that Gozo is VERY quiet - someone on Malta said that, by 4PM in the winter, the streets are deserted - it looks like a lovely place to relax. As the light changes in the afternoon, the stone turns golden and the sky is clear. But I need to go back to Malta, so I catch the unbelievably crowded 5:30 ferry.

Most of the passengers are on guided tours, so they decamp to their buses when we reach shore, but the rest of us search for the right local buses, which are mobbed, mostly by fairly clueless young European tourists. The driver of my bus is... strange. He will take on only as many passengers as there are seats - leaving a middle-aged woman on crutches to await the next bus - but he also flies past bus stops, apparently not interested in picking up passengers. While it makes the trip back much faster, it is just odd - the buses in Malta are generally crowded, with lots of people standing.

When I'm back in St. Julian's, I finally realize where it reminds me of: Bleeker Street, with young tourists, stores selling trinkets and mediocre Italian food. Not exactly what I had in mind.

To Sicily
My flight to Sicily left at 9:15AM. In theory, I was supposed to arrive 2 hours early - but I refused. There simply couldn't be that much of a crowd at the Malta airport. Which turned out to be true - but there was plenty of traffic on the road, so I had to leave my hotel by 7:15, far from my favorite time of the day.

The flight to Sicily was 30 minutes - but the wait for the bus to Taormina was 45 minutes. Then the bus spent 30 minutes picking up passengers in town before getting on the road. I did not arrive in Taormina until 12:15 PM, tired hot and cranky - only to learn that my hotel was a smart 1KM walk - uphill.

Now, I travel pretty light - a rolling carry-on bag, a small back pack and my electronics vest. But none of this is designed to be dragged, at a 30 degree angle, over cobblestones, for a KM - and especially not when I'm tired. I ask about a taxi, but a British tourist warns me against it - he had taken a taxi from the hill below town back up the night before and was hit with a 20 Euro fare. His comments about the town were less than complimentary - and he was paying with Pounds, whose exchange rate versus the Euro is much more favorable than the dollars'.

Finally, I get to my 2 star hotel, the aptly named Condor, perched WAY above the bus station. I am sore and exhausted from what ended up being a 5 hour trip.

My room, at 60 Euro very reasonable for this town, is down the hillside. There is a very slow elevator that the receptionist advises against, but three flights of stairs do not appeal. I go to my windowless room - there is a door to a view less patio, but leaving it open lets in tiny mosquitoes - and collapse. I emerge from the room for lunch and dinner, both a substantial walk down the hill, to very mediocre restaurants, and spend the rest of the day passed out in my room.

Hopefully, tomorrow will be better - and I plan to take the train, 15 Euro taxi ride and all, to the next town. The "destination expert's" suggestion to take the same bus, change at the airport, and then take another bus seems absurd, now that I know what the trip will be like.

iChurch
I woke up too late for breakfast and wandered into town to have some tea. It is raining, and I dislike everything about this town. The restaurants are expensive, the food mediocre and a steady rain in no way improves it. The things I most want to do - go out to the Greek ruins, see Etna in the distance - all together a very 20th Century stay here - are rendered impossible by the rain.

So... I am in a town in Italy. It is raining. My hotel room is windowless, cold and damp. I can stay in a cafe but so long. What to do?

Go to church!

The one thing you can count on in Sicily is that the major churches will be open - and have some place to sit. So I find one, which is dry and warm, settle onto a bench, pull out my iPhone - and finish Mary Roach's excellent book Bonk, a history of research into sex. This is just... right... on so many levels.

The nice thing about going to church on Saturday, at least during the hours I am there, is that there is no Mass. This is one area where even Phyllis Steen is aware of the need to consider others sensibilities.

Needless to say, this combination of cafes, churches and sex makes for an odd day in Sicily, and one very different from what I had planned. But, as the song goes "Whatever gets you through the night" - which I assume is equally valid during the day.

During lunch, I am parked at a table in a cafe where the British tourists seated nearby have made their own accommodation to the rain - they are getting tanked on fizzy pink cocktails. I overhear one woman say, gravely "Well, you know, your son's your son until he takes a wife, but your daughter's a daughter for all of her life" to general agreement around the table. Wait a minute, I think, those are the words of a song. And this is CERTAINLY not true in most of the world, where exactly the opposite applies.

I guess analytical thinking isn't required to get a passport.

During a break in this long, dreary day, I decide to check the train schedule. I have read that there are "frequent" trains from Taormina to Siracusa - but it turns out that the best train is 7:41 in the morning - a completely obscene hour, and one that requires a 15 Euro taxi ride to the station, far below the town.

Since the train will take only 2 hours, while the bus will take at least 6, there's really nothing to decide, so I book a taxi for 7 AM and retire to my room, muttering obscenities under my breath.

Train
The alarm goes off promptly at 6. Instead of hitting the snooze button, I hit "off" instead - and next surface at 6:48, which leaves me all of 12 minutes until the taxi arrives.

I decide to skip a shower.

On with the clothing, zipping up the bags, and upstairs into the waiting cab. At the station, the ticket machine doesn't work and then I am flying down and up stairs to reach the right platform. Everyone in the car I get on is asleep, which seems perfectly reasonable, so I back up and find a compartment with only one occupant. She moves her bag, I settle in and demonstrate my newly acquired ability to sort of fall asleep sitting up, which I think is simply a hangover from my sleeping meds - but I don't care. It makes the trip fly.

