Our Trip to Rome

Every winter, my son and I travel around Christmas to warmer places. We both have long winter breaks as I teach and he is a student in academia, so we reward ourselves with a trip abroad. We've been to Brazil in 2019, Peru in 2021, and France last year. And this year, we decided to go to Rome.

It is an absolutely breathtaking city. There is so much history in it, you can stumble on an archeological site, palace or a Catholic cathedral on every street corner. We arrived yesterday and spent the first day just walking the streets of the city for more than 5 hours, stopping only to take pictures and sitting down once for dinner.

And today we went to the Vatican City, to explore its museums and St.Peter's Basilica. One mistake we've made as rookie tourists to Italy was buying the tickets to the Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel online. We are used to the United States practice when you buy tickets to museums or other city attractions online you will get a discount from a regular ticket price. It's a marketing technique that allows the attractions to estimate how many people will come in a day and to attract additional tourists through convenience and security of the visit planned in advance. I guess in Italy, the most visited country in the world, they do not need Internet discounts to attract tourists. Moreover, they consider the convenience of buying the tickets online a service for which the customer should pay. So if you ever come to Italy on a budget and have enough time, don't buy the tickets online. The actual lines to the ticket office move fast and you will save 5 Euros per ticket.

Once we got to the Vatican Museums, we were impressed by both the scale and amount of artifacts they have from all over the world. We spent about 5 hours walking around the museums and by the time we got to the Sistine Chapel my brain was maxed out on history and religion in art. So I just sat there for about half an hour, staring up the ceiling at Michelangelo's masterpieces. It was there that I wondered how the Creation of Adam would look if it was painted in the impressionist, cubist, Soviet realist and expressionist styles, which I asked DALL-E to create as soon as we got back to the hotel. The result is the cover collage for this story.

The most adventurous part was with the tickets to Christmas Mass on Dec.24. I knew we would be coming to Rome for Christmas, so at the beginning of November shortly after the ticket release I requested two tickets for the Mass through the Papal office. The tickets are free and are distributed globally on a first-ask-first-get basis. I got an email confirmation that they'd received my request and was hoping that I managed to get the tickets reserved. I was supposed to receive an official letter from the Vatican confirming that the tickets would be there waiting for me but the letter never came before we left. I was just hoping that it takes time for the letter to arrive by regular mail and decided to check with the ticket office anyway.

The St.Peter's Basilica ticket office is a separate entrance that took us time to find, with directions from two different police officers. When we finally got there, the door to the ticket office hallway was blocked by several Swiss guards in their traditional medieval garb, which was even more impressive in person than in any picture. The closest guard was talking to a policeman in a regular Italian police uniform who stepped away once he saw me approaching.

"Good afternoon, sir, I would like to check if my tickets for the Christmas Mass are available," I inquired politely with the Swiss guard.

"I will need to see your confirmation number for the tickets to let you through," he answered politely as well.

"Oh, I never received the official letter, just an email confirmation that my request was received," I explained.

"May I see it?"

It took me awhile to pull up the email on my phone, while the Swiss guard resumed talking with the policeman in Italian. I finally showed the email to him. He read through the Italian portion of it and said, "There's no confirmation number on it and the tickets are not available anymore."

"Are you sure," I tried to push back softly, "perhaps my confirmation letter was just delayed in the mail?"

"If the tickets were available, you would have received a confirmation number," the guard responded firmly. "Unfortunately, I cannot let you through. Please step away, senora, there are other people behind you."

I stepped aside, still confused, and watched a woman produce an official-looking letter to the guard to receive the tickets. I was sure a letter like that would be waiting for me back in the United States. I talked this over with my son who was patiently waiting for me to give up. I just didn't want to. "You can ask him again to go to the ticket office, just to check if the tickets are there under your name," my son suggested. "The worst he can say is another no."

When I got back to the entrance, the Swiss guard moved deeper into the hallway, talking to the other two Swiss guards. But the policeman who heard our first conversation was still there. I smiled at him and said,

"Sir, would you please let me through to the ticket office, just to make sure that there are no tickets under my name? I still hope the letter was delayed in the mail."

"I would let you through under one condition," he said.

I nodded, "What's the condition?"

"If the tickets are not there, you will just turn around and leave," he said.

"Of course, what else could I do?" I asked, dumbfounded.

"Oh, you can't even imagine how many people refuse to leave, whining and crying and begging the officers to check and recheck if the tickets are there. Some even throw tantrums like little children."

"I promise you, sir, I won't do that. If the tickets are not there, I'll just leave."

"Ok," he said, "I'll have to believe you. Just follow the red ropes."

I went into the ticket office and explained the situation. I also said that I put the request in at the beginning of November. The ticket officer checked for my last name in their database and shook his head: the tickets were not there. I was probably visibly upset.

"How fast do they go?" I asked.

"Sometimes in a matter of hours," the ticket officer responded.

Shocked and frustrated, I kept my promise to the policeman by turning around and leaving right away. On the way out, we exchanged smiles with the first Swiss guard: "They were not there," "I told you so. I'm sorry."

As I was walking to my son, I heard someone calling for me from behind, "Maaam!" I turned around and saw a woman with a wide American smile and recognized her face: she was standing right behind me at the ticket office.

"Yes?" I said.

"I happen to have an extra ticket, would you like it?"

I nearly cried.

"Of course!" I exclaimed. "But are you sure?"

"Yes, let me just count them again." She pulled the tickets out of an official Vatican envelope, counted and said, "Yes, I do have an extra."

"Oh my God, thank you so much! We came from the US for this, and I was really hoping we'd have the tickets!"

"Yes, I heard your story. So did we! But it's just one extra ticket, unfortunately."

"It's great fortune for us! Thank you so much!" I wanted to hug her.

She gave me the ticket, I thanked her again and we parted ways. So now my son will be able to attend one of the most important religious events for the entire world. I would have loved being there too, but mostly for the cultural experience as I don't believe in God. My son does, and he said it's the greatest Christmas gift for him from a perfect stranger.