Sunday, March 22, 2009

Life in Europe, Page 5: Il Cambio Vandelized and Terriorized

This is a picture of the inside of Il Cambio, the oldest and most famous restaurant in Torino.

Last night a group of people wearing black masks charged into the restaurant during dinner time carrying buckets of manure. They declared to be supporting the immigrant workers unfairly treated in Torino. They then proceeded to throw the manure around the walls and the patrons eating. Some of the murals on the walls were painted 250 years ago by artists that never imagined that this morning they would be covered with dung.The culprits have not been caught, yet but the police are still gathering the "evidence" as you can see in this photo I took just this morning. You can also see that all of Il Cambio's windows and doors are shut tight so no peeking in at the damage.

The restaurant is just around the corner from our new apartment so it appears that we will be in the center of all the action of the city. I would like to say that for myself, being an immigrant to Italy, DON'T want these people to speak for me. I moved here for the art history. Many millions of people visit Italy every year for the art history. Ruining it will not win the respect of the rest of the world to your cause, but it will give more attention to Il Cambio, which will just increase its business, which will give them more money to spend on higher security.

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