I arrive in Siracusa at 10AM and am told that my hotel is 1 1/2km from the station. Now, Siracusa is flat, but I'm not up for a stroll with bags in tow, so I take a taxi for 10 Euro. It is a good thing that I do, because my hotel is on the tiniest of ancient streets and, this being Sunday, there would have been no one on the street to ask. My room is not ready, so I repair to a sea side cafe. It is overcast but not raining, so I am happy to spend an hour of so over my tea.

My hotel room turns out to be a small apartment in an ancient building. It has a double-bed, a day bed and an ottoman that converts to a bed. There is also a kitchen. More importantly, it is warm and dry, with its window facing out onto the tiny street. The only way to know whether it is raining is to listen.

The room has high wooden ceilings with wooden beams and is a great place to hang out, which I know I'll be doing since I booked it for 4 days. I hope Syracuse is sufficiently interesting - I had planned to spend a day sitting in a sunny cafe, drinking the local wine.

Since it isn't raining, I wander the old town, from the Greek ruins near the mainland, to the Jewish ghetto. I did not know that Sicily expelled its Jews in 1492, as Spain and Portugal did. On one hand, it makes sense - Expulsion is Expulsion - but how come I never heard of it? And what about the Inquisition? In any case, I explore the narrow street, coming to a doorway with a 6 pointed star - perhaps that is the mikvah? I'm not paying attention to the guidebook - I rarely do - but this is a street worth returning to. It is also close to the puppet theater - for lack of much else to do, I should try to catch a puppet show - learn more about Sicilian puppetry.

Overall, I am much happier in Siracusa. The food is quite good, the prices lower and, while there are tour groups, a stroll down a side street and you are alone. The sea surrounds the narrow old city, so it is always close at hand. And the fresh water pond, foreseen by the Delphic Oracle, is near my hotel, with large cafes overlooking the sea.

I lunch on antipasti at a modern wine bar near the new city - I am trying to have vegetables every day, because a diet of pizza, pasta and sea food is not what I had in mind. The plate of antipasti is only 5 Euro, much more reasonable than the prices in Taormina - and vastly more tasty.

At 3 PM, my choice is coffee or a nap, so I return to my room to try out one of the beds. I listen to the rain and wonder that I manage to sleep after such long naps. Maybe sleep is addictive?

A guide to dining in Italy had come out shortly before my trip, so I am delighted to discover that one of the restaurants it recommends is right around the corner - and inexpensive. Except it isn't. There. There is no restaurant at all at that address - the building isn't even inhabited. But the restaurant on my hotel's narrow street looks promising, with locals eating there, and soon I am tucking into pasta con sarde, although there are no obvious fish on my plate. Maybe they're ground into the powder on my plate? But since I have also ordered white wine, which appears at a 1/2 litre carafe, there's not much I care about for long. I haven't had wine in weeks and it goes promptly to my head. I sit there, sipping the wine and reading a Operation Mincemeat, the book about the cover for the Allied invasion of Sicily. Even though it is set in England and Spain (so far), it concerns Sicily, which makes it perfect reading.

I have neglected to buy a SIM for my unlocked GSM phone - I really have no idea who I would call - but I take my iPhone with me everywhere. I don't care what anyone says - it is the perfect eReader - and device - for travel. Thank Heavens that the small hotels I'm staying in have free WiFi - I do enjoy reading the Times with breakfast.

A Message From Your Sponsor (rant)

It has been 4 days since I posted. But mostly not my fault. Really.

The network was down in all of Siracusa Ortiga, the old city, for one night.
I was set upon at dinner by a crazed tourist, got home late and had an early train.
I then wrote a really wonderful riff last night - and it just... vanished... from my screen, unsaved.

So now I will do what bloggers should not - make up for lost time,try to capture the feeling and the spontaneity - and simply try to remember what I did and would have wanted to write about - during those lost days.

Noto

Since the entire south eastern portion of Sicily was destroyed by an earthquake in the 17th Century, it is filled with Baroque towns. Some you stay in, some you pass through, others you day trip to. Noto is a day trip, a tiny town of a few streets, 40 minutes by bus from Siracusa.

Now, doesn't that sound like an easy side trip? Well,what they neglect to mention is that it is 40 minutes from when you get on the bus at the bus station. First you need to get to the bus station, by expensive taxi or infrequent shuttle bus, then you need to wait for the regional bus, then you get to spend your 40 minutes on the bus. By this point, easily 90 minutes have passed.

You spend a couple of hours in Noto, looking at more carved cherubs and masks and skulls, eat something, and then repeat the whole transportation thing in reverse. This is how a simple side-trip into "a suburb of Siracusa" turns into a full day trip. Now, don't get me wrong - Noto is lovely - but I am also a very lazy tourist.

Originally, for reasons that escape me now, I had planned to catch the 8AM bus, so I would have plenty of time to see the town before siesta. But when I awoke at 6AM, it was raining - hard - in the narrow alley outside my hotel - so I rolled over, reawakening at 8AM, when the rain had stopped.

Since I now have a number of Sicilian churches under my belt, I am coming to realize that the interiors were way less important to the 3 Baroque architects who rebuilt these cities than the exteriors. The interiors are simple - not stark, the way, say, a Lutheran church would be. Simple, and surprisingly light - with off white paint trimmed with gold. And then it hits me: the Italian provincial furniture of my youth. In the Italian provinces.

