Rome Confidential: the “lotti” around Piazza Bologna

Well, it has been very rainy in Rome lately. I mean, since last May we had lots of rain. Now, when it rains Rome loses all its charm. This is not mineral Paris. Not shiny red-brick Ferrara or misty Venice. With the rain Rome is plain ugly.

This is a town built for blue skies, cold or raging hot, but definitely dry weather.

So during the rare sunny days of this winter the blue/orange contrast was even more surprising even for us, spoiled locals. Ok ok, the Centro Storico is fabulous. Still are you interested in going beyond? In no-postcard zone?

Well, you’re lucky, there is a special reportage today on the eastern borders of town, where we live. We’re outside the city walls. Still, it’s plenty of Roman rests here…acquedotti in San Lorenzo, the roman barracks of Castro Pretorio, and the remains of the consolari: Tiburtina, Casilina, Prenestina…Nomentana…but this was Roman Countryside when Goethe was doing his inter-rail tour. And it remained like that for a while.

Ever heard about the “lotti”? This was a sort of social housing of the early 20th century. As in Berlin or London, probably in those years social housing hit its zenith. Houses mimicking the rural set up, in continental Europe with more of a village feeling compared with the already very industrialized England. Buildings never too big, created with a strong user experience aim. Having in mind playgrounds for children, places where to hang the clean laundry to dry, a bit of greenery, and possibly also architectural charm.

I took some photos of the lotti behind Piazza Bologna, the area where MeinMann grew up. One century ago here flocks of sheep would gaze the distant horizon. And they did still exist in the 1950s, when the parents of MeinMann came to Rome and the 1960 and 1970 tall periferie hadn’t clogged the horizon yet. We’re in a recently built neighborhood. Never been here?

Nothwithstanding the bad weather we got so far, the mimosa trees are about to blossom…typical for January in Rome.

If you want to do your Spazierengang among ladies going to the market with their trolley, want to meet a grumpy gattara*, hear conversations from balcony to balcony come here. You will not see “trendy” bars, meet expats by the hundred, the odd soap-opera actor posing at the caffe’ or bo-bos. Real Rome, if you are interested in the merchandise.

True, some lotti got their share of gentrification and now it’s prime real estate. That’s why you have to hurry up and visit the area before it gets all sealed up and manucured…

Some still retain their reddish patina of pozzolane, a reddish paint done with vulcanic stones, which is wearing out in Rome and compares to in-the-face orange industrial paint like pastels to stabilo-boss.

There are squares for the kids to play (the Campo Sportivo Artiglio kids soccer club is behind the corner), even if kids are a rarity now. There are clustered courtyards surrounded by a fence, for hanging the washing up out to dry without that soccer interferes with it or visitors mess around.

Buy the biscuits at Gentilini, or the freshly-made pasta around the corner, cut with a mechanic guillotine. Have a kosher croissant next to the synagogue. Or take your basket and head to the Mercato and enjoy the competition with tenacious old ladies for those artichokes or roman cabbage…

*lady (or man) taking care of our several cat communities, one day I’ll speak about the roman cat communities!

Goethe, natural born blogger

I realize

more clearly

every day that

I was really

born to be

a blogger.

….

Of late it has been

a bit confused in Rome,

and even more so in my head,

as the spirit of blogging

has invaded me and for 14 days

I have done nothing but

post and upload.

(Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, squatting at his friend’s Tischbein, in via del Corso)

Rome, the beauty of it

Yesterday during my lunch break a ray of sun…I paid a visit to the House of Goethe, close to Piazza del Popolo. I wanted to recall the feeling of someone coming from the North when in Rome. The mesmerizing power of Rome is something I’m constantly reminded of, especially in winter days when a turquoise sky plays the contrast with the magnificent ochre of the buildings.

“The desire to see

this land has long since

reached maturity.

Water pipes, baths,

theatres, amphitheatres,

the stadium, temples!

And then the palaces of

the emperors, the graves

of the great – with these

images I have fed and

stregthtened my soul”.

I have the chance of crossing the city center twice a day on my way to the office, so beauty is at hand every day. Therefore the present situation is even more painful.

Rome has blossomed over the past decade. Always magic,  it’s still messy but no longer sticky and dirty as it appeared to us, northern Italians, in the 80s and early 90s. Many beautiful Piazzas which used to be wild parking areas were given back to the city and to citizens and visitors. Proportions were restored. Pavements in some areas of the city are now dignified. But since a year or so I have the impression that someone pushed the “pause” or the “rewind” button on the city infrastructure, and the private interest of that shopkeeper or that resident is risking again to take over the collective interest of the community.

Rome is an enormous deposit of beauty, your eyes dig, there’s more to come. Still this beauty needs protection. And sometimes beauty is necessary but not sufficient. Rome is aloof, never excited and never surprised, she’s seen too many invasions, easy to take, impossible to hold. But aloofness can became indifference, failure to be aware.

Beauty must remain public and not be swallowed by those who aim to make a hold up on beauty, to make public beauty a private benefit. Rome risks of becoming an hostage. Of her eternal beauty, if she fails to look forward. Of those nasty little zealous black ants, the politicians, climbing on her left ankle, who no matter how small, still can bite hard in her white skin while she’s enjoying a conversation at the pic-nic of history.