When going to a museum, especially in a city like Rome, you have to come prepared. It's like the forebear of the internet. Without a plan or knowledge you are submerged in a different kind of perceiving the world, sucked in by curiosity and attentive for five minutes before you get tired and numb without noticing that you have been staring mindlessly at an inanimate object for half of your life. You feel feel like cultivating yourself but really you're just wasting time and not remember a thing. What you're doing doesn't really matter - look at paintings, text, architecture, people, lighting - but make sure to focus on something you'll be able to use yourself. That's what I have been telling myself, preparing for a career as my own private self help guru. In Rome there are dozens of palazzi full of high level art. This time we were approaching *palazzo Barberini* at sunset. As far as I'm concerned, the display already started on via Barberini, tourists lined up like on a more beautiful sunset boulevard in front of the cinema at golden hour. Walking down the sidewalk felt like swiping through a tiktok feed and from time to time one of the belles de l'epoque tucked at my attention like the next reel bumping from the bottom of the screen "Pull me up! Look at me!". I wonder why haven't phone manufacturers figured out how to read our smiles? It's so much easier to communicate intention with your lips than with two fingers. The place was packed, beauty undoubtedly present. But just like in a museum of antique sculptures, there is a theme. Beauty is always shaped to a general taste, it is commodified. One of the accompanying males, who are really only here so that the girls don't bump into each other and hurt themselves while taking the same pictures over and over again, made me think of a new kind of investment product. Why not create a fund tracking the net worth of the 100 most beautiful women on earth? There are objective criteria to select them, there are always new issues, the market is highly liquid and I'm sure if you really tried you could come up with a serious research paper for the investment thesis that certified beauty outperforms the broader market. Include different ethnicities, men and fictional characters for diversification and you probably have the most stable product in the investment banking world. As we approach the actual palazzo, the density of visitors drops to ppm levels. A gets in for free pretending to be my tour guide and I of course have to pay like a plebeian. The museum is showing Caravaggio's Judith but apart from that I have to admit to have lost the sensibility necessary of reading these works. "Stick to the plan!" I shout encouragingly, pointing my finger towards a concerned visitor, where I imagine the camera to be and decide to make a couple of pictures at random, focus my thoughts and grow as a human being. Giovanni Baglione - Michael, the fathers on the angel's back are shaped and lit like piercing flames, a blow torch to cleanse the world of evil. Some landscape paintings. In the woods under the village on the hill are people shouting to each other, communicating a gross a good distance, the guy with the cane - is he stalling or working? Did people do anything other than work back then? What was his motivation I wonder. Two oxes are furrowing a field while there is an assembly at the church - a wedding? A discount on absolution? We'll never know. A dog in the shape of a meatloaf, I call him Botticelli because of his eyes looking at me like a trained painter of impressive inner value. Greco. From god are emanating blue white lashes of burning power. You thought a candle burns bright but imagine blue giant stars. Bodies and the act of looking are one and the same, a way to make your mind feel moved in the whirling design of this one greek painter that everybody knows. The naked son of god is shining brightly too, illuminating feeling, thinking, arguing and anticipating men. You hear their chatter like the angels in "Der Himmel ueber Berlin", bouncing off reflective clothes that cannot hide the noise, only color it. I don't remember much else, maybe there is some masterpiece I have overlooked and I'll apologyse to them directly next time we see each other. Did you know Rome had an imperialist past? Several in fact. The last one built itself a district for a planned world expo that was supposed to shine a light on the glory of Italy, called EUR. The district is monumental and austere and as such really impressive. It's like you would imagine old roman cities, imposing and inhumane. Its also in really bad shape and falling apart at the seams, approximately 2000 years after construction. I think the beggars here act as some kind of glue without which the structures would crumble. My favorite is the *palazzo dei congressi*. Imagine a giant venue for industrial shows or opera. Columns pull the roof somewhat over the glass facade and provide at this hour the even rhythm of lightbeams marching to the beat of sunset. Columns of this size have always been composed of several shorter pieces, mostly for practical reasons, but here they have a smidge of yellow adhesive band in place to make sure two parts hold together and continue to do their job. I'll have to look it up but I think this is an old Etruskan building technique. My actual favorite place here is Cafe Palombini at the fringes of the district, where people walk dogs an through away washing machines in ditches. No less surreal, just different. But Palombini is a place the likes of which I've never seen. It's a cafe, cantine, restaurant, tobacco shop and liquor store. You ask a lady whose cash register is centrally located how this all works, you order there, pay and then get your amatriciana or carbonara from one of the surrounding counters. The lady will laugh by the third time you come, moving your arms as if swimming through the ocean of people, because the pasta is actually delicious. Business people, a couple of *mamma pelliccia*, or old italian ladies in fur coats, a girl who just ran away from the runway with a Fendi bag and coat and you dream of running with her to the end of the world or your credit line, whichever comes first. The guy behind the counter speaks all the languages: one word each but always joking and energetic. The coffee is excellent and people watching here is most rewarding because while all the roads lead to Rome, all paths of life seem to converge on the small circular box, where the lady with the cash register sits.