I know that last bit seems snarky. It really wasn't intended that way. The interiors are surprisingly restrained, given the Baroquefest on the streets and, oh, the Cathedral of Valetta. And not only restrained, but pretty and delicate and charming. It takes me a few minutes to recall where I saw that color scheme. Canarsie, Brooklyn, the far away land of my adolescence, where, appropriately, the choices were only provincial - Italian or French.

Siracusa: The Ancient Dead

After Rome, Siracusa has the largest catacombs in Italy, but I need to leave Ortiga, the peninsula that contains the old city, because these dead weren't welcomed there, way back then.

Knowing that I needed to take a bus, I stopped by a tobacco store to buy a ticket. No, that isn't wrong - that's how the system works - although I wonder what Mayor Mike would think about it. In any case, in I go, only to be told that, no, you buy tickets on the bus. Hmm. I know that's not right, but, hey, he lives here.

So off I go to the bus stop, and wait, and wait, and wait for the right bus - maybe 45 minutes. I get on, and offer a handful of change to the driver - who tells me that I need to buy a ticket at the tobacco store - only now I realize that there is a tobacco store near the bus stop, but if I go there, the bus will leave, and then another long wait - and this not only Italy, but it is Sicily - which means that there is a post-audit system. You buy your ticket, have the bus on the machine stamp it, and, if an inspector comes around, you show them your ticket or get fined on the spot. But, this is Sicily. I get on the bus and tell the driver where I want to go.

After a while of rolling around the new city, I ask the driver to tell me when it is the right stop. Like some Warner Brothers cartoon, he realizes that I am on the bus, that I have the audacity to be asking directions when I don't have a ticket - and he says I-can't-even-imagine-what out loud - very loud - in Italian - no Sicilian. And then he says it again. But I get off the bus, and wander over to my cryptic destination. I arrive, with only 2 minutes until the English language tour. Just like the journey across the River Styx, you can't wander in the land of the dead alone.

The crypt is small, but the catacombs large - originally joining another catacombs under another church. It has streets and avenues and traffic circles and there is a distinct hierarchy among the dead. Not that there are any dead to see - those old bones were taken up to Rome after the War - bones from tens of thousands of bodies. The early Christians, who had to be buried outside of the city walls back in the day - the same way that we buried folks at the African Burial Ground in NYC. In both places, with time, the dead won, the civilization that ostracized them, embraced them.

In any case, we can't do the standard tour because the catacombs were once a Greek aqueduct, built into porous rock (the better to let water inside,my dear) - so there are puddles and drips from the copious rain that morning. We see niches for families, for nuns, for children, some with ornate facades, others just sort of stuck into the stone. The architecture of death.

Here and there are vents to the overworld - either for filling the aqueduct or for venting the smell of large numbers of decomposing bodies, which much have been overwhelming when men needed to work down there, enlarging the 'combs.

We take the tour - no photos allowed - except someone cheats, but who am I to complain? - so you will have to find your images on the 'Net - or in the darker recesses of your imagination.

It is now 12:30, so Sicily is about to start its siesta. If it weren't Monday, I could go to the badly organized and labeled museum next to the site, with thousands of artifacts jumbled - but it is, and I didn't want to go anyhow. The crypt guy suggests that I walk back to Ortigia, because the wait for the bus is so long (and there may not be a tobacco store), so I do, crossing one of the bridges to the old city. Then lunch in an impossibly narrow street - too narrow for even a motorcycle - and waste the afternoon, wandering hither and yon in this most romantic Baroque city.

So far, the pouring rain that has been forecast for all of Sicily and most of Europe has either been at night, or simply not materialized at all. In Siracusa, the weather is hot by day, with a cool sea breeze at night.

Dinner that night is at a wonderful restaurant a few blocks from my hotel, further from the Duomo, the site of all things tourist. Tuna is pretty much the main offering, so I have a wonderful, extraordinary tuna steak with tomatoes, the meal fresh and sweet with olive oil. We don't know tuna like this is New York. While there are other tourists, this restaurant is more sophisticated than the normal tourist haunts, and somewhat more expensive. But it is a wonderful place to linger, looking through the tall archway at a wall of wine, drinking the local vino.

A Ruinous Day

The next morning, I have a problem - I have seen all the sites I really care about, but the Neaopolis architectural zone in the new city is open, so shouldn't I go and see some really good Greek ruins? A fabulous theater? I decide to go, buy two bus tickets - one good for the next 120 minutes, the other for the next 2 days - and wait for the bus, which still doesn't take me anywhere near the site, but I find it, spend 9 Euro for a ticket, and go look at ruins.

Now the ruins are wonderful - but I really don't care. I look, I wander around. I'm very happy being in the middle row. I poke into an oracle's cave. And then it is time for lunch. Handily, I have with me the page from the updated restaurant guide to Italy that was republished to rave reviews. It tells me to ignore the tourist places at the site and walk a mere 250 meters to a plain bar with good pasta.

The street is nearby, I walk to the number - and there is nothing remotely resembling a restaurant there. This guide how has 2 strikes, 1 hit, and I am not happy. I am also starving.

At this point, I don't much care about the excellence of the cuisine - I want FOOD - McDonald's would be fine. But this is a commercial street with nary a bar. I finally spot a place for a calzone and water and wonder how I get back to Ortiga.

The ticket to the archeological zone includes entry into the museum, so I am walking in that direction. And walking. And walking. I am hot. I am tired. There are no taxis. There are no buses. And there is no museum.

