Arrival

soon after the plane landed, and I walk off the exit ramp and follow the crowd, not understanding anything in Italian except "uscita" which is exit haha..Immediately Im hit by a heat wave and stickiness; it must have been over 90 with 80% humidity it was like WhoaH!..nothing ive ever felt.

I get to my bags and pull off the two duffle bags and cart them toward the exit, and Im met by a huge mob of people calling out names and holding signs up..and I was completely thrown for a loop, but I decided to follow the people leaving and I see a flicker of the sign reading "Hanson" and im like ooh!! Hanson!!! and I walk over and the guy holding the sign says...ms. hanson?? I respond by saying yes, and he just stands there looking around and asks "anyone else?" and i say no...hes like ook..well..lets go! (all in very italian sounding english haha)..he helps me carry my bags to the car and then taxis me around rome, showing me the sites and asking me if i wanted 'chewing gum' (?)...I didnt mind him showing me around since i already paid a flat fee, and he really got me aquainted with my first impressions of rome..its huge!!! he was also amazed to hear that I was going to be here so long, but finally he got me to my hotel and left me from there.

at the hotel I got my key and lugged my bags upstairs, opened my room and Ahhhh~~! a bed at last after over 24 hours of travel!!..i was so happy to see I had ac too, and I throw down my stuff and get ready for some good sleep (even though it was only about 4pm in rome)..

I loved my quaint little room, and went to check out the view from the window. So I open this huge window, since its amazingly old like everying in rome, and I take a look around the bustling city outside. I then am sooo ready for bed and I go to close the window, and bam!! The thing wont close! Every time I go to close it, it feels like there is something stuck in the hinge and Im going to break the darn thing off~ So then I think to myself..ok, youve done work on plenty of things in houses, how can you fix this? I pull over a chair and get on it and i notice theres holes all over where the hinges are, apprently showing the problems the window has had before, and where they drilled new holes for the hinges. Now, having no drills, nor the muscle power to hold up a 100 lb window I think of how I can reset the hinges without busting them more and having the entire winow fall on me. The only solution?? try to push the hinges back into their holes while pushing up on the window to get it on the latch, all while in my pajamas, with the heat a humidity blasting up my side and face. That plan exhausted, I conclude that the problem is beyond my power to fix and I have to change back into real clothes and call the guy at the front desk and tell him I opened the broken window.

So that went great, haha. It took me awhile to convince the man that I wasnt trying to change rooms because "I didnt like the view from my window" but that, indeed, the window was minutes from falling off because of its own weight pulling at its hinges..he comes up and immediately sees the problem and say "oh. yes. this window is broken." I think to myself...yeaaaaah. He then gets another guy in there and together they somehow push it back into place and latch it so it doesnt fall off, leaving me much relieved that it didnt fall off, and that I could finally go to bed eventhough it was postponed about an hour because I wanted to see the view from my first Roman hotel room. >_<

written by  Amanda on June 30, 2008 from Rome, Italy
from the travel blog: Revelle in Rome
tagged Gum, BrokenWIndow and HeatStrikes
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