A Very Special Birthday!

I have never enjoyed having my birthday on Christmas Eve.  Many people like to say things like, "Oh, I bet you get combo gifts (Christmas/birthday gifts)," or "Oh boy! You get double the presents!" But in reality, or in my own reality at least, it's not about the gifts.  It's about the people.  Usually I can't ever get all my friends together on my actual birthday because of Christmas gatherings with families and other holiday celebrations.  But this year was a little different and special.....

The day before my birthday, Alex and I were trying to get ready for our quick trip to Rome and decided to get dinner fairly early in order to get to bed early.  We went out with his classmate, Tatsuya, and had some cupcakes as a little celebration of our own (I, apparently was the only one not aware of the plans for the night).  After dinner, Alex told me that one of our friends from Ecuador, John, had something for me and we needed to go see him.  We waited outside the apartment forever waiting for our friends to let us in, but once inside, I discovered that it was a surprise birthday dinner for me!  

This was huge.  Alex has never EVER been able to surprise me since we've been together.  I think I am getting rusty in my old age!  Our friends from Ecuador and Brazil (John, Gabriella, and Henrique) had planned a dinner and made a very tasty one at that.  We even had two guests who John had met and invited that day from Mexico and Venezuela.  The food was great, the company was great, and in this foreign country the timing couldn't have been better.  We ate the birthday cake until there was no more left and we laughed and talked about world issues until midnight came and it was officially my birthday.

On top of this wonderful surprise, I also had an All-American birthday dinner at a local American 50's dinner with all of my new found friends from around the world!  We had a great time laughing and shoving our faces full of greasy hamburgers, fries, and milkshakes.  Highlight of the conversation: talking about what roosters say in different languages!  Thank you Rami for fooling us for about an hour in saying that roosters in Egypt say "babada."  These moments will remain in my heart forever, and so will the knowledge of creating things on Wikipedia for personal conversation advantage ; ) .

Thank you my friends and my sweet husband!  I will never forget my first ever surprise birthday at the oh so wonderful age of 29!

A Last Minute Christmas in Rome

http://youtu.be/UPwdJMyg3Ew

Click the link above for a special Christmas video we made of our travels so far!

Alex is now officially half way through his global MBA program at EDHEC here in Nice, France and with a whole 3 weeks free, we did not know where to even start when it came to exploring Europe even more.

We decided about 3 days before Christmas Eve that we should visit the place of all places to spend Christmas......Rome!  Even though we are not Catholic, we have a huge love for Pope Francis (Papa Francesco as they call him in Italy) and could not think of a better way to spend a Christmas in Europe than to be present with the Pope at the Vatican for Christmas Eve mass and the Christmas Day "Urbi et Orbi" message.  Needless to say the experience of being at the Vatican with so many people, listening to an angelic sound from the choir, and seeing the Pope and all of his passion was overwhelming.  So many good things have been accomplished through Pope Francis already and I hope that he continues to allow his bright light shine on humanity.

As soon as we got to Rome, we ate at our host's father's restaurant which was absolutely amazing Italian food (they specialize in fish dishes).  After dinner, we attended Christmas Eve mass at the Vatican  where both Alex and I were awestruck at the beautiful architecture and lights.   One down side to being very short is that when you are short and in a large crowd, you just see heads and shoulders.  At one point I managed to hop on Alex's shoulders and I could see for miles......tall people have great views!  At another point I managed to buy some rosary beads, hoping to catch the Pope to bless them (perhaps even in the Pope mobile) but no such luck.  And in the end, we felt blessed just to be able to be there.

On Christmas Day, we woke up and ate breakfast at a nearby cafe right before going back to the Vatican for the "Urbi et Orbi" message.  The Christmas Day crowd was much larger and there were flags being flown from different people from around the world.  Brazil was in full representation!  Near the end of the message we started walking towards the exit because there were so many people. Little did we know, there was only two small exits and as soon as we got to one, the message ended and the huge crowd turned and was walking towards us.  We somehow were shoved through an exit and managed to escape the trampling that ensued thereafter, and decided to walk.  And walk we did!

We walked from the Vatican City all the way to the Colosseum!  There were so many interesting and historical sites to see that we didn't even realize we had walked so far until our feet started to hurt.  On this day we saw; the Vatican, several Egyptian obelisks, several churches,  Castel St. Angelo, Piazza Navona (had lunch here; best pizza of our lives), the Pantheon, St. Ignazio di Loyola, Fontana di Trevi, Spanish Steps, Villa Medici, and the Piazza del Popolo.  On this night, we ate at a restaurant very close to our place called "Rendez-vous" which was quite a deal and had quality food.  We returned to the Rest Guest House ready for "rest."

On our last day in Rome we woke up fairly later due to our death march we had completed the day before.  It was pouring rain, so we decided to utilize the Metro to get across town quicker and to save our feet.  We ate at the cafe that serves breakfast for the guest house again and headed straight for the Metro in the rain.  We hopped a quick ride to the Colosseum and walked around these sites: the Colosseum, Archo di Costantino, Palatino, Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele II (went to the top of the monument where we could see the entire city and beyond), and lastly to the Piazza Della Repubblica.

All the museums were closed the time we were in Rome, but we felt like we saw so much and that made it worth the trip.  Alex's favorite site was the Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele II, but he also liked several of the fountains throughout the city.  My favorite site was St. Peter's Square in the Vatican because it was so unexpected and beautiful, but I also liked the winged cats on the Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele II as well : ) . 

For those of you who want to experience a great place to stay in Rome:

We had a wonderful stay at a bed and breakfast type lodging called, "Rest Guest House."  The building the Rest Guest House occupies was a former monastery and had a secret underground tunnel that led into another monastery in the Vatican.  It is located right outside of the Vatican City and was recently remodeled and modernized this year.  The owner has grown up in Rome and was very hospitable.  He made us reservations at his father's family style Italian restaurant during one of the busiest nights of the year, waited on our table himself to ensure we enjoyed the food and service, and even allowed us to keep our things in the room past check out since it was raining hard on our last day.  If you ever need a good place to stay, we recommend this place.
Via Sebastiano Veniero, 8
00192 Roma
www.restbandb.com