Whirlwind (On Hold-Will Be Back Soon!)

Chapter 3

It was 11:30 p.m. when Alexandra’s flight landed at Leonardo da Vinci International Airport in Rome that night. Her mind felt fresh as ever, but she knew her body needed some well-deserved rest. Tonight, she would focus on getting settled in the hotel that she was booked into and on catching up on her sleep. Tomorrow she would be ready to begin her explorations!

There were a few obvious reasons as to why Alexandra had chosen to come to Italy over other countries for her break.

A)   Italy was steeped in history, especially tangible history. Hence, it was a History student’s paradise.

B)    It was a cultural delight. There was no one uniform Italian culture per se. The regional variations made things confusing but intriguing for a foreigner like her.

But her ulterior motive behind specifically coming to Italy had been hidden from her family. Italy was the place for romance and love! A die-hard romantic like her would have to be dense to let go of an opportunity to visit this country. Who knew, she might find her own love story here!

The possibilities were endless…

When Alexandra awoke the next morning, she felt rested and relaxed. By 9 a.m. she had showered and dressed and was just in time for breakfast. Breakfast was set in an open-air verandah, strewn with wicker chairs and tables. Alexandra did not realize how hungry she was till she saw the buffet counter and the smell of the food wafted lazily towards her. Her stomach growled and she looked around to make sure nobody had heard her.

Alexandra loaded her plate with food- an omelet, pieces of hash brown, toast and three kinds of cheese with green olives. And of course, her customary cup of bitter coffee. After half an hour, satiated, she grabbed her handbag from her room and left the hotel.

Since she had checked in late at night, she had been unable to really look at the building or pay much attention to the interiors. But now, coming out of her hotel, she saw it was a quaint little place, atleast a hundred years old. The pictures of it posted online did not even come close to doing it justice. There was a certain old-world charm that the photographs had not been able to capture. It was a small place, granted, but clean, and the staff friendly and helpful.

Alexandra had pre-decided to fill her first day in Italy with idle sight-seeing. She did not expect to begin her productive visits just yet. The first day should be spent soaking in the atmosphere and culture of the place, she firmly believed.

Accordingly, she hailed a cab to the Trevi Fountain or as it was often called, The Fountain of Love. Alexandra was not surprised to see the droves of tourists swarming about the place. The Fountain had a romantic legend behind it, which in turn had led to its being featured in several Hollywood movies, and its consequent iconic status. Despite her reservations about the truth behind the legends and stories revolving around the fountain, Alexandra decided to push aside her skepticism for a bit and go with the flow. She walked up to the fountain, turned her back to it and threw in a coin into the water. With her eyes squeezed shut, she thought dramatically, “O Great Fountain of Trevi, please make my maiden trip to Italy a memorable one-in whatever way you can!”

Though Alexandra was not very involved with art history, she decided to visit the Scuderie del Quirinale to look at their exhibition on the Roman Emperor Augustus. She had always been fascinated by the Augustine Era and she would be damned if she let this chance to know more about it slip her by!

To say that the exhibit was enormous would be an understatement. Alexandra was pleasantly surprised to see how well the museum had recreated Augustus’ personal life and political career. She took all of three hours to take in all that they had to offer. It was 2 pm in the afternoon when Alexandra finally left the museum. The exhibit had been enthralling and she was pleased that she had visited it.

She decided to grab lunch at a street-side café. She was not in the mood for anything fancy-just some old-fashioned Italian goodies. She ordered herself a bowl of asparagus soup and a margherita pizza. It seemed a pity that she was a vegetarian-eggitarian to be exact. There was just so much choice for non-vegetarians to choose from in the food section. And it tempted her to no end! But she had been a vegetarian from the very beginning, a few temptations meant nothing. She wouldn’t let go of her philosophy just because she was ‘tempted’ to sample meat delicacies. But damn, did they smell good!

She spent her own sweet time on lunch and ended the meal with tiramisu, the quintessential Italian dessert.

Alexandra felt drowsy, happy and excited.

Drowsy because the delicious food in her stomach and the wonderful Italian sun together were making it hard not to close her eyes and drift off to Dreamland.

Happy because she finally was in the place of her dreams.

And excited because she could not wait to begin her explorations and adventures.

Alexandra spent the rest of the evening in the balcony of her hotel room, reading. She had brought a bag-load of books with herself-fiction novels, non-fiction, historic-you name it! She realized she was way past the tag of ‘bookworm’; that she had entered a phase that few others experienced, namely ‘book obsession’. Who else would carry a whole bag of books to a place over 1300 miles away from home!

But in her defense, she was to spend two whole months in Italy. And not every waking moment could be spent travelling, exploring, researching and writing, right? A girl needed some sort of escape.

And books were her escape. Her personal space that she would not give up for anything in the world.