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INSIDE ITALY

Inside Italy: Berlusconi Airport, Meloni’s mood and an unexpected detective drama

In this week's Inside Italy review, we look at how Italy’s politicians are honouring Silvio Berlusconi, a surprise job for Angela Merkel, and why Giorgia Meloni can’t keep her face straight.

Published: 13 July 2024 10:24 CEST
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni attends a meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Council during the NATO 75th anniversary summit at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, DC
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni attends a meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Council during the NATO 75th anniversary summit at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, DC, on July 11, 2024. The PM is becoming known for her facial expressions. (Photo by SAMUEL CORUM / AFP)

Flying low

Leonardo da Vinci, Marco Polo, Galileo and… Silvio Berlusconi. What do these well-known figures have in common? They’ve all got an airport in Italy named after them – as of Thursday, when the transport ministry announced it had renamed Milan Malpensa airport after the scandal-plagued late former premier.

Unsurprisingly, the idea hasn’t been popular in Italy: many pointed out that naming a major international transport hub after a figure best known abroad for sleaze, tax evasion and close friendships with dictators might not present Italy in the best possible light.

The government, which Berlusconi played an outsized role in forming before his death, didn’t address these concerns as it pushed through the name change “with immediate effect”.

The news was a gift to social media users everywhere, who joked about the airport now featuring a “Bunga Bunga lounge” and asked if this meant it would be getting a facelift. Some said they would boycott Malpensa in future and fly elsewhere; good news for Milan’s other airport, Linate, where the local mayor blocked a past attempt to rename it after Berlusconi.

Judging from the huge – and overwhelmingly negative – reaction this story has had internationally, the damage to Italy’s image has already been done, long before the airport has even had chance to change the signs. Much to the dismay of those of us who’d like to see the country move on from being viewed as a basket case.

Expressing herself

Speaking of taking things seriously (or not), anyone who follows Italian news has probably noticed by now that photos of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni capture some intriguing facial expressions.

Far from keeping a poker face at official engagements, the Italian premier is becoming known for showing us plainly how she feels about any given situation, or person.

Her face always tells a story: from her apparent delight at Rishi Sunak’s company curdling into intense awkwardness at the G7 meeting last month, to her obvious impatience as leaders waited for Joe Biden to arrive at the NATO summit on Thursday.

Meloni’s expressions did not escape the notice of the international press, with English-language journalists enthusing about her being on “top eye-rolling form” and numerous outlets posting the video online.

She was also pictured seemingly grimacing at the back of her long-time political ally, Hungarian President Viktor Orban, who has recently contributed to Meloni’s troubles at the EU level.

Being upstaged in the European parliament, combined with the French and British election results, seemed to have put her in a terrible mood.

People sometimes ask if she’s forgotten about the cameras, but I have no doubt that all this face-pulling is conscious and intentional. It’s another of Meloni’s (admittedly very successful) populist tactics. Her fans often praise her for it and insist she’s just showing normal emotions.

After all, anyone can relate to feeling like pulling a face at an annoying workplace situation or colleague – though most of us know better than to actually do it.

Merkel on the case

Here’s a question you probably weren’t asking: What would happen if former German chancellor Angela Merkel became a private investigator and roamed northern Italy in search of murders to solve?

We are apparently about to find out, as Italy’s state broadcaster Rai this week announced a new primetime show called Miss Merkel based around her doing precisely this in her retirement, for reasons which are yet to become clear.

Italian TV critics assure us that the series, produced in Germany and dubbed in Italian, is “absolutely real”.

“Living in the age of fake news and artificial intelligence, everyone was suspicious when the first images of Miss Merkel appeared on social media,” wrote Italian review website RivistaStudio, describing the show as “even more absurd than the images suggest”.

Merkel herself doesn’t seem to have commented on the show, but we bet she’ll be tuning in.

Miss Merkel is set to air on Rai 2 on Fridays from July 12th at 9.20pm.

Inside Italy is our weekly look at some of the news and talking points in Italy that you might not have heard about. It’s published each Saturday and members can receive it directly to their inbox, by going to their newsletter preferences or adding their email to the sign-up box in this article.

 
 

Member comments

  1. I,m very pleased that Malpensa has been named after Berlusconi he played a big part in Italian history and was a larger than life character something that is missing in todays poor efforts.

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INSIDE ITALY

Inside Italy: Trevi Fountain tickets, a controversial cricket ban and is Rome’s taxi problem over?

