Day 5 - Epilogue (19th September 2014)
I visited Rome with a certain level of apprehension as when I visited in 2002 (?), I found the city quite similar to London. Admittedly, my last visit was just an overnight stay, so my impression of the city was informed through a whistle stop tour of the tourist attractions kindly provided by my friends. I also remember the graffiti that adorned the city.
In 2014, the graffiti still exists but my view has changed.
The word, 'Shit' seems so much nicer in Italian.
I enjoyed visiting Rome. Having said that, I do feel that as a city it lacks the sense of completeness offered by such cities as Barcelona and Berlin. Rome feels fragmentary. It is vehemently tied up with the past and for some reason, I found it harder to truly comprehend it as a whole. I feel that to truly understand the city, you need to delve beneath the glorious remnants of past generations and explore what is going on now. Again, maybe I wasn't in Rome long enough. I was even somewhat confused by the lack of bookshops. They exist but they tend to be specialist bookshops. My fear is that Rome will become simply tied up with expensive fashion businesses and franchises, which could suffocate the creativity of future generations. The art scene thankfully suggests that this may not happen for awhile. It's a rewarding place to visit and I will probably go back. I feel as though I want to understand the alternative scene in Rome and the aspects of the culture that are not overtly religious or illustrative of past triumphs. The past is important but I want to understand the present.
Something of a metaphor... Fashion as a social constraint.
Barry Watt - 19th September 2014.
