Italy,  Rome,  TRAVEL/HOLIDAYS

Blogging from Italy: Day 03- Trastevere

Sunday – 21st March 2010

{Note: I apologise for not being able to blog as often as the Boscolo Hotel (B4 Hotel) is having an internet connection problem. I got connection from an unsecured line today and many thanks to the owner of the unsecured line!~ Emila, 27th March 2010, Bologna, Italy}

Went to the Porta Portese Sunday Market as early as 7am. Linda and I wanted to have more time to look around the market as we have to check out from B&B Maggiore at 10am. As per instruction by Arnold, the assistant keeper of the B&B, we walked to the Termini Centrale to take bus number H to the market. I looked for the Bangladeshi boy who spoke Malay the other day to buy tickets but his shop was still not opened so we just bought tickets from a machine nearby.

The bus to Porta Portese

We board bus H and found empty seats beside a big fat lady. A really big fat lady. After awhile, Linda looked at me and I looked at her. I spoke to Linda in Malay, “Linda, you ada bau sesuatu tak?” Linda replied, “Ada la, makin lama makin kua.t” So we decided to find seats in the front part of the bus. After having my seat (my seat was facing her), I could not help but looking at the lady. She has blonde hair, shabby clothes, shoes that she only wore half of them and a very big bag. Anyway, she has two whole seats to her. Pardon me I know it is rude to stare but my eyes controlled my head. She noticed that I looked at her, panicking, I quickly turned away. Later she took out an eyelasher curler and slowly curled her right eye’s lashes. Later she put the curler back inside her bag. After looking left and right, she took it out again and curled her left eye’s lashes and put it back inside her bag. Her face looked very confident after the curling session as if she was saying out loud, “hey, look at me, I am pretty now.” But, still; the smell won’t go away. Most of other passengers around her, moved to the front part of the bus as the longer you smell it, the harder you are keeping yourself from puking.

Anyway, when the bus moved, I totally forgot about her as the view outside the window was more interesting. The bus took us to Transtevere where the market is located. Arnold told us to board off the bus after we see the river. The river we saw and off we board from the bus.

Linda walking towards a newspaper stands to ask for direction

There was no sight of the market and we just walked until we saw a man and we asked. He told us to walk straight and could notice the market from far. And that was in sign language and a bit of Italian but we comprehended. It was a 15 minutes walk!!! But that was ok, we got to see pretty things…

We finally reached the market after the 15 minutes walk and Linda and me got to buy a jacket for each of us for only 3 Euro!

Porta Portese market

Bread dough decorations

Chinese trader selling scarfs

It was 9.30am and it was time to fetch our bags from the B&B and checkout. As there was a marathon in Rome, most of the major roads have been closed down so we took the train back to Termini Centrale. We bought our train tickets to Bologna. The Eurostar ticket made me poorer Euro65!

Trastevere Train Station and two girls from the marathon who passed by B&B Maggiore

After checking out B&B Maggiore, we headed back to the terminal to board our train to Bologna. The ride took us more than two hours.

Me posing in front of Eurostar (thanks to Linda for taking my picture!)

The Bologna signboards (left) and the Boscolo Hotel (right)

 

 

 

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