Another Colosseo

Monday, June 20th, 2005

A magnificent Roman monument, although you probably won’t find it in any guidebooks to Rome. It’s part of the abandoned gas works in the Ostiense neighbourhood near where I live. Other strange towers spiral up from the undergrowth and rusting gantries jut out over the sleepy green Tiber.
The whole area contains a number of relics […]

Little Odessa

Wednesday, March 9th, 2005

Rome is not as cosmopolitan a city as London or Paris, and almost the only obviously non-Italians in public view are windscreen cleaners, newspaper sellers and informal Prada sales reps, ever ready to scoop up their street wares in a sheet and leg it when the lookout signals police approaching. Yet Italy is the main […]