Last spring when Covid vaccinations started, I was very envious of my friends in the US who were able to get vaccinated months before those of us in the same age group – over 65 – over here. But then, lo and behold, in a country not known for efficiency, a miracle occurred. Italy’s vaccination […]
I guess I missed this during last spring’s mayoral election campaign here in Rome, but it seems the mayoress (she stupidly has insisted on being called “sindaca” which is not an Italian word – the word is sindaco and can just as easily refer to a woman as a man) is going ahead with her […]
Italy’s new young mayor, Virginia Raggi, a member of the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement party (M5S), earlier this month managed to convince a majority of Roman voters that a new broom will really sweep clean. But, boy oh boy, is she going to have her work cut out for her. Raggi, soon to be 38, a […]
Marco Pannella, the founder of the Italian Radical Party and a long-time warrior for civil rights in Italy and elsewhere, died yesterday at the age of 86. Many young Italians of today probably don’t even know who he was. Or, if they do know his name, they may have come away with an image of […]
Tourism in general is going to have a rough time in coming months (possibly years?) as people become increasingly frightened by the spectre of terrorism and prefer (not me) to stay home rather than to travel. But in the meantime, Rome has been holding its own and, indeed, basking in the glory of knowing that […]
Well, Rome is now in a pretty pickle. Just four weeks from now, on December 8, the Jubilee or Holy Year (the year-long Vatican-sponsored celebration that many of us residents are dreading) is to begin and Rome, the Eternal City, is without a mayor. True, there is now a prefect – actually two prefects – […]
If this seems like a plug for Fendi then so be it. The Italian leather and clothing fashion house spent $2.2 million dollars to pay for the restoration of Rome’s magnificent baroque Trevi Fountain. Restoration work began in June, 2014 and was concluded three days ago on November 3, when water from the ancient Aqua […]
Alberto Sordi was one of Italy’s greatest actors and comedians, many of whose iconic roles have passed into posterity as testimony to the problems and conquests of postwar Italy and, even more particularly, as commentaries on the character of 20th century Romans. Sordi,, who never married and had no children, died in 2003 at the […]
With only three months to go before the onset of a special Roman Catholic Jubilee of Holy Year, the city of Rome appears (the appropriate word is “appears”) to be rushing to finalize plans to help deal with the traffic problems that inevitably will ensue from the expected arrival of an estimated 25 to 33 […]
Romans are not happy with their city’s services, according to a recent poll, 2000 interviews carried out among as many inhabitants of Rome between March and April of this year, and they are far more critical than they were a year ago. The respondents were asked to use a scale of from one to ten […]
