Roma, io vi ho sperimentati solo per tre giorni, allungato più di quaranta anni del mio essere, e come io desidero fortemente per essere in grado di ritornare, e sedersi, e guardare, e esplorarvi di nuovo, senza qualsiasi consapevolezza di tempo, o la sua fine.
Roma, sólo le he experimentado durante tres días, estiró más de cuarenta años de mi ser, y como yo mucho tiempo para ser capaz de volver, y sentarse, y mirar, y explorarle otra vez, sin cualquier conciencia del tiempo, o su final.
Rome, je vous ai seulement connus depuis trois jours, a tendu plus de quarante ans de mon être et comment je longtemps pour être capable de revenir et s'asseoir et vous regarder et explorer de nouveau, sans n'importe quelle conscience de temps, ou de sa fin.
Rom, ich habe Sie nur seit drei Tagen erfahren, streckte mehr als vierzig Jahre meines Wesens, und wie ich lange, um im Stande zu sein, zurückzukehren, und zu sitzen, und zu schauen, und Sie wieder, ohne jedes Bewusstsein der Zeit, oder sein Ende zu erforschen.
And what I said to the online translators was Rome, I have only experienced you for three days, stretched over forty years of my being, and how I long to be able to return, and sit, and look, feel, and explore you again, without any awareness of time, or its ending.
I am being unfaithful to my work mistress this afternoon, after an unusually late awakening, after a night trying to find a ready made layout for My Space the 101 installation. Oh I know, art installations are what you find in galleries, or in the open air, but an internet site, come on, your kidding? You kidding ain't you kidding And this writing is a Performance Art Work, rubbish? You rubbishing me? You disrespecting? You think I'm bovverred? I have worked out how to scan, crop, store and print from the all singing and dancing guismo, and sorted out 120 ink cartridges into groups of six, and started the rewrite and photo insertion for the 100th celebration birthday volumes for my mother. Hey I ought to have a site for her on Myspace where she can hang out with all those other 100 and 99 year olds. Add it so the list of things to do before I die.
Rome has its thugs like any city, its villains, and its conmen, its illiterate, its poor and dispossessed, an its politicians who fail to unite and organise so that scratch the surface and you will find those hankering for the one leader who made the trains run on time, exported the Mafia to the USA, drained the deadly marshland and provided the people with a sense of purpose, or at least that is what the last tour guide I encountered told me, and anyone, who cared to listen.
Roma is my city of all cities, but as with most matters I write about, I am no authority. It is a city, like Athens, of time past and time today. It is a city for the young, oh to be young and in love in Roma, and for the old, to remember when they were. It is a city where you can feel the ancients, but most of all it is a city to simply sit, and look, and marvel, or eat out with friends in some glorious square.
So where else have I been to the established great cities of the world? The following is an attempted order of first visiting, working or living in, and with in brackets the number of years or days. I have not counted passing through times, such as visits to Paris to board the train south or a memorable night searching for the municipal camp site in Munich. Stockholm (6/7 of a 14 day stay) Salzbourg (2) Venice (1) Roma(3), Naples (1), Geneva(3), Athens(14), Paris(12) Barcelona(3) Amsterdam(2); also the city states of Gibraltar(10), Andora(2) and Monaco(1) and the walled French Town of Carcassonne (2). The UK cities of Dublin (3), Edinburgh (3) Glasgow (50) Cardiff (6) Swansea (3) and the English tourist cities of Oxford (5 years), Chester (3 years) Cambridge (16), York (12-20), and Durham 100plus, latterly Newcastle visited over 30 years and London, living in the greater area for 23 years and visited centrally for 60. I have lived in Birmingham for one year and continued to visit since, and lived near Leeds for another year, and visited regularly since, three months at Norwich and mini stays for conferences and work visits, or holidaying outings, or in support of a football, or cricket team, and appreciated the regeneration of places such as Manchester and Liverpool, but none remain fixed in the way those mentioned have.
And in the imagination I have been to Hong Kong, Istanbul, Tokyo, Sidney, Bangkok and Peking, Jerusalem, Prague and Vienna, Moscow, Mexico city, Rio de Janeiro and Bombay, through a series of Time Life Photo essay books, and from hundreds and hundreds of cinema films, with the most visited Casablanca and the Berlin of Christopher Isherwood, and where I plan to visit before I die, along with the sites of the concentration camps, and to New York to kneel privately where twin towers were, and most of all to the cities of Andalusia.
Three days in Rome, with one a distant memory, yet I have several images, although these are mainly of the visit to Vatican City which is another dimension. I was prompted to remember Rome this week because of a coincidence. I fortunately checked the TV scheduling to find a one hour individualized documentary which features aspects of the City, only to have also received the DVD of Feline’s Roma. I also have the Michelin Green Guide, and Dorling Kingsley Eyewitness Guide which along with the Time Life, I transport there whenever I wish.
And what are the lasting images? The Pannini Pantheon visited as a choral orchestral ensemble was rehearsing for an evening performances, and which brings back the memory of visiting the cathedral/church at Bezier on a gorgeous hot day, sitting in thrilling wonderment as an organist played his heart and soul out in practice for an hour, and who dares say that the devil has all the best tunes?
Sitting in recent memory in some nameless square with its statue, eating made up salami rolls, grapes and purchased iced water, remembering when walking about the city alone in my youth, I dared enter a restaurant and had a meal, which ended with a plate of red and green grapes.
Eating multi flavoured ice cream on the banks of the Tiber while earlier at the Coliseum, I could still hear the screams.
And then the Tivoli where I have been twice, and witness a wedding couple stop the horse drawn vehicle to take their coins back. That's not true, the taking back of the coins, that is.
