When in Rome

I heard a new Finnish expression recently from a client who said, “I am out like a snowman!” He was trying to express that he didn't know anything about a new initiative in the company and needed help to understand. My interpretation of this was that it was similar to the English expression, “left out in the cold” but that the Finns took it to another level with “out like a snowman.” As a snowman, you add insult to injury with not only being left out in the cold but being left out in the cold wearing nothing but a few buttons, a top hot, and a carrot nose with which to survive it! So, maybe mortified in addition to being clueless. Regardless, it is quite an appropriate phrase given how much of the year is cold and conducive to snowmen. The last chunks of ice in the Baltic Sea off the shores of Helsinki melted at the end of April and it already started snowing again in the beginning of October. We’re now in the midst of the steady and scarily fast decline into the ever increasing darkness. I’ve been told to prepare myself for November, supposedly the worst month of the year.

I got a break from the cold temperatures a couple weeks ago when I was able to spend a long weekend in Rome. I left my apartment at 6am in the cold and the rain, right around freezing, and landed in Rome at 10am to 75°F – it was amazing! I had been to Rome several years ago but it was only for a rushed couple of days in the middle of the heat and tourist onslaught in June. On that trip, I arrived by train at 6am and was welcomed by near 100°F sweltering heat and, after having slept very little over the previous two nights of night trains (and two days of no access to a shower – and no, for those of you wondering, swimming in the ocean doesn’t count), I was really dragging my feet. The city was uncomfortably hot, I was uncomfortably dirty, and every tourist site, or even street corner, was uncomfortably crowded. I saw most of the major sites over the next 36 hours or so but was exhausted and, sadly, hardly remembered anything at all.

This trip, on the other hand, I arrived well-rested if still recovering from the flu, took the train into the city (which I knew well from my previous trip to the Amalfi Coast in May), and arrived to perfectly pleasant weather and a bustling but not overcrowded city. It also helped a bit that I was heading to a beautiful hotel and didn’t have a backpack on my back. What a difference a job and a little money makes with respect to travel! Channeling a little bit of the old backpacker (i.e. the part of me which is too cheap to pay for taxis!), I made my way from the train station to the hotel by foot. The 30-minute walk was a great reintroduction to Italian culture from its polar opposite in Finland – more people said hello (or “Buona sera,” rather) to me in 30 minutes in Rome than have said anything similar to me in Finland over the past 10 months. Unfortunately, no, this is not an exaggeration.

Rome is a beautiful swirling of the old and the new with fancy scooters practically flying through tight alleyways of stone streets, a fashion model doing a photo shoot from the window of a thousand year old building, an ambulance speeding by less than 20 yards from the Colosseum walls, and even iPhone covers being sold next to fresh flowers and watercolor paintings at the top of the Spanish Steps. Around every turn of every corner is another lovely, unique alleyway with beautiful old buildings, Italian men wearing aprons giving open arm welcomes to their pizzerias, another stunning Catholic church tucked at the end of a forgotten street, and then, suddenly, the Colosseum, the Pantheon, the Vatican. It is truly an amazing city, both with so much to remind us of its ancient past but at the same time careening along full speed in the 21st century.

I had visited St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican the last time I was in Rome but I went back this time with much more appreciation for what I was seeing. The previous trip had been a whirlwind and very much a “check the box” type of first-time visit. This time I took my time and spent several hours in the Vatican Museum which is both completely overwhelming in terms of sheer number of exhibits and completely awe-inspiring when you think of the artistic genius housed within this single museum’s walls. There are ancient Egyptian artifacts including tombs and preserved bodies (honestly, maybe a bit too much is on exhibit but it is interesting even if a bit disturbing to see), some of the most famous paintings and frescoes in the world, ancient Roman sculptures and ruins, not to mention the Vatican grounds and buildings themselves, impressive in their own right.

