I updated our blog, read the comments and replied to a couple of emails, then took myself for a long walk. I avoided the large streets, instead taking myself along smaller streets I haven't been on before. I came to a large park near the colloseum
but it was unlike Exhibition Gardens, for example - the grass was quite long, paths unmaintained, people were sleeping rough on the benches and there were groups of people dotted around, but looking like they lived here. I felt a little afraid, but without cause - there was a tour guide and her group ahead, and other people around. I put my foot up on a stone bench to do up a shoelace; an African man quickly deployed some handbags on the other end.
I went to a small interesting museum on Roman times, then wandered back to our room, full of gelati and pizza slices from the tavalo caldos, where you buy wonderful thin and crispy pizza by the slice.Polly: I had a much more interesting time - shoes, handbags and a red leather jacket that I made the mistake of going back to ask Tim about before buying. Needless to say, I am jacketless and the accountant is inwardly smiling.
I had armed myself with two valuable phrases before setting out for the day - 41 (my shoe size) and 'do you have really big clothes?' (this last said with much gesticulation towards my hips). My first stop was the profumerie where I also armed myself with a liberal dose of Chanel No. 5. Then, shopping ... The first shop I entered was run by a thin little English-speaking woman who insisted that she did have large clothes and proceeded to pull out the 3 things in the shop that might fit me. None were really my thing, but she talked me into trying on a black poncho type thingy that made me look like the side of a house. First she assured me that her sister is 'big like me' and she has one and loves it. When I explained that I wasn't happy with how I looked in it she informed me that nothing would make me look any smaller and that if I didn't buy this top from her, I wouldn't find anything else in Rome that would fit me. I told her that if that was the case I would just buy more shoes.
I had read of a market at Campo de Fiori and decided to head there via every shop I passed on the way. I bought a couple of scarves and some gifts, but nothing really grabbed me in the shoe or bag department. After walking for 3 hours I was quite sore in the hips and wondering why I had not yet reached the market. It was at this point that I recognized Termini station up ahead. I was a block from my hotel. Obviously I had zigged when I should have zagged at some point. After a reviving lunch I went to Termini and grabbed a bus to the market. It was a food market.
Tim:I went to a wonderful museum of sculptures and mosaics and spent a couple to rapt hours taking it all in. I love this stuff! I'm fascinated by Roman times, fascinated by what they can deduce about a statue from it's location, style, pose, finish, materials and size, fascinated by the things we know and don't know about their civilisation. For instance, we know about the names of the women's hairstyles on the statues and their years of popularity, but we don't the identity of some some magnificent statutes. Historians can understand their complex calendar - very similar to ours but with 8 day weeks - where there were five types of days that controlled what could legally happen on those days such as markets, feasts and government meetings; but for only four of those types of days. The fifth is a mystery. 
And the mosaics! Let me tell you... over dinner I excitedly told Polly all this until she started shoving pellets of bread into her ears.
Polly: And over dinner I discovered that every time I told a shop assistant my shoe size I was saying 40 in French and 1 in Italian.
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