Mafia Kids Set up Shop, Advertise on Internet

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Two children of jailed Mafia boss Toto’ Riina have opened up shop and advertise on the web. Agrimar, which specializes in farm machinery, took out a banner on the town of Corleone’s home page. Maria Concetta Riina and her brother, Giuseppe Salvatore (called “Salvo”), are described as “highly-qualified staff” on the site. In business for about a year, the venture sounds like any other new-economy outfit: “a dynamic, cutting-edge approach” “average staff age 23” “free consultations…” Maria Concetta may have steered clear from the other family business though her relationship with Tony Ciavarello, suspected of Mafia ties and a partner in Agrimar, has raised doubts. “The image of Corleone is changing thanks to enterprising young people,” remarked mayor Giuseppe Cipriani, who gave permission for the banner on the city’s home page. “Before tourists expected to find women dressed in black, men with sawed-off shotguns. It’s not that way–thanks to these young people, there’s a bit of bustle, nightlife.” Salvatore “Tot?” Riina is trying to appeal a life sentence. He’s serving time for the 1993 bombings of the Uffizi, which killed five and injured 29, as well as the car bombings that same year in Milan and Rome. 1999-2004 zoomata.com

Related resources
www.corleone.it
More on today’s town from the web site….

City Provides Dates for Women’s Day

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So much for hands-off government: a city council is organizing dates for single women to celebrate national Women’s Day March 8.
The idea came from the culture councilor of a town called Cernusco sul Naviglio near Milan. The holiday, meant to celebrate emancipation, in recent years has become an occasion for a girl’s night out — preferably in a trendy ethnic restaurant or at a male strip show rather than for any serious discussion on women’s rights.

“We’re against women by themselves in pizzerias on March 8,” joked Daniele Cassamagnaghi, who invented the free date scheme. “It’s sad, really. Why not spend the evening with a blind date, do something a bit different?”

So far there are over 25 men available, including city council members, who have met minimum requirements: "a pleasant appearance and the capacity to speak at least four words," explained Cassamagnaghi. To take the city up on the offer, women ring the town hall specifying age and other prerequisites. The town council will play matchmaker for the evening’s festivities that include an aperitif and a cabaret show.

A letter of protest, signed by 20 townswomen, asserted the right to go out without men every once in a while. "Thanks but no thanks," said the letter. "At least once a year it’s great to go out with only women…It doesn’t mean we don’t like men or can’t get dates."

Related resources:
www.donnamimosa.com/home.asp
However you decide to celebrate March 8, try sending these animated greetings in Flash…

Italy by Numbers: “Brick Fever”

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60% Italians think home buying is best investment
14.1% Italians currently interested in buying homes
+17% home price increase (1999-2001)
Casa dolce casa. Italians are increasingly more afflicted by "brick fever" (la febbre del mattone), and national statistics institute Censis predicts the frenzy will last until 2004. Some 800,000 Italians bought homes last year, causing a price increase of about eight percent. Inhabitants of the Bel Paese were less interested in investments considered riskier, like stocks, which dropped by 5.9% in 2001. More than half of all Italians, 67.6%, live in a home they own and only 22% are renters.

Restoring a Home in Italy
Live the dream of owning an home in Italy….

Web wise: March 5-12

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Chocolate Feast/Fest in Rome ? Italian practice: city residents publish personal diaries ? Barilla Celebrates 125 Year Anniversary ? What’s underneath next winter’s collectionsChocolate Feast/Fest in Rome
Not just Perugia: Italy’s most famed chocolate feast has doubled the dates…For a dietetic look at what’s going on in Rome (the edible Vespa & chocolate architecture exhibit are just a few winning ideas) until March 10.
www.eurochocolate.roma.it

What’s underneath next winter’s collections
Get an eyeful of the slinky lingerie looks presented by Italian designers in Milan during the 2003 winter collections….Photos & video (requires real video media player).
http://valeoggi.tiscali.it/news/200202/28/3c7ce66405aa5
www.tg5.it/cgi-bin/video/video?mms://video.jumpy.it/tg5/verissimo/0228sfilata.wmv

