A meeting with my internship director took me into the streets of Pigneto after our final today, where I discovered another side of Rome that I hadn't encountered before. Living most of my life in the historic city center has its perks (like being able to get gelato within any two-block radius and casually passing by the Colosseum by taking the 810, 81, and multiple other bus lines), but it doesn't really give you the feel for how most Romans conduct their everyday business. The study abroad program is based in the governmental and commercial center which is far too expensive to host anyone other than the wealthy, which we have learned are far and few in this time of extreme economic struggle. All except one of the program directors and study center staff live on the outskirts, some even beyond the reach of the Aurelian walls that contain the bustling center of the ancient city tight within its hold. I am used to small alleyways tucked between multi-story buildings with shutters lining every wall and window, street vendors around every corner shouting at passersby, and grand marble facades adorned with crosses and latin scripture indicating another one of the hundreds of churches in Rome.

Pigneto is still relatively close to the city center, but removed from the hustle and bustle of what I would call true city life. It is located west of my area of town, slightly south of Termini and San Lorenzo. I arrived on the bus about 45 minutes early to our scheduled meeting time (and conveniently/accidentally got off a few bus stops early -- they really need to label those better) so decided to take a stroll around what my internship director later told me was the pedestrian area of Pigneto where most stores were shacked up and shuttered down for siesta hour, but are supposed to open up later in the evening to reveal tons of bars and music clubs and transform into a lively area for nightlife. The groups of people on the streets loitering in front of the serrandes in the pedestrian area faded away once I crossed the train tracks into the less-commercialized residential neighborhood. What was most bizarre to me was seeing a sort of suburb area, where the houses were small and not 6-stories high, some had gates and fences, even yards. Even unlike the residencies of Trastevere that feature more modern apartments, Pigneto is filled with single or two- to three-story homes, much more greenery per block, and quieter roads even void of traffic. My internship director likened the area to "the Brooklyn of Rome." She described to me her motivations for living near there because Pigneto is one of the more diverse and multicultural/ multiethnic areas of Rome. It used to be all farmland and a very impoverished area which did not improve upon suffering from Allied bombings during the second World War. It became a hub for immigrants because of its cheap living, and has faced many problems from a strong drug presence in the past to being neglected by city officials and piling up with trash, but in recent years has drawn together an eclectic population of artists, students, and thirty-somethings.

Similar to San Lorenzo, my unguided tour of Pigneto revealed a neighborhood rich in art and the alternative movement. While going to a gallery to appreciate art is one experience, walking around these streets tickled my adventurous spirit as it felt like a huge scavenger hunt and I on the search for what famous name I could find on the next street, curating an exhibition of my own and collecting pieces of artwork along the way. I came across a peeling poster-paste of the creepy Kinder kid signature of the work of UNO, walls shared by both artists and taggers, unexpected faces slightly reminiscent of the Beatles down on the train tracks, beautiful typography on posters, and a modern play on the portraiture so typical of traditional artwork so important to the documentation of historical figures in European society. Once in the residential area I turned in from the main road and was greeted by this face pressing forward out of the wall and the stenciled letters HOGRE, one of the biggest names in Roman street art, as well as the telltale colorful spray paint and detailed portraiture of Alice Pasquini. Her work truly stands out from the rest, as you can recognize her trained background in traditional and studio art and design in the intricacy of each piece she creates. Another wall a few blocks down also revealed an image of Alice and her cat, and heading more towards the tracks I was caught off-guard as I was passing by a plain wall and then recognized the block letters spelling HOPNN, another prominent name, and the strange little human riding a bicycle on a tightrope held by two octopi and another HOGRE piece not too far down from that. The little stencil "Banana's Stolen Street Art" poked fun at the idea of authorship and public art (the sociology/media studies student in me thought about this way too much before deciding to snap a photo... plus hello to me in my natural shadow state of disheveled hair and carrying too much stuff), and a head stenciled in color-by-number style.