Forget Fat Tuesday, Let’s Make it Fat Week.
*WARNING LONG POST; but good celebrity sighting at end, read on...*

Je suis returnee. That’s French, but my italian’s very limited. If I knew more, all those shopkeeps that totally made fun of my American self wouldn’t have gotten away with it! I do have a new favorite word though: BASTA! [trans: ENOUGH! Liiiiike “BASTA! Too much PASTA!”)

But yes, Rome. Let’s talk about it.

1. There are a lot of ruins. They are old. They beg to be photographed. And photographed. And photographed. And you know that these are going to be the most boring pictures EVER, but you keep taking them. Let’s just get this out of the way. Here are a few choice historical sights:

2. forget britney, beyonce and pink in the coliseum. Check out my sister pretending to be a Christian eating lion:

(SIDE NOTE: best discovery of this trip? That my sister is totally and completely hysterical. When did her delivery get so good?! Example:
Lucie: Mom? Can I have like €5 in case I get separated or something? I don’t have any cash?
Mom: Separated??? what do you mean?
Lucie: I just mean, like, if something happens or even if I want water—just, can I have €5 please?
Mom: what would you do if you got separated?
Lucie: I dunno... take a taxi back to the hotel I guess...
Mom: Well, anyway, €5 isn’t going to get you anything or anywhere.
Lucie: Fine. (waits a beat) €20 then, thanks.)

3. Have any of you ever seen the movie Stigmata? I have. Many times. I find it fascinating. Stigmata, that is. So much so that once, after watching a documentary (a highly dramatized documentary) I wrote a letter to the Stigmata-ologist featured in the show asking him if he needed a research assistant. Yesssss. I know. But this gives some context to my fascination with the Vatican and things related. And why I made my father pretend to be the priest from stigmata in this photo.

I’ll spare you the pics of the other religious iconography (my sister to me when I was surreptitiously taking this picture in one church: “what if, when you develop these? THERE ARE TEARS OF BLOOD COMING OUT OF MARY’S EYES!” Me: “That be stigmatastic!”)

4. let’s just say in italy? They only eat Italian food. They even have special Italian Jewish Cuisine (??!??!). and the sign is in English because....?

5. right. So dwarfs follow me around. I’m not joking, and if you didn’t know this about me, I’m not really going to explain. You’ll just have to believe me. I see them everywhere. So of course, I saw some in Rome. First I took a pic of this dwarf statue because of, well, to be honest, my paranoid fixation. But the next day LO AND BEHOLD, what’s that behind that pillar at the forum? A child? NOPE. A dwarf.

And the next night, who’s sitting right behind me at a restaurant? Another! Don’t tell me this is pure coincidence. At dinner that night, the dwarf and her companion were done when we were seated. They proceeded to [extremely suspiciously] remain at the table for the duration of our meal, only to shove back their chairs and [in the case of the agent on my tail] hop down when we stood to leave. The largest aliens of a very tiny alien race have picked up the trail and are shadowing me once again...

6. and now, before this gets to be the magnum opus-est of magnum opi (how’s that for latin?), one last story. So we’re in the Piazza Navonna. Oh wait, some background. My grandfather was stationed in Rome for the war, a period he refers to as one of the best of his life. He wasn’t fighting, he was cavorting around roma as a single, American hero. Bene, no? anyway, there was this one café in the Piazza Navonna that he loved. My mom decided that she wanted to take a picture of me and my two sisters in front of this café and frame it for my grandfather.

So as we’re primping for this staged, yet still somehow touching because of the generational span involved, photo, my sister Emily is all “HEH. THAT GUY OVER THERE TOTALLY LOOKED LIKE COLIN FIRTH FOR A SECOND, LAUREN, LOOK (she taps me and points to a table at the café. She is screaming, I’m not sure why) DOESN’T THAT GUY LOOK EXACTLY LIKE COLIN FIRTH?"
(at that second, they guy picks up his head, makes direct eye contact with both of us, and has obviously heard this entire conversation.)
ME: yes, he does look exactly like colin firth. I think that’s because IT IS colin firth.
(we break into hysterics borne mostly from embarrassment. My mom is yelling at us because she has no clue what’s going on and wants to take the picture and WHAT IS SO FUNNY? And my other sister just keeps going “Who? Who? Who? Who? Who? Who? Who? Who? Who?” over and over again in my ear.) Finally, we pull it together and get a table. We believe the episode to be over. Funny and embarrassing, but over.

FF two days. Scene: Leonardo Da Vinci Aeroport in Rome. A tall skinny man in off-white corduroys and a black pea coat jacket has just finished checking in with his wife. He turns around and does not a single take, not a double take, but a TRIPLE take at this American family standing right behind him in line.
Basically: Colin Firth’s worst nightmare. I sat behind him on the plane. He has skinny really pale arms and gets cranky when he travels. He likes Thai food (that’s what he and his wife were having for “supper”), and takes tomato (pronounced to-MAH-to) juice with extra worcestershire sauce as an in-flight drink. He’s no Owen Wilson, but knowing that not only did we see Colin Firth multiple times, but that we’ve also made enough of an impression [albeit a not a positive one] on his consciousness that now he’d recognize *US* has got to count for something... I’m just not sure what.

NB: in real life, colin firth's not this blurry.

Comments

[kd_indy_chic]

Who's website is this? I was searching Jaime Gleicher and got this page. Your pix are awesome and your notes and stories rock too!

[ethan]

i get it. yur pictures are some sort of clue towards uncovering the truth behind the knights of templar. apparently colin firth is their president. also that lucie pic kills me. any luck with lode runner?

[lg]

i got on the plane last week to go to Rome and GUESS WHAT: my game boy batteries died. hence no lode runner. i do have to send you your gameboy and game.

you should've asked colin if he had any spare AA's. im sure he would've been happy to assist...

[Pauline]

Hi: I read your Rome adventures and laughed and laughed. Then I showed my husband the pictures and the stigmata(we both went to Catholic school) and then the dwarf put me over the edge. And all because I love CF. You were so lucky to sit behind him. The world gets smaller every day. Oh to know what he talked about during your flight and with your Dad. If you remember please share.

[Farmer's Daughter]

This was sooo sooo hilarious, glad you put it all in print to share with the rest of us, especially your Colin Firth encounters. It's interesting he flew right along with everyone else and not in frist class! I love your pics!!

[Nada Younis]

Your comments were so nice and hilarious.I really enjoyed reading them thank you.You were soooo lucky to meet Colin please if you have anything to add regarding him please please write to me...was he with his children,was he talikng a lot ,where the airplane was taking you all..is his wife nice ..I will be really grateful if you you can write all the details about him I envy you ..because you were so close to him and TWICE ....I haven't been in Rome before and I did like the photos and your story ...best wishes to you
Nada

[RCS]

You've seen Colin Firth?! Do you know how many of us would love to?! Just to tel you this, you're a darn lucky girl!
Great posts! You're very funny!:)

[Nan]

What a great blog! Made me laugh. And how lucky to have made such and impression on Mr. Firth. Tee Hee. What restaurant were you at?

OH MIGOD!!! i love colin firth. oh man. you are so lucky. and your sister *does* sound pretty funny. god! what a great story.