Playing Tag
June 5, 2009
The Italian government fights a losing battle against taggers. By Mac McKerral
But it seems from my first-visit vantage point, that the country now fights a losing battle to what I have started calling “CT ‘n T,” meaning cats, trash and tagging.
Litter appears everywhere, even in the heavily visited tourist areas. Even historical dig sites in progress come covered with an array of wrappers, bags and hundreds of bottles. People seem to ignore trash bins, but honestly, they appear infrequently.
Yesterday, I spent two hours at a fountain near the Hotel Cisterna in the Trastevere area where stay. Small, ornate trash containers circle the fountain. Hundreds of people visit the area to sit on the fountain steps to people-watch. Many leave behind, gelato-covered napkins, papers, bottles and wrappers when the containers sit a few feet away.
Meanwhile, the government seems to have flown the white flag in the battle against taggers.
So much of the street art — apparently the way youth here “dis” the police — that to an outsider it seems (wrong language, I know) passé.
No buildings, even churches, walls, doors or public areas get spared.
I know America comes with its fair share of visual eyesores, but with such a tourist driven economy, it would seem Italians would fight a more effective battle.
Finally, stray cats seem to jump up everywhere, most of them black.
At the ruins of the Curia of Pompeii, where Julius Caesar reportedly met his maker, I counted 24 strays — only four non-black — in a matter of minutes.
For me, looking up beats looking down in Rome.
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