Lunch at Alfio's parents'

Alfio is a teaching assistant at ASM and his parents live in Naples - near Pompeii's ruins. He picked us up after our day walking around Pompeii and brought us to his parents' home for a lovely lunch. This was one of my favorite activities during the winter holiday. The food was delicious and the company was even better! We had a lot of laughs and conversations mixed in English and Italian.   : )

After we ate, Alfio's mom taught my mom how to make the delicious greens that we had. We also had pasta, sausage... then fruits, panettone, coffee, aaaand homemade limoncello AND a walnut limoncello-type after-meal drink.

Pretty cool watching the two moms communicate about cooking together -- different languages, same conversation   : )

Luca and Alfio -- brothers

Pompeii's fresco paintings

The fresco paintings in Pompeii are beautiful. They add splashes of color to the ruins... and I love that the people of Pompeii took the time to add artistic beauty within their houses and the city.

This fresco wall painting is in the entrance of a grand house within Pompeii - called the House of the Vettii. Shocking to look at... apparently this painting is of Priapus (God of Fertility), weighing 'himself' compared to a bag of gold coins... showing that the people of the house would have much wealth and fortune.

some favorites from Pompeii

Favorite photos from walking around amazing Pompeii -->

The think line of bricks going up the wall is great:

Live at Pompeii! - Amphitheater

The ancient amphitheater of Pompeii became even more famous in the early 1970's when Pink Floyd made a film of them playing a concert within the amphitheater... without an audience.

Sean really wanted to get to the amphitheater while we visited Pompeii...

I really liked this other theater that we visited:

Some of the steps have been worked on to expose the original marble:

Gorgeous mountainous background too!

Brothel of Pompeii

Well... a walk through one of the brothels of Pompeii was... interesting. There were small rooms on either side of a narrow hallway within a two-floor building and each room had a stone bed with built-in pillow.

In the hallway above the doors were fresco paintings, visually displaying the menu of 'options' available.

bricks...walls... beauty @Pompeii

I love the photos below. While walking around Pompeii, I kept being drawn to the detailed brick walls and the colors that still exist throughout the ruins.

a Pompeii kitchen... and bakery!

It was very cool to see kitchens that were around Pompeii... in both 'restaurants' as well as homes. The photo below shows a kitchen of a restaurant... with multiple holes along the front of the shop, which keep the food warm in bowls.

We also saw a bakery... the wood-burning oven is on the left and one of the mill stones is on the right:

Read a bit more about Pompeii's bakeries by clicking here for a BBC article.

the people of Pompeii

Encased bodies as they were found after the wrecking of Mount Vesuvius on Pompeii.

bath house, Pompeii

I was blown away when walking through one of the public bathhouses in Pompeii. It was gorgeous... fancy... and even had heated flooring! I had no idea that people had these kinds of buildings with intricate decorations and technology that many years ago. Incredible.

The bath area:

Decorated ceiling:

Letters around a fountain:

the Maiorani famil at Pompeii!

Mom, Dad, and Sean --> Come back! 

I had a great time having you here... let's do it again!

We all really enjoyed this gorgeous day, as we walked around Pompeii for more than 4 hours... an incredible experience.

Always up for a cappuccino break!

Thank goodness for Mom and her buddy, Rick Steves!

trees and carvings. not 'tree carvings' @Pompeii

I loved the view in the photo below... a cool tree at the end of this road, behind ruins and in front of the mountains:

Then... same tree from a different location!

As we liked to say about many things in Vietnam, "Same same, but different."

The following carvings are from the same area, as we were on our way to see the amphitheater: