We, Romanians, have been so used to looking at Italy as heaven on earth, but, to be honest, Romania seems (at least to me) to be a much more secure place to be now. Ok, milk and honey does not flow from the sky anywhere in the world, but knowing that 1.5 million Romanians had chosen to live in Italy (and that is only the official number, who knows how many others live there without being even registered) always made me think that there's a bit more milk and honey there than here.
The truth is that Italy appears to be in big trouble these days. The economical crisis has returned, jobs are hard to find, or badly paid, a lot of companies prefer to recruit newly graduates or students for the so-called "stages" (internships - not paid of course) to avoid paying wages, prices have risen... and so on. Not to mention that this has lead to social movements and riots in the last few months, culminating with some people literally throwing parties in the streets after the resignation of Berlusconi last night. And last but not least, having a strike every month does not sound good either, right?
I may not know much about politics and macro-economics (especially not those of Italy which is not my home country) but.. I wonder what effects will all these things have on the long-term. I know that Italians are already sick of so many "stranieri" coming from everywhere to steal their jobs and welfare, and I selfishly hope that my "bubble" at the University there will somehow protect me from being affected in any way by this.
Having Facebook as my research field, I naturally searched Berlusconi's page a while ago and I've been following it ever since. Judging by the comments that most of people posted... a lot of them not only hate him but are also definitely VERY upset with life and what's happening in the country. There are obviously some people who like him (otherwise they wouldn't have voted for him), but I guess many of them are disappointed of him not actually doing anything for saving the country from economic disaster. And things are going crazy even on that page... 1000 new "fans" only in the last hour, and 2950 comments only on the last note (and 5236 comments on the third last one).
I surely don't want to find myself a few months later caught in the middle of a riot in the street or not affording to buy food anymore, because that's really scary. But... scary as it is, I still count the days until getting to live there and to do my work and research in peace and quiet.
So as much as Italy looks now more like this...
... I still want to think it looks like this:
... or, like this:
... or, like this:
and, as a conclusion, as the Italians like to say, I still want to see "rose e fiori" everywhere, like this:
Nota bene: the "rose e fiori" (roses and flowers) thing could be the Italian equivalent of the Romanian "milk and honey flowing everywhere" or "dogs walking around wearing pretzels on their tails"... which describes a general state of well being. Weird people, us Europeans, huh? :)
Otherwise, everything fine here in the Kingdom of the Frog, did some very productive research for the thesis this weekend. Next in line: FINALLY paying my car, going to the scholarships office with my bunch of papers, finishing my presentation for the film marketing conference in Paris, then Milan next weekend for some more home scouting and not only, and then Paris for the above mentioned conference.
Buona serata a tutti!
Love,
La Reina Rana
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