Escape to Rome with The Bittersweet Life! (Virtually or IN PERSON!)
This week we’re thrilled to share Episode 558: Escape to Rome in which we kick off our 2024 Bittersweet Life Rome Adventure!
We had an absolute blast sharing “our Rome” with 11 of our amazing listeners and we can’t wait to do it again next year.
Maybe in 2025 you will join us! Â (Get in touch to find out how!)
You can listen right here, or find the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, and elsewhere.
Related Episodes:
Episode 560: [LIIVE] The Ghosts of Things Not Seen (with our Rome guests!)
Episode 508: Discovering Rome’s Secrets with our Listeners
Episode 507: Seeing (and not Seeing) Rome for the First Time
Episode 506: [LIVE]: Discovery (with our listeners!)
Episode 505: The Roman Adventure Begins!
Here are 5 key points from the episode:
- Katy arrived in Rome for the second Bittersweet Life Rome trip, where they will lead a group of listeners on walking tours to secret sites in the city.
- They discuss the challenges of international travel, including tight layovers, airport security, and the physical toll of long flights.
- Tiffany compares airline travel to childbirth, highlighting the loss of dignity, physical discomfort, and being at the mercy of others in both situations.
- They reflect on how technology has changed interactions with fellow passengers, noting that people are less likely to engage in conversation now compared to the past.
- The hosts share personal anecdotes about chance encounters during travel that inspired them or planted seeds for future life changes, such as moving to Rome.
Full Episode Transcript:
Today’s show kicks off a series that we recorded in Rome during the month of October. So get ready to do a little time traveling and to be abroad for a while. If you’re not already living in Italy, let us take you there for the next couple weeks. I arrived in Italy on October 3rd and this episode that you’re going to hear today was recorded very shortly thereafter. We were there for the 2024 Bittersweet Life trip to Rome where we were joined by a group of wonderful listeners and friends who joined us to take a walking tour through the and to see the secret side of Rome, the side that tourists and even some locals never get to see. We had an amazing time and I hope you enjoy this peek into Rome. And stay tuned! We’ll be taking a secret Rome tour in October of 2025 as well. And we will be announcing that trip in the weeks to come. And if you’re interested, you’ll want to snag your seat as early as possible.
Katy
Hello, this is The Bittersweet Life. I’m Katy Sewall.
Tiffany
I’m Tiffany Parks.
Katy
Tiffany in Rome. Katy, also Rome. That’s right, I’m here. It’s official. I’m visiting. I just got here
Tiffany
And we’re so happy you’re here.
Katy
I’m still so very jet lagged. So, Tiffany, obviously I’m here because we’re about to do our second Bittersweet Life Rome trip with some of our listeners, a nice group who we have yet to meet that we will be meeting in a couple days. And so we’ve been kind of just at my rental apartment planning things out today, trying to get our ducks in a row, trying to figure out our schedule for every single day. Because if you’re just joining us, we are doing a one week long trip through Rome showing everybody the secret sites. And every single day is a different walking tour and every single day has a different theme. And so we’ve been like walking through the locations where we’re going to go, how we’re going to get there. What’s an interesting path to take all those, those details which you said took a lot longer than you were thinking it was going to.
Tiffany
Yeah, it takes so much planning, especially when you’re taking off from the same point every day, but you’re going to a different place. You know, you want to make the route to get there, not the same street that you walked down the day before. And so it can be complicated. And there are lots of roads in Rome that kind of feel like they’re leading you in one direction. But actually there’s going to be a huge roadblock and you’re going to have to go around and backwards. And, you know, it’s. It’s full of little blind corners like that. Yes.
Katy
Tons of mazes. And this year, we are making this year a little bit different than last year. So if you’re listening and you were actually one of the people who came on the tour last year, this is going to be a different thing. I mean, there might be some things that we do that you would recognize, maybe some of your favorite sites. Of course we’re still going to, but we’re also lacing in a bunch of new things, which also adds a new layer of planning.