Finally, a bus stop. I have a ticket. I ask and am told that the bus goes to Ortiga. So I wait. There is not a bench. And the wait is long. Very long. And when the bus comes, it takes me to the bus station, where I need to catch a free shuttle bus to Ortiga. Which I know from my trip to Noto, can mean a long wait. But it is there, door closed, I knock and he lets me on. Yes! 5 minutes and I will be back in the plaza in Ortiga. Or not.

This driver is... unhappy. He stops to scold the woman parked in the bus stop by the Ortigan shore. He complains about something else. And he is not taking the normal route back to the center of Oritiga - he is going along the perimeter.

I tell him that I want to go to the Duomo, since that's always safe, and I see that we are rounding the tip of the island. Hmm... then back up the other side. Finally, he stops the bus, points to a promenade by the sea and then to me and announces "Ortiga" pointing to the water. Well, yes, but so is everything else here.

It is obvious that I have no choice but to get off the bus, which I do and realize that I have no idea where on this small peninsula with tiny streets I am. I also realize that I'm in the downscale part of the old city, which I hither-to did not know existed. I ask for directions. I am turned around. I go off in one direction. I am told to go in another. Finally, I spy the Duomo, 3 hours after I left the archeological park. My plan for a day sitting at a seaside cafe, doing nothing, is shot.

I repair to a wonderful gelataria and happily spend 5 1/2 Euro on achingly wonderful Sicilian lemon sorbet. I have never had lemon sorbet this good.

As you might imagine, when spending days sightseeing, if you're out of diapers, you'll need to use the ... services ... WC ... toilet ... with some frequency. If you do, you will quickly discover that they are clean and readily available - and uniformly lacking in toilet seats. I don't mean one or two. I mean almost every toilet in a cafe, bar or public toilet that I encounter. The ones in the hotel rooms and most restaurants come with seats.

Now, in Malta, there was one toilet that came with "sit, don't squat with shoes on" diagrams, for the odd African who strayed. In Sicily, a noticeably more diverse place, there are no such instructions - and no seats. Are the Sicilians simply heading the feet on seats problem off at the pass, so to speak? Have all the toilet seats been stolen? Is this some as-yet-unknown type of Mafia protection? I don't know - but it is most curious.

Lacking inspiration, I decide to have dinner at the same restaurant. A tourist couple is browsing the menu and I give them my recommendation, as does another American woman, who invites me to join her. Feeling friendly, I do. Mistake.

When we sit down, I notice her patrician appearance - and her glassy eyes. She lives in a world of privilege, hangs around with people who are far wealthier, and has traveled widely, doing interesting things, some of which I don't quite understand. She is a friend of the owner of the restaurant and knows all the staff. She introduces me to one of the waiters, who says, yes, he served me the prior evening.

A short while later, a man is seated at the table next to us. She invites him to join us. He declines.

Throughout the meal,she talks to him, repeating some of the things she just told me. He and I exchange meaningful glances - not about our future together, but more along the lines of "OMG!" - some of the staff and I exchange the same glances. She moves to his table and, at some point, states that he will walk her home. Later it comes out, of course, that he is married - happily - but I don't hang around to see where the conversation goes.

It turns out the meal is free, for all of us. I tip the waiter well and walk home with my head buzzing - not from wine but from a dinner of endless chatter by a creature from another universe.

Ragusa
In the morning I take the train to Ragusa, another small Baroque town 2 hours inland. The train has two cars and runs on separate rails. It is almost empty and, apparently, the government has been trying to shut it down for years. Since I vastly prefer trains to buses, I am delighted and settle in for some uninterrupted reading. We arrive in the new city of Ragusa and I am told that the taxi stand is at the corner - which it is. But there aren't any taxis. I am soon directed to the adjacent bus stop, which has its own ticket office, learn which bus to take - and wait. and wait. Since there is, of course, no place to sit, I sit on the step into the ticket office. The man who works there is furiously polishing the counter. Then he sweeps the floor, and the step, making me get up, then the street. He then proceeds to wash the floor, and the stoop and then lock the office for the mid-day break. I have no choice but to stand, since my prior perch is wet.

45 minutes later, the bus arrives. On it is a voluble old Sicilian, who talks, non-stop, to one old Sicilian woman, then another, and finally, the driver.

I try to tell the driver where I am going, but he is disinterested. I try again a few minutes later. and finally am told to get off, which I do.

I am at on a curved street, high above a town which descends, endlessly, via steep steps - many, many steep steps.

I descend to a small plaza and look for someone to ask for directions. Finally, I see someone on the terrace above the plaza and shout up to them. He tells me that my hotel is 2KM below - and that I should take the bus, which I know means another 45 minute wait - and, of course, I don't have a ticket. I would have no qualm about using the same ticket I had bought, but the thought of waiting another 45 minutes for a bus is impossible. So I start to walk.

I hear a car - and put out my thumb to hitch. To my great surprise, a woman in her 30s, with 2 children in the car, stops and after she understands my problem, offers me a ride. I guess a white haired woman with a suitcase doesn't seem threatening. I toss my wheelie into the trunk and get in.

We drive, and drive, and drive, down, down, down, around, down, around. This would have been one heck of a walk. The drive is made longer by the fact that no cars are allowed in the center, and she insists upon driving me to my door. She does so, we say goodbye, she makes sure that I go in, and drives off.

