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Day 7 – The return of the Wi-Fi, gelato and the last dinner

We began our day with a long sleep-in. On most of our days in Rome the alarm clock sounded very early but not this day. The reason was that our only meeting was at 15.30 instead of 8 or 9 a clock in the morning. At Thursday we arrived back in the civilization after the return of the Wi-Fi in our apartment. So the first thing we did when we woke up was to recover the time we missed in our social lives on Facebook and other social webpages we are addicted to. And after that some of us wrote and published posts retroactively on our blog. But the time was running fast away on our last whole day in Rome, and suddenly we went away to our last meeting.

This meeting was set to take place with four journalists who are involved with a project called IRPI (Investigative Reporting Project Italy). The project consists of a group of Italian journalists and was made in reaction to the absence of media that is not are under political influences. In Italy most of the media is owned of politicians and parties, or at least have very strong connections to either the left or right side of the political scale. And the connections are often much more extreme than those of Sweden.

The journalists began to talk about the situation for journalists who are not a part of the big media institutions in Italy, which they mentioned as the “journalist order”. The order is a mix between a trade union and a club for journalists in Italy. To become a member in this order you have to pay an amount of money every year and you have to either work as a trainee for 18 months or go through a special education that costs a lot of money. So if you have a journalist degree from abroad and written articles in newspapers like the guardian, you´re still not good enough to call yourself a journalist in Italy. And if you´re not a part of the order you have to pay 32 % in taxes instead of 4%. So it´s a very odd situation that many of the free-lance journalists are in.

Wall of journalists at the meeting with IRPI

Wall of journalists at the meeting with IRPI

IRPI has just launched the first platform for whistleblowers in Italy and they have many scoops on the way. They also work hard on creating new ways to reach out to people. I really recommend to follow this project on either twitter or at their website www.irpi.eu, I think this project will play a big role in the future of Italian media.

After this meeting we finished our inspiring and wonderful weekend in Italy with a walk through Rome. Our gelateria-addict Anahita got a taste of her favorite ice cream in the whole world, and then we walked to the very charming area Trastevere. We there found a very good aperitivo place called KmZero that served prosciutto, cheese, jam and wine that was out of this world.

Preparation if the aperitivo

Preparation if the aperitivo

The most impressive handlebar moustache in Trastevere

Kate, Gon and Lily

Kate, Gon and Lily

Then the time was set for our last dinner in a genuine Italian restaurant, in front of which we stood in line for a half hour just to get a table. But the food and the whole authentic Italian experience made it worth it! So the evening gave our journey the great ending it deserved.

Our last dinner in Rome at Augusto in Trastevere

Our last dinner in Rome at Augusto in Trastevere

Arrivederci Roma e arrivederci il blog!

/ Alexander A