feldmanlarry

In 2009, there was an internet poll to select the 7 man-made wonders of the world. I saw the last of the 7 in the fall of 2014 when I went to Macchu Picchu in Peru and the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro. But I was cheating a little since I had only seen the Roman Coliseum when I was a teenager and I don’t really remember it. So today was the day I could say that I have seen all 7 of the man-made wonders of the world. The guide had a different style than all the other ones. Someone asked her where the headphones were and she replied that she’s an opera singer and doesn’t need artificial amplification. Her presentation style was much more as a dramatic actress rather than as a scholar. Most of the time it really worked well. She frequently asked us to imagine what the great events that occurred here were really like. She recounted stories such as Brutus killing Julius Caesar right at this spot where the ruins of the Roman Forum are. I was overwhelmed by my first look at the Coliseum. It’s actually similar to an American football stadium. It’s 180 meters long, which is about 200 yards. The football field of play is 120 yards plus there is extra space on both ends so the Coliseum is just a little longer. The Coliseum held 55,000 people stuffed together, which is less than a typical football stadium. The tour went to two places that most tours can’t go to. The first was the underground area where the slaves, gladiators, and animals waited for their moment to perform. I gave the link to the tour company in the morning blog. The guide was again very dramatic and tried to get us to feel what it must have been like to know you were probably going to die brutally in front of 55,000 people. We went back up and I took a bunch more photos. I made it a point to talk to all 10 of the other people on the tour.    The other place this tour had special permission to see was the very top of the Coliseum. There’s no question that the Roman Coliseum belongs in the list of the top 7 man made wonders of the world. When I left, I was very surprised that all the traffic was gone from the large boulevard right outside the Coliseum. I looked down a street and saw thousands of people behind a large banner. I waited for them to start to pass by and asked a few people if they spoke English or French. Finally, I found a woman perhaps my age and asked her what the demonstration was for. She said it was for jobs and housing. I walked with her and a while and decided to join the demonstration. I’m for jobs and housing too. The woman worked in a laundry and told me how hard it was to find housing. She said a group of homeless people occupied a building and were thrown out. She and I had a nice conversation in English. At one point she said she hates Americans because America is always starting wars and killing people. I agreed with her but told her that there are many Americans such as me who do not agree with our war culture. A friend of hers joined up with us and I could understand her telling him that all Americans aren’t bad, just the government. I respected her wish not to be photographed. They reached the end of their route just steps from the concert I was going to. There were a lot of police and the demonstrators lit some flares. I felt just a little bit of danger. This was a point where “my brake”, Margaret, came through in my head and said it was time to say goodbye to my new friend and to the demonstration. I found a pizza place that promised to get me food quickly since the concert was starting soon, at 8:30. The concert was such a sudden change from the craziness of the street. There was a male and female ballet dancer, three singers, and four musicians. I loved it when they were all on stage at the same time They did some Tchaikovsky and Italian language operas from Mozart, Rossini, and Verdi. I had a good conversation with some French people on one side but an annoying conversation with a Jewish couple from Connecticut on the other side. The Jewish person was so loud and so scared of the world. Her mother had been to Israel several times but she was too scared to go. I know Israel is not the safest place but there have not been any attacks on tourists in years (unless I’m wrong). There are millions of Israelis going through their normal life not in fear of being attacked. Many people would say it’s too scary to go to the US because of the violence there.