The smell of burning rubber clogged my nose as the bus weaved along the sun-scorched road. The scenery outside knocked upon the glass pane that supported my sleep-filled head to pull me out of unconsciousness. My eyelids retreated from dream as my eyes became immediately captivated by the rolling hills. Mountain after mountain floated into the horizon as if I were in a sea of green and the massive verdant waves were bobbing me towards my final destination.

I have experienced the beauty of Italy before, but upon every return I find myself in the same state of awe. Awe so great that it makes me feel as if my home is a facade, a firmly worn mask that is disguising the magnificence of the world. The skyscrapers, apartment buildings, and malls of home have polluted my mind; as the thought that places like Cagli still exist in this widespread world never occurs.

Narrow cobblestone streets, speeding motor-scooters and cars, decaying buildings, cafes, stray cats. These are the first characteristics the eye discovers upon entry into the town. It's as if someone recorded the way life should be lived and allowed the group and I to view it. The cramped housing, the odors of Italian cuisine, the loitering in front of houses and stores, the echoing fragments of Italian words off the coarse street walls, create a place that I have only witnessed in the flashbacks of movies. Even as I interact in their tranquil world I still feel as if I am a member of a movie audience, gazing up into the past, into a world that seems too simple and so unlike the one in which you play a role.

Cagli is the epitome of beauty. A tightly tucked corner of the world that is almost impossible to disturb. As my eyes ride along the undulating grassy landscape that surrounds my terrace-slash-drying rack my mind marvels in the possible tales that land has witnessed throughout time. I wonder if the great emperors such as Julius Caesar, Marcus Aurelius, or Octavian, who spent so much of their lives fighting for lands like Cagli, knew what they possessed. In their never-ending pursuit of power and the maintaining of the status quo, did they ever come to a place like Cagli and enjoy the fruits of their labor? The answer is probably buried under columns of words printed in a history book or located in the random fact collection of a Roman historian's mind. Regardless, one thing is for certain, a place like this is worth fighting for.