Thursday morning I went out of our hotel to find some breakfast for us, since the hotel didn't offer any breakfast service. I walked the (about) 30 steps it took to the closest shop, Saby's bean. I walked into the shop, up to the girl standing behind the counter, and our conversation lead:
-Parla ingles?
-Glass?
-Parla ingles?
-Glass?
So, after we had established the fact that she was Swedish, she could answer all my questions about breakfast options etc. It turned out that the owner of the shop, and the near-by Heartbreak restaurant, had a connection to Sweden/was half-Swedish (or something like that), so a lot of young Swedes were working in these two places.
She gave me some directions to a supermarket, so I could find some yoghurt and other things that they didn't have. Of course I didn't find it, so I scurried across half of Rome looking for one, but the few ones I could find where closed. And (of course) my hunt eventually lead me by Pantheon. Sweet bliss.
In our hotel room, which had a tiled floor, some of the tiles were loose, as if they had never been properly assembled. Later, when we got out of the hotel and walked a couple of blocks, we came across a lot of loose bricks in the pavement. Apparently, the loose tile technique seemed to be a Roman speciality...
We decided to start our day with walking to Il Vittoriano. It is a monument built in 1885 to commemorate the Italian unification and to honour king Victor Emmanuel II. It's gargantuan, and it takes a number of stairs to get to the top. Once up there, you have a splendid view of Rome. We then went to the Piazza del Campidoglio and continued to Capotiline hill for a view of the Roman Forum. We spent some time in the Roman Forum, but by then it was scorching outside and we had get Emilia and us into the shade and to get some fluids and something to eat. We exited halfway through the Roman Forum and followed the adjacent street where we, after climbing some stairs, found our oasis.
After lunch, we decided to do Colosseum the next day instead.
Something that's peculiar about people in Rome is their total lack of split vision.
Something that's peculiar about people in Rome is their total lack of split vision. In their minds, they have decided to go somewhere and at that same moment they totally lose their awareness of what is in their periphery. There were many times when we, or other people, had to make a turn the last split second before impact. I think this mostly applies to Italians, but some tourists started acting that way too, so maybe it's contagious.