I remember learning about Pompeii when I was younger in grade school. It was our first introduction to what an active volcano could destroy. Many teachers danced around the fact that it wiped out an entire city, but they were sure to tell us how hot lava was and that many people died. Now, to a child, the word "many" is relative. I remember thinking that "many" meant ten people. When in actuality is meant more like 2,000 people when referring to the destruction in Pompeii.
As I grew older, in the New England area, I realized the story of Pompeii was changing. It seemed that with each passing grade, the story's facts were more and more lost. How could I know the factual events of that day? How could anyone? I left high school with the blanket understanding that Pompeii was a terrible incident due to a volcano eruption, and the entire city was covered in lava and ash. Something about the story always bothered me. If this was a site of destruction and sadness, then why were so many people excited to stand and visit where thousands of people died?
When I entered college, I was an undeclared major and a studio art minor. That required me to take art history and take a broad range of classes to decide what I wanted my major to be. I ended up in art history and geology at the same time. Within a few weeks of classes, it wasn't long before I learned about the art restored from Pompeii and the inner workings of a massive volcanic eruption. I started to understand the pull of wanting to stand at the physical site.
My art history interest pulled me to want to visit Pompeii first. I wanted to see the pottery, sculptures, and architecture that were thousands of years old and survived the catastrophic event. The idea of art being timeless and everlasting had weighed on my mind. Even with the greats, their art lives on significantly longer than the actual person. I wanted to visit Pompeii and see the buildings and materials that were used in someone's daily life. In a way, art can make a person immortal, and that thought fascinated me tremendously.
On the other side of campus, I was sitting through my required geology classes, trying to stay awake. That was until we finally reached the volcanic unit. I have liked things going "boom" for as long as I remember. For my fifth-grade science fair, I made a volcano. I had it continuously erupt by baking soda and vinegar. I remember the smell of the combination like it was yesterday. I also remember the container within the fake volcano getting clogged and my mom having to race down to help my 10-year-old self not have a panic attack at the school. Even today, I work full time in visual effects for movies and television. A lot of which requires making things explode using 3D animation software and bringing the scene to life on the screen. You could say my interest in that geology class raised significantly for those next couple of weeks.
Learning about the mechanics of a volcanic eruption and the history behind some of the most famous eruptions like Mount Vesuvius's and Mount St. Helen's, for example, had made me interested in visiting those areas that were affected. When I was planning my trip to Italy in 2018, I knew that there was no way I was missing this opportunity to see Pompeii and Mount Vesuvius. My family was on that leg of the trip with me, and they too had a massive interest in seeing the history. It was maybe the one area within Italy that we agreed on going to unanimously.
Our visit to Pompeii was one of our last days in Italy. We had coordinated to be a part of a tourist group. It was a two-hour tour of Pompeii then we would participate in a hike Mount Vesuvius. That was a whole day adventure from starting early in the morning to returning late in the afternoon. We knew that it would be extremely exhausting but powerful to visit the ruins and climb the volcano that destroyed many lives.
That morning of our tour, we dressed in athletic wear and comfortable shoes. We packed bags of water and sunscreen and then headed out of the hotel. The tour van came to your hotel, so there was no need for us to drive, which was a nice touch overall.
We arrived about forty minutes later and exited the van. We looked up, and in the distance, we could see the ruins. My heart started to race with excitement but also a sense of nervousness. The gravity of the situation was infiltrating my mind. Thousands of people died at the location where I was standing. That was an incredibly humbling feeling. I looked around as families of tourists gathered together, smiling, laughing, and enjoying the sunshine. How fortunate were we all to be alive? Especially since so many had died here so long ago.
We headed into the area with the ruins shortly after our group gathered together. There were about 20 to 30 of us in the tour group. I peered at the young children who were naive to the events that had occurred here. Their innocence made me smile. I wish sometimes I could go back in time and be naive again to how the world can be cruel and unfair. I was snapped back into reality when my sister grabbed my arm and dragged me forward with the rest of the group. She was taking this as seriously as I was. Her face was stern while listening to the guide explain what a typical day in Pompeii before the eruption was probably like. I could tell we both were thinking the same thing. The world can flip upside down whenever it wants. One day could be an average day, then the next... everything as you know it could be gone.
