But now it's time to talk about my past week in Rome. On Monday, I had the normal class schedule, and Tuesday I only have class at 5:15 PM, so I had all of Tuesday to see Castel Sant'Angelo. This building used to be the mausoleum of the Roman emperor, Hadrian, who was a great emperor. He traveled throughout the Empire, especially to Greece. He commissioned the Pantheon to be rebuilt in Rome (in case any of you have forgotten, the Pantheon is one of the best preserved ancient buildings in the world!), he had a beautiful villa right outside Rome in the town of Tivoli, he founded an efficient post service for the empire, and had a period of peace within the Empire, to strengthen its borders. If you can't tell by now, I went to Castel Sant'Angelo not only to visit a castle, whose patron saint is St. Michael, but because I'm writing a paper for my art history class on Hadrian's mausoleum and why he was such a good emperor, along with the funerary practices of the time. It should be an interesting research project, but I'm not very motivated to write a 10-page paper about the topic.
Anyway, so I went to Castel Sant'Angelo on Tuesday afternoon. I want to let you know it's right near the Vatican, not even a 5 minute walk from St. Peter's Basilica. After the first sack of Rome, when Hadrian's ashes, along with his wife's ashes and all the other emperor's remains housed there, were stolen, it was used as a military fortress for a period of time, since it had a good look-out point and it was right next to the Tiber River. When Rome was under attack by enemies or during the Sack of Rome, there is supposedly a secret passageway from the Vatican to Castel Sant'Angelo, and the Pope would follow the passageway and hide safely in the castle. Since the early 1900s, it has been a museum and that is its present-day purpose.
After paying the entrance fee and walking around kind of aimlessly, I decided to return to the entrance to buy an audioguide. It was very helpful and taught me a lot about the original purpose and structure of the building. Another note: it's kind of freaky going to a site where you know there used to be ashes of deceased people, even if they're not there anymore. But I overcame that fear and took detailed notes, as I will have to describe the structure of the mausoleum in my paper. On top of the castle, there is a fantastic view of the city, and you can see a wonderful view of St. Peter's Basilica. There is also a statue of Michael the Archangel on the terrace, and I'll explain the significance of that with a supposed legend I learned about on the audioguide tour.
(If you're not into history, just skip this paragraph- but it is pretty interesting I think). During the 6th century, when the pope was Gregory the Great, there was a plague in Rome, which was believed to be a divine punishment for all mankind's sins. Pope Gregory organized a procession with the image of the Holy Mother from Santa Maria Maggiore (one of the Vatican churches in Rome) to San Pietro. As the procession was passing the castle, St. Michael appeared in the sky over the castle, brandishing his sword and placing it in his sheath, as a sign of peace. The plague suddenly ended after his appearance, and a chapel was built to St. Michael inside the castle, and from then on, it was given the name Castel Sant'Angelo, since St. Michael is one of the most important archangels. The bronze statue of St. Michael on top of the castle was added later.
Wednesday was another day full of classes, and then Thursday was Thanksgiving Day, which they obviously don't celebrate in Italy, because Italians don't have a reason to be thankful for the pilgrims and Indians. LOL I only have one class on Thursday (Italian), and my teacher had an interesting lesson for us that day: we were going to make the Italian dessert, tiramisu, instead of having a traditional class. She spoke in Italian to us, and we followed the recipe in Italian. It's actually really easy to make, but I won't spoil the recipe for anyone- I want to make it myself when I'm back in the States and impress everyone with my newly acquired cooking skills. :) After making tiramisu, we went to the dinner that our school was cooking for us. It was nice to have turkey and stuffing and mashed potatoes and wine of course! I'll have to admit, it wasn't nearly as good as the meals I would have had back home, but it was a good substitute. I talked to my parents on Thanksgiving morning their time, right before I went to Italian class. I had a relaxing Thursday night and Friday, and I grabbed some coffee with my friend Rita on Friday evening.
I had to be up early on Saturday to catch the bus for the school trip. This was my final trip with AUR, and I was excited to go to Assisi. They had a tour guide waiting for us when we got off the bus, and I learned a lot on the tour. I didn't know that Assisi was a Roman town; they even had Roman ruins underneath the medieval streets that are still standing today. Most of the buildings are made out of limestone brick and there were green plants everywhere- it was a really beautiful, serene town, and it was nice to take a trip somewhere so calm. We saw two basilicas there- one for St. Clare, one for St. Francis of Assisi. They were both filled with amazing art work and had interesting historical backgrounds. We ate an authentic Assisi meal- I had bruschetta and then pasta with olive/mushroom sauce. It was soooo delicious and I was so full, yet I still had room for a chocolate cannoli. :) We had a little time to browse the shops, but I personally didn't do any shopping. It was time to catch the bus back to Rome, and I admired the setting sun on the Italian landscape, realizing that I only have three more weeks to enjoy this beautiful country. Until next time, ciao!
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