Tiffany
Yes. And also considering the fact that next year is the Jubilee year, lots of places in Rome are under heavy restoration or closed altogether. And so we’ve had to definitely rework some of our tours because obviously there are places that we just can’t go to.
Katy
Yeah. In fact, just this morning it was funny, we were like, what if we took them down this particular staircase and then we were running an errand together and we passed that particular staircase and we’re like, oh, I guess we’re not going to use that. Completely closed for restoration.
Tiffany
So, yeah, it’s a good thing that we saw that.
Katy
I wonder how much more of that we’re going to encounter. But, yeah, I guess that’s good advertising for the Rome tour next year, if you’re interested in coming. When you hear this as you listen throughout the episodes that we’re going to record in the next few weeks, we are planning at the moment to do a tour that’s happening during the Jubilee after all of this restoration is done, which hypothetically means that Rome will be at its shiniest and prettiest by next year. And we don’t take them to the crowded spots.
Tiffany
So that’s the good thing about coming on our, our tour, because it’s really the lesser known spots, the secret spots, the off the beaten track spots.
Katy
Right. But okay, so I just got here, so travel is very fresh on my mind. Very fresh. It’s still very physically fresh in my body as well. You know, I don’t know if you ever get this like, where you travel and, you know, Ever since I went through the whole process of what it takes to get here from Seattle, you know, my throat feels extra dry, my muscles kind of all ache, you know, and, and granted some of that is from all of the running I had to do through the airports, which, if you want to talk about it, we can talk about that. But it’s also just the physicality of sitting in one space for over the length of a workday without getting up beyond, like walking a few feet to the bathroom.
Tiffany
Oh, yeah. It hurts the body especially. Especially as you get older.
Katy
So I came via Heathrow in London, and a friend I had, actually, I don’t know if you’ve ever had this experience, but I had a friend who was on my same plane. Just by happenstance, we both were so crunched to get to our connecting flights that we didn’t connect. Like we didn’t get off the plane and give each other a goodbye hug. Like, by the time I got off the plane, because I was like seven rows back from him, he was long gone, running toward his own flight, no doubt. And I was, you know, barely going to make my own. But I wrote to him later and just said, hey, you know, good to see you, nice to share a plane with you. And he just said, boy, getting through Heathrow was a gauntlet. And I can’t think of a better word for what it was like, especially when you’re like, looking down the barrel of time. But I tried to take this new Zen approach. There’s nothing I can do about it. So what happened is that the plane landed on time, everything’s looking great, but the plane landed way out on the tarmac for whatever reason, we didn’t have a gate, so they brought up a rolling ladder to the plane and then they brought buses in, but the buses would arrive one at a time, so first class. They were often gone for, I don’t know, 15 minutes before the next bus came. And I’m at the back of the plane and everyone around me is starting to exchange information, like, what’s your connecting flight? How soon is it? It was like 7:10 in the morning. One girl in the row in front of me was said, well, my next plane’s at 7:30. And so we’re like, no, boy, that’s not probably going to happen, you know.
Tiffany
But what was the scheduled arrival time of the flight?
Katy
6:50. So it was already going to be tight.
Tiffany
6:50. And her connecting flight was at 7:30. That was not a smart move. You never ever do a layover less than an hour. And even if. And even in a place like Heathrow, which is the same as JFK, you need two hours. Certain airplane, certain airports need two hours. That’s. That was bad planning.
Katy
Well, and it’s also so hard to know. Like, let’s. I don’t know if you do this too, where I come over here a lot. Now that we’re doing these trips, I’m really coming over here a lot. And yet some sort of amnesia happens where you don’t remember. Like, what did I go through last time I went through, you know, London’s airport. And, you know, so I got off the plane finally, when it was finally my turn in the third wave of four waves. And let me tell you, the woman who was sitting beside me the whole flight, she. When we got to the door, they let me go and they held her to wait for the fourth bus. I would have missed my flight if I had not been through that door on that run. So I got lucky there. I felt very lucky about it. But then you’re just sort of optimistic. You’re like, well, maybe they won’t make us go through security again. Maybe, you know, maybe they’ll just have an international terminal where I just pass through to the next plane or, you know, because some have that, some have.