The guide was trying to make the tour uplifting, but you could feel a sense of sadness that always hung suspended within the air. She spoke about how the street curbs were so high because the sewer system was the street itself. I have noticed the ruts carved into the road and later learned that they were due to all the carriage wheels that had continuously passed there. She explained how magnificent the water system to the bathhouses was and how everyone bathed together within the community. She led us in and out of ruins and streets, showing us significant buildings that remained and reinforced. Each stone I saw was original to the city and was preserved beneath the ash and lava until archeologists excavated the entire area.
We turned the corner, and there was one of those infamous glass boxes holding a mold of one of the people who fell victim to the eruption back in 79 AD. Growing up, I always thought these molds were hardened ash around the actual body of a person. I found out that that was so incorrect. When the ash and lava came through the city of Pompeii, people did not have time to escape the city. The people of Pompeii became consumed with poisonous fumes from the volcano, and many suffocated. The ash and lava would cover their bodies, but many were already dead. Over time their bodies decomposed and left hardened pockets within the ground in the shape of their bodies. The molds we see today in Pompeii and textbooks are plaster molds. The archeologists will find these pockets within the earth and fill them with plaster. They will let the plaster harden and solidify in the space and then excavate the mold. That is what we are seeing. The plaster molds that formed. There is nothing left of the body, unlike what you were taught or initially thought. Now thinking about it, if they showed the actual remains of people on-site, that would bring a whole new morbid level to the experience. That might deter people from visiting.
At the end of the tour, the guide brought us by the collecting ground for all the material things found within the archeological site. It is like their own outdoor museum. People can browse objects from a distance and see all the pottery, fallen columns of buildings, and other tools. I would have never imagined that they were able to find so many things still intact but broken. Even damaged pieces have a bit of beauty to them.
Once the tour wrapped, we all piled onto a coach bus that would take us to Mount Vesuvius. Mount Vesuvius was and still is the active volcano that destroyed Pompeii. Our next activity would be to hike to the top of the volcano. My father, sister, and I were all extremely excited about this part of the tour. My mother at the time was not so much. The bus ride was curvy and uphill. My stomach started to churn, and I could feel that I was getting bus sick. I just wanted to reach the parking lot as soon as possible, but it seemed to be never-ending. The woman in front of me felt the same way because she ran to the front of the bus, made the driver stop, and then upchucked on the side of the road. She had to stop the bus a total of three times before we got to our destination. We all felt for her tremendously, and probably some of us also wished we could have gotten sick to feel better.
We all thought this hike was going to be a stroll up to the top. We were wrong, which made my mom even more unenthusiastic. None of us had hiked a volcano before, so we were unaware that we were to hike up volcanic sand. We, and many other families, were unprepared for this. Yes, we all had sneakers on, but that does little when the mountain is steep, and people are slipping everywhere all around you. It was almost like a game to see who would fall less up to the top. As we made it further to the top, the view started to dissipate, and we were walking within the clouds. Eventually, we made it to the top ridge of the volcano. We peered over the edge to see the inside. The drop in the center of the volcano was daunting. I wouldn't want to stumble in. The center of the volcano wasn't like what is in cartoons of the movies. We couldn't see lava, and it wasn't bubbling at all. It was just a concave center of volcanic sand that descended downward. I don't know what I expected, but either way, I was thrilled to be standing on the ridge of an active volcano.
Getting back down to the bus was another challenge within itself. We thought we had to be careful not to slip going up, but it was three times harder not to slip and fall going back down. Families around us were falling one by one. Many of them right after another. My sister and I tried to learn from others' mistakes and not step where they had. My parents were behind us, taking their time to stay steady. We eventually all made it to the parking lot. At this point in the day, we were all drenched in sweat and just had one of the most difficult workouts of the entire vacation.
This experience is something I will never forget. I was fortunate enough to share the excursion with my family. That day went from a somberness to a day full of laughs trying not to fall on our butts. I had learned so much from these experiences of witnessing history firsthand. I learned more than anything with a textbook, and it was also a lot more fun. Unfortunately, Pompeii became famous only during its destruction, but the civilians' souls live on there. The remains that still stand tell their story and make their lives immortal to the world. The more that is uncovered will contribute and continue to shape the story as we know it.
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