Arrivederci!
Today was our first full day wondering the historic streets of Rome.
We started with the continental breakfast at our hotel. I was expecting a lot of fruit and small pastries, but there was cereal, custard pies, hot chocolate (which was really good) and then the fruit as well.
Following breakfast, we had time to freshen up and I got a chance to look through the pictures I captured yesterday – and WOW do I have some gems.
Then the communication group met up with Matteo to head to the American University of Rome (AUR) to listen to a lecture from one of the professors there, Andrea Bini.
Professor Bini talked about mass media of Rome and Italy, from its history to where it stands now and how it got here. One of the things I found most interesting is the connection between politics and media. Almost every station owner or famous host has some connection or affiliation with a powerful politician.
Thinking back to how things work in America, I am SO so glad we aren’t the same way. A lot of the stations are affiliated with parties or tend to be more left or right leaning, but at least our journalists are not also the politicians.
We also got a little tour of the gardens at AUR. It was beautiful, and if I weren’t a broadcast journalism major, I would definitely consider studying abroad here (the language barrier is too great in my opinion).
Following our scholarly afternoon, we went to the Colosseum for a rainy, yet still amazing historic tour with our tour guide, Catia (I’m really sorry if that’s spelled wrong). It was just as breathtakingly beautiful as I remembered – filled with ancient beauty and hidden secrets.
We then went into the Roman Forum, something I didn’t get to do on my first trip here. I studied it so much in Latin classes from high school, but we didn’t have time during my first trip to tour it.
The Forum was my favorite part of the day and probably my favorite part of the trip so far. To someone who doesn’t care much for history, it just looked like a few broken brick buildings with a few cool looking arches in between.
It is so much more than that, though. All of those buildings are filled with so many stories – from the cremation of Julius Caesar to the deification of prior leaders of Rome and their families to the Vestal Virgins and so much more.
I have a lot of pictures of those things, so I’ll be adding those to my picture blog when our time in Rome has come to an end.
Josh, Robin Cecala, Matteo and I also got to scope out the restaurant that we will be making a homemade pasta dish in, and I’m already excited to go.
I ended this evening with pizza, wine, orange fanta, and raspberry gelato with Josh. After being hungry all day, it was AMAZING. It was also the first gelato we got to have on the trip – and I promise, there will be more where that came from.
Until tomorrow, ciao!