On our first full day in Rome, we spent an enjoyable afternoon sightseeing and exploring stores near the Vatican. When my daughter Tammie and I were tired, we decided to stop at a restaurant for a meal and return to our Airbnb apartment until it was time for us to board the nighttime bus tour. Glancing around, Tammie shared, “Let’s find a tobacchi shop, or a public transport machine to buy tickets for our bus and Metro rides for tonight and tomorrow morning.”

Looking down the street, I questioned, “How are we going to find a tobacchi shop? There are so many store fronts, it’s like looking for a needle in a haystack.”

Tammie assured me, “Tobacchi shops are all over. You can spot them easily because they always have a large blue or black sign with a huge letter ‘T’ hanging over their door.”

We spotted one of the iconic tobacchi signs at the same time, just half a block away. Before stepping into the store, my daughter mused, “Let me think, we need tickets to get to the bus terminal tonight and tickets to return to our apartment. Then, we’ll need tickets to and from our pantheon visit tomorrow.” I nodded in approval. Tammie was good at planning ahead and she knew how to use the public transport system. Compared to her, I felt like a country mouse visiting the big city for the first time.

I followed my daughter into the tobacchi shop and looked around. Like many shops along the streets of Rome, it was small, but offered a vast array of services. Besides selling transport tickets, this store served as a mini post office, a place to pay utility bills, buy phone cards, stationary, candy, trinkets, and lottery tickets. It appeared to be a cross between America’s 7-11 store and a gasless gas station.

The tickets we bought confused me. I wasn’t sure how to use them on the buses. There never were collected. Some riders got on and held what looked like credit cards to a box in the front of the vehicle. Other people had paper tickets like Tammie bought for us. An English-speaking tourist noticed our bewilderment and explained how to validate the paper tickets by inserting them into a box usually located at the back of the bus. It took a few times before we understood which way to slide the ticket inside and hear the ker-chunk noise as it was stamped. Looking relieved, Tammie explained, “If a person is caught riding public transport without tickets, they’re fined 150 Euros.”

Riding buses and the subway, which in Rome is called the Metro, was a very foreign experience for me. The rush to quickly get on and off, without getting caught in closing doors, unnerved me. The lack of room to sit due to crowded conditions on these vehicles, leaving a rider hanging tightly onto poles to keep from being thrown about when the bus turned, started, and stopped intimidated me. Feeling like an ordinary person in a crowd, I always felt shocked when a man or young person gave up their seats for me. Although grateful for their solicitude, I wondered when I had crossed the line between looking young and able to take care of myself and looking old and in need of help.

Outside the bus, the streets teemed with bikes, Vespas, smart cars and motorized scooters. These were travel options to avoid buying tickets and knowing schedules. Tammie and I laughed when we spotted a handsome young man dressed in a stylish suit and tie whiz by on a scooter. His briefcase was secured to the scooter frame and his tie fluttered in the wind.  

My daughter and I never saw a ticket collector on the buses until one of our last days spent in Rome. Men came aboard to check for tickets on each of the four different buses we rode that day. All the buses belonged to the same line. Perhaps the owner found that occasional spot checks insured ticket compliance. I felt panic when he said to me, “Ticket, please.” One of our tickets was found to not be properly stamped. Luckily, the ticket inspector forgave the mistake and validated it for us before moving on to the next person.  

On our last bus ride that afternoon, the ticket inspector confronted a young man a few rows ahead of us. He had no ticket and claimed not to understand what was wanted because he didn’t speak English or Italian. When the inspector demanded his passport, the young man shook his head and indicated, “No understand!”

I leaned over to whisper to Tammie, “Whatever language a person speaks, after going though customs while entering a foreign country, you quickly learn to recognize the word, ‘passport;” She nodded in agreement.

Tammie and I got off at the next stop. We heard the ticket inspector loudly ordering the young man get off the bus with him. As we walked away from the bus stop, the young man got off the bus and quickly disappeared into a crowd of other young people his age and ethnicity who also got off the bus. Nudging my daughter, I said, “Wow. That whole confrontation was tense, but he got away with it.”

My daughter nodded again and pointed out, “The group he was with were laughing as they hurried away.”