The main attraction, and rightfully so, is the Sistine Chapel. I did not visit the Vatican Museum on my first trip to Rome so had not seen the Sistine Chapel before – what a travesty! No trip to Rome is complete with seeing the Museum and, more importantly, the Sistine Chapel itself. Michelangelo, who considered himself to be a sculptor more so than a painter, was “asked” by Pope Julius II to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and although Michelangelo was supposedly rather hesitant to take it on, particularly when it would detract from his primary art of sculpting for several years (it ended up taking him four years, from 1508-1512 to finish), ended up taking the challenge and what a gift it was to the world that he did! The Chapel frescoes are fantastic individually and truly one of the world’s artistic masterpieces when taken together as a collection.

The most famous and recognizable fresco is the one depicting when God created man in which God is reaching his hand down from heaven toward Adam’s (from Adam and Eve, of course) outstretched hand. Seeing this fresco amidst all of the others telling the story of the creation of man, man’s original sin, and finally The Last Judgment is really powerful. Michelangelo’s genius here is the telling of such important Bible stories through relatively few yet very descriptive paintings, making it real and meaningful for even those who couldn’t read at the time when it was originally painted. I don’t know anything about artistic genius but, as with other things, I know it when I see it and the Sistine Chapel is absolutely brilliant. Pictures are not allowed within the Chapel which is frustrating but also understandable. This is something you have to see, and sit in silence to appreciate for a while, in person.

Besides enjoying plenty of gelato and pizza I spent most of my time in Rome wandering around the amazing historical sights (very convenient that both gelato and pizza are both good on-the-go foods…and available for purchase about every ten meters) including the Colosseum, the Pantheon, and the Roman Forum. The Colosseum is something that I remember from my first trip to Rome and it was just as incredible and overwhelming the second time I saw it as it was the first time. Knowing that it was built nearly 2,000 years ago (completed around 80 A.D.) and is (largely) still standing today in all its glory is really amazing. What is also amazing is what actually went on in the Colosseum…prisoners fighting exotic animals to the death as a form of community entertainment is pretty unfathomable and, thank goodness, is no longer seen as a spectator event (or exist as an event at all, at least to my knowledge)! Standing high in the Colosseum and looking down upon the now exposed labyrinth where these prisoners and animals were once confined made the visualization a bit too real for me. To be fair, the Colosseum was also used for more standard arts performances including plays based on classic mythology and re-enactments of famous battles, not just gladiatorial contests and executions. It is estimated that it could hold 40,000-80,000 spectators (apparently difficult to estimate because most of the actual seats have been long gone for hundreds of years)!

The Colosseum is one of the most popular tourist sites in Rome and, perhaps, one of the most iconic constructions in the world today. Given that it is so famous and that I had visited before, I was surprised to learn that the Colosseum has strong ties to the Roman Catholic Church and that the Pope even leads a “Way of the Cross” processional from the Colosseum grounds every year on Good Friday. Perhaps the most surprising thing about the Colosseum however is finding that this ancient architectural wonder is smack dab in the middle of current day Rome madness. The Rome of today was built literally on top of, around, underneath, beside, and sometimes straight through the Rome of yesterday. I was struck by this as I tried to get a good picture of the Colosseum and first had to wait for the Italian labor union picketers, several speeding taxis, and a tourist bus to move out of the way after which I had to figure out how to hide a high-rise building crane from the back of the shot.

The Roman Forum is another pretty amazing thing to see, particularly because some of the ruins are approaching 3,000 years old and are again front and center in the middle of present day Rome. Because of the ancient Roman practice of just building over top of old buildings and ruins, the excavation of the Forum today shows ruins from several different centuries, some of which dating back to the 7th century BC. I remember the Forum from my first time in Rome and being in awe of the fact that they let visitors walk as they pleased all over the ruins. Relatively little is roped off and visitors are allowed to explore the areas quite freely which struck me as strange coming from the US where tourist sites, even those which are very “new” by comparison to anything in Rome, have tightly controlled (and often fenced in) walking paths, required guides, and a long annoying list of visitors’ rules. Touring the Roman Forum is much more of a free for all…and seems to have been so for several hundred years

