a glimpse of the strait ¹sunrise – 7:12, sunset – 5:57
10 hours and 45 minutes of daylight

¹ Uno sguardo sullo stretto – mario greco

The image was taken from Bagnara Calabra a small town on the western coast of Calabria just north of the mouth of the Strait of Messina. On the left and around the bend are the cities of Scilla, Villa San Giovanni and Reggio. On the right is the northeastern tip of Sicily. The image was taken by Mario Greco. Il signore Greco has posted some amazing images. I cropped his original image to fit into the post. (Follow the link attached to the footnote to get to the image Mario Greco posted.)

The rant today is about the garbage all over southern Italy. (It was not as pervasive in Le Marche and in Puglia it was restricted to the sites where the garbage bins are located.) How did I get to garbage? I wanted to see what the northeastern tip of Sicily looked like, so I went and looked at images of Torre Faro, the town at the tip. In almost all the images there were empty plastic bottles and cardboard and paper lining the streets. And among the litter were the Italians walking around as if they were strolling down some grand boulevard with not a care in the world.

One excuse is that garbage collecting is a government task and in a country where government is suspect, why would I be surprised that there’s garbage all over the place. You could also say that garbage collection is controlled by crime syndicates and there’s no oversight that anyone can bring to the problem. I reject both excuses. I think it’s about conspicuous consumption. Southern Italy grew rich after The War and the garbage is evidence that il mezzogiono it’s no longer poor, that it’s people are no longer peasants; that it’s stores are chuck-full of the products and conveniences of the north. What’s a little garbage next to that brag? And what’s the problem with old refrigerators lining the side-of-the-road? The American tourists are getting more and more like the Germans. Stop looking down and look at the azure sky. Where else do you see a sky this color?

O mia Patria sì bella e perduta

 
31 days till spring¹ FB – Calabria Fotografia