‘When in Rome do as the Romans…’ is of course the accepted wisdom when visiting the Italian capital. However when I single-handedly tried to form a quasi-facist imperial state based on military might invading other countries and assimilating their cultures people just looked at me in a funny way. So I turned tourist instead and joined the Missus and the Boy walking around the place discovering ancient monuments.
And it’s very pretty and it’s quite funny walking around a street corner to discover another 2000-year-old lump of temple. But there’s a lot of tat too.
Take the Pantheon, a stunning Roman temple that was then turned into a church. Architecturally and visually it’s a stunning piece of work… then you get outside and there’s a man dressed as a Fisher-Price version of Mark Antony and a fat woman dressed as Cleopatra who try to grab you and convince you to have your picture taken with them.
I spotted this odd couple and pointed them out to the Boy.
‘That’s the fattest Cleopatra I’ve ever seen…’
‘Yeah. And she’s not even bothered to try and look Egyptian either….’
‘He’s got a plastic sword too.’
‘And she’s got blonde hair. I’m sure Cleopatra didn’t have blonde hair…’
Myself and the Boy are also playing Nun Watch. It’s the same rules as Goth Watch but it’s seeing who can spot the most bizarre-looking Nun. The Boy is so far winning this because he spotted somebody who looked like Gillian McKeith.
More from Rome later…
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