I had a fantastic three days of walking and exploring till I almost dropped (to be revived again and again by the powers of the aforementioned gelato and pizza!) and once again confirmed my love for Italy. The sun was shining, the people were (as always) lovely and friendly, the buildings beautiful and in a rainbow of different colors, the ruins jaw-dropping, the sculptures gorgeous and plentiful, and the attention overwhelming and much-needed after ten months in Finland! As a woman, every Italian man you walk by gives you a brazen and rather piercing once over and follows up with a big smile and, “Buona sera!” (Good evening!) or the personally preferred “Ciao, bella!” (Hello, beautiful!). I met an Italian woman at the airport who had lived in the US for several years and then moved to the UK with her British husband but who, now again so close to Italy, couldn’t stay away. She was asking me about Finland and my travels and when I mentioned that the Finns were wonderful people but quite private and a bit difficult to get to know initially she said, “Even the men?!” I said, yes, even the men, and told her that after three months in Finland I realized how much my self esteem relied on input from other people as I was telling my mom on the phone in a low moment, “No one, male or female, has looked at me in three months. No one has even noticed me in any context. I feel like I am invisible!” My new Italian friend again came back with, “NO! They don’t say anything to you? The men?! Really? What is wrong with them?! Even the men?!” I laughed, a quintessential Italian response if ever there was one! I told her that one reason I think that Americans (well, basically, anyone from anywhere!) love travelling in Italy is because the people and the culture are so friendly, welcoming, and open. I told her that it was a great change of pace to be in Italy and that I just soaked up as many ciao bellas as I could and tried not to think about the fact that Italian men say this to every woman…quite literally every woman. She paused, grabbed my arm, and dropped her chin to look me dead in the eyes, “Honey, definitely don’t think about that. I mean, who even cares?” I laughed and agreed. And for those Finns or any shy men who may be reading, “Ciao, bella” and a smile goes a loooooong way and certainly a hell of a lot longer than does ignoring someone…giving a whole new meaning to the word “ignorance,” at least in my mind. Ha!

You could really spend weeks in Rome exploring the many different areas and types of ruins (and enjoying gratuitous amounts of both gelato and ciao bellas) and I, unfortunately, could only spend several hours over the course of a long weekend. I pushed myself pretty hard in order to see as much as I could and all of the things on my “must-see” list and then got in a cab on the way to the airport and drove by several more pockets of ruins which I hadn’t even heard about, some were individual buildings or complexes while others were the equivalent of small cities. Besides being concerned for my life given my self-talking and American music singing disaster of an Italian taxi driver (the traffic and drivers in Rome are crazy!), I was also frustrated that I had missed so much and couldn’t stay longer. Thankfully, I had already thought ahead about another visit and had thrown a single coin into the famous Trevi Fountain earlier that day which, according to local legend, means that I will be back to visit Rome again. I certainly will go back…it just might be a little more difficult to do a long weekend there from San Francisco next year! I haven’t yet looked into a career transition from consulting to gelato scooping but I would be extremely tempted if I meant I could move to Rome!

Tear it down

I haven’t written for a while but that has been a function of too much work, too little sleep, and catching the flu on top of it all…not lack of travel. Since Moscow, I’ve spent my last four weekends in Cannes (France) for an office outing (via 14 hours of travel starting in Helsinki, stopping over in Stockholm to pick up our Swedish colleagues, changing route and landing in Genova, Italy, and then taking a bus for three hours to Cannes courtesy of the French air traffic controllers strike – ugh), Zurich and Bern (Switzerland), Berlin, and Paris. It’s been a travel whirlwind and I have to admit that I am getting tired! Not tired of it - just tired! (I told this to a friend of mine here and she said, "So you actually are human after all!" I didn't think much of it until another friend said the exact same thing that same week - yikes! Happy to know I make such a good first impression!)