For all the jokes about Sicily and the reality of poverty and crime, the reality of these towns is that there is a society of a type that has long gone missing in large cities. People get up on buses, to offer older, or frailer, people seats. You hear "please" "thank you" and "excuse me" constantly. Of course, there are anti-drug signs pasted to the wall of a building near my hotel, so this ancient town is a real place with real problems - but, still, it is nice to see a society so lacking in larger places.

The hotel is small but lovely and the town is... tiny. Maybe not the whole town, which crawls up the hill to the new city and down the sides of the hills, but the tourist center. It is even smaller than Noto's. 10 minutes, and you are done.

My plan was to stay here, day trip to Modica, another Baroque town nearby, known for its chocolate, and then on to Enna, the ancient hill town known as the navel of Sicily. But, now that I understand the way things work, I cross Modica off the list, While it may be only 40 minutes away, without a car, the time required to go to the bus station in Ragusa, get from the bus station to the town in Modica, and reverse, is just too exhausting to contemplate. With a car - sure. But, without one, well, how many Baroque towns do I need to see?

I go to the restaurant around the corner, also owned by the hotel, and a blond woman my age is seated at the next table and we start to talk. Fortunately, not only is this woman normal, she is very interesting, a retired Canadian special ed teacher and principal, whose son lives in NY, a place she visits often, now that a grandchild is on the way.

With nothing to do, we sit and talk for the next few hours and then we both return to the hotel - she is staying at the same one I am, with her husband. Now this is a fine way to spend an October day - off the square in a tiny, quiet Sicilian town, sipping wine, talking.

Back in my room, I start to wonder how I will get to Enna and now understand enough to be concerned about what I see. Yes, there is a bus - back at the airport at Catana. This means that I need to go back to where I started, almost 2 hours in the wrong direction, and take another bus back. And let's guess what the wait times for the buses will be.

When I started thinking about Sicily last winter, when first one trip, then another, to China fell apart, my first question was the feasibility of public transport. I was assured by Vagabonda, ostensibly a person who has done 26,000 posts on TripAdvisor's Sicily Forum, that it would be no problem. Now everything she - or whoever is answering all those posts with incredible details and lightening speed - said is true. But. And the but is an important one. Yes, the travel times are reasonable - as long as you don't include wait times and connections. Yes, there are buses and trains - but maybe not at the right hours. And yes, the Baroque towns are interesting - but there is really no reason to visit more than Siracusa.

I check with the desk that I can extend my stay another day and cancel Enna. I am not sure what I will do in this tiny town for 2 more days, but I would rather hang out then spend hours traveling for no real reason.

I go to dinner at the only place in town recommended by my foodie guide - it is really nothing special - a pork chop in an astonishing amount of olive oil - and, when walking back to the hotel, meet my lunch companion and her husband, who I join as they dine.

We quickly realize that we all have worked in similar worlds - he works with children with learning disabilities and disorders like ADHD, which is how they met. It is a long, comfortable conversation among people who are strangers but share experiences and perspectives. He speaks little, she speaks more, and it is a most enjoyable evening. We meet at breakfast and have another long chat.

Since I started traveling, I've had minor, but chronic, GI problems. In Malta, I thought it was the after-effects of an anti-biotic I was taking - or maybe the side effects of another drug - so I went to the pharmacy and bought some probiotics. Then, in Siracusa, I bought something else. But the problem is persisting and 10 days is a long time, so I go to the only pharmacy in the old town and buy some more probiotics. But I am concerned. GI problems are normally quick and violent, where this is slight but persistent. I ask the desk clerk about seeing a doctor and am told that it is too late on Friday and no one will be available over the weekend. A 4 hour bus ride to Palermo, on buses without toilets, is not something I want to consider.

I go on-line to contemplate my options - WiFi may be slow, but it is wonderful to have your own computer. I am supposed to go to Palermo on Sunday, fly to Rome on Wednesday and then to NY on Friday. Instead I realize that I can go to the airport at Catania, 2 hours away, and catch a flight to Rome on Sunday. Since I love Rome, and am finding Sicily only OK, that seems like the best solution. Foolishly, I don't book a flight = the prices will rise 50% the next day, the day before the flight, but I don't know that yet.

I then check for hotels - obviously, all the good, inexpensive ones are long booked. The place I have reserved can get me in one night earlier, but that leaves 2 nights. After much poking around TripAdvisor, I end up booking a more expensive B&B. I then tell the hotel in Palermo that I might cancel - another mistake, because, when I receive their response in the morning, it is officially within 24 hours of my planned arrival, so the on-line booking service will charge me for the first night. I HATE these on-line services, but sometimes they are the only way to book these small hotels.

Since I have travel insurance, I email them, and am told to call their emergency services number collect, which I do on Saturday morning. They are, in a word, useless. They keep telling me that the insurance company will determine what to pay - and when I point out that I was told to call them, they are puzzled. They can't even give me an English speaking doctor in Rome.

Fortunately, the older woman at the desk understands "idiot!" and she decides to call the doctor in town - who is in his office, and comes right over. He speaks some English, she translates, and soon I am diagnosed with the stomach virus that is going around Sicily. Interestingly, he prescribes the same meds I am taking and what the Sicilians call a "white" diet - plain rice, tea and toast - none of which are easy to find in Sicilian restaurants. He is happy to write me a note explaining that I need to go to Rome because of my illness - whether the insurance company will honor it is TBD, but I am not sure how they will argue with it. I get a bill and make reservations for Rome. Since I will be spending so much money on the hotel, if the insurance doesn't cover, I decide to take a taxi to the airport - very expensive, more so than usual because it will be a Sunday, but given the bus timings, the best option.