I cannot get upset about yet another English sporting humiliation as three score young bodies return to their grieving families Weep Lord, I do.
Roma, sólo le he experimentado durante tres días, estiró más de cuarenta años de mi ser, y como yo mucho tiempo para ser capaz de volver, y sentarse, y mirar, y explorarle otra vez, sin cualquier conciencia del tiempo, o su final.
Rome, je vous ai seulement connus depuis trois jours, a tendu plus de quarante ans de mon être et comment je longtemps pour être capable de revenir et s'asseoir et vous regarder et explorer de nouveau, sans n'importe quelle conscience de temps, ou de sa fin.
Rom, ich habe Sie nur seit drei Tagen erfahren, streckte mehr als vierzig Jahre meines Wesens, und wie ich lange, um im Stande zu sein, zurückzukehren, und zu sitzen, und zu schauen, und Sie wieder, ohne jedes Bewusstsein der Zeit, oder sein Ende zu erforschen.
And what I said to the online translators was Rome, I have only experienced you for three days, stretched over forty years of my being, and how I long to be able to return, and sit, and look, feel, and explore you again, without any awareness of time, or its ending.
I am being unfaithful to my work mistress this afternoon, after an unusually late awakening, after a night trying to find a ready made layout for My Space the 101 installation. Oh I know, art installations are what you find in galleries, or in the open air, but an internet site, come on, your kidding? You kidding ain't you kidding And this writing is a Performance Art Work, rubbish? You rubbishing me? You disrespecting? You think I'm bovverred? I have worked out how to scan, crop, store and print from the all singing and dancing guismo, and sorted out 120 ink cartridges into groups of six, and started the rewrite and photo insertion for the 100th celebration birthday volumes for my mother. Hey I ought to have a site for her on Myspace where she can hang out with all those other 100 and 99 year olds. Add it so the list of things to do before I die.
Rome has its thugs like any city, its villains, and its conmen, its illiterate, its poor and dispossessed, an its politicians who fail to unite and organise so that scratch the surface and you will find those hankering for the one leader who made the trains run on time, exported the Mafia to the USA, drained the deadly marshland and provided the people with a sense of purpose, or at least that is what the last tour guide I encountered told me, and anyone, who cared to listen.
Roma is my city of all cities, but as with most matters I write about, I am no authority. It is a city, like Athens, of time past and time today. It is a city for the young, oh to be young and in love in Roma, and for the old, to remember when they were. It is a city where you can feel the ancients, but most of all it is a city to simply sit, and look, and marvel, or eat out with friends in some glorious square.
So where else have I been to the established great cities of the world? The following is an attempted order of first visiting, working or living in, and with in brackets the number of years or days. I have not counted passing through times, such as visits to Paris to board the train south or a memorable night searching for the municipal camp site in Munich. Stockholm (6/7 of a 14 day stay) Salzbourg (2) Venice (1) Roma(3), Naples (1), Geneva(3), Athens(14), Paris(12) Barcelona(3) Amsterdam(2); also the city states of Gibraltar(10), Andora(2) and Monaco(1) and the walled French Town of Carcassonne (2). The UK cities of Dublin (3), Edinburgh (3) Glasgow (50) Cardiff (6) Swansea (3) and the English tourist cities of Oxford (5 years), Chester (3 years) Cambridge (16), York (12-20), and Durham 100plus, latterly Newcastle visited over 30 years and London, living in the greater area for 23 years and visited centrally for 60. I have lived in Birmingham for one year and continued to visit since, and lived near Leeds for another year, and visited regularly since, three months at Norwich and mini stays for conferences and work visits, or holidaying outings, or in support of a football, or cricket team, and appreciated the regeneration of places such as Manchester and Liverpool, but none remain fixed in the way those mentioned have.
And in the imagination I have been to Hong Kong, Istanbul, Tokyo, Sidney, Bangkok and Peking, Jerusalem, Prague and Vienna, Moscow, Mexico city, Rio de Janeiro and Bombay, through a series of Time Life Photo essay books, and from hundreds and hundreds of cinema films, with the most visited Casablanca and the Berlin of Christopher Isherwood, and where I plan to visit before I die, along with the sites of the concentration camps, and to New York to kneel privately where twin towers were, and most of all to the cities of Andalusia.
Three days in Rome, with one a distant memory, yet I have several images, although these are mainly of the visit to Vatican City which is another dimension. I was prompted to remember Rome this week because of a coincidence. I fortunately checked the TV scheduling to find a one hour individualized documentary which features aspects of the City, only to have also received the DVD of Feline’s Roma. I also have the Michelin Green Guide, and Dorling Kingsley Eyewitness Guide which along with the Time Life, I transport there whenever I wish.
And what are the lasting images? The Pannini Pantheon visited as a choral orchestral ensemble was rehearsing for an evening performances, and which brings back the memory of visiting the cathedral/church at Bezier on a gorgeous hot day, sitting in thrilling wonderment as an organist played his heart and soul out in practice for an hour, and who dares say that the devil has all the best tunes?
Sitting in recent memory in some nameless square with its statue, eating made up salami rolls, grapes and purchased iced water, remembering when walking about the city alone in my youth, I dared enter a restaurant and had a meal, which ended with a plate of red and green grapes.
Eating multi flavoured ice cream on the banks of the Tiber while earlier at the Coliseum, I could still hear the screams.
And then the Tivoli where I have been twice, and witness a wedding couple stop the horse drawn vehicle to take their coins back. That's not true, the taking back of the coins, that is.
I cannot get upset about yet another English sporting humiliation as three score young bodies return to their grieving families Weep Lord, I do.
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