As expected, Cannes was gorgeous and had it not been for the travel nightmare to get there, was a great trip. It always amazes me to see how big Hollywood is outside the US and, of course, Cannes is even more movie star crazed given the famous annual film festival and the subsequent and enduring association with Hollywood’s most glamorous and celebrated actors. I can understand getting excited about seeing a celebrity but in Cannes tourists were crawling all over one another to take a picture of an empty red carpet. That takes it to a new level!

I flew to Zurich on a whim after many months of wanting to go to Switzerland (one of the few western European countries which I had never been to before) and the opportunity finally presented itself so I jumped on a plane. I stayed in Zurich but had heard wonderful things about the smaller capital city of Bern so took the train there for a day. Bern is all it is cracked up to be with a quaint and lovely old town, a hilltop rose garden, and it’s inspiration in cages on the banks of the river for all to see. ..?! “Bern” means “bear” and they may have taken this a little too far with the bears-only “zoo” just outside the old town. For a girl from just outside of Yellowstone, and even closer to “Bear World” (yes, it really does exist!), this was a little too much commercial USA creeping into old Europe. Otherwise, Bern was beautiful and I had a great day exploring the cobblestone streets, climbing church towers, visiting the famous rose garden overlooking the city, and drinking wine outside of Einstein’s home.

Both Bern and Zurich and, so, now all of Switzerland in my mind, are just overwhelmed by designer clothing, shoe, crystal, furniture, chocolate, jewelry, etc, etc, stores. If the dollar wasn’t so weak and if prices in Switzerland weren’t already so unreasonable, I could have easily spent my way into trouble in either of those cities. It was a two day test of self control to not get lost in all the “things” – I had to put myself on a train to Bern for sightseeing and then go on a long run in Zurich to keep myself away from the shopping! This is probably made much worse by the fact that I haven’t bought anything (except plane tickets and lots of them!) this year because I’ve been so disgusted with the prices but I’m now getting to the edge of my rope. I’ve already committed my first two weekends back in the US to shopping. I’m expecting to be poor but hoping to be well-dressed by Christmas.


I appreciated Bern much more the week after I visited when I was actually in Berlin. All I can say is, WOW, what a difference getting leveled in two world wars vs. staying neutral makes when it comes to cities today! Berlin was the exact opposite of Bern; it is growing quite literally straight up in sheets of shiny metal and glass, traversed by multiple lanes of perfect and efficient concrete streets. Bern’s old town, on the other hand, is slow and easy with cobblestone roads winding their way between centuries old buildings maxing out at around four stories and topped off with very pretty, terracotta roof tiles, all overseen by the Bern cathedral. I stayed in what used to be East Berlin and is now a sparkling and streamlined apex of luxury goods shopping. (I was tempted again! It’s getting more and more difficult each week to stave off the urge to buy new shoes!). Ironically, only about a kilometer down this street of temptation I ran into “Checkpoint Charlie,” the most famous of the six East-West Berlin crossing points and the only one through which the Allied forces or any other foreigners were allowed to pass between East and West Berlin.

I spent a few hours at Checkpoint Charlie reading the panels of Cold War history posted around the better part of two city blocks and, embarrassingly, I have to admit that I probably learned more in those few hours than I did in all of my years of schooling. (The last real history class I had was in high school…sadly, they sort of skip over anything besides science and math in chemical engineering curriculums! I’m way behind!) It was at Checkpoint Charlie where USSR and US tanks faced off in the Berlin Crisis of 1961 when there was a dispute about whether or not the East German guards were allowed to scrutinize the travel documents of an American diplomat. Ten Soviet and ten US tanks subsequently lined up at Checkpoint Charlie to settle the matter, both sides threatening attack. Thankfully, the dispute ended peacefully about a week later. (Incidentally, almost exactly a year later was the Cuban Missile Crisis and although this conflict didn’t happen in Berlin it starred the same two key players who were at odds at Checkpoint Charlie – JFK and Stalin. Ultimately, and as you might even remember, JFK withdrew US missiles placed in Turkey when Stalin agreed to pull the Soviet missiles out of Cuba…or vice versa, depends on if you ask an American or a Russian who “caved” first. Either way, I’m just glad they both backed off!) The pictures of the tanks lined up at the checkpoint are really unbelievable and a bit shocking. It was really amazing to be standing in the same place as those tanks and think about the role that the Wall, and the city of Berlin, has played in the world’s history. I am humbly reminded of my lack of knowledge of and appreciation for all the sacrifices and battles, both figurative and literal, which were over and done with by the time I came on the scene in 1981. History from any time period in any part of the world is always fascinating but I at least sometimes forget how real, raw, and recent much of the history that so significantly shaped the world we will live in today truly is.

