Finishing Up Campania

Today I'm going to finish up Campania, but first my current status. We're currently entering the home stretch of the semester, so things are a little tense. I have a draft for my final project due Monday, a paper due Wednesday and a presentation Thursday, and then finals the week after. Fortunately, one of the perks of being a predominantly Catholic country, we have Monday off thanks to Immaculate Conception. Other fun facts: today in Bible study (I participate in a Bible study with two other Catholics, four Christians, and a very open and curious atheist. We meet once a week for an hour, pretty chill) we were discussing Jesus' trial and his death. I brought up the point about salvation, that even though Jesus "lost" (got himself killed) he won in the sense that he was resurrected, just like we as Christians believe in the resurrection and forgiveness, so that no matter what we still are loved and will come to good things as long as we keep the faith. In a real life, real time example, I've been reminded of my home a lot recently. My parents are looking forward to having me home and I'm looking forward to being home. This hasn't been the easiest semester socially, but I've known that I'll at least be able to return to a place that I am loved for who I am regardless of what happens. I also found out tonight that I'll be returning to my home dorm at school, which is another huge weight off my shoulders. Each dorm at ND works like a Hogwarts house, and there was a possibility I wouldn't make it back into my house, but I received the email that I'm going to get to go back to my second home, where I'm loved for who I am regardless of what happens. Cheers to two weeks, I'm going to make the most of it with my friends here, but I know that I'm going home shortly. Anyhow, enough of the sappy stuff and let's get some photos and commentary going.

Our last day of the Campania trip, we headed North and West into the mountains. We first stopped by a Roman villa, similar to one we saw at Pompeii, that was also preserved via the volcano:

The house

Now I'm at the house level looking up

Pig 

You can't tell, but these are all ancient cloth samples, with the bottom right one being cotton

Ancient bread!

Grains

Dice 

Amazing how little some tools change over centuries

We then moved on to Capua, that supposedly has some ties to Spartacus, the gladiator slave who started a rebellion in central Italy around 100 BCE. Fun fact, remember that time I gave a snapshot of Roman history? If not, here's the link (http://classicistadventures.blogspot.it/2014/08/a-brief-history-of-romans.html). And remember how I said all triumvirates had a useless guy? Well useless guy A from the first triumvirate, a fellow by the name of Crassus (regarded as one of the richest men in all of history) put down the slave revolt. So while Caesar was making his way through Spain and Northern Europe, and Pompey was conquering everything from Italy East, Crassus put down a slave revolt that was centered on Mt. Vesuvius. Yay Crassus!

In Capua is a huge amphitheater (second only to the one in Rome) except in this one you can go underground!!!!!

Well that's a relief! 

The one downside of Capua is their business hours. They had a couple really good looking food stands, including a burger joint. We were there at 2 pm on a Saturday, and there wasn't a single pizzeria, burger place, kebab store, sandwich shack, bar, open. Not a one! How are you supposed to build an economy if you're not working 2 pm on Saturdays! We wound up going to an all healthy, organic place, which, sold relatively cheap food. It wasn't burgers and I dislike organic, so it was a lose, but my hands were tied. We then went to a church that was supposed to have a temple underneath it, saw neither the temple nor inscription and then went to Rome, but not before seeing the sun set on Campania!

With sun

Without!

This weekend (maybe tomorrow?) I'll catch up a post a week summary of the week after Campania and this week and maybe finally get caught up to the present era!