Valuable Lessons Learned - Part 2

* Don't let your husband borrow your cell phone and put it in his pocket (granted this technologically advanced Roman Gladiator isn't wearing pants, but I thought it was a cute photo). You might be surprised to learn that an unlocked phone in a pocket can use up an entire 40 Euros prepaid card by sending SMS messages (300+ calls) to a friend's landline and lock up their phone for 2 weeks.

* Don't listen to a Dutch classic rock station unless you can handle regularly listening to Meatloaf (apparently he didn't really die in "Rocky Horror Picture Show").

TV in Holland...

It took a few months to get a digital receiver so we can watch TV. For $10/month, we get CNN, BBC, Discovery and Animal Planet as well as many Dutch channels. Dutch TV has a lot of game shows and reality shows (no doubt from the ads that shows like “Temptation Island” are much spicier here than the US counterpart). In honor of The World Cup, TV station Veronica has been interrupting movies to air 15 minutes of “Hot Shots” which features these bimbos kicking footballs; a more appropriate name would be “The D Cup”. Jimmy (who obviously picked the photo) encourages any non-female with a pulse to click here to check out the US team.

The local channels also air several US shows such as our favorite “Lost”. Lucky for us, all shows are aired in the original language, except for kiddie shows, since this country is small enough not to require dubbing like in Germany, France or Italy. Most nights there are 2 or 3 uncut US movies to choose from; it still freaks me out to see a movie ad complete with nudity and swearing. I asked my Dutch teacher why all English profanities are translated to the same word on the Dutch subtitles and she said that’s because everyone already knows those words so they don’t need to be translated.

A Day in Paradise...

After 2 days of the madness of Naples, I was ready to escape to the calm and beauty of the island of Ischia, a 1-hour ferry ride away. While we never made it to this castle, we enjoyed this view from the little beach cafe that we hung out at for the day. At first glance we thought the beach was covered in trash, but were happy to discover it was mostly sea glass, which made for a great souvenir along with local limoncella (a lemon liqueur best served chilled).

Lesson from History--Don't Live Under an Active Volcano

While Jimmy was busy working in Naples, I took the girls to Pompeii, my favorite place we visited during the week in Italy. It's hard to describe how amazing it was to walk down the streets of this ancient Roman city. This photo was taken in the Forum, which was the main business and political area of the city. We especially loved seeing mosaics and frescoes in their original locations after almost 2,000 years (we saw many others the following day in the Museum Archaeological in Naples). This place is truly immense and we made it through less than half in the several hours that we were there; definitely somewhere worth visiting again. Luckily we made it back to the train right before the skies opened up.

A Dome with a View...

A trip to Rome isn't complete without a visit to the Vatican. Unfortunately, the line to the Vatican Museum was ridiculously long, so we missed seeing the Sistine Chapel. Instead we climbed the 320-stairs to the top of the dome of St Peter's Basilica (completed in 1593) where we saw a fantastic view of Rome. Then we explored the inside of the Basicila, which was definitely the most spectacular church we've ever seen. We did postcards sitting by a fountain in St Peter's Square (wonder what GGMa thought about that Pope stamp), then visited neighboring Castel Sant'Angelo, which you may have read about in Dan Brown's "Angel & Demons".

When in Rome, Do as the Romans...

Of course, that statement's open to interpretation. As fun as a public bath or toga party might have been, we stuck to the usual overindulgences -- chianti, pizza and gelato. In fact, we made it a goal to find the best gelato in Rome and despite having to eat it everyday, I'm happy to report we found it near the Colosseum.
Rather than live like tourists, we lived like modern day Romans by renting an apartment from a family at our school. It was great having the extra space and seeing what a typical neighborhood was like.

Love that Water!

It's impossible not to love Trevi Fountain. The newest tourist site we visited, the fountain was completed in 1762 after 30 years. This photo doesn't even begin to capture the beauty of this magical place. Despite being surrounded by tourists tossing coins over their shoulders (if you do it the right way you're ensured a return trip to the Eternal City), it was easy to be mesmerized by the force of the water as commanded by Neptune and two Tritons with seahorses. We especially loved the drinking fountain on the side that had the best water we'd ever tasted. Although Rome has more trash than we'd expected, it has amazingly clean water with many historic drinking fountains.