Rome: The Good, the Bad, the Old

What are tourists looking for? I ask myself that at least once a week when I go to lunch at work. TENNIS Magazine HQ is a block from 5th Ave., near the Empire State Building. While the working space of Peter Bodo may be a draw to an enlightened few, there are nevertheless almost no tourists prowling our block. Which isn’t surprising, since most people don’t travel to NYC to browse shoe-shine shops.

On the other hand, I don’t go to the top of the Empire State Building. Ever. When I turn the corner onto 5th Ave., I see a world of visitors—teenagers, moms, families, nice people—and wonder what they’re doing. Getting something at Staples? Eating at McDonalds? Quiznos? Taco Bell? Then I look up. Oh yeah, that.

To be honest, I have been to the top of the Empire St. Building twice, and it’s cool. The point is, it’s not something people who live in New York do, precisely because it is something tourists do. It's always odd to hear about the city that visitors call New York, compared to the one that its citizens call New York. The two do not overlap at all. Work and leisure can’t stand to look each other in the eye.

I was on the other side of that equation walking toward Rome’s old city today. I had gotten off the Fodor’s track (i.e., lost) and was forced to walk past many bus stops and tall modern buildings and financial institutions and office drones. It left me with an odd anxiety. Why was I looking at a gleaming, 20-story bank? The Rome I want doesn't have banks. (This is somehow different from walking in residential neighborhoods of foreign cities, which make me curious but not anxious.)

Unlike New York, there's a fairly distinct physical separation between Rome's tourist and working sections. From the north, the historic area begins at the Piazza del Popolo (pictured above). You walk into this vast square with its central obelisk and college-age political agitators and you know you’ve seen your last working-stiff Roman for the day. Despite this knowledge, it’s a tremendous sight. You can see down two narrow avenues lined with old buildings. I felt OK again, the way a tourist family in New York might feel if they wandered too far away from 5th Ave., saw a bunch of magazine writers getting their shoes shined, and then, thankfully, stumbled back to safety.

The streets off the Piazza del Popolo take you as far back through Western history as you can go. They end in ancient Rome, at the Forum, which is awe-inspiring and frustrating. There are just enough random pillars and arches and broken down halves-of-buildings to let you know that something major once went down here. (I know for a fact that Williamsport, Pa., doesn’t have a Temple of Saturn, like this place does. A Sons of Italy, a Knights of Columbus, sure, but no Temple of Saturn.) But there wasn't enough left of the Forum for me to put it together in my head (in an hour, at least). That’s what makes the Colosseum, which sits at the back of the ancient district, so startling. It’s there.

Also there, and startling, is the Arch of Titus, built in 81 A.D. and intact. It was erected to honor the destruction of the Jews (and their subsequent scattering, which turned out to be a surprisingly big deal). Proof once again that history is fierce.

That’s where the day’s opening half ended. The second started on the other side of town, and history, under the watchful, creepy eyes of Mussolini’s famous Foro Italico statues. They were looking at Novak Djokovic, the world’s latest member of the Top 5, struggle. He was overpowered in the first set by Robin Soderling. I found myself wondering, as I have many times, what makes Djokovic special. He doesn’t hit the ball particularly hard or even deep; he rarely comes to the net, at least on clay; he makes his share of cheap, unexplained errors, and his form gets funky when he gets too close to the ball.

Then he gradually reminded me of what he does do well: win. He doesn’t do much more than that. Djokovic’s lack of weaknesses or regular mental hiccups is a bigger deal than it sounds, if only because so many other players have them. In the second set, he got back into the match by using a basic baseline pattern. Short crosscourt forehand to bring Soderling up; down the line forehand to get him scrambling; strong backhand crosscourt behind him. It was a relentlessly simple and effective point construction, and it didn’t require him to hit a single ball near the lines.

In the third, Djokovic showed why he’s already in the Top 5. Down early and tired after winning in Estoril last week, he could have packed it in and no one would have thought twice about it. But he fought off break points at 2-2 in the third and came back form 0-40 to hold again at 3-3. Up 5-3 but down 0-15, he came up with a game-changing second serve by sliding it down the middle in the ad court and taking Soderling by surprise. The Swede shanked the return and didn’t threaten again.

I met Djokovic today for an interview. As you may have learned from Miguel's opus at Tennis World, Novak is a friendly, energetic guy. He was willing to stick around and keep talking to me, even though he’d just done a press conference and a long phone interview. He credited his recent success to the work he did in December of last year in Monte Carlo with his coach and trainer (yes, he has both). We watched the end of the Gasquet-Volandri match, and he mentioned how tough Gasquet’s spin is—“if you let him do it.”

Watching Gasquet, I was matching him up against Djokovic and thinking of their futures. The Frenchman has many ways to win—more than his opponent today, and perhaps more than Djokovic. Gasquet can create out of nothing. That’s enough for me to think he will win, and win a lot more, someday. But what’s more important for now is that Gasquet also has many more ways to lose. His strokes are looser and jumpier, and he steps back where Djokovic stands in. He has more options but doesn’t use them with as much purpose; it’s hard to imagine Gasquet sticking to the basic point construction that Djokovic used so effectively today.

So, what was left? Some good, some bad. The good was Rafael Nadal. His opponent, Daniele Bracciali, was throwing a lot at him to start, but Nadal had the answers. Seeing him up close for the first time in a while, I noticed how well Nadal defends with his two-handed backhand. That shot isn’t built for defense, but he can hit it with pace even when he’s pushed wide and sliding backward with his right foot.

Nadal-Bracciali was a mismatch for two reasons. The Italian’s short, sharp one-handed backhand didn’t have a prayer against Nadal’s topspin, especially up high; he has to lean into that thing. And his shot tolerance just isn’t in the same league. Late in the first set, Bracciali hit two nice crosscourt forehands, a strong forehand down the line, and a high backhand for a winner. That netted him exactly one point. You could almost hear Nadal say: “Do that 47 more times and you’ve got me.”

As for Nadal, I thought he was hitting his forehand exceptionally well, generating a lot of pace without as much effort as he put into it two years ago. When he lost a point, he came back aggressively on the next one. As the second set began, Nadal walked back to receive serve early. He looked into the crowd behind him. Other players, like Andy Roddick, will look straight at people. Nadal stays remote, in his own world. Instead of relaxing and glancing around now that he had one set in the bag, he did two quick head pumps at no one (except himself) and got back to business.

Now the bad. Marat Safin. It’s official after all these years: He’s a drag. I first saw him nine years ago at Roland Garros, where he brought a whole new level of power and excitement to the sport. Today I tried to find some remnant of that kid during his loss to Nikolay Davydenko, either in his attitude or his game. It wasn’t there. He was the very image of someone “going through the motions.” The stands were packed; but the crowd sounded suitably disgusted. To make it worse, all afternoon there was a helicopter circling right above the court and grating on everyone's nerves. It gave the evening a war-zone atmosphere. Safin suddenly looked a little like the champion surfer who Robert Duvall forces into the water during an enemy bombing run in Apocalypse Now.