"Rome, the eternal city." a Rome Travel Page by betako3

It's a city whose history spans more than two millennia, history so rich that it's impossible to embrace in full. The accumulation of sights is amazing. And among those thousands of years of history normal people lead their ordinary lives, drive their cars, go to work, have dates...
It's the city of pagan ruins, it's the capital of Christianity, it's the city of elegance and fashion, and it's the city of cats :) I still have a poscard from my first visit to Rome in 2000. It shows a bunch of cats dosing languidly on an old, wooden cart in a very romantically looking backyard.
One of my first experiences of Rome this time was the smell of cats' urine in Largo Argentina. This is a square in central Rome with ruins of three ancient temples, surrounded by streets with ordinary traffic. The ruins are fenced, the ground on which they are situated is below street level. With all those cars and noise around, the temples- which look so quiet and peaceful - seem slightly unreal, out of place. No wonder this site became home to a group of stray cats. There was a whole bunch of them when I was there. Judging by the smell they had been inhabiting this place for quite some time. They were of different colours, age and sizes, some were walking aimlessly, some were lying, others were chasing one another. There was one cat without a paw. It was painful to see it moving on only three legs but it seemed to manage well.
It is a strange feeling to realise that Largo Argentina is the very spot where in 44 A.D. Julius Caesar, one of the greatest people in history was murdered. Now it's the cats' territory. Surrounded by traffic and people in a hurry.
It's just one of many impressions a had in Rome.

This is the guidebook I was using in Rome this time and it turned to be a real treasure for beginners in Rome. I particularly enjoyed the way in which it is organised. Each chapter is a suggestion of a few-hour-walk around Rome and all information about sights you will find on the way is presented in the order they appear on the route. The great advantage is that the book contains not just facts but also a lot of interesting stories and trivia which makes it very readable, it's definitely something more than just a reference book. Unfortunately, it is in Polish and I'm not sure if there is an English copy.
Title: Rzym Watykan Historia lat swietych.
Author: Adam Broz