Tiffany
Not Heathrow and not JFK. This is why I do not fly through Heathrow or JFK unless there’s literally no other option.
Katy
Well, we learned that. So by the time I get to through security, which was its own maze that they were just making with different ropes, you know, they were making us just walk in circles, basically to slow the line down. And some guy, I do. I do have some respect for this. Some guy just ducked one of the ropes because he’s like, what are we doing here? Like, we’re just walking in circles. The line is right there. And the woman pulled him back out of line and says, sir, that’s not fair. All these people have been walking in circles longer than you have. You know, she didn’t say walking in circles, but she could have, because that’s what we were doing. We were basically in an empty room parading around in different formations. But anyway, that’s beside the point. So by the time I get my luggage through or it’s in the scanner, and I was telling you, Tiffany, that because I travel with all this radio equipment, one of which within a scanner probably looks like something like a taser, maybe one is like a shotgun mic, so it looks like this long metal rod. Both things take an Extra look, you know, you can’t just pass that through. So they were staring at it for a long time and I’m like, oh my gosh, how much time do I have? I’m purposely by the way, not looking at a clock. I don’t want to know. If I know I’m going to just be more and more panicked. My flight took off at 8:40, so I had a little time but I didn’t have tons of time by the time I got through anyway. So while I’m waiting, I find a nice young man who’s standing by the belt who works in security. He wasn’t just a random guy. And I just said, so sir, if I had to run for the A gates after I get these bags, which direction would you say I go? And he said he goes, take a left, run down the stairs and you’ll find a reader board there that tells you what all the gates are out of that thing. And that’s exactly what I did. Basically grab my luggage. Thank goodness they didn’t ask to open it. I was a little concerned because they held it there on the conveyor belt for a long time.
Tiffany
Did you have to immediately recheck it or did you have to lug it with you to the next gate terminal?
Katy
I mean I didn’t check any bags so I was carrying.
Tiffany
Check any bags. Oh, okay. I thought you were picking up your checked bags to go through customs and then dropping them off, which is what you have to do when you fly to the U.S. if you connect through a place like JFK, you have to pick up your bags, walk through a gate where you don’t do anything, there’s like nothing to declare and then you have to drop them.
Katy
See I’ve been through that too. But no, no, I generally speaking because I’m relatively able bodied, I try to just keep everything with me and it’s a pain for sure, especially if you have to run. And I always have to run. I feel like every time I end up at a big airport I have to run. You know there’s major offenders in the United States where certain airports, it’s like I hate them so much because I always have to run.
Tiffany
But how many, okay, how many hours did you have for your like based on if, if everything arrived on time, what was, how many hours did you have?
Katy
If it was a layover, landing at 6:50, taking off at 8:40.
Tiffany
So just under two hours. Yeah, I’d say Heathrow. That’s cutting it close. I wouldn’t like even JFK. I Wouldn’t do, I wouldn’t do that. I would do two and a half. I would, I would err on the side. I mean, the last time I talked about this, I don’t know, a couple months ago when we flew to the States and we went through JFK, which I had sworn I would never do again, but it was the only option. There was a flight leaving Rome at 9 and there was a flight leaving Rome at 10, and they both connected to the same JFK Phoenix flight that I had to get. And the 9am one was more expensive and the 10am one was significantly less expensive. And I was like, I’m doing the 9am because I do not want to be in JFK sweating bullets.
Katy
Well, here’s the thing though, I mean, I took British Airways, which, you know, given some of the airplanes I’ve taken over here in the years past, I would say they did a better job than ones I’ve flown in the past. But you know, as a consumer you sort of trust them to a certain degree because what do I know? If you’re the British Air, you’re British Airways, this is your airport, you know, this is your, arguably your hub of an airport. You would know what it takes for me to get from one place to another. So it’s just you sort of like say, well, if this, if they say I can do this, then I can do this.
