Thursday, October 25, 2012

Roam-a-Roma

Here's my first week and one of the close encounters to Rome city center. 
At the end of the first week of our Mathematical Economics class, the Mundus Urbano - Rome group hurriedly went to the Welcome Day 2012 organized by the Erasmus Mundus Association. This event aimed to prepare the EM students to the Italian cultural, academic and gastronomical life. 
Mundus Urbano - Rome group: Me, Jamileh, Manuela, Tharmendra, Lea, Aleksei, (Matthew is still in Darmstadt, Germany); and EM Students
We arrived late but just on time, uhmm, for lunch. So our empty and hungry stomachs went rejoicing after seeing the lunch cocktails prepared. It was a real-tummy filling experience.
Fusilli, Risotto, and Panini

Unfortunately, we missed the morning session, but we are ready for the practical activities in the afternoon. All of us signed up for the Homemade Pasta-Making session led by Chef Ben Hirst of Ristorante Necci. Soon I will try out doing my own fresh pasta and practice until I can cook some when I get back to Los Baños. 

We wonder when will they teach us how to make great sauces. Just not to forget, the pasta dough's ingredients: a kilo of semola di grano duro (semolina flour), 1/2 liter water and a teaspoon of oil.
Chef Ben showing us how to make fresh pasta while we show off how we can do it as well
After making efforts to create our own pasta, we decided to spend time walking in the city. To a place where we can relax before waiting for another Italian aperitivo.
Ever touristy sites of Rome. The fantastic four looking at the cityscape
How blessed and privileged are we to stay and study in Rome? *big grin* The city actually is small relative to other cities I had been. But amazingly, Italian cities had this picturesque sense generally.

A short stop at Manuela's flat at Ponte Lungo and off we go to Ristorante Necci for another feasty meal. We had met also other students from different parts of Italy taking various Erasmus/ Erasmus Mundus tracks. What can we say about the night's aperitivo? Let the plates explain.
How can we stop? Foods from the Ristorante Necci are simply delicious
What a start!



The eternal city of Rome to where should I compare you? As an urban economic specialist, I will look at cities now in the international level. It may not be an apt comparison, but do you know that the city of Rome, half the land area of Davao City of the Philippines, has almost the same population of the Davaoeños at 2.7 million. Comparing their unemployment rates during the 3rd quarter of 2012, Davao is nearly at full employment level (4.6 percent, LFS), while Rome has more than twice (10.7 percent, NASDAQ). 

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