Again, we made our way from the hotel to Rome via the bus and the train. Again, we got out near the Piazza del Populo. This time we decided we were going to walk down the Via del Corso again to check out the shops and look in the windows. We spent at the most an hour doing this, during that time I got to check out all of the clothes, shoes, and other items along with the people (there were two men playing accordions together, really quite wonderful players). I haven't mentioned this yet in my blogs, but long ago (in Paris) I realized that many of the big cities have a dress code: where pigeon clothes. The pigeons have mostly gray, black, and brown colors. Pigeons also have hints of green and purple in their neck feathers, and they all have feet that are either orange or are red. The people in the big cities have taken a cue from their "pests", many of them donning dark colors with a few things of color here and there (mostly dark colors).
In Rome they even follow the advice to wear colorful shoes. Italy is famous for it's leather, and I've seen quite a few people wearing their colored boots/heels proudly. I'm not a huge fan of the pigeon theme, all of the dark colors tend to be quite boring for me after a while, but I do realize that the dark colors are very functional. Big cities all have their filth, and darker colors don't show the filth as much (my jeans display this frighteningly well). Another function the dark colors serve is that of a "slimming" effect. People do look skinnier when they're wearing black.
Since I've seen the pigeon-like clothes multiple times over now, I was definitely ready to look at the colorful things, or at least look at the cuts of things a bit closer. Ahmee and I went into several shops were we "educated our tastes" and decided which things we'd be happy to try out, and which things we'd rather simply look at. After only seeing a large amount of color in shoes, I was ready to go into the store that had contrasting colors blaring at me in their window. This store had cute pieces and then also had some stranger ones. I liked looking in this store because the things were different. After this we needed to head to the Post Office and then catch a bus to the Piazza Navona. We had to catch the bus to get to the station first so that Poppy could send some post cards.
As we went to catch the bus Ahmee and I wondered what we'd wear if we were filthy rich. Normally it disgusts me to think of wearing something that would cost huge amounts, but then I know that there are things that I think are pretty that are expensive and that I know I would buy if I had the money (ex: Ahmee and Poppy got me a gorgeous pair of boots when we were in New Mexico, they were expensive, but I loved them-I didn't have the money). We caught the bus to the nearby bus station, and then ended up waiting for 45 minutes to be seen in the Central Post Office.
Basically to send mail from the main Post Office in Rome you have to take a number and then go to the window that has your number above it. Obviously it takes a while for your number to come up. During this waiting time I got to reflect on the outfits I'd seen. At the time I longed for my sketchpad because I was completely in the mood to draw. After the post office we caught the bus that took us close to the Piazza del Populo. We had thought it would take us directly to it since that's what we'd asked when we asked the bus driver. Nope, it only got close. It was a good thing that we saw the sign that said the Piazza del Populo and that there was tons of traffic on that road, otherwise I'm not sure how far we would've gotten from the Piazza. We asked the bus driver to open the door, which he did with no problem because at the time the traffic was terrible and no one was moving, and then we headed towards the Piazza del Populo. Before we got there we stopped and had a bite to eat. Our original plan had been to eat in the Piazza, but by the time we'd gotten close by our stomachs were just about to combust. After we watched the people and the traffic we headed to the Piazza where we were greeted with a wonderful sight. Tons of artists were in the Piazza, painting, and selling art. I know that before I said I was collecting prints, I didn't get any prints there simply because so many of them looked the same. I like different takes on things rather than the same old front on picture or the same picture I have in my tourist book. I enjoyed browsing though, and I really enjoyed watching some of the performers. There were two tap dancers in the Piazza with their radio and their box for coins who I liked the most and who brought a smile to my face. They were really quite good, and they went from one dance to the next with very little break time. I made sure to put a few coins in their box.
From the Piazza Navona we decided we'd walk to our next destination: La Bocca della Verita to put our hands into the mouth of a medieval drain cover. The legend of this drain is that if the mouth ever closes on someones hand the end of Rome and the end of the World will occur. 
The walk there was a long one, and we did not have too many shops to peer into on the way. The few furniture shops I saw were often on the other side of the street from me. I wasn't interested enough to walk across (except for a few times). Once there we discovered quite a line for the bocca. What took a bit were the photographs. The bocca was Italy's Blarney Stone. Luckily this one didn't have scary steps leading up to it. After we all three put our hands into the bocca we went into the church: Santa Maria in Cosmedin, the church that houses the bocca on the outside. This was a small, ancient church, I was glad that it had it's own icon to bring in income because this place of worship was much more intimate and real to me than St. Peters or other various cathedrals. 
We left the Santa Maria in Comedin and hurried over to St. Peters in Chains, weaving our way through windy streets, past the Roman Forum, up the hill, up through a tight alleyway (with an english-speaking homeless person resting in there), and into the courtyard of the church. We made it in time to get in (we were afraid we'd get there and it'd be closed). Once inside we got to see the church, St. Peters chains, and Michelangelo's famous carving of Moses. This carving of Moses was said by the tour guide of the Vatican to be the true masterpiece of Michelangelo, the David wasn't even close. My opinion was that Moses had been well-loved when people were able to reach him. He was shiny from all of the oily hands who had rubbed him. The church made a lot of money from this sculpture. They put up lights that only shone for about a minute before they turned off. To keep the lights going you had to keep putting money into the box. Since many people wanted to take pictures of Michelangelo's sculpture the coin box was fed very often. I think the longest amount of time I saw of darkness was about 30 seconds (yes I counted). 
I didn't go down to see the chains that supposedly bound St. Peter to his cell (story goes that an angel came and released him from his imprisonment). Perhaps I should've gone down to inspect them further. From a distance the chains looked completely whole, if a little rusty. 
Before leaving to go catch the metro to head back to the hotel we looked at one particular sculpture that I'd seen already while in St. Peters and heard others comment on. This was a sculpture of a skeletal grim reaper holding a hour glass. The sculpture displays two things a person can never escape: death, and time. The meaning of the sculpture is: to appreciate the time you have because at some point your time will be up. Wonderful to have this statue in a church. I think it's better than sculptures of Heaven and Hell. This sculpture focus's the person on life on earth and promotes the practice of enjoying it while you can. Once back at the hotel we dined in the dining room, typed on the computer, and then went to sleep. All of us were happy to be off our aching feet.
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