"Trogdor?" she asked, looking at the name I had jotted down on her little sheet.

"That's right. Trogdor."

Her face screwed up with determination and confusion, the young Asian woman tried to think of how she would translate the name "Trogdor."

The sun was setting in the Piazza Niccolo in Rome. I had just shelled out a Euro and indicated that I wanted my name written in Chinese, on the "Blue Dragon" template, please. I tried to keep a straight face and wondered how my life would be different had my parents named my "Trogdor Leigh Whittemore," rather than Nathaniel.

This is the great side of tourism; the vacation part; the part where the biggest decision is whether to say your name is "Trogdor" or "Mayor McCheese." (The former won just because I decided McCheese wouldn't fit on the page.)

Rome is a huge city. Unlike Forence (where we are now) or Cinque Terre (where we were before Rome) which are extremely pedestrian friendly and extremely tourism based, Rome has distinct parts that are for travelers, and other parts that aren't as great. Basically, its a huge city.

The Piazza was wonderful. It had all the vacationistic things you could want: street hustlers, fake Dior Sunglasses, bad (and even a little good) street art, etc. We spent a few hours there, eating Gilatto and watching ugly dudes get their characatures drawn. As darkness fell, we decided it was time to make our way over to the Trevi Fountain, which we heard was really nice all lit up. Real good vacation tourism stuff. As it would happen, we were in for some shitty bad tourism stuff, as well.

There are lots of schemes to get your money on the streets. One of the more successful ploys goes something like this. A friendly looking guy with a handful of roses and a big smile plastered on his face comes up to a couple and hands the girl a flower saying "take it, take it, its for you." The girl says "No, no, no" but the florist persists and eventually she takes it. As soon as it is in her hand, the vender turns to the guy in the equation and asks (really, demands) money.

We knew it was coming before it happened, so when the young guy came up to us at the Trevi, Christina stuck her hands in our pockets and said "No" more firmly than most. Undettered, he shoved the flowers into her, at which point, I lost my cool (Rome is big, remember? I was stressed and a little tired), pushed his hand out of the way, and told him to Piss Off. In response, he COMPLETELY lost his shit, hit me open handed, and tried to hit my face with the roses. Not one to back down in a "lose your shit" contest, I told him to get the fuck away, or he'd be in trouble.

It was a stupid encounter. Stupid because an avoidable situation had blown up, maybe dangerously. A minute later he came up, looking for a fight. When I told him that I wasn't going to fight him, he told me he'd "see me later {because he} would remember my shirt." At that point, the cost-benefit calculator in my head tipped decidedly towards swallowing pride and away from getting shot.

It took about ten minutes of talking and apologizing and vigorous slightly angry handshaking which eventually calmed to normalgrip chilled out situation over handshaking, but it turned out fine.

It turned out that he didn't really like this job. He had come to Italy just a few years ago, wasn't much older than me, and sure didn't like having someone make him look like an even bigger asshole by smashing his arm to the side in a crowd of people and yelling for him to hit the road. I understood - pride sucks, and wounded pride is the worst.

After all my talking about fighting and kicking ass, I ended up apologizing. Live to fight another day though, I guess.

Anyway, Rome was pretty good, but nothing like Florence, where I'm typing now. More soon...

Love and Roses smashed into your face.