Sunday, December 4, 2016

Beware the Ides of March!

Diario di Roma Tre
Sunday December 4, 2016
Sunny 60°F/16°C in Roma, Lazio, Italia 00128
Ancient Rome declined because it had a Senate, now what's going to happen to us with both a House and a Senate? Will Rogers
Buongiorno,
       God only knows what Will Rogers would say if he were still alive to see Donald Trump
"Smile, You're on TSA Net!"
elected President! Some of my friends vowed to leave the country if Trump became President of the United States. I get that! After all, the U.S. Presidential election of 2016 was viewed here and in Europe in the same way as the Fall of Rome in 476 AD when the Eternal City fell to the Barbarians and the Dark Ages began.  But, politics has nothing to do with my upcoming trip to Europe! It has more to do with all those coins I tossed into Trevi Fountain on my four previous trips to Rome. It’s a continuation of a personal journey. This time, I hope to retrace the steps my grandparents took when they emigrated from what is now the Czech Republic and came to western Pennsylvania where they lived the American Experience, starting on the ground floor. Actually, my grandfather started well below the ground floor, mining coal in a small company town south of Pittsburgh.
So, it’s just coincidence that I will be leaving the country in the Spring of 2017. But, just in case our new President mistakes the nuclear trigger for the start button on his microwave oven on some future night and a mushroom cloud envelops Trump Tower, I will be grateful for the extra distance.
         Rome is the city of echoes, the city of illusions, and the city of desires. (Giotto di Bondone)
         That is my favorite quote about Rome. Bondone said that – in Italian – back in the 14th century, well before Rome’s Metro was built, but long after Rome’s aqueduct and sewer systems were installed. Bondone was from Firenze – Florence, birthplace of the Renaissance - but he captured what Roma is all about. And if you ever go for a long walk through the narrow streets of the ancient city, you will understand the phrase completely.
         Roma è la città di echi, la città delle illusioni e la città del desiderio.
This will be my fifth trip to Rome. I traveled there for my birthday in 2005, just five weeks
Roman Forum
before Pope John Paul II died. In fact, we walked by the hospital where he was a patient at the time. My then fiance
é and I had our two week vacation planned to include Rome, Pompeii, Florence and Venice. But we were so captivated by Rome that we spent our entire holiday there. When I returned two years later for several weeks, Michael took me for my first trip on the TrenItalia high speed train to Bodone’s home town – Florence. We took  another train to Pisa so I could see how far the famous tower is leaning for myself.  In November 2013, I returned for what I thought would be a two or three week visit, and I wound up renting a flat and staying in Rome for almost three months.  My initial reports home to family and friends on Facebook quickly became the initial chapters of my Rome Diary, which evolved into my blog and are now archived on my website – www.mikebotula.com. I share as well on Google Plus, Twitter, and LinkedIn. The trip to Rome in 2013 started me on yet another career – writing. After I returned from my fourth trip, I got busy and put the finishing touches  on my book about my father’s wartime experiences in the U.S. Navy during WW2 – LST 920: Charlie Botula’s Long, Slow Target! (Published by Amazon Books and available from Amazon.com and online from Barnes and Noble as well as Booktopia in Australia and New Zealand).
       Shortly after my move to Texas, I started thinking about another trip back to Italy, and as soon as I had finished unpacking and setting up my new apartment, I started long-range planning for Rome. I renewed my passport and signed up for an Italian class at Austin Community College’s Continuing Education Center. My language instructor, Professoressa Patrizia Casciana, is a native of the Puglia region of Italy. Her Conversational Italian classes are the next best thing to being there. When I told her that I would like to continue with her next class but would be traveling in Italy for a month, she did not bat an eye. No problema, Michaele! Vi e-mail i compiti a casa. E invii le assegnazioni torna a me.  (I will email you the homework. And you email your assignments back to me). Problem solved. Grazie mille, Patrizia!
       In addition to the itinerary that Laura and Michael are putting together to keep me entertained during my visit, I am also hoping to make a trip to the Czech Republic to meet some of
MikeBo, Laura, Michael-Venice
the descendants of the Botula clan that my grandparents said farewell to back in 1903 when they emigrated from what was then Austria to settle in western Pennsylvania. A few of my cousins have already visited with our distant relatives back in the old country and I have already been in touch with a distant cousin who speaks English who has agreed to help me if I can make the trip from Rome to the Czech Republic. Alice, who is now a Facebook Friend and Skype Buddy has also suggested that I learn a bit of the language –
Cesky -  to help me navigate during my hoped-for  trip to the Czech Republic. Unfortunately, Austin Community College doesn’t offer Czech in its language curriculum, so I’m doing the best I can with some on-line language instruction, and a lot of reading about that part of Europe. Plus, Alice has tipped me off on some on-line resources and recommended a couple of language books. If you are a fan of The History Channel, you’ll recall that The Sudetenland was the part of the new country of Czechoslovakia that British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain gave away to Adolf Hitler in 1938 to assure Peace in Our Time! We all know how THAT worked out.
Ciao,
MikeBo

[PS: Mike Botula’s wannabe best-seller LST 920: Charlie Botula’s Long, Slow Target! Is a dynamite item for holiday gift-giving. Ol’ Santa has snapped up a sleighful of the books and will be happy to deliver one for placement under your Channukah Bush or in a Christmas stocking!  Order it from Santa or Amazon Books, or Barnes and Noble.]

© By Mike Botula 2016






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