Rome's Homeless problem

Rome's homeless problem comments

This unexpectedly brought tears to my eyes. Its not a good look to be a man who cries in public, so I was lucky then, that I was wearing my oakly surfing sunglasses. The big black shades did well to hide my red watering eyes as I walked away in a hurry. I went through the streets of Rome with tears rolling down from under the plastic frames. This ancient wondrous building - a symbol of human goodness a church in Rome, The normal people arriving on foot or parking their Volkswagen Polo's and their Fiats and their Ford Focuses all new cars, the normal people their sense of community their sense of stability and social inclusiveness. Contrast this to the Gypsies girl at their feet at the cathedral door holding a baby that must have been less than 2 months old. Maybe 2 weeks old. The baby was oblivious to its dire straits its impending deterioration in a harsh exclusive society. I new she was begging I knew she was using the baby to attract sympathy But I was outraged at the calm normal people who showed apathy and indifference to the girl and her newborn. All she has is a piece of cardboard and they have their 40000$ euro-cars and their designer handbags. They have acceptance by the community of their presence in the community and our gypsy girl and her rug rat down there they don't belong. They are excluded. They are Gypsies in Rome.

The first thing that shocked me when I arrived in Rome was the extent to which the Italians - men included, dress up even in everyday life. They don't just wear a shirt, they flick up the collar, they are very all out in their mostly successful attempts at being stylish as all gucci However the second obvious thing I was struck with, was the extent of Rome's homeless population. It is huge. There are homeless people everywhere. Around every corner I find another homeless person or groups of vagrants. You simply don't see this kind of thing in London or Sydney. You will get your "pick pocketed" so to speak, if you don't watch it in Rome. I've never seen so many "pock pickets". I stood on the terrace of the garden above the Coliseum tube station entrance which faces the coliseum and I sniped with my camera and took many pictures of marauding gangs of children - homeless and gypsy children pick the pockets clean of all these loud mouth tourists coming out of the underground. "Oh wow Betty come ere a minute darling look its the Acropolis thing!" Says Barry., "Its called the Coliseum dear" Says Betty mean time I'm photographing the begging Gypsy lady at their side. She passively confronts them with her monotonous slogan "Speak english hello speak english do you have a coin?" She bounces her outstretched palm up and down as she rhythmically chants her slogan. She is unobtrusive and she seems innocuous but when Betty and Barry have turned to focus on the "Acropolis coliseum thing" Gypsy has flung her pincers into Barry's man-bag and whipped out a camera. God I love photographing these kinds of human interactions in the Eternal City as opposed to doing the hum drum tourist thing.

These two old ladies must be the girlfriends of Romulus and Remus off to find the she-wolf to suckle on. But all they have is two wheelchairs and each other. What chance do these two homeless ladies stand? This is the Rome that no one talks about - but this is the centre of Rome this is not some far flung suburb, this is the very centre of Rome cbd and these two ladies are a typical sight on Roman streets these days. I started taking this photo set when I realised the unavoidable prevalence of homeless people in Rome. The paradox is obvious too: Italy Rome Western Europe at its finest, and yet such an exclusive society, a divided community a place of poverty, why do I encounter such large numbers of homeless people? Obviously its not necessary or unavoidable and I compare and contrast Rome to Melbourne and London, and even Prague and I find that Rome and Italy has no excuse to allow the continuation of such misery in their modern community. Obviously the fault lies with Italian policy-makers who have let Italy become an exclusive community. Those that are mentally ill need tax payer funded safety nets and illegal immigrants and gypsies need to be addressed too.

Some street artist has drawn 2 pictures on these walls in Rome and I was so intrigued by them that I recorded them and wondered at their meaning. This above shows Adolf Hitler Smiling and obviously happy and seemingly associated with a Euro currency. From this I conclude the artists meaning is that Hitler would have been happy to see the modern Europe which has now become the European Union - something like a Western European community which occupies roughly the same territory that Hitler's Nazi empire briefly occupied in the 30's and 40's.

I love the composition of this shot because it depicts the two Rome's: The homeless and the tourists.Our typical LA Sophomore ladies, Conner and Hunter, have just stepped off the plane from LA and they have hit Rome in search of good times with hot Italian men. Unfortunately for Mr.HomelessItaliano2008 here, he don't meet the selection criteria of these two Valley Girls.

Here's the second one by the same artist and I have no idea who Eugenio Beauharnais is, so I do a google search later and find he was some court dude in the 1700's in France and he had some political influence on policy making of the time or something. But I fail to comprehend the point that the artist had in mind.

Here we go, Fat Alberto here is moving house in his hermit crab manner, he's got a bucket and a visage like father christmas and he's taking up the pavement but he's invisible no one sees him...Except you and me that is. Everyone - all the normal people are out and about on their mobile phone enjoying Rome window shopping eating drinking and talking, but not Fat Alberto over there, he's engaged in a life and death stagnation that only has one ending and it isn't good for Albert.

The thing that troubles me is that guys like this need help and its obvious they're not getting any. Their numbers are just far too high. I cant imagine the Swedish letting Fat Alberto walk around for too long on the streets of Stockholm. They'd pick him up and give him some accommodation and some supervision and some support. And so tourists like me know that he's being looked after because he is absent from the street. But in Rome he and his mates are all on the street.

Yep, there he goes. Il Duce on the left keeps his profile agaze somewhere else and Bella red head over there on our right - well look at her body language, you can tell her and Fat Alberto aren't dating anymore cant you.

Now then what have we here? Inspector Montalbano has fallen on hard times I suppose because he's got his flannel shirt out and he's constructed a personal billboard I don't read or know Italiano but I know the meaning of the text "I'm homeless no one helps me i've got a family and kids to feed I lost my job I'm a good guy now i'm screwed please help" You don't need to read to know what he's written.

This sign in this area just about sums it up: some things are meant to be invisible. Like Rome's vagrant problem.

Some cumulonimbus aggressively forming above Rome. I find the combination of blue sky and cumulonimbus very beautiful and here around the Mediterranean area that's what you see allot of.

Rome is called the Eternal City because it - and this statue have existed in glorious civilisation since the dawn of time.

The ancient Romans were great artists.

And great war lords. Here is Julius Caesar.

Now Rome gets invaded every summer by an army of cashed up diabetes suffering baby boomer yanks poms aussies japanese and kiwis.

I quickly grabbed a few snaps before "Da Da Vinci Code" guy yelled "No photo"

There we go in the centre of the roof the gods do the ET phone home thing and touch fingers.

What a great life these guys lead. I wonder what Silvio Berlusconi is doing about this??

Holy crap these people live in destitution!

All these men could be put to work building houses or something but their potential goes idle and their lives waste away. Its like they are no more than stray cats.

I took this shot from Trastavere on the hill. Rome is truly wondrous and beautiful. comments