There are only 18 days left of my time in Rome. I am pretty unsure how this is the case, but as my time in ending I am making sure to appreciate every day more than the last. It is hard to believe it is coming to an end because I still have a trip to Copenhagen and a weekend of the Vatican, and on top of that finals, papers, and projects to finish. With my time running out I find it important to reflect on my time here and make sure to appreciate every day more than the last. The small moments of eating at our favorite restaurants, going to the grocery store, making dinner with all my roommates, and even the long stair full walk home is even more important in these last weeks. I know that returning home will bring some amount of sadness, and though I’ll be excited to return to all my friends and back to Rollins classes, I will still miss plenty of things about Europe.
The first thing I will miss is traveling. I know that since I was just in Rome and Europe for a semester, I made sure to cram in as many trips as possible. Though doing this was extremely easy and affordable. I flew from Vienna to Poland for 15$, in America that would get me a new shirt, maybe. I was able to be in a different place nearly every weekend. I saw a total for 9 countries and about 9 cities within Italy. All of these places were able to offer new insights on their culture, their architecture, and their food. I was able to see things that I never even knew I would enjoy like an opera in Vienna. I was able to live in the moment and just see new things that I did not even know existed. Though in America you can travel to other states and places near you it isn’t the same as being able to experience a whole new culture and history every weekend.
I will miss the food. Most important I will miss Dar Poeta, which is the most amazing pizza place you have ever been to. The highlights being the Dar Poeta (a spicy meat), the Vicoletta (potato, pesto, cheese, and cherry tomatoes), Carbonara (legit just like carbonara pasta but on a pizza). Some days here in Rome I wake up thinking about this pizza, so I can only imagine my carvings for it coming March. Also, I will miss Cacio e Pepe, cheese and pepper pasta. It might sound basic, but the sauce is unreal and when its paired with a homemade noddle cooked al dente it is just perfect. Not only will I miss going out to dinner, but I will miss cooking dinner with my roommates. Some of our favorite recipes to make would include lemon chicken and lemon pasta, as you can see there is a theme. When we make dinner, we are forced to take a break from work and just interact with each other and sometimes at Rollins you just run to the CC and forgot about this.
I’ll also miss the culture of Rome. It is so laid back which is so different than how the US is. I have learned to eat dinner for hours, we normally sit at the dinner table for about an hour after we are done eating and we were in a restaurant for nearly three hours the other night. Everything moves at a slower rate, but it allows you to take in all the little moments. At first, I could be frustrating how slow things moved, but now when I am rushed in a restaurant, I feel annoyed they aren’t allowing me to finish my conversation or take in my last moments of the meal. I will also miss the culture of the city. We can get on a tram and get to the center of Rome or Testaccio in 10 minutes. It makes it easy to adventure and see new places. I never feel like I have nothing to do or see because the public transportation makes it so easy.
I also will miss the way I am able to disconnect here. I don’t have a phone plan here other than to use maps, so I am only on my phone when I am in my apartment. That means most weekends I check my phone only right before bed. This is a major change from how I used technology in America, and I hope I will be able to continue this when I return. It has forced me to be better at living fully in the moment and only focusing on what is currently happening in my life. I also have been able to have more meaningful conversation with all my friends because we do not use our phones in dinner, so we have exhausted nearly all conversation topics. I know about everything you could imagine about them so now we have to pick dinner topics to spark conversation and it leads to deep discussions. I think often times in America if we have exhausted conversation topics than we will all just scroll on our phones, but here it forces us to continue talking and push the discussion even further.
I have seriously loved my time in Rome and cannot wait until I get to come back. To end this post reflecting on my time I will end with answering the three questions my friend asked me the other day (I encourage you to think about your answer to these too because sparks great conversation). Her first question was: Could you live in Rome. My answer was for sure. Though I would probably need to learn Italian, I think the laid-back culture and their outlook on school and work is much better for my life. Her second question: What was your favorite place, other than Rome, that you visited. I had two answers, in Italy Venice was my favorite and outside of Italy was Prague. Venice was just beautiful and something like I have never seen before, and Prague just made me happy. The atmosphere of the city, the sites, and food just made me happy and like I belonged there. The last question: Where will you go next that you did not get to while here. My answer was in Europe it would be Switzerland and outside of Europe somewhere in Africa. I know that I am so lucky that I got to have this experience so young because I have many more travels ahead of me. I am counting down the days until I leave, but know soon enough I will be counting down the days until I get to come back.
