back to article FLICK my FLINT and SNIFF my TREE on the streets of Naples

Youtube Video "See Naples and die" the saying goes. After visiting the city recently, I can believe it. Hang around there long enough and you’ll be dead. The likely causes of your imminent death in Naples are many: you might be run over by a motor scooter, stumble into a pothole in the broken pavements, get hit by falling …

  1. frank ly

    Maybe ....

    .... they smoke in their cars and thus need the little tree freshener?

    1. tfewster
      Joke

      Re: Maybe ....

      As a smoker, I find the smell of a "little tree" freshener far more offensive than cigarette smoke. Don't get me started on those who eat citrus fruit in the office or marinate themselves in perfume.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        I, for one..

        Don't get me started on those who eat citrus fruit in the office or marinate themselves in perfume.

        I, for one, would welcome the use of a lighter when someone decides to follow the ads and empty half a can of Axe deo on their armpits. Those ads should have never been broadcast, ugh.

      2. Alistair Dabbs

        Re: Maybe ....

        >> those who eat citrus fruit in the office

        My wife was in a sauna when a woman walked in, sat down and proceeded to munch through an orange. Everyone else had to leave because they were unable to breathe.

        BTW, "munch through an orange" isn't a euphemism. At least, not yet.

        1. Trigonoceps occipitalis

          Re: Maybe ....

          Neither are oranges the only fruit.

      3. frank ly

        @tfewster & AC Re: Maybe ....

        The zest of orange peel is flammable. You two could get together and work on something involving a lighter.

        1. Roq D. Kasba

          Why lighters and air fresheners?

          100-odd years ago in London it would have been matches and bootlaces, another unlikely combination.

          You see varaitions all over - the purpose of the goods is to be legit to approach strangers when you can either 1) sell them an overpriced cheap item 2) beg for money in order to get rid of you 3) hold them still and distract them whilst your mate picks their pocket. Streetside shoe polishing is the same deal.

          The Big Issue is better as it has a decent margin but also prohibits vendors from selling tat or begging, and has an backup infrastructure to help move people on (hopefully)

      4. Evil Auditor Silver badge

        Re: Maybe ....

        @tfewster

        As a non-smoker, I find the smell of those little tree fresheners far more offensive than cigarette smoke. No joke.

      5. firefly

        Re: Maybe ....

        Has anyone noticed that since the smoking ban pubs now reek of an unpleasant mix of BO, urine and vomit? Tobacco smoke was very effective at masking it and pubs smelled far better then than they do now.

        1. Andrew Moore

          Re: Maybe ....

          ...and stale beer; which is the last thing you'd want a pub to smell of (not that your examples are welcome either)

    2. Dan 55 Silver badge

      Re: Maybe ....

      But would they be so desperate that they'd be willing to drive to and park in the centre of Naples to buy their magic trees and lighters?

  2. Mystic Megabyte
    Pint

    Pro tip

    I know a guy who was pulled over by the police for a breath test. Realising that he had no mints he quickly eat the little tree "air freshener". How he managed that I don't know but even though he'd drunk several pints he passed the test!

    In Milan some years ago the police sealed off all the main roads just before the afternoon commute. The whole place was gridlocked. The reason? It was a rehearsal for a summit conference (G8?) the following day.

    1. durandal

      Re: Pro tip

      Unfortunately, the breathaliser isn't especially interested in the smell but rather the alcohol content. The design is such that it disregards the first part of the blow and does its work on the last gasp. The only purpose the mints serve is to try and disguise the smell from the copper. The machine cares not.

      It is possible to drink several pints and stay under, but it depends entirely on the metabolism of the subject, their weight and other body factors, the strength and type of drink, time elapsed since drinking, how long it took for the drinks to be drunk etc etc.

      Which is a long winded way of saying that the tree just served to make him feel queasier than he already was!

    2. John Gamble
      Boffin

      Re: Pro tip

      The guy you know was just repeating a humorous (but false) story. I'm sure it got a good laugh at the pub, but as snopes.com points out, it doesn't work.

  3. Mage Silver badge
    Black Helicopters

    Welcome Back

    I wondered if you are meant to set fire to trees?

    Retailing could be worse if it was logical and accurate. Imagine if Amazon/Tesco/Google/ebay perfect their profiling and send you adverts and vouchers for stuff you actually want!

    1. Graham Dawson Silver badge

      Re: Welcome Back

      The big brick and mortar retailers generally do send you vouchers for things that you want - or more accurately things that you are more likely to buy based on your shopping habits. They can be disturbingly accurate in their predictions - so accurate that they have to toss in unrelated vouchers to mix things up a bit.

      Online retailers are amateurs in comparison.

      1. TheProf

        Re: Welcome Back

        Accurate profiling? So that's why Amazon has just sent me an email inviting me to sign up for regular deliveries of baby wipes.

        If only I had a baby.

        Or had bought baby related things in the past.

        Or had even looked at baby goods.

        Nope! Not me.

        1. Shady
          Trollface

          Re: Welcome Back

          Have you looked in the bin, to see if there are any, erm, testing kits that your missus has recently used?

