The thing about maps is that getting from point A to point B always looks VERY simple. Just follow the black line from wherever you are to wherever you want to go. Compare that to standing on a busy Italian street corner after just emerging from an underground Metro with exits on all four corners of the intersection. Not only do the street names not correspond to the ones you were expecting according to the map, but you can't even see the Vatican to orient yourself (which according to the map, should only be 3 blocks away, save for all the buildings in between).

Because we took separate flights a day apart, both Tamarind and myself had to figure out the directions on our own. I feel very sorry for her. Though I gave her the best map we had in our posession, I had also given her directions that I had hand-crafted from supposedly valid sources. My mistake was not confirming the directions with the rental agency. Tamarind's mistake was believing that I actually knew what I was talking about.

The apartment we were staying at had a small map online, pegging its location 3 blocks from the Vatican. It located the apartment with a red dot but did not list street names, so I took it upon myself to correlate it with the map I had. From this, I gathered the directions as, “From the metro stop, take Via Candia to Via Leone IV, turn right, and walk 1 block. It should be right there.”

Problem was, Via Candia was actually Viale Giulio Cesare where the Metro emerged. And Via Telesio (the street the apartment was on) was in fact no where near where the online map suggested it was. And since Italian streets change names almost every 3 blocks. you could be a block away on the same street as where you want to go, but never know it. It was by pure luck that I stumbled across the apartment within 30 minutes of wandering. It took Tamarind over 3 hours to find it.

Even when I found the apartment and was standing right in front of it, I still was unsure whether I had the right place. With the help of the semi-patient apartment manager, I rang what she showed me was the intercom to the apartment. No answer, so I used the elevator and knocked on the door. Still not hearing anybody, my worst fears were bubbling to the surface. Was this even the right place? I had no idea where else it might be. Was the internet rental agency a scam, and there was never an actual apartment for rent? Perhaps Tamarind missed her flight connection in Newark, and was stranded waiting on standby for who knows how long. Perhaps she got lost just like me, and ended up being kidnapped by a roving band of Italian gypsies, forced to sell roses to unsuspecting tourists and dance the Tarantella with people named Maria and Massimo.

But no, as soon as I got off the elevator on the ground floor, set on finding a pay phone to let the police know about yet another missing American woman selling roses, I open the front door only to find her just putting the key into the lock, a bag of groceries in one hand and a bouquet of flowers for the apartment in the other. That was a very happy sight, indeed.