SUNDAY, APRIL 7, 2024

JEWISH GHETTO, FLASH PACK WELCOME, AND ANCIENT ROME BY NIGHT

This morning I was planning to head to Rome’s famous Jewish Quarter. After two full days of churches, which I loved and were beautiful, I needed to do some balancing out with my own people haha. I was planning to take a tour of the Great Synagogue and Jewish Museum, then have lunch and head to a different art museum (the Doria Pamphilj Gallery), but this morning is when the travel exhaustion and built up work exhaustion started to catch up with me. So I ended up staying in bed all morning, watching some TV on my laptop and just relaxing. I needed it, and don’t regret it at all.

After taking my time, I finally left around 1:00 with the plan to just leisurely head down to the Jewish Quarter, have lunch, and then potentially visit the museum afterward depending on time, as I needed to get back to the hotel in time to get ready for our Flash Pack welcome dinner. When I was planning for the trip I had read that the city buses were unreliable, so I had planned to walk everywhere (the subway is efficient but only has a few lines that weren’t near me). But after that first day of realizing how hilly the city is and what a long and tiring walk that would end up being, I decided to take the bus.

Turns out it’s just… a normal bus that took me where I needed to go, no problem. I had read online that the Rome buses take contactless pay, so was planning to tap when I got on. But once I got on one of the back entrances and was trying to pay, a kind local saw me studying the machine and gave me the “don’t bother” knowing smile and head shake, so I didn’t. There are a lot of warnings in Rome travel guides about how the police will get on buses and if you don’t have a ticket you can get a really big fine. But that guy’s look showed me I was correct in assuming that it was like NYC, where technically the same police thing exists but in my 21 years of regularly taking buses, I’ve seen it happen zero times. (This is, uh, not me encouraging you to not pay the bus fare! I would’ve paid if the tap-to-pay was more obvious.)

Walking past the Theater of Marcellus once I got off the bus. Not to be confused with the Colosseum.

Of course as I was approaching the neighborhood I was looking for, I stuck my head into a random church since the door was open and I could see a really striking altar. Rome is really incredible in this way, just one unassuming exterior after another, but bursting with elaborate artistic detail on the inside.

Chiesa di Santa Maria in Portico in Campitelli

The Roman Ghetto (aka Jewish Quarter) really does have a unique history, as it’s one of the few Jewish communities from before the Diaspora, and is the oldest in the world outside of the Middle East. While the community had been living there since pre-ancient times (“discovered” in 161 BCE by the Jerusalem envoys of Judah Maccabee of Chanukah story fame), it’s in the 1500s when the ghetto was built.

Pope Paul IV (angry at the Jewish community’s refusal to convert to Catholicism and their nerve to live among the Christians) issued an edict in 1555 that gave the 2000 Jews of the city a number of harsh restrictions, including a mandate to live in a walled quarter that locked its gates at night – after making them pay for the building of the wall of course. Its streets are all very narrow, and it was built in one of the least desirable parts of Rome where the streets flooded all the time from the Tiber River, bringing the rats in. It was a place of inhumane conditions and poverty because of a number of new restrictions on what occupations Jews could have, and inevitably caused a lot of disease and death to the community over the many years.

Finally in 1870 (315 years later), the reunification of Italy and the dissolving of the Papal States brought an end to the ruling, and in 1888 the locked wall was torn down, lifting the restrictions on the Jewish community.

And now today it’s a thriving, popular modern neighborhood with notoriously great food.

One of those notorious foods is the way they prepare an artichoke, and as a major artichoke fan I knew I must get one! Wandering through the busy streets, I saw displays of artichokes all over the place, in front of almost every restaurant. I assumed they were there all the time during peak season, but as I learned that night at the Flash Pack dinner, it happened to be an artichoke festival that day!

I found my way to the restaurant Sora Margherita, where I encountered a very long wait for a table – wasn’t surprised by the time I got there given how crowded every restaurant was. I had declared today a go with the flow day anyway, so I found a spot leaning against a wall with the other waiting tourists, and stood for a little more than an hour relaxing with some music and phone scrolling.

My view for the hour

I finally got my table, and ordered my carciofo alla giudia (Jewish-style artichokes), as well as an appetizer of meatballs. And they were as good as I was hoping. That artichoke is so crispy, and basically melts in your mouth. Excellent meatball too!

Leaving my very late lunch I wanted to head over to the Jewish museum and synagogue. It looked per online hours like it was about to close, so didn’t think I’d be able to catch a tour, but figured I’d check it out anyway. Go with the flow day.

On my way I passed some of the ancient sites, like the Porticus Octaviae built in 27 BCE to house the Roman temples of Juno and Jupiter, a library, an assembly hall, and lecture rooms

I had planned to stop at this renowned 200-year-old bakery Pasticceria Boccione for a piece of their storied ricotta & cherry tart, but after seeing this line I kept walking!

I found my way to the museum, and as luck would have it I was actually just in time for the last synagogue tour of the day, which would then allow me a short time in the museum afterward. Glad it worked out!

We met our tour guide in the museum before she walked us next door to the Great Synagogue, built in 1904 with an eclectic design that takes from a variety of cultures, and spent about a half hour explaining the history of both the building and the neighborhood.

The colorful pattern in the dome represents the rainbow after the flood in the Noah’s Ark story, while the cedar trees represent the Jewish people. And the fact that it’s square rather than round is unique in Rome and only found in this synagogue.

Leaving the synagogue, we were taken back to the museum where we had a little bit of time to look at the exhibits before it closed.

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In all, I’m glad I was able to both have my relaxing morning and also check out this important neighborhood. I’m not usually one to seek out Jewish quarters or experiences when I travel, but given the unique history of this community in Rome, and the unexpected deeper personal relevance of Judaism this year, it was absolutely worth the meaningful visit.

Leaving the museum, I walked to the bus stop, passing the famous Ponte Fabricio pedestrian bridge that crosses the Tiber River to the small Tiber Island in the middle. It’s the oldest bridge in Rome, having been built in 62 BCE.

The bus back to the hotel was as uneventful as the first bus (didn’t seem unreliable to me!), and I had a little bit of time to shower and get ready to meet the Flash Pack group for a welcome drink at the rooftop of our hotel.

This is when I had my dumb American Eurotrip moment. We had been introduced to our guide Michele on the WhatsApp chat a few days before the trip. So when I went to meet her and this nice man came up to greet me when I got there, I had no idea who he was and was very confused for a very split second before realizing that Michele with one L is of course a man’s name in Italy. Embarrassing!

Up on the rooftop, the group started to arrive and we had a round of drinks as everyone introduced themselves and Michele gave us an overview of the upcoming trip.

Snuck some photos from my lap for the sake of remembering the night – too soon in meeting these people to be blatant paparazzi haha. My first ever aperol spritz!

After drinks, introductions, and enjoying the beautiful rooftop view, we went inside to the hotel restaurant for a group dinner of pasta, chicken with zucchini and potatoes, and tiramisu. Lovely meal.

As it was the last night in Rome, I had been thinking about heading over to the Colosseum and Roman Forum ruins to check them out at night. When I mentioned my plan a few others liked that idea too, so four of us met downstairs to take the bus over to the ancient part of town and walk around.

Getting off the bus, we made a quick detour to get some gelato. On a whim I chose the cantaloupe flavor and it was really great!

Our first stop on the way to Colosseum was the gigantic Victor Emmanuel Monument in honor of the first king of a newly unified Italy. Can’t exactly miss it!

We then started walking to the Colosseum along the Via dei Fort Imperiali, passing beautifully lit ancient Roman ruins along the way.