Hopefully, the meds will work and I can eat well in Rome. I have to say that, after all these days in tiny towns, I am ready for several days in one of my favorite cities.

Rice a Roma

I left Ragusa at 10 AM, landed in Rome at 2:30, got into a taxi - and ended up fighting with the driver most of the way into Rome (at some point we stopped speaking). Why? Because I was going to a very small street in Testrastevere, in Rome, a city of tiny streets. Since the driver had no idea where it was, he decided to check the index on his map - while driving in the left lane.

When I objected - I finally found something worse than texting while driving - he explained to me, in excitable Italian, that he was a professional driver and that it was perfectly safe to be reading a map while driving. And, anyhow, no one could possibly know all the streets in Rome (which is true).

He continued to check the map, I continued to scream at him, he pulled over to the side of the highway - I assumed to throw me out, but actually to read them map - and got back on, now typing into his GPS. The only problem, of course, is that he didn't really read the name of the street right so he was spelling it wrong - and so he kept re-typing it - while driving.

After we passed the exit to Testrastevere, going instead to the historical center of Rome, which is no where near my hotel, I got him to understand that the street was spelled MeN and not MEM - so he plugged it into his GPS and delivered me to the door. Why he didn't do this at the airport probably says something about men and directions and the sub-species Italian men and directions.

This B&B is in an old apartment house, so it has one of those little cage elevators - Roman style - that fits 3 people. I am greeted by the owner of this B&B, and the one I originally tried to book, a surprisingly young man. After graduating from college, he thought "teach - or something in tourism, because Rome is a tourist city" - so he decided to go into the B&B business.

The rooms are large, with high ceilings - but not yet finished. It really doesn't matter, because all I need is a place to sleep for two nights, but it is a bit strange being the only person in a B&B. But the location is good and I am happy to be in Rome.

After a long chat with the owner, and the usual room-set-up activities, I decide to look for a place for dinner. There is no shortage of restaurants and pizzerias in the area - some look fabulous - but I'm on a white diet and that diet doesn't include pizza with 4 cheeses. I walk a bit in the rather cool and damp evening air, wondering what to do, and then I set... two red lanterns... which I head towards smiling broadly. Japanese food! No, I don't mean sushi and shashimi - I mean miso soup with noodles and bits of meat. I mean something that doesn't have olive oil or tomato sauce.

The bowl of larmen is small relative to a NY portion, lacking in noodles - and not particularly good - but I devour it. I then wonder what else I can order and settle on white rice and chicken skewers, hold the sauce. I can literally feel my body bloom as it gets its first food other than rice and toast in 24 hours. I can't begin to tell you how exhausting it is to travel when you're not eating nourishing food or drinking anything caffeinated. And the thought of walking around Rome with only toast in my belly makes me want to stay in my room.

It is cool out - but the Romans are acting as though winter has arrived. I see a woman go past with her scarf over her nose and mouth, the way we do when it is really, really cold.

I go back to my quiet hotel and finish yet another book on my iPhone. I have now read 12 books on it and, I have to tell you, I just love the thing. Yes, you need to turn pages all the time - but then I think about the books I schlepped with me - and even my eReader - and it is more than worth the trade off.

A Pilgrim's Tour

It is cool and cloudy - my down vest, sweater and shirt are barely warm enough. I head across the Tiber to the main part of Rome and quickly am struck by just how many tourists there are.

When I was in Rome in 2005, there were a LOT of tourists - but their numbers have increased dramatically. Almost everyone you see is carrying the same free map of Rome or, less fortunately, playing follow the leader with someone carrying (1) a flag (2) a silly umbrella opened (3) a collapsible umbrella, closed - or, alarmingly, the members of the tour group are all wearing (1) bright yellow hats, (2) white scarves with the name of the tour company printed on it or (3) ear pieces, so they can listen to the tour leader's narrative. I am sure that there are Italians - and even Romans - in Rome, but, at times it is hard to spot them. There are SO many tourists.

And when I'm not looking at tourists, what do I see? Priests and nuns. A surprising number of young, and even attractive, priests. A surprising number of nuns, many of them African, in all sorts of unflattering attire, including little round white pillboxes on their heads underneath their wimples. The priests,needless to say, are wearing loafers - but their attire varies, I suppose by the order. Some wear suits. Others, robes. And there is one with a fetching jacket with a nipped waist and short cape - I had a Tahari suit just like it that I loved. Of course, this being Rome, it makes sense that there are lots of clergy, and that there's none of the "woman religious" stuff that American nuns practice - habitless, to be sure. Nope, these are the regulation, flying through the air, singing in Sister Act, nuns.

Except... for the Rome 2011 calendar. Now, I didn't buy one - and it was sealed, but can someone tell me WHY there is a calendar with a reasonably attractive young priest on the cover? Might this be the Vatican version of the NYC Firefighter's calendar - but who is the Vatican raising money for? Legal settlements?

Snarkiness aside, I guess the thing that surprises me most is how many young people, of both sexes, take vows. I can understand African women entering a convent, although I know that is not remotely a politically correct sentiment - but, as with the early Christians, religion could be a ticket to a better life for some people in the developing world. But for people from the West? I thought they were having trouble recruiting. Well, I guess that's why there's a bell curve...

