If you know me, you know a couple
of things, first that I have an (sometimes unhealthy) obsession with Italy and
all things Italian, Second that I’m extremely sentimental and finally that I consider my time
studying abroad in the aforementioned country as the best experience of my
life. Since the day I returned that summer I have been trying with all my power
to go back and one major reason is because of something I was unable to do.
The reason I hold the trip in such
high regard because being over 4,000 miles away from home, it was the first
time I was truly on my own. I grew both as an individual and as a man because I
was very much outside of my comfort zone. I lived with a host family that was
extremely busy so if I needed anything be it food, transportation, guidance or
anything else, it was on me to do it.
So being the lost little sheep that
I was, commuting to school proved to be a difficult experience at first. There
was a bus stop on the corner of my apartment but I had never really traveled on
mass transit and struggled to figure out when
the bus would be there and how I would get to school. This is where the journey
to find my way back to Italy begins. Because rather than figure out the big bad
bus schedule, I decided for the first week of school to walk each day. The walk
was a little under an hour but was one of the most unique parts of the trip.
This is because I was lucky enough to walk through Villa Borghese Gardens
(the equivalent to Central Park in the City) for majority of the trip. It was
early in the morning when few people were in the par and you could truly enjoy
the peaceful landscape.
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| Not A Bad View to Commute With |
As enjoyable as the walk was, I eventually
learned how to take the bus and save about 45 minutes on my commute. It was the
last week of my trip when the sentimental side of myself came out. I wanted to
walk to school one last time. Unfortunately or rather unluckily the last week
of the trip was also the biggest party week for my classmates and me. Getting
up an extra hour early on the last day of class with a splitting hangover is an
extremely difficult proposition. So I did the only thing any right-minded
hungover (rather contradictory but nonetheless applicable) individual would do;
I took the bus to school. The fact that I was unable to retrace my steps to
school is what has me writing this inaugural blog post about my bucket list.
Before I die, hopefully a long time from now, I want to return to Via Monti Parioli in Rome and retrace my steps through the park into Piazza del Popolo and
on into the heart of Ancient Rome….
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| Piazza del Popolo; My entry to Ancient Rome |