Artemis in Pompeii? No surprise there :)
Pompeii is the most fascinating of the ancient ruins I’ve seen in Italy. It is so well preserved and so massive that we almost died of sun, and heat, out among the temples and ancient shops. The guide took us through what used to be a luxurious merchant city. There were three main temples and all worshipped the Olympian pantheon. My favourite of these was the temple of Artemis and Apollo. The guide seemed convinced that it was a temple to Apollo but when I asked him what evidence he had of this he simply said that women were not held in high esteem during the early period in Pompeii so the temple must have been primarily for a male god. I am not as convinced since the evidence places both gods on opposite sides of the entrance aiming an arrow at each other… it seems to be a playful challenge between siblings… have to look into it when I get back.
We then went to a famous brothel where we saw many original mosaic decorations of several sexual escapades, and a variety of sexual positions displayed on the walls of the building. There are many penises in Pompeii… that’s right I said penises, LOL! Apparently it was good luck to have penises on your house/building or in your entrance, or veranda. There are also many penises that point the way to the brothels. Because this was a merchant town on the sea shore, there were many weary naval men who were looking for a good time LOL. In fact, some of them even wrote the name of their favourite women on the walls of brothels or other buildings.
The sad, and creepy part about the ruins, was the bodies. There are several bodies that have been mummified in some way (cant remember the explanation) which are placed in the main square. A few of men, a woman and a dog. Because they were all suffocated by volcanic gas, most of the position of the bodies are in the trauma of dying while asphyxiated. The fact that they were placed around the square like that was really creepy… the guide tells us that there are still bones and organic matter within the corpses and that really creeped me out. I don’t know if I want to see these people in their agony… I thought maybe they should take a photo and then bury the bodies instead of displaying them. But Italians have a thing for organic relics… did I tell you in one of the churches we visited they had the blood of some saint?? Its in a big cauldron and apparently they have a ritual every year where they test whether or not it will coagulate fast enough. If it coagulates fast, it will be a good year, if not then, not such a good year - kind of like our Groundhog Day, but not, LOL. Really creepy.
Volcano Solfatara….Walking on a crater is kind of like walking on the moon…
Those of you who know me know that I’m not much of a tour bus kinda girl, LOL, so when our guide asked who wants to see an active volcano I almost hugged him… almost :) Of course the night before we had been partying in Sorrento (we’ve been doing a lot of this, as some of you have heard) and none of us were quite ready for the early morning and the smell of rotten eggs and urine (sulphuric gases).
Volcano Solfatara was apparently where the ancients believed the war between the Giants and the Olympians took place… and I don’t blame them. Walking on the surface of this monster is like entering another world. A really stinking, hot, humid and poisonous world.
Our guide was about 100 yrs old which made the adventure even more interesting :) To his credit, the old man scared the shit out of us when he dropped a large rock at our feet and we heard it echo down below (video of this will be posted on FB). Some of my tour mates actually left! - they were terrified. We pushed on though and he took us to the vents of the crater which stank so bad some of our mates almost threw up all the wine and limoncello they had last night. He then lit this newspaper torch thing he had on fire, and the smoke around us started to rise VIOLENTLY. You have to see this to believed it. It was as though the volcano could sense the smoke and fumed even more… sooo cool!
We then walked around a boiling lake, temperature 150 degree Celsius and finally came to the pit of despair. They called it the gates of Hades and so we all had to pose for pictures and see if we can hear Cerberus howl from the depth of the Netherlands.
All in all a great time in the south of Italy. With home only a couple of days away it seems we are getting rowdier every night. Last night, on our way home after dinner and drinking we sang and danced in the laneway of the bus despite the nasty looks we got from some of the more sober Brits who had the misfortune of coming out with us for a night on the island. And what kind of music unites Canadians, Aussies and Americans on the way home after too much sun and wine?? ABBA!! Ok, and the Beatles LOL.
Tonight we dine in the Tivoli gardens where I am told 100 fountains flow among trees and blossoming flowers. I’m also told theres an open bar, so wine will flow freely (again) and hopefully no one will feel like a late night bath.