Italian practice: city residents publish personal diaries
A fascinating look at daily life of Italians with this diary project: since 1984 the town of Pieve Santo Stefano has collected over 4,000 autobiographies..The online version publishes a one new each month, from the self-proclaimed "City of Diaries."
www.archiviodiari.it/primapersona.htm

Barilla Celebrates 125 Year Anniversary
One of Italy’s most famed pasta companies celebrates a landmark anniversary with a deviation from its usually sticky sweet commercials: this one was written by author Alessandro Baricco & directed by Wim Wenders. The image of a wheat harvest is overrun with surreal images of Italy’s recent history…Runs on Media Player, Quick Time,
Real player.
www.barilla125anni.it

Museum Prices Post Euro

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The Italian government made a solemn promise to protect consumers from unfair price hikes because of the changeover from lire to euro. Unfortunately, this is not always the case in state-run museums: some ticket prices for star attractions increased by 25%. To be fair, some ticket prices were rounded down, but for venues such as Rome’s Museum of Musical Instruments.
Here’s an overview of what it will cost you to visit some of Italy’s most interesting attractions — the sites totaled would run almost 70$ (77.5 e). Keep in mind the list is fairly short because the multitude of private museums and churches which charge entrance fees did not release new price lists.
To convert into your currency:

www.x-rates.com/calculator.html

Florence Ticket Price Galleria dell’Accademia
www.sbas.firenze.it 6.50

Galleria degli Uffizi  http://musa.uffizi.firenze.it

 

6.50

Medici Chapels
www.sbas.firenze.it

4.00

Boboli Gardens

 

2.00

Rome

Ticket Price

Coluseum/Palatine gallery

www.archeorm.arti.

8.00

Domus Aurea

 

5.00 Baths of Caracalla 5.00 Galleria Borghese
www.galleriaborghese.it
   6.50 Venice Ticket Price Galleria dell’Accademia 6.50     Pompei 8,50 Paestum 6,50 Capri (Blue Grotto) 4.00

Ercolano

 

8.50

Italian for Mobile Phones

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Around ten thousand SMS are sent daily in Italy — a figure that convinced the government to send out reminders to taxpayers via SMS.
Here’s a quick guide to everyday Italian for cell phone messages & how to send them for free.

Abbreviations How to use them Key Phrases Spelled out Watch out! Spelled Out
6=sei C 6 “Ci sei?” TVTB "Ti voglio tanto bene" quando TC metti 6 3mendo "Quando ti ci metti, sei tremendo"
x=per Xch? "perch??" dove 6 "Dove sei?" 6 tu che non vai bene x me "Sei tu che non vai bene per me"
+=più

mai +

"mai più"

 quando non C6 mi sento Xso "quando non ci sei, mi sento perso" mi hai r8 "Mi hai rotto!"
8=otto scem8 “scemotto” + x me che x te "più per me che per te" Xnacchia "pernacchia"–virtual "raspberry"

How to send it:
Most major Italian portals offer free SMS service, keep in mind space is even tighter–125 characters per message.

www.jumpy.it/830sms.htm Don’t know what to say? Choose a message (love, jokes, greetings for special occasions etc.)

http://sms.puntopartenza.it
List of free internet SMS senders, with character counts

Kids to Adults: Please Use Better Italian

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A group of elementary school students in Treviso has started a crusade to clean up the Italian used by journalists and officials. The fifth-graders, led by teacher Maria Cristina Andreola, have one main gripe: the incorrect use or lack of the subjunctive mood. Often one of the most difficult things to learn for students of Italian, the subjunctive (or congiuntivo) is used to express preference, desire, thought and hypothetical situations.

Under fire are linguistic clangers like: “I wish I was” instead of “I wish I were, ” pronounced on national television by public figures ranging from soccer coach Giovanni Trapattoni to ex anti-corruption magistrate Antonio Di Pietro and former Premier Massimo D’Alema.
As part of a homework assignment, students were asked to find examples of subjunctive use in newspapers and on television. "They’re finding errors everywhere, especially on television, but also a lot of incorrect use by family members." With the help of Andreola, the kids plan to start an Italy-wide campaign, tentatively called "S.O.S–Subjunctive." The class wrote a letter to local paper La Tribuna di Treviso asking journalists and officials to use the language more carefully.
The Accademia della Crusca (Crusca Academy), however, the national language academy of Italy and the oldest such institution in Europe, considers these errors only venial sins. "Even Dante, considered the father of modern Italian, didn’t always use it," commented Crusca president Francesco Sabatini.

Related resources:
www.chass.utoronto.ca/~ngargano/corsi/varia/eser/congiuntivo.html
Subjunctive or not? Try these excercises…

Italy by Numbers: Active Gray Panthers

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34.7% have an "intense sex life"
47.2% regret losing youth & beauty
74.3% do not miss youthful sexual vigor
20% admit to having had crush, age 60+

Italian senior citizens, currently the only growing segment of the population, confirm that they are still young at heart. Of the 3,500 over 65s interviewed by the Ageing Society, 65% say they have an inadequate sex life, but only because they have difficulty finding suitable partners.
While over half mourn the loss of youthful looks, about 75% say they don’t complain about loss of sexual appetite. About 90% wants to do something useful for society, 18% take life long learning courses and 69% regularly frequent some kind of association. The majority, 68%, still consider family the main source of assistance, only 11% the Church. By 2030, over 50% of Italy’s population will be over 60 years old.

http://digilander.iol.it/raulbova2001
Actor Raul Bova’s landmark nude calendar–he was cited by women over 65 as the ‘ideal man.’

Web Wise–Feb25-March 4

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Festival San Remo: send audio stickers • Resource on Italian authors •The Missing Klimt: An Italian Mystery • Italian practice: quiz to find the ideal sport

Festival San Remo: send audio stickers
The country’s most important, longest running & likely most boring song contest starts March 5, but get in the mood by sending audio sticker greetings of some Festival classics like ‘Non Ho l’età", "A Modo Mio" and "Cuore Matto."…As they say, "because San Remo is San Remo."
www.sanremomusic.com

Resource on Italian authors
The foundation of venerable publishing house Mondadori has put online a wealth of information about some 45,000 books and over 3,000 letters from Italian and international authors…Just a few names: Gabriele D’Annunzio, Luigi Pirandello e Italo Calvino , Ernest Hemingway , James Joyce, Thomas Mann and Hermann Hesse.
www.fondazionemondadori.it

The Missing Klimt: An Italian Mystery
A painting by Gustav Klimt went missing from a gallery in Piacenza in 1998, another never seen came out of nowhere. The two paintings have some remarkable similarities….
www.tgcom.it/SpecialeTgCom/speciali/speciale149.shtml

Italian practice: what’s the right sport for you…
Take this quiz to find out whether you’re more suited to team sports (here intended, of course, as soccer) or are more the solitary type…
http://news2000.iol.it/index_test.jhtml?id_test=321

Padre Pio: The Television Station

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Sainthood may have to wait, but Padre Pio has already been made the star of a new television channel. Tele Radio Padre Pio which has a brown-and-yellow logo featuring the Capuchin monk in profile, currently only broadcasts in the area of San Giovanni Rotondo near Foggia but plans are already underway to broadcast by satellite throughout Europe. Padre Pio, expected to be proclaimed a saint in June 2002, is also the subject of countless websites and a radio station.
The devotion for the beatified monk has certainly brought about an economic miracle for this area of Southern Italy. In 1999, 7,500,000 pilgrims stayed overnight in the constantly expanding town of 26,000 residents. Donations from pilgrims built one of the most advanced hospitals in the region and a church, designed by Renzo Piano, big enough for 10,000 people is also being constructed. Plans are also underway to create a sort of “sacred theme park” relating the life of the stigmatist with one miracle recognized by the Catholic Church.

www.teleradiopadrepio.it/index.asp
The online version of the broadcasts, in Italian. Currently the only English on the site is the button for donations.