The urchins of Rome

A city with such a rich history is never without its tourist attractions. Millions of people from all over the world flock towards Rome to behold the magnificent remnants of such an amazing history. With waves of tourism comes a lot of oafish and clumsy head scratching, map reading, bickering and bumping into people. I’ve heard it said that a lot of the local residents actually move out of Rome for the summer to avoid the cavalcade of zealous visitors to their city. Not everyone, though, for some the arrival of all these fresh faces means one thing and one thing only, opportunity. 

Once you are in proximity of a historic sight you literally can't move for opportunists; street vendors, flower mongers, beggars, pick pockets, lepers, the lot. It seems to go hand in hand with the eagerness of the tourists to appreciate Roman history.

The thing that amazed me about the street urchins of Rome is how pushy and persistent they actually are, they are not just there willing to sell their 'goods' to people who show interest not by any short-coming, their tactics are a lot more persuasive, for example; placing something into your hand as you marvel unsuspectingly at a grand portion of history then demanding the money for the item is just one of the sales techniques deployed on the streets of Rome. There is definitely a sense that tourists are fair game to be cajoled out of their Euros. In saying that there is a stark contrast, once you are away from the attractions everything seems to calm down (including the prices) in some instances just by going round the corner, in fact, I've never seen so much rapid fluctuation of inflation. It is incredible. 

It seemed then, in order to keep away from being pestered and potentially fleeced it was a good idea to go off the beaten track for any purchases I might have wished to make and on the most part this strategy was quite fruitful, but for the time that I decided to take the air one night with my significant other in an unfamiliar district not far from the Villa Borghese. We ventured from the metro station down a busy strip in hope of finding a quiet bar but only came across a continuum of bourgeois looking establishments catering to only the wealthy and well to-do, needless to say we felt it might be better to stray off from the main strip and see what was available away from all of the swankiness. I think we took two right turns and were all of a sudden on a completely different scene. From the off set things looked a bit (for want of a better phrase) 'moody,' it was a dimly lit street with a few shady guys dotted about; loitering, leaning up against their Piaggios, keeping a watchful eye on any passers by. There were a few bars on this dingy looking backstreet with various names but all followed by the additional moniker of "piano bar."

We had walked about 20 metres up the street when we were greeted by a sharply dressed but slippery looking middle aged man who invited us into one of these "piano bars" stating in broken English: "free night club come in, have a look." As there could be no harm in looking we ventured down the stairs into the underground grotto where the clichéd European night club music was in full swing. The place was almost empty apart the slippery guy who had followed us in, a bar tender and a few gregarious looking ladies who peered over at us with beckoning grins. It set in immediately that this wasn't what we were looking for but we decided to maybe have one drink at the bar as we where already inside. At this point an even more sharply dressed and more intimidating gentleman approached us with the offer of a table and I can only imagine what other various services would follow before an extortionate bill, we kindly declined and told him we would just have a quick drink if it's no trouble. “One drink is twenty five Euros," was his cold response. We obviously weren't welcome in the “piano bars” unless we were willing to splash the cash.

There was however one instance of exorbitance that I was willing to except and that was my visit to Antico Cafe Greco, the oldest coffee shop in town and one time haunt of Casanova, Lord Byron, Buffalo Bill and many other interesting chaps. It was the most luxurious coffee shop I've ever seen; the walls were decorated with classic art and the waiters were dressed in tuxedos, there was a maid in the toilet and the decor was lined with velvet and other fine materials, (all nice little touches). Purely for the novelty I was willing to pay the five Euros for a coffee which was no different to any other coffee that I had been paying around one Euro for anywhere else, (which was what I had expected really) but as novelties go this time I think I certainly got my money’s worth.

 

 

David, TCC