Today I have decided to, essentially, walk across Rome. While I could revisit famous sites, see great art, I prefer to see Rome, as opposed to historical Rome, so I walk across the Tiber, say hello to the Ghetto, which has more "kosher" signs than I remember and then try, unsuccessfully, to stick to back streets, avoiding the tourist sites. This trip, I am captivated by the wonderful interior courtyards of the great Roman buildings. Many have gates barring entrance, but you can see through them and others are freely available. They are wonderful - statues, carvings, fountains - sometimes, veritable galleries of sculpture and friezes.

As is my wont, I also photograph the incredible jumble that is Roman architecture, all angles and wonderful colors, because the buildings are painted in ocher, sienna and corals, many aging in interesting ways. And the buildings also have ornaments - leonine metal boot scrapers - or something. Paintings of the Virgin at the corner of a building, often surrounded by cherubs. Wonderfully carved doors with worn brass handles. Fountains - some noteworthy, some just sort of there, if you take the time to notice. Odd bits of ancient Rome left exposed in more modern walls. And the, of course, the modern city - graffiti, often stencils as opposed to tags, although there are those too.

This is the Rome I love, the collision of centuries alive in the 21st century. The city that lives and breathes and works and eats in sidewalk cafes.

I skirt Piazza del Fiori, try to avoid Piazza Narvonna and the Pantheon but fail. It is sad to see how many tourists are at the Pantheon these days - I recall sitting there, in a cafe, without the place being inundated. But that was a lifetime ago.

Ultimately, I end up near the Spanish Steps. Now, this has always been a tourist site but now, OMG! There are so many tourists sitting on the steps that it would be impossible to walk up or down them - something I did regularly on my first trip to Rome, because my hotel was above them. Admittedly, that was in the 1980s, but, even in 2005, it was nothing like this. The whole area is mobbed so I pass until, exhausted, I reach my destination and find a mini-bus that will take me back the way I came.

Now buses are always a problem, because you don't ever know where they are going. I know that this will go down a main street - but then it turns, and I'm not sure where, so I get off. Mistake.

I recognize the enormous monument and figure I'm near the Tiber, so I'll just walk to it through the side streets. The very small side streets. The tiny side streets that aren't quite on any map. The minuscule side streets that are, essentially, fly paper for lost tourists. We enter, we look at our map. We look around confused. We walk hither, then yon. We kinda, sorta know where we are - but we don't know how to get out of the maze - especially since a couple of the streets are dead ends.

A man cycles through, stops and asks if I need directions. YES! He tells me how to go and then I tell him he has to stay there, all day, to help lost tourists. I try to follow his directions, which involve walking under an arch - but I can't find the arch.

It is now 3PM. I have been walking since 11AM. I want only to go back to my room and put my feet up.

Finally, I am on a main street, which I see on the map and then I see arches, which I walk under, and beyond - but there's no river. So I,l painfully, walk back. There's a police box but, good bureaucrat that he is, he can't talk to me on THIS side of the booth so I need to walk to THAT side of the booth - at which point I discover that I was walking away from the river. It is odd - the river is uphill from the street I am on. I never think of urban rivers as being uphill.

I cross one of the old bridges and then realize that it is one of the furthest from my hotel, so another walk is ahead.

The Japanese restaurant is closed on Monday and Tuesday, so I am at a loss where to eat. I go into a place nearby for a pasta without tomato and cheese - and find that they're out of all sauces that are the reason I came in. This is really getting old.

Just for the heck of it, I should mention that there aren't a lot of toilet seats in Rome either. Why?

Another Rant

I wrote more last night. I SWEAR that I did. But then, it vanished, just like the last time. Now, I know you need to save stuff regularly, and I did, which is the only reason that any of the post survived, but, really, what is going on?? Between not having connectivity, this - and being engrossed in various books - I am days behind. And I am hating my netbook - sure, it types, but it is just too slow and the screen too small. Now that brand new MacBook Air, well, it might be in my travel bag next year. Rant over.

Moving Downtown (Sort Of)

This morning I move to the B&B I had reserved from NY - 5 rooms, in a more residential area further from the heart of Trastevere and the historical center, but on a good tram line. It is top rated and 25 Euro a night cheaper. If I pay cash, I will be staying in Rome for about $115 a night, which is about what I paid when I was here in 2005.

The room is much smaller, with clean, higher quality finishes the best WiFi to date and each room is beautifully painted with Roman scenes. More importantly, it is one of the rare hotel rooms to have a comfortable place to sit - in this case, a leather sofa about the width of a single bed - which it converts to. I know that high end hotels have upholstered hotels, but they never exist at this price point. At last, some place other than the bed to sit, put my feet up, and read or write (This is being broadcast live from that chair now).

Check-in completed, I grab the tram to the Center, even though I have no idea what I am going to do. I had not planned on 4 full days in Rome so I have only a minimal guidebook - but I've also spent enough time in the City that I don't feel the need to rush around. And the weather has improved dramatically - 50 degrees at night and in the low 60s during the day, with partly cloudy skies.

I walk horizontally across the Center, staying on small streets and stopping periodically to watch the world go by. Normally, I'd be hanging out at cafes but the fact that I can't eat pretty much anything turns me strongly to Plan B, which means no whiling away the time in a cafe with some wine. I had SO wanted to do this.

