MINE EYES HAVE SEEN THE POPE, AND HE IS A LITTLE WHITE DOT

Rome is like a giant fitness gym. We have walked and climbed most of Rome in the last two days, and it is really the only way to see the city. Rome is old, as some of you may have heard, and it has a lot of ruins, which were mostly constructed as sets for the movie Gladiator. The downtown section is completely filled with them, and it is easy to see how Rome was once the most impressive city in the world. Between the Coleseum, the Pantheon, and the Palantine, it must have been quite a sight back in the day. But I'll skip most of that today, and get right into the good stuff.

So Mark was supposed to plan the walking tour yesterday, but that was slightly hampered by the fact that he didn't know where anything was. If Mark wrote the popular saying, it would go like this: "When in Rome......get lost a lot." In addition to being an awesome navigator, Mark is also a spellbinding tourguide. He helpfully pointed out that we really needed to visit a particular island in the Tiber river. Knowing Mark's nose for good places, I led us there, and we had this informative conversation regarding the history and architecture of the island:

Teresa: "Mark, what are we looking for here?"
Mark: "I don't know."
Seth: "Is that a wedding? Cool!"

(Please note that the above is given in defense of Mark's mean comments about my detailed tour information.)

So we dragged Seth out of the wedding party, where he was taking pictures and posing as a photographer, and went to go eat, which we ALL were good at.

So we showed up at the Vatican today, and it turns out that the Pope was going to be leading a service on the steps of St. Peter's. Since this meant that the rest of the place was completely shut down, we had a seat to hear what the Pope had to say.

He arrived in a modified version of the popemobile, which was an open-air car with oversized tires and a railed platform. The crowd went nuts as he circled the crowd several times. We couldn't really see him, being seated in the center, but they did have largescreen monitors to help us out. Then he ascended the platform, where the popemobile proved its worth by driving straight up the steps. From his lofty perch, he addressed the crowd, and I heard his message loud and clear: Learn Latin, you nuntz! I can't swear for sure, because of the distance, but I think he liked me.

St. Peter's Basillica left me with one major thought: The Catholic Church is ungodly wealthy. (Pardon the pun.) St. Paul's in London? Poor little country church. Notre Dame? Tiny crusty relic. St. Peter's is huge, with gallery after gallery, alcoves and wings and chapels beyond counting, all paved and walled with multicolored marble that puts the palaces at Versailes to shame. They have huge monuments to departed Popes, statues, frescos, and paintings. Truly a dumbfounding place. We climbed the stairs to the inner dome, and then took the winding passages up to the top, where the city view was amazing. Never seen such tiny stairs that wound around in such a crazy pattern. On the way down, several people had to stop because they got dizzy going around, around, and around. The whole time we were in the church it was raining outside in a blasting thunderstorm, with thunder, lighting, and just torrential rain.

As a side note on other international news, the United States qualified for the World Cup soccer finals by beating their arch-rivals, Mexico. After a 2-0 beating, the Mexican coach showed that Mexico can accept defeat graciously as well as savor the fruits of victory, by stating, "They play like small people. They play like my mother, and my daughter, and my aunt." Tune in for the grudge match in 2006 if they meet in group play.

Coming up next: Istanbul; or is it Constantinople? And why won't they stop playing that song??
JS®