On the busiest day of the religious pilgrim's year, St. Peter's Cathedral closed promptly at 6 p.m. Banks refused to exchange currency on Dec. 31 and one of Rome's most popular museums at the moment, the recently opened Borghese, couldn't rent audio guides because the batteries weren't working. Italians love to talk, and it shows. The Internet, however, is another matter. Love the candy, the coffee and the ice cream. Great assortments of flavors, styles and textures from the gorgeous gelati to the chocolate bliss-bombs, not to mention the thick, viscous coffee that you can stand a spoon in.
Italian TV is a hoot.
Once you've seen Bonanza and RoboCop dubbed into Italian, life can never be the same. And it all happens 24 hours a day. And finally the church. As one who was raised Roman Catholic, an altar boy no less, and now practices marketing as a profession, I could only marvel at the might and prowess of the money machine. Row after row of religious ornaments, artifacts, trinkets and keepsakes are sold from street carts, storefront shelves and even the Vatican corridors.