Tiffany
No, not in my experience, no. I have seen flights where you’re like, oh, it just came up this, you know, you put it in the search engine and this is what pops up and you’re like, oh, this is such a really short flight. And then you look at the connection and it’s like 20 minutes and it’s like, why are you even offering me this as an option? Because this is impossible. Even in a normal airport, 20 minute connection is impossible. So I don’t think that they do. I don’t know, I don’t know what the rule is.
Katy
I don’t know. Well, I mean, long and the short of it, like I told you, I was just trying to be like zen about it. If I miss it, I miss it. What can I do? It’s better than being super stressed out about it. Ran down the stairs.
Tiffany
Did you have to take any kind of Airbus or anything like that?
Katy
Well, I did to get from the plane to the terminal, but nothing else, thankfully.
Tiffany
So you didn’t have to do like a terminal to terminal bus like you gotta do in JFK?
Katy
No, thankfully, that would have been the death of me. But I come Running around the corner. And this man. There’s a few victorious moments that happened during this trip. And this man is standing there to look at passports, and he yells to me up the halt corridor, you know, are you going to Rome? And I said, yes. And he’s like, you made it. Because on the reader board, it basically said, Rome, gates closing. And I.
Tiffany
These are the moments that when you’re living them, you say, I’m done traveling. I’m not doing this anymore. I had that moment in 2021 when I told you the whole story. We got stuck at JFK because of COVID and Europeans weren’t supposed to be going to the States, and yada, yada, yada, we got stuck there for 24 hours. We had an hotel, thankfully, but we did get stuck there. And I said to myself, you know what? I think I’m done. I don’t think I want to travel anymore, like, internationally. I think I’ll stay in Europe and that’ll be good for me. Of course, you change your mind. Of course. But in that moment, you’re like, I’m done. This is not worth it.
Katy
Yeah, I know. It is so true. And you also have that thought where you think, you know, at no other point in my life do I run carrying 40. 40 pounds of stuff. I don’t know. I didn’t weigh my. Well, my suitcase, which was on a roller, thank God, because I usually carry a backpack. And this year, Derek suggested that I take my dad’s. I borrowed my dad’s suitcase, and if I had to, normally I carry two backpacks. So you’re actually carrying it physically on your body. But even with that, because I’m still having to pick up the roller bag every time I go down the stairs, you know, and so. Or up the stairs. I did a lot of running upstairs as well. There is no other circumstance like the fact that I could actually do that was surprising.
Tiffany
Well, I think on this show, I have. I’ve made this comparison in the past, but I think it’s worth making it again. Sometimes I feel like airline travel in all of its parts from beginning, you know, from door to door, Basically, it’s a lot like childbirth because you’re at the mercy when you’re. And you give birth in a hospital, which is typical. What. You are at the mercy of that place. And you do have a certain amount of trust, right? You’re like, okay, I’m trusting that I’m not going to die here. Because, you know, women used to die a lot during childbirth, and now we go to the hospital. And we don’t usually die, but you never know. And I’m trusting you with this really, really important thing, like, arguably the most important thing I’ll ever do in my life. And don’t mess it up. And also, you’re going to tell me to do a whole bunch of crap that I don’t want to do. You know, you’re gonna be like, okay, spread your legs and okay, put yourself in this position. And then. And you’re gonna have no dignity. You have zero dignity when you’re giving birth. And, you know, it’s in terms of, like, people walking past your door while you’re, like, literally in active labor. Like the husband of some random woman walking and peeking in. And you’re like, oh, my God, I look so awful right now. Plus, I’m in this position and I feel like it’s the same way on an airplane. You’re, like, trying to sleep, like, so close to another human who’s a stranger. And you’re like, if you’re like me, I just bought this recent brand new neck pillow that’s supposed to be like, so great. And it really did not live up to the hype. But, you know, I’ve got this horrible, like, it basically looks like a neck brace on. And, you know, I’ve got my mask on, my eye mask, My hair is all messed up. Like, I just look awful. And I’m just sleeping or trying to next to some random person, or I’m in the bathroom, like, doing gymnastics to try to, like, not fall over while I’m peeing or I’m, you know, I mean, just the things that you have to go through and like the. The waiting and taking off your shoes and you’ve got like a hole in your sock or something. I mean, it’s humiliating. The whole. The whole thing from the beginning to the end is humiliating. And you also have to just do what people to tell you. Like, the people at the security, they’re just like, do this, do that. And if you don’t do it, you risk missing your flight. Just like, if you’re at the hospital, they’re like, do this, ma’am, and you don’t do it. You know, you’re like, okay, am I risking? Especially if you’re a first timer. Is my child going to die if I don’t do. Do I really have to? I don’t want to, but I suppose I need to. There’s just so many parallels.
