Roman Diaries Episode 1: Limoncello, Agamemnon and the Pompeii Selfie

Roman Diaries Episode 1: Limoncello, Agamemnon and the Pompei Selfie

When you travel 18 hours over 6500 kilometres and across 3 continents to Rome from Mumbai and are generally pretty jet lagged, you sleep well and get some rest. Well let’s just say if we had done that I wouldn't be writing this story.

                                                          First aerial view before landing

After landing at 2 pm and immediately putting in a 5+ km walk to Vatican and back we decided on a travel plan starting at the wee hours of the morning like all crazy travelers. Day started with getting up at 5:30 in the morning still half dead, scampering to the Termini and finding ourselves waiting in front of the closed doors of the empty train compartment with a couple of nuns and 3 giggly European girls for company. It was 6:27 am and the train was supposed to leave at 6:35 am.  

Now if you are from India and are used to the entire train travel gig you are used to a farewell party of 6 with a couple of travelers dutifully reaching the station 2 hours prior to the train, boarding it good half hour before departure and settling down comfortably and getting to know all the passengers by the time the train departs, this is bound to feel surprisingly cavalier.

                                            Map: Roma to Napoli to Pompei and back
       (For brass tacks of A Day Trip to Pompeii from Rome read this post - http://bit.ly/1pniO57)

Except that it wasn't and we were waiting in front of the wrong compartment, in fact the wrong train(there were two trains on the same platform and both had a compartment with the same number). So on the back of a nick of time warning by an Italian gentleman and egged on by calls of  “Fretta!! Fretta” we sprinted to the right compartment and barely got up on the train when it started moving.

The 2 hour train journey through the beautiful Italian countryside towards the south of Italy was largely uneventful and by the time we reached Napoli we were hungry for a good breakfast and raring to go for a long and exciting day.We had our morning Cuppa Espresso and Brioche to get us going. Naples was crowded and had people from various parts of the globe, and reminded me of Mumbai.

We climbed down to the basement for the Circumvesuviana line, which is a circular train line around the Sorrento- Naples area.  These platforms were are little different, the station looked unkempt and the trains looked like lovely colourful matchboxes! The platform was getting filled with fellow passengers all waiting to board onto the train to Sorrento for Pompei. On boarding however we figured that the train gods were clearly unhappy with us as we had boarded the train to Sarno instead of Sorrento.  We needed to disembark within the next 2 stations, and board a train to Sorrento. A gracious Napolitan fellow traveller’s exasperated gesticulations and repeated attempts at explaining this finally bore fruit as we got down at Barra to change the train.   

Pompei Train station

All this while we were conversing with a few co-passengers who had met with the same fate as us. During the 45 minutes train ride we got talking with a couple who had boarded with us on this train. It was nice to know fellow travellers, and luckily they were visiting Pompei from Rome for a day too! I wouldn’t be exaggerating if I would say it here that we kind of instantly clicked with Stathis and Eleni. They were on their first Roman excursions from Greece. I can say now on hindsight that Greeks can be a friendly lot. Because we hit it off instantly, and then got our entry tickets and planned to navigate around this place by ourselves. Of course we had our audio guides , to give us the stories. 

                                                                   Fresco at Pompei

The volcano lies dormant at Mt. Vesuvius, view from Pompei

The streets stuck in time at Pompei

Chariot wheels immortalized on stone roads at Pompei

Amphitheater at Pompei where Pink Floyd rocked in 1972

The Pompei day trip was surely a great experience. Before we left we decided to immortalize the memories with our legendary Pompei selfie in front of the Pompei amphitheater -the inspiration for the much more famous amphitheater in Rome constructed about a 100 years later and goes by the name of Colosseum, and the site of the equally legendary 1972 Pink Floyd video album “Live in Pompei. By the time we came out of the gates, we had walked ourselves tired.

                                  Throwback video from 1972- Live at Pompei by Pink Floyd

                                        

                                         A Two thousand year old man, now stone at Pompei

                                                            Preserved body at Pompei

                                                  

                                                                    Our Pompei selfie

The ancient cobbled roads had clearly taken a toll on us, as we trudged back towards the station, all the while looking for a good eat out to rest our tired feet and raging stomach! It was a hot day, even by Indian standards so I could imagine the state of our Greco friends. We limped past several restaurants, till we found a good hotel and restaurant, with several souvenir shops around. Quickly sitting down we ordered some Ham and Cheese Pizza and some Peroni. It was a nice sit out place, which looked out onto the entrance to the same hotel. We sat there stuffing our faces with the pizza and talking about our respective countries, lives, etc. After all, in the age of Facebook how often do you get to have a fresh perspective in person!  Stathis and Eleni are both teachers by profession, and they belong to Greek Cypress. We had so much to talk about, so the chat was never-ending. We later walked back towards the station, and took a train ride to Naples. 
                                                          Pizza for the tired souls

We had about 3 hours to spend in Naples before a 6:15 train back. But due to a dearth of time we weren't able to explore the city as much as we wanted to. Sfogliate Lab loomed across the road to the station like a beacon and we could see how it was thronged with customers.

We went in too, and found ourselves with probably the most aggressive and dramatic bunch of middle aged Italian restaurant staff. One man ushered us in, while still puffing on his cigarette he rolled down the sun umbrella for us to take our seats. Another man seemed to be almost in our face getting ready for a fight, of course he was simply taking down the order. It was funny how the entire transactions for our purchases happened in us gesticulating and speaking in English and then they would do the same but in Italian. 

                                            Cafe Latte served cold at Sfogliate Lab in Napoli

Finally we got our cafe lattes the way they had it. I had never had a cold latte before, so I wanted to try it even more. It was cold, but it was delicious. We had ordered a puffed pastry with Limoncello cream , which was beautiful. It was tickling my taste-buds, the cream had the right among of sourness and sweetness to make it taste delightful. We learned that Limoncello is a liqueur from Lemons (lemon as the hero ingredient) famous mainly in southern Italy. We could see everywhere from bottles of Limoncello liqueurs in shops, to postcards and fridge magnets on Limoncello.

                        The sinful puff pastry with Limocello cream filling at Sfogliate Lab in Napoli

While serving us our Napolitan server struck up a conversation with Stathis trying to find out which part of the world he was from. All his explanations of how he is Greco and very similar to Italians with same ancient gods etc were clearly misplaced as the man just didn't know where Greece is and was quite dismissive about Stathis’ claims of being similar to Italians. Then a light bulb seemed to go on in his head as he pointed at Stathis and said “Agamemnon!” with a broad smile, and the connection was made. The ancient Greek ruler of Mycenae came to the rescue of our friend and peace was restored.  

                                                  Many colors on the streets of Naples

After the coffee, we strolled into the city- walking as much as we could within the time constraints to explore Napoli. But I know that we couldn’t do a good job of it. Firstly because we were already tired from the rough excursion few hours ago, and secondly we had a train to catch! I have made a mental note to come back to the south coast of Italy later and catch up on the sun and sea at my own time. But for now, we had to head back to the station.