Half a day in Orvieto and the absolute importance of looking beyond pictures while traveling

How does it feel to revisit a place you once explored as a different version of yourself?

Yesterday, the Google Photos app on my phone unearthed a treasure trove of memories from my honeymoon in Italy. Six years ago, in June 2017, amidst our Italian odyssey, Dee and I found ourselves in the quaint hillside enclave of Orvieto, a mere two hours from Rome.

A veil of time seemed to drape itself between then and now, simultaneously obscuring and intensifying those moments. Yet, within those photographs, much of that day remains unspoken.

As you gaze at those images and videos we made that day, you'll see the two of us looking pleasantly young, a nondescript train journey, a funicular ride up the mountain (with another tourist hogging the best view throughout the ride), a dive into the pre-Medieval Etruscan past of the town, a most gorgeous church with beautifully painted exteriors and interiors, and a few pictures from the town’s charming streets.

What you won’t see in the pictures is the fight we had because we missed our early morning train; the way I remained sullen for the next many hours, and how, after multiple attempts to cheer me up, Dee had given up and turned equally sour. The two long hours we spent at the Roma Termini station waiting for the next train, talking little, observing the crowd, and interacting with an Indian Italian who briefly shared the pros and cons of living away from his watan in Punjab. Also missing from the photographs is the acute awareness of time slipping away from our already limited grasp.

No photograph will be able to convey the Indianness of our Italian train, its ticket checker attempting to extract an unnecessary fine thwarted by my chance research about those types of scams. The short but beautiful bus ride from the funicular station to the heart of the town, and perhaps the freshest, soaked in olive oil pesto pizza we have ever had won't be captured either. The photographs won’t tell you how, like total nerds, we spent most of our time immersed inside the gorgeous Duomo and missed out on exploring the equally charming town outside.

Yesterday, when I looked at those imperfectly captured photographs from what feels like an era past, I wished there was a way to reach out to that slightly younger version of mine. I wanted to tell him to enjoy Orvieto and all it had to offer but to relish the journey more. To create more memories with the one he was traveling with because cities and towns will come and go; she will be the only constant through those.