I was beginning to fall out of love with Italy. After three months of living in Florence, I grew tired of little Italian nuances I used to find charming when I studied abroad. When a place starts to lose its magic, it is usually time for you to go home, get perspective and appreciate it all over again.
When I was 14 years old, I fell in love with Italy in Rome. Perched at the Trevi Fountain lapping up a gelato, there was something about that evening that dictated the rest of my life. When I returned to Rome this past September before catching my flight home, I became reacquainted with the city and discovered I wasn’t falling out of love with Italy.
Pulling a Gregory Peck at the Mouth of Truth
Just south of Vatican City and on the west bank of the Tiber River, the neighborhood of Trastevere won Italy back for me. An area I had never covered on my many trips to Rome brightened during the day with streets for strolling and classic Italian images like the one below.
Trastevere, Rome
At night, Trastevere invades with tourists and locales, wining and dining. Performers fill the squares as some gather around them. Two Italian women begin their nightly stroll, fashionable and complete in their apparel. They have looks on their faces as though this feeling is normal, that the city of Rome has always been this way, powerful, magical and attitude changing. I fell back in love with Italy, with the same emotions of that 14 year old in Rome some 10 years later.
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My fav! Everywhere I’ve ever been in the world, I have found great food and bad food. Not in Rome, I could not find bad food. I love the picture with the little red car!
Such great pics, make me want to go to Italy NOW!
Italy is amazing – would love to spend more time there, sometimes its needed to have a break from a place for you to realize that it really is amazing.