Katy
That’s a very funny analogy.
Tiffany
Plus, it’s painful in both cases. And you do things physically that you did not know you could do, like running with £40 that you’re carrying.
Katy
Same with upstairs.
Tiffany
Upstairs. When you’re giving birth, you’re like. Claudio was like, I’m shocked. He’s like someone who’s worked out his entire life, and he’s like, it was basically like watching somebody do a double marathon while they’re being punched. Like someone, like, basically in a boxing match being punched over and over again while they’re running a marathon. And I’m like, yeah, that’s pretty much it. But the reward is great in both cases. You know, you get a child, you get an amazing trip. So that’s why we put ourselves through it.
Katy
That’s a great analogy. For some reason, I like that, running a marathon while being punched. I remember asking a male work colleague of mine after his first child was born, we were taking a walk. He had just come back to work after spending some weeks at home, and we were taking a walk, and I said, well, how was it? And he’s like, oh, the kid’s great. And I said, no, how was the birth? Because he wasn’t sure how it was going to go down. You know, they’d done the typical training to try to get prepared for it. And he just said, and I’ll never forget it. He said, the only way it would have been more animalistic is if it happened under a bush. Which I thought was so funny. Yeah, that’s the difference, maybe, is that it’s like your physical body sort of takes over, you know, and in an airplane or airport, you just have to, like, mentally go into Zen mode somehow. There was this guy that was in front of me once. You go through all the flights and you end up in Rome. Fumicino Airport, also one of my least favorite airports in the world. They put you, if you’re a US Citizen, an Australian, a British passport. I forget what the other one, New Zealand. All of those people get funneled into the same area, and it’s just, you know, it’s chaos. Like, whatever system it is, it’s just not a good system, you know, because the theory Derek always says is if they have to keep screaming at you about what to properly do, it’s not organized. Right. You know, because people are not intuitively figuring out, like, what they should do in this situation. But there was this guy in front of me who was like, you know, one of those guys where he’s keep trying to look over everybody, and he’s like, you know, you can tell he’s just like, super agitated and frustrated. And I just wanted to say to him, look, there’s nothing you can do. This is going to be a chaos until we get to the other side of that guy who’s in that booth over there. So just chill. You know, it’s going to go as fast or as slow as it’s going to go. You’re stuck in this line, so what’s the point of trying to, like, see over it? To see, like, how the line is not moving in front of you for some reason, you know? But of course I was like, well, maybe that would be the thing that throws him over the edge. He obviously is not having a fun day right now. But going back to what you were saying about those strangers who are sitting beside you in these flights, and you’re in all these weird positions, and of course, you’re quite cordial, generally speaking, hopefully, with the people that are sitting around you, because these are your allies. If something terrible happens, they’re your allies, but they’re also the people who you’re going to be sitting with for like, 9, 10, 12, depending on how far you’re going, hours, you’re going to be sitting next to these particular people. And I just think it’s so interesting how there’s a certain familiarity that comes from. Even if you don’t talk to each other, it’s like, you certainly recognize the guy. Like, if you pass him in the airport later, if you’re all off that plane and you’re heading toward your other plane, you’ll be like, oh, there’s that guy that was sitting. And then the minute you’re out of that airport, it’s like amnesia. That guy could pass me. A week from now when I go back on the plane or three weeks from now, maybe I would recognize them. I don’t know. But it’s. It’s like these people that are so familiar, and then they become like, no one. Like strangers just disappear back into the ether. You know what I mean?
