Rome probably is the city with the most to offer.. Though it's still a lot on Christianity.. I kinda liked the ancient Roman parts of the city best.. after all.. it's like what you always hear in stories and watch in movies.. and now I'm there to experience it all.. =)
Christmas Eve Our first day in Rome was Christmas eve. Checked in to this hostel full of Americans. In fact I would think that most travellers into Rome are Americans coz there are full of them on the streets (recognisable by accent)
With Lonely planet on hand, we visited the typical famous Roman sights like the Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon.. and of course, Weijie didn't miss the chance of making his Travel Video..
Trevi Fountain
Piazze Colonna
Pantheon
Why Christmas Eve in Rome? Coz the Pope would be giving his Midnight Mass.. thought that this would be the real way to celebrate Christmas at the heart of Christianity itself.. Whoa should see the queue at the St Peters Basilica where the Mass would be held man.. it was already like more than 200m long worth of people at around 6pm! There were big screens at the square outside the church so we didn't pay the 100euros to get in.
We went for dinner first. Found this nice little steak house at the corner of the road near the Vatican City serving affordable cheap steak.. a nice way to celebrate Christmas. But we didn't eat the steak haha.. had pasta.. with red wine.. while we waited for midnight to come.
By 10pm when we got back the queue had almost encircled the square 2 times! Crazy! But the square was still relatively empty though. Went around our usual routine of taking photos while waiting for the Mass to start. Cold sia! Wasn't as freezing cold as Switzerland but standing around in open space doing nothing was chill-inducing. The girls paid frequent trips to the toilet just to use the heater! hahaha..
Surprisingly we met fellow Singaporeans in a foreign land.. Gabriel my OCS buddy and Clement from KR! They flew all the way from UPenn (where Weijie is now).. so coincidental!
So talk cock all the way until midnight where the Mass actually started.. oh but it was in Latin (or wadever language it was).. and about 15 mins after it started it was so unbearably cold and tiring that we left.
So much for Christmas eve at the Vatican City. Haha. Heard that the previous Pope organised live concerts before the event to celebrate Christmas. This new Pope, however, well.. more religious ba... I guess I very much prefer the commercial Christmas rather than the religious one.
Looking forward to Christmas celebrations in US or in Finland.... I wonder how many years from now....
Christmas Day Woke up late today.. Met this Hongkong girl while cooking breakfast in the hostel and she suggested tagging along to see the city.. Strange request.. but ok lor... since we fellow Asians and she was alone...
And at the reception while waiting for the Hongkong lass to 'take money to pay for her stay' I met this American dude called Chris who happened to tell us about the Pope giving his Christmas speech at the very same place at Noon. Ha looks like we have somewhere to go now.. though it was the same place haha.
15 more mins to noon so we went to the Vatican City again.. Roman style.. by squeezing in the crowded Roman bus there. The girls probably didn't find it too amusing but I thought it was quite an experience!
The square outside St Peters was much more crowded compared to the night before.. and the Pope was standing on the small balcony giving christmas wishes in every language possible! Serious! Even in Japanese (クリスマスをおめでとございます) and Chinese (圣诞节快乐)! And of course it wasn't hard to tell where the different groups of people were from based on the cheers everytime he spoke in a different language.. i.e. the Spanish would cheer if he spoke in Spanish and the French would acknowledge when he spoke in French.. We were joking that he left out Singlish.. which would probably be "Ok la ah.. Merry Christmas ah!" Haha
So after the hooha we went into the St Peters Basilica to take a look.. after all.. it was build at the very site where St Peter was buried.. and the 2nd largest church in the world. As usual I couldn't really appreciate it that much coz I'm not Christian.. but still a nice place to visit...
Then the 6 of us (Chris included) headed on to the Colosseum to take a look. Passed by the Roman ruins, which, under the setting sun, looked magnificent. Too bad the Colosseum was closed on Christmas day.. kinda disappointed the we didn't get to go in...
