Though the apartment itself is big and beautiful, and I even encountered some really lovely locals, the area where this Airbnb is located is at least a 30 min bus ride from the center of the city and it makes for a really raw first experience in Rome (or Italy in my case). Because of a late flight arrival and trains from the airport ending at 11:20pm, I had to take a shuttle bus. The bus was more of a van of people being herded in by an Italian guy saying “$15, five minutes and we go” which, as it would appear, is not the most reassuring thing near midnight. Worse still, while the van driver did take me directly in front of the address, the outside of the apartment complex is dimly lit and is facing what appears to be an empty lot (in the light of day, it is in fact a community garden), bordered by parked cars, graffiti, and dumpsters. After finding the correct gate number, I tried searching for “Battista” on the outside panel of numbers. Not finding it, I decided to go in behind someone who had luckily opened the gate to at least be at less risk of getting mugged in the street, even if I wasn’t in the right place. I tried following Battista’s description of the gravel path to his place, but I still couldn’t be sure. I finally was able to log into Airbnb via my phone browser (i was having trouble accessing it on the app because my new SIM card was not already registered as a recovery method) and found Battista’s phone number on his Airbnb profile. Upon entering, he pointed out that the name following the address on the message he sent me with arrival instructions was in fact the name on the door buzzer. Rather than apologizing for being unclear he said, “you are the only person to have had a problem with this.” This May be the case, but given the stress of travel and not understanding the order of Italian addresses (street name, followed by number), there is still no reason he should not list this in the future as “name on door” for clarity. Despite this odyssey of an arrival, Battista was an agreable host and helped me with laundry and had a good reccomendation for a place to eat during my stay. That said, no matter how kind a host is, I would never return to this Airbnb or the area for the sheer distance it is from the center coupled with the atrocious state of the Roman transit system and the third-world infrastructure of the city.