buon anno!

new years in rome was excellent. we went from piazza to piazza armed with grocery bags of beer. people were lighting fireworks, nearly losing hearing in both ears. let me just say that italians have a strong penchant for explosives on new years. prior to going out, i seriously thought we were in a war zone. im not talking your little happy good times sparklers or an occasional booming whiz bang something or the other, these are some serious explosives. undoubtedly illegal in the US of A. it was awesome. i have never seen such a celebration in the streets though... people all over, all over. piazza del popolo is where we ended up, northern part of the city. there was music, some sort of show going on that invovled something like peter pan... and just shit tons of peole. and firecrackers. i mean firebombs. lots of fun.

other than that, rome is definetely the favorite place so far. it is just awesome. so much to see and do, the food is excellent and the hostel we are staying in is really great. there are all kinds of people to meet and such which is fun.

probably the coolest thing was actually seeing the pope this morning at the vatican. he was giving the new year address and we stood in the san pietro listening and watching. REALLY crazy. that made up for the vatican museum and everything else in vatican city being closed.. including the sistene chapel (sp?). big bummer, but the pope was pretty crazy.

all along i thought we were leaving for florence tomorrow but it turns out it is the 3 january that we depart, so we got a nice bonus day.

i am off to search the town for a laundry facility-- clean socks are in order at this point, big time. hope everyone had an enjoyable nye celebration.