In this week's Inside Italy review, we look at the end of a 20-year taxi drought in Rome, new plans to charge tourists for access to the Trevi Fountain and deep-seated social tensions behind a cricket ban in northern Italy.

Published: 7 September 2024 10:02 CEST
Inside Italy: Trevi Fountain tickets, a controversial cricket ban and is Rome’s taxi problem over?

Inside Italy is our weekly look at some of the news, talking points and gossip from Italy that you might not have heard about. It’s published each Saturday and members can receive it directly to their inbox, by going to their newsletter preferences or adding their email to the sign-up box in this article.

Rome ends 20-year taxi drought – but will it be enough? 

Following years of customer complaints about long queues and lengthy wait times when trying to hail a ride, Rome will soon have new taxis as officials this week issued a public tender for the release of 1,000 new licences – the first in nearly two decades.

The move, which aimed to solve long-standing cab shortages ahead of the 2025 Jubilee, was praised by Rome mayor Roberto Gualtieri as “a historic day for the city”.

But will the upcoming release of 1,000 new licences be enough to solve the Eternal City’s chronic lack of taxis?

According to Nicola Zaccheo, president of Italy’s transport regulation authority, the new 1,000-strong fleet will only scratch the surface as the city would need at least 2,330 additional cabs to solve its shortages after it registered 4 million ‘unresolved calls’ in 2023 – that is people who tried to book a taxi but couldn’t find one.

Zaccheo also highlighted how “meeting demand does not depend solely on the number of licences, but also on how service shifts are organised”.

In May 2023, city officials brought in new rules allowing a second driver to take a shift in the same taxi, and setting out new requirements to organise shift rotations via digital platforms.

Whether or not these rules are being enforced however is a different question altogether.

And as the old Italian adage goes, tra il dire e il fare c’e’ di mezzo il mare, which roughly translates to: “There’s a distance as big as a sea between saying one thing and actually doing it”.

Trevi Fountain tickets? 

But news of the upcoming issuance of 1,000 new taxi licences wasn’t the only Rome-related story to make headlines in national media this week. 

After Rome tourism councillor Alessandro Onorato said city officials were mulling charging people for access to the iconic Trevi Fountain to cut down crowds, mayor Roberto Gualtieri called the idea a “very concrete hypothesis” on Thursday. 

“The situation at the Trevi Fountain has become very hard to handle,” Gualtieri said.

“There is a buildup of people that makes it difficult to properly enjoy the monument.”

Following a drop in tourist figures during the Covid pandemic, large numbers of visitors have returned to the Baroque masterpiece over the past couple of years, with crowds often being so deep that it is hard to get a proper look at the fountain.

According to the latest estimates, the Trevi monument sees over 10 million tourists a year – more than three times the number of people residing in the entire Rome municipality (2,755,300) 

But issues are not simply related to overtourism, as reports of ‘rogue’ international visitors swimming in the fountain have become something of a regular occurrence during the peak tourism period. 

Given the long list of incidents reported over the years, the latest of which occurred last weekend, it would be hard to blame city authorities for wanting to control access to the monument.

More than a cricket ban

The small town of Monfalcone, on Italy’s Adriatic coast, made international headlines on Friday after a BBC report dubbed it “the Italian town that banned cricket”. 

The report referred to rules prohibiting Monfalcone residents from playing the sport in local parks and outdoor areas, with fines of up to €100 for those flouting the ban.

But while authorities’ official explanation for the ban was reported as being that cricket balls posed a danger to passersby, local players said it was an anti-immigration policy targeting the local Bangladeshi community.

This was not the first time authorities in Monfalcone were embroiled in major controversy.

Last July, mayor Anna Maria Cisint, who’s a member of Matteo Salvini’s anti-immigration League party, sparked nationwide outrage after she demanded “Muslim foreigners” stop swimming “with their clothes on” when visiting Italian beaches.

Later that year, some 8,000 people took to the streets of Monfalcone after Cisint ordered the closure of two local mosques on grounds that they were “illegal”. 

League leader Salvini has so far avoided addressing the tensions in Monfalcone in public, but as another questionable (to say the least) policy from local authorities makes international news, it’s hard to see how he’ll be able to put off that discussion much longer. 

Inside Italy is our weekly look at some of the news and talking points in Italy that you might not have heard about. It’s published each Saturday and members can receive it directly to their inbox, by going to their newsletter preferences or adding their email to the sign-up box in this article.

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