Summer 2014: Return to Europe: And On the Seventh Day, I Was Busy

My first task this morning was to go grocery shopping- real grocery shopping, in the store my family and I went to the first time. There's a pretty nice market at the train station that I usually stop by because it's more convenient, but I was running low on some supplies I haven't found there. First, however, I had to find the store again, which was rather a challenge. I did find it eventually, and even managed to find my way back more easily than I thought.

After I went back to the apartment and put everything away, I went out and started my day of adventuring with some delicious gelato. Then I looked through some of the nearby outdoor markets, and even though I didn't buy anything, they're fun to look through.

Conveniently, right next to the train station I found a great way to spend the afternoon- the National Museum! It was pretty cheap to get in, so in I went to check it out. Suffice it to say, it's definitely been my busiest picture day since our family outings!

On the first floor, there were lots of statues, mostly busts. The interesting thing was, unlike most of the other museums and places we went, they weren't usually of anyone- the plaques just said "young woman" and the like. Actually, most of the attention seemed to be on the various hairstyles, which denoted the person's social class. I guess I should start paying more attention to what I do with my hair!

The basement floor was my favorite. The sign just said pottery, but actually their main exhibit featured coins from throughout Roman history! I was expecting, you know, a couple of displays with a few really old coins and a variety of increasingly more modern counterparts. What I did not expect were 59 separate showcases, each containing an average of 50 coins, from that many different historical periods. It dates back to really-stinking-old Rome and goes through such eras as the reigns of Trajan, Hadrian, and Constantine; Gothic, Byzantine, and Lombardian control; the time of St. Peter; the lira; and eventually today's currency. There was also a bit about engraving the coins, why certain designs were chosen. Also in the basement were the promised pieces of pottery and various types of jewelry with lots of gold and precious stones, but I didn't learn as much from plaques that just said stuff like "assortment of gold pieces."

The second floor was back to statues, though at least here they seemed to be focused on recognizable figures, mostly Roman gods. I wasn't as impressed with the quality of the statues, though- almost all of them were badly broken, missing heads, arms, legs, you name it. And just about all of them were missing noses, so maybe the Egyptian ways were popular during that particular sculpting period and everyone wanted to copy the Sphinx.

The third floor, though, was dedicated to mosaics and frescoes from ancient Roman homes. These were also really cool, because although the paintings were faded and a lot of the mosaics were incomplete, envisioning them in a room of tricliniums made the things I learned in my Latin class that much more real!

I did find a couple of shirts I liked on my way back, so that's another thing I can cross off my list.

Then it became laundry time, because hey, at least I have the drying rack to myself! So I got that out of the way before making dinner, which was some spinach and cheese tortellini I picked up this morning. I mixed them up with olive oil and Parmesan cheese like Mom and I do at home, and voilà! Dinner. I even made enough that I can have some tomorrow too.

Hopefully today was satisfyingly interesting!