Most of the clothing stores in Rome are tiny, and the price of clothing is expensive, at least to someone accustomed to discount stores. Very broadly, there are three types of clothing: couture like Armani, beautiful, very classic - and expensive - clothing, in muted colors, and whatever is the current vogue, which I don't find at all appealing. And a lot of the scarves and shawls are from Asia or India, but priced very aggressively - inexpensive viscose shawls sell from 72 Euro here, which is absurd.

The people on the street look both similar and different than they do in NY. Perhaps 10 percent are dressed in classic Italian style. Most of the rest are in the international uniform of jeans, tights, tee shirts, etc. Overall, I think the clothing looks cheaper than that work by New Yorkers, which may have something to do with the prices here. Diversity is much more limited - a small number of Africans, some darkish peddlers whose ethnicity I can't figure out, and the inevitable Roma, begging everywhere. While I have read that obesity is a major problem in Italy, I haven't seen any evidence of it - the Romans are a small people and you see neither extremely thin nor overweight people.

Perhaps the biggest difference is the absence of color in people's clothing. Traditionally, Italy has been a navy and camel/brown country, with red supplying some cheer. Which is to say that it has nothing like the color of NY's streets, and certainly none of the extremes of style. No neo-Punks. One Hip Hop wanna be (sort of). Or, as an Italian I know once said "Only Americans wear pink."

On some level, Rome is what NYC will be hundreds or thousands of years from now, assuming we survive. What Rome lacks in current diversity, it makes up in historical diversity, thousands of years of empire, conquest and civilizations, bringing cultures and religions and influences. What is happening in NYC now is probably the modern equivalent, happening, as everything does these days, at warp speed. Where Italy had conquest, we have immigration, but we need another hundred years to see what we look like - what all that mixing will turn us into as a people, and as a culture. Our WASP days are far behind us and we are heading for a blending that will probably be unique in history.

My day over, I head back to my room and try to figure out what to do about food. I Google "Japanese restaurants Rome" and get a lot of hits - not all of which are Japanese, and only one of which is remotely close. Their take out menu is all sushi and shashimi, the thought of which revolts me - I am pretty much better, but I have no interest in experimenting with raw fish - but I hope for soup and noodles.

I head out, thinking I saw another Japanese restaurant on the main street - and find it quickly. It is, of course, a Japanese, Chinese, Italian restaurant - which means it will do nothing well. I have the worst won ton soup I have ever had and steamed pork dumplings. Between this and my lunch of flattened chicken and roast potatoes, I've done remarkably well today - but, boy, is this not what I envisioned.

The next day, I explore Trastevere, which I've visited in the past, but only for lunch. It is filled with restaurants and workshops and tiny streets across the hill from the Vatican. I walk to its heart and go to see a church I've missed - which is extraordinary - and I don't say that about churches, in general, and after 3 weeks of them, in particular.

This church is from the 12th century and has the most exquisite mosaic alter. The ceiling is carved and painted and there is a high Baroque side chapel. The floor is a design of circles with bands of marble mosaic. The facade also has a large mosaic. I spend a long time in it because I have come at the right time, with the sun streaming through the windows, reflecting off the gold, illuminating the interior. I try to imagine what it must have been like all those hundreds of years ago,

This is a thought you can't help but have in Rome, where there are churches, literally, everywhere. What was it like to live here when religion was a much more dominant force in people's lives? What caused all these churches to come into being - were they created by the powerful or by the ordinary people? Here I am not talking about the grand basilicas but rather the churches you pass everywhere on the streets. I am sure there are all sorts of histories, but I am equally sure that they are dry - and I would rather wonder than know all the details. The cost of maintaining them must be astronomical.

Sightseeing done, my thoughts turn naturally to lunch - and, today being Wednesday, the Japanese restaurant is open. Disconcertingly, the waitress remembers my Sunday night order which is, alas, exactly what I will eat for lunch. Complain though I do, coming to Rome was the right decision because ASIANS DON'T COOK WITH DAIRY.

Even though I seem to be OK - it is some sick joke that I'm recovering when I leave - I'm being conservative, so the thought of dinner brings only despair - I can't face either the Japanese or the Chinese place again - so I dine on rice crackers and Gatorade in my room - gross, huh? - and finish my book. I am not a mystery reader or a fan of Swedish literature so I am surprised that I am so in to this book. I guess that is why it is an international best-seller.

After I finish it, I check its reviews on Amazon and am surprised that a significant percentage of reviews were very negative. I assume that it is like independent films - love them or hate them. I download the next book in the trilogy to my iPhone, since I have a long flight ahead of me. I have more than enough books to get me through, but there is a certain type of book that is perfect for airports and 10 hour flights, so I want to be sure that I have one in reserve if I need it. To give myself a break, I switch to my other favorite, Mary Roach, who is examining life - and bodily functions - during trips to outer space. In view of what she did with sex, I can't wait.

"Ciao Roma"

I really don't want to do anything today - I am done with sight seeing. But I feel that I really should visit the ancient ruins, even though I hate ruins and am sure that they will be inundated with tourists.

I take the bus, the train, and walk up 3 enormous flights of steps - Rome being a city of hills - to get to a church that doesn't excite me. Then towards the Coliseum. All my fears are realized. The restaurants have touts. There are guys selling faux silk scarves with reproductions of the Coliseum and there are so many tourists that, from my position above the the site, they truly do look like ants. I don't go in.

I walk past some of the other ruins, turn off into a tiny street for an overpriced lunch and then do what I wanted to - head back to Trastevere and hang out for the rest of the glorious day, doing nothing but watching the people and wondering whether I will ever come back to Rome.