Tiffany
Absolutely.
Katy
It’s like you’re friends for a second, but it’s like you don’t actually have to say goodbye to those people. I was just telling you, like, I got divided me and the girl sitting next to me got divided onto the bus, you know, And I had that brief moment when I was at the bottom of the stairs and she was being held at the top of the stairs. And I thought, should I wave? You know? And then I was like, but why would I wave? But we had. I mean, we had talked some on the plane, so it wouldn’t have been like out of the question for me to wave. This woman’s not going to miss me, you know?
Tiffany
Yeah, I mean, that’s, that’s a cultural thing, I think. I think that’s your Seattle personality coming through. I don’t think an Italian would ever even consider it unless you’d had like, like a real long conversation or something like that. But I gotta say, I don’t really have. I don’t really make connections with people on airplanes anymore. Part of it is because now that I’m, you know, with Claudio now, Ralio, we usually sit together. I mean, we always sit together. And oftentimes there’s only space for the three of us or that fourth seat, if we’re in the middle and there’s four seats, there’s nobody in that seat. That’s I, you know, that’s what we always hope for anyway. And so I don’t find myself sitting right, you know, cheek by jowl next to somebody else. But even when I travel alone, I feel like because of the AirPod and just, you know, phones and devices in general, we close ourself ourselves off in these worlds and we put up these very. I know I do it like I put up a very, like, I don’t want to talk vibe. Like, because I don’t usually, if I’m on an airplane, I want to read my book, I want to listen to whatever I’m listening to, maybe try to sleep if I’m lucky. I’m not really interested in chatting. But I used to, I used. And I feel like it’s a. It’s a modern versus a oldie timey thing. Because I know when I was younger, especially when I traveled alone, when I was going back and forth from college or the times that I used to go to the, to Europe alone, I used to always talk to the people on the airplanes. And I have a very, very strong memory of talking to a lady. When I was flying to Rome, and I was flying to Rome to do some kind of student event, like a, like a music festival or a month abroad sort of a thing. It wasn’t after I lived here, I definitely didn’t live here. And that was not even in the near future. So it was probably when I was in college, but I already had the dream of living in Italy. And I was flying to Italy and she said, oh, she was American and she was probably in her 40s, now that I think of it. But she said, yeah, I live in Rome. And I just thought, no, like, do. Maybe that was, you Know, thinking back, maybe that was the first time I ever, like, considered I could move there. She’s like, yeah, I live in Rome. And I was like, do you speak Italian? And she’s like, yeah, of course. And I was like, say something in Italian. And she rattled off some phrase. And part of me was like, she’s just making this up. She’s just talking gibberish, but I can’t tell. But I’m sure that it was Italian, and I’m sure. And I think she said, yeah. I think I said, oh, yeah, I’d love to live in Italy. I’d love to live in Rome. And she said, you gotta live in Trastevere. That’s where all the young foreigners live. And I remembered it and it stuck in my head. And that’s, of course, where I lived when I first moved to Rome. And you were. You as well.
Katy
And that’s where we’re actually sitting right now. Interest every. Because that is where the hotel. We’re sending everybody. I know you need to go. You got to pick up Aurelio from school. This is something we don’t run into when we’re taping from abroad, where we actually do everything after Aurelio goes to bed. But I think there’s more here because I. One final thought. I had the same thing like you are talking about with this woman saying that she lives in Rome. I had the more provincial version of that. I was in Hawaii, and I met this woman on the beach who was in her mid to late 50s, and she was alone. And I don’t know how we ended up talking, but she said, oh, yeah, you know, I just decided that I wanted to do something different with my life. And she’s like, I just decided, like, what am I waiting for? I can do whatever I want. And so I decided I was going to move to Hawaii. This was before I ever came to Rome. And I’m like, you just moved to Hawaii? I’m like, you know, at the time, I was like, really? You just. And that’s not even that hard a leap. That’s. It’s in the same country. But it just felt to me at the time, like, so radical. And I said, had you visited here a lot? And she’s like, no, no, just like, one or two times. And I’m like, one or two times you moved? Because, I mean, Hawaii, you’ve been there, right? I mean, it is part of the United States, but it feels like it’s somewhere else. And there is. We could get into a whole argument about whether or not people from the United States mainland should be moving to Hawaii because of the native Hawaiians, but that’s beside the point. But at the time, I was just like, wow, what an interesting concept. And I think it was only about a year later when we got the opportunity to move to Rome. But I think that was, like, where the door cracked. I was like, you could just up and go wherever. Like, you know, and then, you know, a year later, here we are, like, up and going wherever, moving to Rome, of all things, which kicks off this show and everything else. So how strange.
