When in Rome, shop

Hmmm... I'm getting a sore throat. I started coughing at night at the Savoy, but put it down to mold or allergies. I may be getting a cold. I'm not dying, so either it's just a passing thing, or it's a mild bug. Time will tell.

Today's plan is to go shopping, with the main objective to find me a new leather jacket. My options were shop or slam my hand in a car door, and I lost the coin toss.

No possibility of sleeping in. The Basilica's church bells start at 7.00, and repeat every fifteen minutes until 9.00.

As normal we start at the cafe on the other side of the piazza - we're becoming regulars, which I like - is to meet Simon at Termini - on time today - then take the Metro to Spanga station, on the edge of the shopping district.

We hit the H&M shop, and Simon and Emma both find clothes they want to try on. No problem, wait in line  for the change rooms...

I don't know if it's a Rome thing, or just an H&M thing, but this takes forever. Everybody takes half a dozen items, their friends, hairdresser, personal stylists, lighting directors, and have a little personal fashion show before deciding they don't really want anything they brought in, and send their entourage out for more gear.

While they're waiting I go browsing. Ends up I'm the only one who buys anything, picking up two t-shirts and a pair of tartan shoes.*

No, seriously. Tartan shoes. I put them on as a joke, and Emma and I both love them.

We interrupt our shopping to check out a 16th century church in the middle of the shopping district in Via del Corso, the Santi Ambrogio e Carlo l Corso.

It's magnificent, in that gaudy, overblown Italian Baroque style. Although I was a mildly disturbed by the relic in the back of the church, the heart of St Charles. Who's the twisted genius who figured carving up heroes of the church is a great way to bolster religious belief? All the rage once upon a time, which is today there's a church with some guy's dessicated heart proudly displayed in a jar, surrounded by angels and latherings of gold leaf.

We broke for coffee, and Emma spotted a shop with nice jumpers (that's  "sweaters" for the North Americans), and picked up a nice one with a touch of bling. The shop next door had leather jackets, and after trying on a few I ended up with a new mid-length leather jacket for roughly half-price.

Feeling cat-deprived we took Emma past the Largo di Torre Argentina, home of four Roman Republican temples, Pompey's Theatre, and half of Rome's cats.

That afternoon back at our hotel we discovered the church bells are a recurring theme on Saturdays. Maybe it's a special holiday. Maybe Seventh Day Adventists have infiltrated the Catholic Church. Dunno, but they're making Emma crazy.

That night we sent Simon off drinking with his buds, and caught a quick pasta around the corner at the extremely Italian-sounding Robin Hood's Restaurant. Food was adequate, but the interior was brilliant, with a six-foot replica of the Statue of Liberty, and walls covered with old movie posters and happy-snaps of strippers. 

* Technically Simon bought clothes as well, but a bulk pack of socks doesn't really count.