We are endlessly told that white people are racist and that white men are sexist. But in my experience people of a different color are much more racist and men of a different color much more sexist. It is just that we do not hear about this racism because no one is allowed to speak about it for ...
Thank God for the Italian spring. It reminds me that there is more to life than the Italians and the euro. Yesterday I drove out of the provincial city of Forlì in the "red" mid-north in my long-axle Land Rover Defender versione anticomunista into the Apennine Mountains" foothills ...
Each year on April 25, Italians commemorate Italy's 1945 liberation with yet another public holiday. Any sane person would think this ought to involve honoring those who did the liberating: the British, the Canadians, the Australians, the New Zealanders, the Indians, the Poles, and, of course, the ...
My brother has just been to stay with me in Italy. He may be a top London lawyer, but he is a mixed-up liberal lefty. He has lots of rich Muslim clients"a mere coincidence, no doubt. "Muslims make no distinction between church and state. The church is the state," I told him. ...
The Italians are obsessed with bidets. They dismiss as dirty the people of any country that does not provide bidets in every bathroom, whether public or private. As a Briton who lives in their midst, I believe it is not simply because sodomy is so popular with straight Italian couples. Italians use ...
Mitt Romney branded Barack Obama's economic policies "European" in his speech last Tuesday after Rick Santorum's withdrawal from the Republican primaries. As a British citizen living in Italy, it was music to my ears to discover that "European" has at last become an all-purpose term ...
The word "Italians" conjures up a number of epithets. Take, for example, "Corrupt Bastards." The Italians are mired in corruption. This is either despite or because of the fact that they are Catholics and their equivalent of royalty is the Pope. But if you ask an Italian why ...
I never cease to be amazed at how foreign newspapers, especially American or British ones, fail to report the truth about Italian politics. Since I moved here in 1998, I cannot recall a single article that was not a grotesque distortion of the political reality. If they get Italy so wrong, what ...
They tell me that I"m "living the dream" because I live in Italy. Well, yes, Italy is quite a country and as I sink my remaining teeth into yet another bruschetta al tartufo at only 10 euros a pop, I do think, "Sod the teeth, this is the life." But there is a catch. Italy, ...
