20220506 Jewish Ghetto and Vatican: Had breakfast here at the hotel. Walked a few blocks to the Great Synagogue where we met our guide Micaela Pavoncello of Jewish Walking Tours, who is terrific. We spent from 10 to 1 with her. First, it was the Jewish Museum. Learned that Jewish women were good at mending seams so they didn’t show and were valued by the Christian women to make and mend dresses for them. In the museum were dozens of Torah covers that came from all these dresses including one from the Queen of Sweden. Fascinating. There are parts of several early synagogues in the museum. And we found out that the lineage of the Roman Jews is directly from Jerusalem thousands of years ago instead of coming to Rome from other countries.
In the synagogue itself, Micaela really filled out the history of Jews in Rome and how they were treated by the Romans and the Popes. Lots of what we see as coming from the Nazis in what they did (e.g., book burning) was going on for centuries in Rome under the auspices of the church. Met Emmanuel Di Porto, a 91 Holocaust survivor. Michaela recounted his story and how he avoided being captured by the Nazis.
Then we walked through the Jewish Ghetto where Michaela pointed out the progression of the Jews in the area, where they lived. Ended up near the Jewish school where Michaela waited for two of her sons to get out for the day. Had lunch at a kosher restaurant near the school.
Took a cab through bad traffic to the entrance to the Vatican Museum in the Vaticanwhere we met our afternoon guide. While we had thought we’d have a Jewish element to the tour, it was mostly about her giving us details of how the Sistine Chapel was painted and details of each panel in the chapel. Ended up being long and, at a point, just too much. Finally, we walked through all the galleries that lead to the chapel itself and into the chapel. It’s lovely, especially after being fully cleaned from centuries of soot. Stood with the hundreds of others looking up.
Went down several flights of stairs and out onto St. Peters Square where we parted out our guide. Jeff and I went across the square and got in line to go into the basilica itself. It’s huge and open with chairs only in the side chapels. No surprises here since we’ve all seen it on TV over the years.
When we emerged, it was raining pretty hard. Found a taxi where our guide had told us to go and went to Colline Emiliane, a wonderful place Sandy Levin had told us about. It was wonderful. Back to the hotel, tired and foot weary. Need to be up tomorrow to meet our guide at 8:30.
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