Here are the photos on the 2nd and 3rd day in Rome...
Boxing Day While the rest of UK are scurrying around with Boxing Day sales.. we were taking our loong looooong queue outisde the Vatican Museum waiting to go in. Yes.. the queue was so damn long.. about 500m like that.. but luckily it moved quite fast.. so we went in about half an hour later of queuing.
The museum was huge! And we could spend our whole day there... could la.. but I couldn't haha.. by about 2pm I finished walking the entire place already.. coz nothing really interested me.. not the arty farty stuff.. not the Christian stuff.. probably only the Sistine Chapel where many of Michaelangelo's frescos that we always see on Postcards covered the walls was interesting...
We were supposed to meet at the exit of Vatican Museum at 4.45pm when the museum closes.. that's 2 hours more! So I headed off alone to the Colosseum again hoping that it would be open!
And it was! I paid 20euros I think for this guided tour that would allow me to skip the horrandous queue into the Colosseum and have 2 guided tours into the Colosseum and the Palentine Hills as well. Quite worth it la I think.
The Colosseum was much smaller that what I expected.. not like what you see in the Gladiator. Though it's very much in ruins now but still can see the internal structures.. where the animals and prisoners and fighters were kept.. where people sat around to watch others fight.. interesting.
If you noticed the photos above.. the photos in the Colosseum were much lower quality than the ones outside. Yah.. coz I was using my camera phone to take the photos. That's the bad thing about sharing camera.. aiyah who ask my camera to spoil.
Next stop was the Palentine Hills.. also a guided tour. Very very nice view what used to be a little garden of the Roman Emperor. What's left are ruins of the structures there.. but the guide was good.. explaining what they were and the little stories about what happened here blah blah blah..
And ending off with a spectacular view of Rome from the hills, again against the setting sun, was a sight that I will never forget =)
Met up with the rest back at the hostel.. cooked dinner.. talked to an ABC from Canada.. funny guy.. then we went off to catch our train to Nice.....
Rome probably is the city with the most to offer.. Though it's still a lot on Christianity.. I kinda liked the ancient Roman parts of the city best.. after all.. it's like what you always hear in stories and watch in movies.. and now I'm there to experience it all.. =)
Christmas Eve Our first day in Rome was Christmas eve. Checked in to this hostel full of Americans. In fact I would think that most travellers into Rome are Americans coz there are full of them on the streets (recognisable by accent)
With Lonely planet on hand, we visited the typical famous Roman sights like the Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon.. and of course, Weijie didn't miss the chance of making his Travel Video..
Trevi Fountain
Piazze Colonna
Pantheon
Why Christmas Eve in Rome? Coz the Pope would be giving his Midnight Mass.. thought that this would be the real way to celebrate Christmas at the heart of Christianity itself.. Whoa should see the queue at the St Peters Basilica where the Mass would be held man.. it was already like more than 200m long worth of people at around 6pm! There were big screens at the square outside the church so we didn't pay the 100euros to get in.
We went for dinner first. Found this nice little steak house at the corner of the road near the Vatican City serving affordable cheap steak.. a nice way to celebrate Christmas. But we didn't eat the steak haha.. had pasta.. with red wine.. while we waited for midnight to come.
By 10pm when we got back the queue had almost encircled the square 2 times! Crazy! But the square was still relatively empty though. Went around our usual routine of taking photos while waiting for the Mass to start. Cold sia! Wasn't as freezing cold as Switzerland but standing around in open space doing nothing was chill-inducing. The girls paid frequent trips to the toilet just to use the heater! hahaha..
Surprisingly we met fellow Singaporeans in a foreign land.. Gabriel my OCS buddy and Clement from KR! They flew all the way from UPenn (where Weijie is now).. so coincidental!
So talk cock all the way until midnight where the Mass actually started.. oh but it was in Latin (or wadever language it was).. and about 15 mins after it started it was so unbearably cold and tiring that we left.