Until 1989, and for nearly 30 years, the people in East and West Berlin were separated by a wall. This is something that I just cannot even fathom. It seems unthinkable to literally separate and imprison people behind a wall, especially when as an American I can move around the world largely at will (excluding a few countries and subject to some very intensive and annoying visa processes!). There are people all over the world being restricted at best and held hostage at worst by politically-driven fear, injustices, and even laws but Berlin is one of very few places in the world where a people have literally been held behind a wall (today’s version is the wall put up by Israel – twice as high and four times as long as the Berlin Wall – to separate the Israelis from the Palestinians). These people happened to live or work on the wrong side of town in the one city which came to represent the world’s much larger political conflict, and then were made to live behind a very real cement and rebar manifestation of it.

Surprisingly, extremely little of the Berlin Wall still stands today. What was once a 140km stretch of concrete, rebar, barbed wire, and, even worse, armed guards ready to shoot any would-be crossers, has now been completely demolished save for two small lengths still standing in the city. Many small sections of the wall survive in other parts of the world, however, and not exactly where you’d expect them either. There are pieces in the places you might expect like at the JFK and Ronald Reagan Presidential Libraries, at the European Union Parliament in Belgium, and even at the Vatican City in Rome. However, there are also pieces in places you’d never guess including the “Marbles Kids Museum” in Raleigh, North Carolina and a Hilton hotel in Texas. Bizarre! Most of the wall was just torn down by the very people it was meant to contain and separate and then unceremoniously used to pave the reconstructed roads and buildings built when the city was made “whole” again.

One building which has remained and is recognizable even to a history dummy like me is the Reichstag, the very stately German Parliament building. After spending a few hours at the Wall and then at the Jewish Museum (highly recommend visiting this one in addition to the Pergamon Museum which was also fantastic), I made my way to the Reichstag and was very disappointed to find that just outside of Brandenburg Gate was a huge stage with enormous show lights, food vendors, and, generally, just lots of obnoxious, non-historical, entertainment “stuff.” I was thinking, “Wow, this is really annoying that they’d have a big concert right in the middle of all of this. Plus, it’s ruining my pictures!” I thought this until I realized that I, by pure chance (again, embarrassing!), happened to be visiting Berlin on the 20th anniversary of the reunification of Germany. The country was officially made one again on October 3rd, 1990, and there I was 20 years later in 2010. Having been put back in my place (and rightfully so!), it was a great time to visit Berlin. Yes, many of my hoped-for pictures of the Reichstag grounds and beautiful Brandenburg Gate were “ruined” but what a privilege to be there for such an anniversary (and party!). For better or worse, there are very few visible “scars” or even reminders of the city’s painful and torn past. Berlin strikes me as a city which broke through the wall and then didn’t look back as it moved on. In fact, the building / bunker where Hitler shot himself and his new wife in 1945 was bombed a few times, flooded, razed, and is now a parking lot. How’s that for history?

I am a huge fan of Berlin. It’s vibrant, alive, a little gritty, and just a city on the move (and, hopefully, on the rise!). Truthfully, it doesn’t have the “old and lovely,” the “quaint and beautiful,” of Bern. But it has an important past. It has a bright future. And more importantly, Berlin seems to be able to recognize and celebrate them both.