Another day in our Roman holiday has passed. Surprise, we saw plenty of piazzas. As I know many people with wee ones, I thought I’d offer some travel tips for visiting Rome. Of course, some of these apply to any city.
1. Wherever you go, you got there the wrong way, just don’t let your kid walk. We have been switching between the stroller and the carrier, but whichever one we bring, I wish we had the other. The advantage of the stroller is that you aren’t carrying your baby, who will feel heavy before long, and you have a little more space to carry stuff. The disadvantage is it is hard to get into crowded places and your child may get shaken baby syndrome from cobblestone streets. The advantages of the carrier are definitely maneuverability and being able to keep your kid from grabbing religious artifacts. The disadvantages are that one of you is bound to ruin your back after hours of walking and the other one is solely in charge of carrying the diaper bag and the camera bag, which can leave your back feeling strained as well.
2. That is how Tristan felt about the Pantheon, the Vatican, and most of the piazzas. You should expect that anyone under the age of 10 is going to hate about 95% of “cultural enrichment” while abroad. The only sights that really get a rise out of Tristan are fountains, so if you’ve got a toddler, find lots of them. Also, find monuments with lots of steps to climb so your child will be nice and tired at the end of the day.
3. The rules don’t apply here. On our broad sidewalks in the United States, it is generally considered courteous to move aside and let oncoming strollers pass. In fact, most people do this even if there is already plenty of room for a stroller to get by. In Rome, if someone is talking to their friend, you’d better be ready to either run them over or jump into oncoming traffic. Also, the upper limit of the age range at which it is acceptable for strangers to spontaneously touch your baby is much higher. Back home, I have not had a stranger touch Tristan since he was about six months old. Here, I can’t walk six blocks without Tristan being squeezed or petted. Fortunately, we are pretty laid-back about this, especially since an added perk is that people will give your kid free stuff. Teach your kid to say “Ciao!” and blow kisses and then watch the goods come rolling in. Here’s Tristan with a hard-earned cookie.
4. Don’t dress like the natives. Romans are actually quite fashionable (except for the men wearing vests over their sports coats,) but people dress as though it were much colder than it is. The mercury has hovered a little over 70 since we got here, which to me is warm. It’s not weather that necessitates shorts, but if you’re walking a lot (as most people are,) it is a sensible choice. I have seen only one other family wearing shorts…I think they were from Sweden. I wouldn’t be so upset about everyone wearing pants, but, for the most part, they are wearing lots of black, and they are wearing trench coats or winter jackets. These people seriously love black.
Yes, that is special laundry soap for black clothes.
5. Have fun and relax. Now that you have a kid, you can’t travel like you used to. Rome wasn’t built in a day, so don’t try to see all its sights in one day. Back before we had Tristan, Glenn and I went to Paris and saw Notre Dame, l’Arc de Triomphe, Sacre Coeur, and the Eiffel Tower all in one day. We were young, crazy, and we didn’t need to stop every other block to pick up toys or put on shoes or attend to some other toddler catastrophe. Two stops a day is plenty, and it’s okay if you count the restroom at the Metro stop as one of the sights on your tour. Remember these places have been here for hundreds, if not thousands, of years; you can come back and see them in twenty years or so after the little one is done with college.
Oh, and here’s another dead pope:
