Monday, May 12, 2014

Lorraine Yu

             

After a few days in Torino, it was a bit difficult to readjust back to the busy streets of Rome.  Stephanie and Amara took us to Piazza Vittorio, the immigrant neighborhood that is right next to Termini Station.  This neighborhood reminded me a lot of San Salvario, where we stayed in Torino.  Amara mentioned that he thinks immigrants tend to gravitate towards living next to train stations because it’s convenient to leave the city and also because immigrants tend to believe that they will only spend a few years there before moving back to their original home.  However, that is usually not the case and they tend to stay where they end up.

We walked around the area for about ten minutes before heading to a huge market that is reminiscent of the one we visited in Torino.  The main differences being that this one was indoors and far less crowded.  Both markets offered fresh produce and food on one side, but the one in Rome had a smaller selection of clothing compared to the one in Torino.  James and I paired up to interview two different people about their views on immigration.  The first person we interviewed was a man who moved to Italy from Bangladesh ten years ago.  He did not really have any opinions on immigration and said that Italians tend to be friendly and are able to coexist with immigrants, especially the younger generations.  He also mentioned that he has children in Bangladesh but it is too expensive to bring them to Italy so he sends money to them instead.  The second person we interviewed was an Italian man who happened to be Roma.  James and I didn’t realize this until after we asked Stephanie.  It can get confusing since Roma and Rome are so similar and Roma means Rome in Italian.  He lives in the Piazza Vittorio area and he loves it.  He owns three clothing shops in the market and was kind enough to show us one of them.  He says that it is hard for both Italians and immigrants to find jobs and also mentioned that he doesn’t believe there is much discrimination towards immigrants in Italy.

After our tour of Piazza Vittorio, Stephanie and Amara took us to get gelato!  At first we were going to go to Palazzo del Freddo, the oldest gelateria in the area but it was unfortunately closed.  We wandered around for about ten minutes and found another one that was open.  I opted for vanilla and tiramisu and both were pretty good.