So much for Christmas eve at the Vatican City. Haha. Heard that the previous Pope organised live concerts before the event to celebrate Christmas. This new Pope, however, well.. more religious ba... I guess I very much prefer the commercial Christmas rather than the religious one.
Looking forward to Christmas celebrations in US or in Finland.... I wonder how many years from now....
Christmas Day Woke up late today.. Met this Hongkong girl while cooking breakfast in the hostel and she suggested tagging along to see the city.. Strange request.. but ok lor... since we fellow Asians and she was alone...
And at the reception while waiting for the Hongkong lass to 'take money to pay for her stay' I met this American dude called Chris who happened to tell us about the Pope giving his Christmas speech at the very same place at Noon. Ha looks like we have somewhere to go now.. though it was the same place haha.
15 more mins to noon so we went to the Vatican City again.. Roman style.. by squeezing in the crowded Roman bus there. The girls probably didn't find it too amusing but I thought it was quite an experience!
The square outside St Peters was much more crowded compared to the night before.. and the Pope was standing on the small balcony giving christmas wishes in every language possible! Serious! Even in Japanese (クリスマスをおめでとございます) and Chinese (圣诞节快乐)! And of course it wasn't hard to tell where the different groups of people were from based on the cheers everytime he spoke in a different language.. i.e. the Spanish would cheer if he spoke in Spanish and the French would acknowledge when he spoke in French.. We were joking that he left out Singlish.. which would probably be "Ok la ah.. Merry Christmas ah!" Haha
So after the hooha we went into the St Peters Basilica to take a look.. after all.. it was build at the very site where St Peter was buried.. and the 2nd largest church in the world. As usual I couldn't really appreciate it that much coz I'm not Christian.. but still a nice place to visit...
Then the 6 of us (Chris included) headed on to the Colosseum to take a look. Passed by the Roman ruins, which, under the setting sun, looked magnificent. Too bad the Colosseum was closed on Christmas day.. kinda disappointed the we didn't get to go in...
Here are the photos on the 2nd and 3rd day in Rome...
Boxing Day While the rest of UK are scurrying around with Boxing Day sales.. we were taking our loong looooong queue outisde the Vatican Museum waiting to go in. Yes.. the queue was so damn long.. about 500m like that.. but luckily it moved quite fast.. so we went in about half an hour later of queuing.
The museum was huge! And we could spend our whole day there... could la.. but I couldn't haha.. by about 2pm I finished walking the entire place already.. coz nothing really interested me.. not the arty farty stuff.. not the Christian stuff.. probably only the Sistine Chapel where many of Michaelangelo's frescos that we always see on Postcards covered the walls was interesting...
We were supposed to meet at the exit of Vatican Museum at 4.45pm when the museum closes.. that's 2 hours more! So I headed off alone to the Colosseum again hoping that it would be open!
And it was! I paid 20euros I think for this guided tour that would allow me to skip the horrandous queue into the Colosseum and have 2 guided tours into the Colosseum and the Palentine Hills as well. Quite worth it la I think.
The Colosseum was much smaller that what I expected.. not like what you see in the Gladiator. Though it's very much in ruins now but still can see the internal structures.. where the animals and prisoners and fighters were kept.. where people sat around to watch others fight.. interesting.
If you noticed the photos above.. the photos in the Colosseum were much lower quality than the ones outside. Yah.. coz I was using my camera phone to take the photos. That's the bad thing about sharing camera.. aiyah who ask my camera to spoil.
Next stop was the Palentine Hills.. also a guided tour. Very very nice view what used to be a little garden of the Roman Emperor. What's left are ruins of the structures there.. but the guide was good.. explaining what they were and the little stories about what happened here blah blah blah..
And ending off with a spectacular view of Rome from the hills, again against the setting sun, was a sight that I will never forget =)
Met up with the rest back at the hostel.. cooked dinner.. talked to an ABC from Canada.. funny guy.. then we went off to catch our train to Nice.....
