I TOOK HITLER TO THE VATICAN AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS BLURRY PHOTO OF HITLER AT THE VATICAN

I recently went on a small vacation to Rome, without my ex-girlfriend (because she's my ex-girlfriend) but with my cousin, who likes to take pictures of buildings. Walking around Rome we saw three things that were particularly interesting to us.

The first was this toy shop near the central station that sold miniatures. The shiny black curves of a sultry old Batmobile are what initially drew our eye to the window, but they were quickly forgotten once we discovered the store's main stock in trade: A bunch of tiny Nazi business.

I asked the old lady at the register who was buying all these wittle Nazis and she said "Italians." I know there are a few places in Italy where being openly into Fascism is still "no prob," but I kind of pegged Rome as a little past that point. Anyways, we were so shocked and appalled that we absolutely refused to buy anything except a tiny Hitler.

We dealt with our outrage by walking around the city all angry for the rest of the day. The furor-induced bunions on my feet were real killers. (OK, enough.)

That night I left Hitler at home to go drinking. This part may not seem that important, but it led to me waking up half-drunk the next morning.

Which led to me to the idea that it'd be really funny to take tiny Hitler to the Vatican.

Here we are on St. Peter's Square. This photo was taken by another tourist who thought we wanted her to take our picture, when really we wanted to take HER picture.

Because she and her daughter looked like they were dressed up as Ketchup and Mustard (remember, still a little drunk at this point).

By the time we got in line at the Basilica I'd completely forgotten about bringing Hitler with me.

So when the metal detector went off, I reached into my pocket like "No big whup" and pulled out a scale model of the most hated human being of the last millennium. Both me and the security guard looked at each other in surprise, simultaneously shrugged, then he let me go on. Great moment.

So anyways, here I am with Adolf Hitler in front of the Basilica of St Peter. As you can tell it turned out a lot less funny then I had imagined it would be. I guess genocide and oppression isn't as humorous as it gets painted.

Oh yeah, the other two things we saw were these cool picture books.

And this place where you can get a doctor to give you lazer vision. BBZZZZZEEEWWM!

JAN VAN TIENEN