Tiffany
Yeah. And I definitely think that sometimes these chance encounters, I mean, I don’t want to get all, you know, misty of mystic about it, but I do think that sometimes these chance encounters that seemed, like, so unimportant at the time, you look back and you’re like, that person. They gave me a nugget of. They gave me an idea. They showed me that something is possible. Even if that person wasn’t important to you in your life, there’s still, you know, we see these little examples of people throughout our lives, and sometimes they come to us. I’m like, well, that person did it, so it is possible.
Katy
Yeah, that’s so true. I do want to say that we travel so much more practically. Like, I wore a pair of jeans to the airport, but the minute I’m on the long flight, like, I put on the pajama bottoms in the bathroom. You know, like, I go for comfort, not for looks. But there were definitely a few moments where I’m like, this is a hatbox example.
Tiffany
Because go back and listen to Episode Hatbox.
Katy
We should really just re air Episode Hatbox sometime. Because I still think today it’s like, one of our funniest episodes. But it’s basically how Tiffany, as a young traveler, decided it would be romantic and cool to travel with a bunch of hatboxes, which, if you think about that as an adult, is, like, so impractical and makes absolutely no sense. But I was sitting near a couple young women who were dressed to, like, the nines on the flight with the very short skirts and the, like, tall boots and the matching accessories and everything just so perfectly put together. And I’m like, this is a hat box example. Because they can’t possibly be comfortable in this flight dressed like, the way that they are. One of them was wearing a trench coat. You’re like, I mean, I know you gotta bring your jacket, but, you know, I don’t know. The whole thing was just like, this is just some romantic notion of what you think it means to travel. And I kind of love that young people have that kind of stuff, too.
Tiffany
Yeah, I definitely, when I was younger, used to dress up to travel. I’m talking the 1990s, though.
Katy
I mean, not the 1950s.
Tiffany
Yeah, yeah.
Katy
But even still.
Tiffany
Even in the 1990s, travel was so much easier. You had to go through security, but it was minimal. You know, you could have gallons of water. You could have as many bags as you want. You could travel with as many suitcases as you wanted. I feel especially if you’re traveling internationally. And there was none of that. There was a lot less of that humiliating stuff. And so I used to always. When I travel back and forth from. From college, I used to always put on, like. Like a pantsuit guy dressed nicely when I traveled. And now I feel like everybody’s in, like. Yeah, like, their pajamas. Like, it’s one thing to put them on in the plane. Okay, I can get around that. But, like, to be walking through an airport terminal in your pajamas, and so many people I see do it in the States. I’m just like, do you sleep in those clothes? Do you want that? All the airport germs in your bed?
Katy
Well, I mean, to be fair, pajama, at least in Seattle, pajama bottoms are a hip thing with the young people right now still.
Tiffany
Oh, God.
Katy
I mean, but Seattle, it’s not like we’re fashion forward. All right, well, we need to leave it there. Aurelio does need to be picked up from school. Do you have any lasting thoughts about, like, how you’re feeling about the fact that everybody’s showing up in a couple days?
Tiffany
Just excited, that’s all.
Katy
Me too. All right, well, we’ll leave it there. I’m sure we’ll do more episodes here in Rome. So until next time, this is The Bittersweet Life. I’m Katy Sewall.
Tiffany
I’m Tiffany Parks.
Katy
Join us again. Bye.
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