Bologna la grassa

Bologna is the place of birth of some famous Italians like Giorgio Morandi, P.P. Pasolini and Lucio Dalla to name just a few of them. It has the first university of Europe (1088). The italian nickname for the city is "Bologna la grassa" (the fat), which refers to their rich kitchen. It's got about 40 kms of arched sidewalks which protect the people from the rain and sun. It's a gem of a town with tons of monuments and museums to see and the university and it's students lends the town a lively atmosphere with a rich cultural life. Some students' contribution to this cultural life will be discussed later.

Arched sidewalks, using them for cycling seems to be widely accepted

In our hometown Amsterdam cycling on sidewalks can cause outcries of anger, the Bolognesi seem cool about that. They also not seem to mind the nervous, ugly paint pissing called grafitti too much, because in large parts of town walles and pillars are covered in this depressing, talentless expressions. It's just everywhere and it seems local government gave up on fighting it.

The wonderful towers of Bologna would make a great drop off point for grafitti vandals

We have no illusions that there will be a permanent sollution for this problem (though the city council of Singapore might have some helpful suggestions, but we in the West are to 'progressive' to implement these). In the excavations of Pompei one can see that Italians were at it more than 2000 years ago. There'll always be a percentage of the population that feels tempted, maybe even forced to share its 'thoughts' with the rest of us. To some it must be gratifying to scribble 'Strike!' on a wall and feel onseself part of a larger being, the big revolutionairy, anti-bourgeois capitalist, anti-daddy and mummy counterculture. It adds instant moral and political correctness.

Of the city's 40 kms of archways, many are blemished by paint spraying vandals

In Modena, a city some 50 kms up North, there is no university and thus not many students. Their city centre is almost 'tag-free', so it is safe to say there is a relation between a having a large student population and vandalism like grafitti. Recent research points out that the brain does not reach the stage of full develeopment untill the owner is well in his twenties. Before that, it's subject to radical black-white ideas. Add to this most students' fondness for all kinds of substance abuse and there you have your incentives for spraying shit on walls.

Consorts of the statue of Poseidon

It would be bad enough if grafitti was only found in ugly suburban areas, on viaducts and underpasses, but this riff raff seems to take pleasure to spray their undigested ideas on the surface of objects that were built hundreds of years ago by people who did possess a talent. This injustice makes any sane person sick with rage and dream of counter measures that would make even the mayor of Singapore blush.

But let us forget these idiots and have a peak at the things of beauty one can find in Bologna.

This is one examples of the many wonderful items one can see in the Museum for Medieval Art

Students at class, not all of them evenly captivated

More students and scholars

Many sights in Bologna are for free. The Town Hall contains many great architectural feats, fresco's and statues. One can see them at leisure, sometimes coming across families who escort their loved ones to the wedding ceremony.

Matrimonio all'italiana

Wedding party

Wasn't she the girl from "Four funerals and a wedding?"

Maybe in a future post we can elaborate on the notion that having visible tattoos, like grafitti, is like shouting loud in public transport. Right now we'll try to finish on a more or less positive note, dear friends of the blog.

Or positive, peculiar anyhow. On saturday afternoon we went into S. Pietro cathedral where there was a mass in progress. The church was quite full, there were many priests and choirboys on the altar involved the rites, there was a nuns choir singing, the air laden with the scent of incense. People came and went, one person even brought his poodle but no one seemed to care. There were even people going into confession booths. I can't remember having ever seen a catholic church in full swing like this.

Nuns returning after performing in S. Pietro cathedral

Belle suore

Yes, people, how about that? It's like Teheran in a way, right? One of them gave me a medaillon of pope Pius XII. If memory serves me well, this pope dindn't came through the war specklessly and my Italian is a bit rusty so we couldn't discuss this matter, nor could I ask if she had a medaillon of my favorite pope, Alexander VI Borgia.