          1. Omgwtfbbqtime

            Re: Welcome Back

            Nappybags are a good way to dispose of the tissues and condoms, allowing snuggling/snoring without either of you staggering to the bathroom afterwards for cleanup.

            First to go to the loo in the morning bins the bag.

            So baby products are still handy without babies!

          2. VeganVegan
            Trollface

            Re: Welcome Back

            Obligatory XKCD ref

            http://xkcd.com/1540/

        2. Alistair Dabbs

          Re: Welcome Back

          >> If only I had a baby. >> Or had bought baby related things in the past. >> Or had even looked at baby goods.

          I think you should have a quiet word with your wife. She may have a surprise for you.

          1. TheProf

            Re: Welcome Back

            Well that would be the logical answer except that I'm single and without a girlfriend.

            Could it be Amazon subtlety telling me to stop enjoying myself and settle down to a life with pipe and slippers?

            1. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge
              Coat

              Re: Welcome Back

              Well that would be the logical answer except that I'm single and without a girlfriend.

              Identity theft? Wait until the child support payment demands start arriving...

            2. This post has been deleted by its author

  4. Doctor_Wibble

    More smutty euphemisms!

    Lighting joysticks in the glove compartment? Sounds utterly filthy!

    Either the word auto-suggest came up trumps again or there's a whole section of urbandictionary I need to both read and avoid...

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    You only need use the lighter once.

    You get bonus points if you set the vendor on fire with their own flaming garbage.

  6. armyknife

    Wacky Idea

    So you couldn't see the poverty for the trees.

    1. John H Woods Silver badge

      Re: Wacky Idea

      @armyknife it is certainly the case that doorstep sellers in the UK have the same old collections of stuff. You even see the same weird items (car window escape hammer and seat belt cutter?, 'amazing' super scissors which can cut 2p coins [i.e. bog standard angled blade serrated steel sheers]).

      My guess is that these people are at the bottom of various pyramids, or at any rate, simply selling anything they think they can sell which makes them a reasonable margin - it's just two steps up from begging (the next step is washing windscreens at traffic lights) and I think you are correct that the principle reason for the weird item choice is poverty.

  7. jake Silver badge

    Street vendors ...

    ... in general, sell nothing useful worldwide. Except street food, of course.

    1. Doctor_Wibble

      Re: Street vendors ...

      I see street food has been correctly described as 'useful' not 'edible'*.

      *NB 'edible' not equivalent to 'ingesting by mistake'

      1. Omgwtfbbqtime

        Re: Street vendors ...

        Ah, but the sausages are your genuine pig product.

        1. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge
          Pint

          Re: Street vendors ...

          Real Pig product? How must sawdust/rusk do you think are in the average Roadside burger van saussage?

          Now if the bangers were the ones from my local butcher that are made with 'Hogs Back Bitter' or proper Lincolshire Bangers then fine but the average fast food outlet serves crap IMHO.

          http://www.alfturner.com/about-us/

          http://www.alfturner.com/products/hair-of-the-hog-sausages/

          Those will be on the barbie later. Drinks? Surrey Nirvana and T.E.A naturally.

          1. This post has been deleted by its author

      2. Sarah Balfour

        Re: Street vendors ...

        ODWR:

        http://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/Cut-Me-Own-Throat_Dibbler

        As I'm shocked he's not been mentioned yet…

  8. Tromos
    Coat

    The automatic banana peeler sounds useful

    Those automatic bananas can be a bugger to peel.

    1. Alistair Dabbs

      Re: The automatic banana peeler sounds useful

      >> Those automatic bananas can be a bugger to peel.

      Ah, I can see where you're going wrong. Try holding it in your hand instead.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Headmaster

    "to see the city’s most famous sites"

    Web sites? Building sites? Or did you mean sights?

    1. Alistair Dabbs

      Re: "to see the city’s most famous sites"

      Sites. As in locations to visit. Sights can't be closed at weekends, unless of course someone covers them up with vast amounts of cloth.

      1. Terry 6 Silver badge

        Re: "to see the city’s most famous sites"

        No. Sights, as in things to see.

        Not sites as in places.

        The sights of a city are the tourist attractions.

        The sites of a city are where they are building the tourist attractions.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "to see the city’s most famous sites"

          I think you're actually both right, it depends on what you seek to express.

          Alastair's interpretation is specific locations in a city that are worth seeing. Yours is about anything worth seeing, not necessarily just locations (for instance, the early morning view across a valley when the fog hasn't quite burned off, or the wildlife in a park/nightclub :) ).

  10. Elmer Phud

    And to think we only have to put up with countless faces on the telly asking if we've got 'pee pee eye'.

  11. Sureo

    Another hazard of Naples

    Mt. Vesuvius may erupt again.

    "... it is regarded as one of the most dangerous volcanoes in the world because of the population of 3,000,000 people living nearby and its tendency towards explosive eruptions." - Wikipedia

    1. Alistair Dabbs

      Re: Another hazard of Naples

      Yes, I read that. Apparently, the volcano was either erupting or constantly puffing out smoke for millennia right up until 1944, when the last eruption collapsed the interior. This means it has not been able to let off er... steam for 66 years and may be bottling something up pretty big, and it's 50-or-so year blast cycle is overdue now. We went for a walk around the crater.

