italiafile

I was intending to email posts to this blog from Sicily, but i was let down by technology, or more clearly, technology hasn'tyet arrived in Sicily. There is a dearth of internet bars, and those which do exist all have bizarre opening hours. Anyway Im now back in Naples and full of gobbets of news.

Firstly, the newspaper article that made me choke on a croissant yesterday morning. While any visitor to Naples is likely to see a child of tender years riding a large scooter down the decumani, yesterday's paper informed the reader that police had stopped a child of 7 while driving his dad's car round Giuliano, a suburb of Naples. What seems to be more extraordinary is that his Dad had tossed him the keys and told him to go adn to do the shopping.

The other big news is that Italy is falling into recession. Sicilian papers say that 400 firms will go bust in the next couple of months. It's getting serious now, though BErlusconi wonìt admit it. Two weeks ago at the first hint of trouble, he annouced that any slump was because of Easter. Apparently having a days holiday was reponsible for the collapse in output. A week after it was the fault of the euro. Mr B revealed that prices have gone up alot since the introduction of the euro, which just goes to show how little he listens to the electorate who have been screaming the same fact since 2 Jan 2001. Now it's the fault of terrorism, world trouble, oil, in fact anything other than Mr B himself. No doubt next week it will be the fault of the communists. He makes TOny Blair look like a moral guardian.