Global holiday: Rome

It may be far removed from beloved American traditions, but Christmas in Italy has its own charms.

By JULIE SKURDENIS

© St. Petersburg Times, published December 24, 2000

Christmas in Rome. My husband, Paul, and my daughter, Katie, couldn't wait. Their excitement mounted as the time approached for our departure in mid-December. I was less enthusiastic.

Christmas is my favorite holiday, but I was afraid that I would be disappointed being so far away from the New York City celebrations I love: the huge Christmas tree and the skaters in Rockefeller Center, a stroll along Fifth Avenue past glittering store windows, the Nutcracker ballet performed at Lincoln Center, a quiet carol service on Christmas Eve. And our home, festively decorated.

Would Christmas be as special in Rome?

I need not have worried about the house part. Instead of living in a hotel room for our three weeks in Rome -- cramped and enormously expensive -- we rented Casa Navona, an apartment in an old, ochre-colored building. It was on a narrow street in one of Rome's oldest and most interesting quarters.

The apartment had two bedrooms -- Katie was about to turn 21 -- and a spacious bathroom with good lighting and a tub large enough for leisurely bubble baths. The apartment also had a dishwasher and washing machine, amenities that helped make our holiday more carefree.

Best of all, there was a working fireplace. Our New York home has four fireplaces, used just three or four times a year. But we used our Roman fireplace 21 times: every night of our stay. As the temperatures dipped toward freezing after dusk, we lit the logs and pulled our chairs up close.

Previous renters had left a poinsettia plant. From home, we brought Christmas place mats, Christmas napkins, Christmas candles and holiday music on cassettes. In Rome, we bought decorated stockings to hang over the fireplace and an elaborate Neapolitan creche, an investment we hope to hand down to grandchildren.

And, after a morning's search our first day in Rome, we finally found a scraggly, 6-foot evergreen with sparse branches and a huge ball of earth attached that we managed to transform with tinsel wreaths, ornaments and twinkling lights.

Within a day or two, our Roman apartment had become our Roman home.

Our choice of an apartment near Piazza Navona was serendipitous. Each year from early December to Jan. 6, this piazza, or square, becomes the scene of a Christmas Fair, with a merry-go-round and dozens of stalls selling toys, creches, ethnic jewelry, silk scarves and pounds of sweets. Performers entertain the crowds milling around this most beautiful of Roman squares, which is dominated by Bernini's elaborate Fountain of the Four Rivers (sculpted in 1651) and Borromini's baroque Church of St. Agnes (finished in 1657). All of this was within sight of our apartment, just steps away.

As for glittering shop windows, there were plenty lining the narrow, twisting streets of "our" neighborhood and in the ancient streets and piazzas surrounding the Campo de'Fiori, south of Piazza Navona, and near Via Condotti, at the base of the Spanish Steps.

But instead of Manhattan's snow maidens and Santa's elves, many of these windows displayed presepi, elaborate nativity scenes. Almost every church we visited, as well as some piazzas, displayed a presepio. One of the many highlights of our holiday was the exhibition of more than 200 presepi in Piazza del Popolo; they are on display each year from early December to late January.

Instead of The Nutcracker, which was advertised, we attended Gregorian chants in the churches, and choral recitals and small orchestral ensembles in concert halls. The weekly publication Romac'e is packed with suggestions for opera, theater, concerts and special events. It's available at newsstands for about $1.

As for Santa Claus, we found a few -- in Piazza Navona, posing for photos with children; on the Spanish Steps; and in the Piazza Rotonda in front of the Pantheon -- but they were as scrawny as our Roman Christmas tree. As Katie noted: "These Santas don't look as if they've sat down to many Italian meals recently."

What Rome lacks in Santa Clauses, it more than makes up for in bagpipers from Abruzzi, the mountainous region of Italy bordering the Adriatic. They stroll the streets of Rome's oldest quarters.

There are also the ubiquitous befanas, kindly witches who bring gifts to good children on Christmas and on Jan. 6, the Feast of the Three Kings. Besides the live befanas, who pose for photos for a fee, the Piazza Navona Christmas Fair sells befana dolls, from miniatures perfect as Christmas tree ornaments to 3-foot-tall witches astride broomsticks.

We didn't lack for food either -- hey, this is Rome, isn't it? -- especially of the gourmet variety. We discovered a cluster of upscale delicatessens on Via Cola di Rienzo, about a 10-minute cab ride from Piazza Navona. They offered a bountiful assortment of delicacies and dozens of varieties of freshly made pasta; you can even watch it being made.

From these stores, we put together gourmet feasts for Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Year's Day. There also was an excellent deli just six steps to the left of the front door of our apartment building.

We greatly enjoyed our holiday meals in front of blazing yule logs, but what would a trip to Rome be without also indulging in its restaurants and trattorias? We did -- often. A small sampling of restaurants we enjoyed, all within a five-minute walk of our apartment: Pancotta at 58 Via dell'Anima; Ecce Bombo at 22 Via di Tor Millina; Osteria del Gallo at 27 Vicolo di Montevecchio; and Navona Notte at 44 Via del Teatro Pace.

A little farther afield was L'Eau Vive at 85 Via Monterone, a French restaurant run by singing nuns, and the Hassler Hotel's Terrace Room, with a spectacular view over the Spanish Steps and an even more spectacular luncheon (bring lots of money). There was even Babington's, at 23 Piazza di Spagna, for the change from cappuccino to a cup of English tea, Scottish scones and plum cake.

We missed our traditional carol service on Christmas Eve. What we did get was all the pomp and circumstance of St. Peter's Basilica, where we attended midnight Mass on Christmas Eve.

Although we had secured tickets through the Vatican Prefect's Office three months in advance, we were still relegated to seating outside the Basilica. No doubt it was warmer inside. It was 35 degrees on Christmas Eve as we sat outside for four hours waiting for Mass to begin, but we had the consolation of giant television screens showing us what was going on inside St. Peter's, a view those seated inside did not have.

We had come to Rome to celebrate the holidays. But Rome is also layer upon layer upon layer of history, and although I have been to Rome a half-dozen times over the past three decades, I had never visited the city with my husband and daughter. This was an opportunity to revisit old favorites with them like the Roman Forum, the Vatican museums, the Colosseum and the Castel Sant'Angelo.

Yes, there were moments when I missed Rockefeller Center's ice skaters and Fifth Avenue's shops. But then, I had the opportunity to celebrate my first Roman-style Christmas, and I wouldn't have missed this for all the street corner Santas in New York.

- Julie Skurdenis is an anthropology professor and freelance writer who lives outside New York City.

If you go

We flew Delta Airlines non-stop from New York to Rome in supremely comfortable business class. Al Italia, the Italian national airline, also flies direct to Rome from Miami.

We rented Casa Navona through the Parker Co., which offers not only apartments in Rome but apartments and villas throughout Italy. The catalog of tempting choices is 240 pages thick.

Casa Navona cost us $1,290 per week, a bargain at $184 per night (a nearby first-class hotel cost $300 per night for one double room). Contact the Parker Co. at (800) 280-2811; fax is (781) 596-3125. The Web site is http://www.theparkercompany.com.

Auto Europe, which we have used for car rentals in Europe for 10 years, arranged for a roomy van to pick up us and our seven suitcases at Rome's DaVinci Airport. Call (888) 223-5555.

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