More gelato and I become a real Italian

My free days I've taken to wandering around the city, sometimes with a church in mind, sometimes not. When they say that Rome is the eternal city, I think it's true in the sense that it feels like a million years are coexisting at once. The newest shops and transportations are right next to ancient ruins or monuments that have been here for hundreds of years. And it's all taken so casually! Italians totally take for granted having centuries right next to them.

I genuinely think it isn't something that Americans can understand unless you travel. I'm not saying Americans are short-sighted or bad or anything, I just mean that it is truly a cultural consciousness. You don't understand how it feels to walk through these living centuries until you go, no matter how much you read about it.

Lately I've been going in and out of tiny shops, picking up gifts for some family and friends back home. Rome is full of tiny family-run stores and once you've been here awhile, you can pick out the mass-produced from the custom-made.

At one point I got hot and, in Roman fashion, it was time for gelato. I found a new place that looked good and had a decent crowd.

The crowd was enormous. I think a tour bus had come through since it seemed to be all Americans grouped together. 

And then, one of the most triumphant moments of my study abroad.

I fought my way to the gelato counter and the guy was obviously frustrated by all these Americans constantly asking "what's that? what's that mean? how much money is that? what's in that?" and I just shoved up (in true Italian fashion) and fired off, in pretty decent Italian, if I say so myself, "one medium with peach, limoncello, and grapefruit, thanks."

The guy looked SO RELIEVED to have someone who actually knew how to order. I got my gelato before most of the Americans, despite ordering towards the end.

I feel like a real Italian and I'm pretty dang proud. Victory gelato.