Why No One Goes to Naples

From the New York Times: http://ift.tt/1rimM0O

turistiSpring is here. In southern Italy, the sun is shining, the sky is blue and the weather is balmy. Orange blossom fragrances mingle with wafts of jasmine. The food is good, the wine is inexpensive, the locals are friendly and beauty is all around. But where are the tourists?

The Amalfi Coast, south of Naples, is still a magnet for wealthy Russians and romantic Americans. Yet Naples itself is a tourist wasteland, and the rest of southern Italy is largely vacationer-free.

Only 13 percent of tourists who come to Italy go to the Mezzogiorno, as the south is known. The rest head for the center and north of Italy, or other Mediterranean countries altogether. German airports sent 223 flights to Spain’s Balearic Islands in one week last summer, and only 17 to southern Italy. Continue reading “Why No One Goes to Naples”

The new corruption index by Transparency International

Countries that rank better (some of them MUCH better) than Italy in the recently published Corruption Perceptions Index 2010:

Rwanda, Ghana, Macedonia, Tunisia, Slovakia, Turkey, Namibia, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Costa Rica, Bhutan, Taiwan, Botswana, Qatar and many others.

Italy went from 51st place in 2008, to 63rd place in 2009, to 67th place in 2010.

Summer holidays 2010

Here’s our planning for our Summer holidays starting on 25 July. If you have any suggestions on places to see or things to do along the itinerary, please let us know.

We will be camping around France (camping à la ferme mainly), and having a relaxed week in a small hotel in Castelluccio di Norcia, a VERY remote place in the Monti Sibillini national park.

After that, we will travel North and spend a few days on Bolsena lake, swimming and kayaking are on the menu. We need to drop Piero off at our friends’ place in Castelfiorentino (he’s leaving to Tanzania for a 2-week volunteering camp, I am sure he’ll enjoy that) and drive up back to Belgium. Tommi is very anxious to get back in time for his first football training session of the season on 17 August, so that’s our deadline…

Ever seen a young Italian President?

Obama is elected to the White House. Obama was born in 1961 – for a fortuitous coincidence, like me. Almost half of political leaders in Italy is 71. Is this just a correlation or a cause of the disastrous situation of Italian politics?