      1. ian 22

        Re: Another hazard of Naples

        Did Little Trees ameliorate (lovely word that) Vesuvius' sulphurous exhalations? Imagine the conflagration when lava comes in contact with millions of those disposable lighters.

      2. Martin
        WTF?

        Re: Another hazard of Naples

        So......

        This means [Vesuvius] has not been able to let off er... steam for 66 years and may be bottling something up pretty big, and it's 50-or-so year blast cycle is overdue now.

        And therefore...

        We went for a walk around the crater.

        Well, all I can say is, you're braver than I am !

  12. Jan 0 Silver badge

    SItes

    Hmm, so you didn't like Naples? If you'd visited Herculaneum you'd realise that modern Napoli is just an endlessly repatched antique city, with the new merging imperceptibly with the old. Notice how many of the roads are constructed from the same stone squares as the 2000 year old ones! You also have to gawp in amazement at the autostrada on stilts that lurks high above the tower blocks, but don't gawp too long as you may find yourself run down by a funeral carriage that seems to be about 300 years too late for the funeral. If you want to feel truly alive, try plunging into the traffic on a nippy motorbike. Oh, did you also notice that it's still possible to buy a real pizza there? A circle of dough with just the minimum of topping to enrapture your mouth.

    Naples always makes me go wow! Visiting Naples is like being in a pacy thriller.

    1. jake Silver badge

      Re: SItes

      Pizza is just a hot, open-faced sandwich. It has existed as long as humans have been baking bread in stone/clay ovens. People who think it originated in Naples are completely deluded.

      THAT said, Naples has been doing a good job of separating fools from their money since roughly 1945. Awful, awful place. Worse than San Francisco, even. And that's hard.

    2. Alistair Dabbs

      Re: SItes

      Yes, we visited Herculaneum. Much of the ancient town is still under slums. However, it has not been possible to acquire the slums with a view to widening the archaeological site and move the unfortunate residents into better accommodation because, according to our Italian guide, intransigence on the part of local politicians in the pockets of criminal gangs. How terribly exciting, I must say.

      I think they are holding out for more cash from the charity that supports the dig: the Packard Foundation, set up by David you know who.

  13. chivo243 Silver badge
    Devil

    dogshit per square metre than in Paris

    I thought Amsterdam was the dogshit capital of the world.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWBQdWzBukI

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: dogshit per square metre than in Paris

      I must admit that Amsterdam doesn't really float my boat, if you pardon the pun, but that may be because I'm not into drugs, and as red light districts are a bit yawn as well IMHO I guess that removes its main attractions. Sure, there is some interesting stuff moored in harbours but once you've seen that it's pretty much downhill from there.

      My next "places to visit for a week or so" are Paris and Florence - both have stunning musea for which a week is barely enough to scratch the surface. It's also not hard work to get good food in there either (I'm personally rather partial to especially real Italian cuisine), and you haven't lived unless you have tried to drive across Place d'Étoile (I never really subscribed to calling it Place Charles de Gaulle) in a rental car with full insurance :).

  14. Zot

    I was struck by the poverty of the place.

    And when I was there the mafia run rubbish collection group had gone on strike for quite a while, the rubbish was strewn high at the end of streets. It was a hot week, and it stank.

    But I enjoyed the visit to Ercolano (Herculaneum)! Just not the train journey, packed full of kids selling shoes etc and assorted poor people.

    It makes you thankful for what you've got though, of course.

  15. Terry 6 Silver badge

    Online retailers

    "Normality is an online retailer who thanks me for my recent purchase of ink cartridges and asks me if I’d like to buy a bicycle."

    No, not quite.

    Normality is the Online retailer who thanks me for my recent purchase of ink cartridges and asks me if I’d like to buy ink cartridges.

    1. Jan 0 Silver badge

      Re: Online retailers

      @Terry 6: somehow I don't think you buy much stuff online. Normality != Sanity

      1. Terry 6 Silver badge

        Re: Online retailers

        Fair point; Normality, in this respect relative to the normal behaviour of online retailers.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Spot on!

    Damn Dabbsy, I've lived most of my life in Naples (I managed to escape some time ago, luckily enough) and your article was a frighteningly accurate depiction of it. Just amplify your thoughts on it a hundred times and you'll have an idea of what it means to live there - I remember waiting 50 minutes every evening for a bus to pass only to find it filled to the brim with people. You'd have to squeeze yourself in, only to end up squished against a window for the rest of the trip.

    Every time I go back, it never ceases to amaze me how the place manages to get worse every year that passes. The problem mainly lies in its inhabitants - the majority only cares about their own business and won't think twice on screwing you over if there's something to be gained from it. The political class is even worse and they just focus on how much money they'll be able to steal/stash away/receive from "respectable businessmen" before their mandates end. There are still good people there, but they're getting rarer and rarer.

    I like quoting one of the best theatrical actors Italy had in the last century or so, Eduardo De Filippo - he was famously heard saying this to a group of young actors that asked him advice... "If you want to do something good with your life, run away from Naples"

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