From the moment I was ten years old watching Audrey Hepburn wander around Rome in Roman Holiday with Gregory Peck, I knew going to Rome was non-negotiable. It had been sitting on my bucket list for years. So when I got invited to go for our first travel weekend, I was very excited.
Since the Winter Olympics are happening this semester, we also somehow managed to get tickets to an ice hockey game in Milan, which made the whole weekend even more unreal.
To maximize our time in Rome, we took an overnight train from Bassano del Grappa at 8:30 PM and got in at 6:30 AM. I slept maybe three hours. We stepped out of the station exhausted, bleary-eyed, slightly delusional, and immediately hit with that feeling of “wait... we’re actually here.”
The city was unreal. What shocked me most was how normal everything felt around the Colosseum. Apartment buildings and little shops just sitting right next to one of the most famous landmarks in the world. It’s not roped off from life. It’s just... part of it.
Of course, it was pouring rain. Aggressively pouring. We had booked a tour of the Colosseum, the Roman Forum, and Palatine Hill weeks before, so there was no backing out. By the time we got to the tour office, we were completely drenched and squeezing water out of our sleeves. Somehow though, the rain made everything prettier. The grass was this bright green, the ruins looked dramatic against the gray sky, and the photos actually turned out amazing.
Later we went on a food tour, which might have been my favorite part of the whole trip. We tried fresh parmesan and creamy cheeses, drank incredible wine, and ate slices of pork that literally melted in your mouth. We had supplì, which is basically a fried rice ball stuffed with tomato sauce and mozzarella, crispy on the outside and gooey in the middle. The pasta we ate was made by a nonna from scratch. The wine cellar in that restaurant is apparently older than the Colosseum, which feels illegal but also very Rome.
We threw coins into the Trevi Fountain, which genuinely looked like something out of The Little Mermaid. The water was this glowing green-blue and the sky had finally cleared. We walked along the Appian Way, where Rome first started, and it was one of the most peaceful walks I’ve ever had. There were cute cats everywhere and dangling off the walls lining against the road were massive orange clementines hanging off trees, so heavy they bent the branches down.
Going into the Vatican Museums and seeing the works of Raphael and Michelangelo in person was surreal. I have seen photos and renderings of these paintings my whole life, so standing there in front of them absolutely stunned me speechless. So speechless, that I bought a 1000 piece puzzle from the gift shop of The Creation of Adam.
Then we headed to Milan. On Lunar New Year, we ended up eating Chinese food, which felt like the biggest coincidence. For a second it felt like I was back home. I ordered our food in Mandarin and in my prideful haze, accidentally asked for the menu when I wanted the check. I definitely lost some points there.
The next day we went to the hockey game: Germany vs. France. During the security check, the security guard asked what the red box in my bag was. I told him it was a puzzle. He was so stunned (puzzled?!) and amused that he neglected to notice my contraband plastic water bottles in the bag. Someone on the train told us to root for Germany, so we fully committed. I was chanting alongside the German fans on our side of the stadium with absolutely no idea what I was saying. Germany won 5–1, and I felt an unreasonable amount of pride for a country I have zero connection to.
The whole weekend felt like a blur in the best way. Rain-soaked ruins, handmade pasta, Renaissance art, Lunar New Year in Italy, and screaming at a hockey game with strangers. Rome had been on my list for years, and it somehow still exceeded every expectation.