A day at Piazza San Pietro

August marks one of the most warmest period in Italy. Cart warned me about temperatures soaring to about 40 degrees Celsius. Madness! With this comes a sort of tradition in Rome for its inhabitants to go on vacation during these times to find respite.

One of the popular destinations are the beach. Italians seem to love to tan! And you’d see loads of brown-skin Italians going by. But I still can’t get used to seeing Caucasians as dark as or even darker than I am.

It’s funny how when in the first three months, I don’t feel like going out because of the cold, nowadays I’d just hide away at home from the scorching heat. Hence, its a great time for some backdated posts! And today, lets explore Saint Peter’s Square or also known as Piazza San Pietro.

When we hosted Jerrick in March, we decided to head over to Piazza San Pietro on a Sunday afternoon. Although I’ve already been here, it still amazes me at how large and opulent the place was.

It makes me wonder, how on earth was this build constructed? Considering that when it was designed in the late 1600s, building technology was not so advanced. Just carrying the sheer amount of marble alone on a horse and carriage is a Herculean feat.

I spotted a couple of Swiss Guards outside the build to protect the Pope.

Cart tells me an interesting information about Swiss Guards – it was a requirement for them to be Swiss, Catholic and between 19 to 30 years old. But nowadays, I suppose that their function is more as a decorational tradition since the pope has another set of bodyguards. I even saw a couple of tourists trying to persuade the Swiss Guards to pose and take pictures with them. You cant do that!

Entering San Pietro requires a number of rules to be fulfilled. One of them being that the visitor must be decently dressed. Not such a problem for me since I was all bundled up in the semi winter weather.

There was also a queue that you had to get in where they will do a metal detector check and x-ray bag checks. I was unfortunately carrying a small bottle of tabasco sauce that day and the guard was looking at the screen and then me quizzedly.

Luckily for me, I passed through. Phew!

I guess it was rather fortunate for us to go to San Pietro on a Sunday since there was a mass. I’ve never seen a mass at San Pietro before.

If it was opulent outside, the inside was extremely grand to me. Everywhere you walk, there were always be something to see – be it a fresco or a decoration. One big mistake that many tourists do is that they just walk through quickly. Slow down and really take a look at these crafts. Cart tells me that San Pietro is never completed anyway, as in the build is always ever expanding.

Similar to the Santa Sabina Church that Cart and I visited in Circo Massimo, there were tombs dedicated to the popes in San Pietro. To be honest, I find it a little bit creepy.

I finally saw a working confessional booth

It probably is not such a big deal. But the only ones that I’ve seen are the ones from television. In any case, we reached the area where the mass was.

It was cordoned with a velvet rope. I wanted to go in and take a closer look but Cart doesn’t seem to be comfortable with the idea since the three of us weren’t Catholics. So we looked from afar. I couldn’t see anything.

At length, there were a couple of men in black suits cordoning us as the mass was going to do a procession. I quickly readied my camera.

Okay, it wasn’t that long, but it was still rather interesting to see. Cart tells me that the procession was according to age, youngest first and the eldest are at the back.

All in all, it was a pretty cool day. I quite enjoyed myself 🙂

Related links :

• A map of Piazza San Pietro

If you like this post, you might enjoy :

• A day in Circo Massimo
• A day in Bracciano
• Celebrating Cart’s Birthday in Garbatella
• How I see Piazza Navona