Competitive City

Everything is a competition in this city. From the moment you leave the house, you are engaged in combat. It is, most often, a very serious business. Edging in front of others, enduring the sharp elbows of diminutive older women or the stilettos of their younger counterparts is all part of the battlefield you confront. Negotiating Naples is largely about assertiveness, portraying a ‘don’t mess with me face’ and adopting an air of self-importance.

Feebleness will get you nowhere. It is essential that you assume a posture that reflects an attitude of ‘I’m entitled to be here, most certainly more so than you’. It pays to be brazenly forceful. Those who are retiring and obliging will find themselves pushed to the side, waiting longer, paying more and struggling for attention and service. That is not to say that Neapolitans are rude, it’s just that there is a different set of etiquette.

The concept of queuing is yet to catch on in Naples. They certainly understand the idea of waiting one in front of the other according to the order of arrival. It is practiced to some degree in government offices, post offices and banks. Elsewhere however, it is a case of pushing in front of others, boldly and shamelessly. Everyone does it. It is an accepted norm. Anyone who fails in this affectation is quickly determined to be a foreigner or suffering from an affliction (perhaps shyness or introversion) which in itself sets them apart from the average Neapolitan.

There is no use rolling your eyes, huffing and puffing or mumbling under your breath. These will all be duly ignored, and place you even more firmly in the ‘must be foreign or non-Neapolitan’ category, thus encouraging the elbowing and hip shuffling to ensure you drop further towards the back.

The rules seem to be that upon entering a situation where a number of people are waiting for service, each individual weighs up how much more important they are and squeezes through the crowd to their place within the pack accordingly. This decision is based on a superficial appraisal of the customers that are already waiting. As elsewhere, the wealthier suburbs seem to have politer residents but this façade of more refined behaviour applies only in circumstances where everyone else is playing by the same rules. Once they come down town, with their manicured nails, coiffed hair, dressed in cashmere or linen, they know that to do their shopping and errands a competitive approach is required.

There is very little sense of the community first in Naples. The needs, wants and desires of the individual will, ordinarily, come well before any needs or considerations of the community - be it community as in a group of people, or the idea of an invisible cooperative spirit. In my experience, Neapolitans will very rarely put the community before themselves as individuals.

Perhaps this explains why queuing is something that they struggle with, even at the post office and banks. An extraordinary amount of conversation is conducted about who should stand where, in what order, interrupted only by the complaints at having to wait. Certainly, under the non-queuing system some of the ‘waiters’ would have already asserted their way to the service counter and had their query dealt with.

This me-first attitude reflects a lack of humility and unwavering arrogance that is uniquely Neapolitan. Ironically, the city functions (albeit slowly and haltingly at times) because everyone plays by the same set of rules. Respecting the community comes third to individualism and the family. This explains why it’s okay to double and triple park, drop litter and deface public property. It is okay to conduct conversations that block the flow of pedestrian traffic and scream from the courtyard to someone five floors up at any hour. It’s okay to ignore traffic laws, drive the wrong way along one-way streets and window shop along the footpath on a scooter. It’s expected that you’ll try to avoid taxes, sidestep government charges and ride for free on public transportation. No one will comment when you take your dog for a walk, off the leash, and fail to scoop its poop.

There is this idea of ‘furbo’. It literally translates to cunning, smart, clever. It is a cultural concept that may not be entirely understood until you’ve seen how things work beneath the surface. Italians, but Neapolitans in particular, take pride in employing ‘furbo’. The laws and regulations in place are so cumbersome that wherever possible people find a way around them. There are some rules that are blatantly broken, but often it’s a matter of sidestepping them with a certain delicacy and a delight at having outwitted the system. Besides, the thinking is ‘why should I obey the law when no one else does’? To do so just proves that you’re sap, a sucker, doing, waiting and paying when you don’t need to. The police are either uninterested or powerless to enforce the laws. What’s the point when the judges are going to dismiss the charges or take a bribe anyway?

Here is a recent example of ‘furbo’. The laws requiring motorcyclists to wear helmets have been in place for years. I estimate that about 50% of those riding motorbikes and scooters in Naples adhere to this law, significantly less than in the northern provinces. The police issued a spate of fines to riders caught without helmets. Some of them went to their doctors, complaining of migraines and depression. The doctors agreed that it is contrary to the health of the patient to have their heads enclosed in a small space when suffering from such conditions. The doctor duly wrote a medical report instructing that their patient be excused from wearing a helmet. This report was presented to the judge who agreed to waive the fine based on the doctor’s diagnosis. Instead of saying that people who can’t wear a helmet due to migraine or depression should not be riding a motorbike, the law has been ignored. This is classic ‘furbo’ at its simplest.

The other thing that happens is that if enough people break a particular law, or find a way around it, instead of punishing them, the law is amended or an amnesty issued. Neapolitans don’t fear the law. Because there just aren’t the same consequences applied. They know that if they wait long enough things will come around to their benefit. It might take thirty years but it will happen. They don’t have the same practice of community self-policing either, whereby if you drop some litter someone on the street will pull you up. If you cross the road away from the pedestrian crossing cars will beep at your selfishness, or a driver who fails to stop at the pedestrian crossing will feel guilty.

This is why, when taken out of their natural environment Neapolitans struggle to understand that laws, rules and social etiquette are in place for everyone to follow. And that it is agreed that following them makes everything work smoother, faster and in a more pleasant manner.

The problem is that Neapolitans come to miss the process of ‘furbo’. They like thinking up ways around the problems, the obstacles, the people, things and bureaucratic processes that hold them up. It takes some time for them to realise the benefit of obeying the speed limit, or paying that speeding fine on time. It takes a while before they see that dropping litter just metres from a rubbish bin doesn’t achieve anything (although in Naples it does create jobs, and with 30% unemployment that is hard to argue with). It doesn’t take long for them to understand that parking illegally may result in your car being towed away, as the inconvenience and expense of recovering your vehicle is not an ideal way to have a good day. They take longer to appreciate why people obey laws that are in place to protect them (like wearing helmets, stopping at traffic lights and not stepping in front of a bus) when they have managed to ignore the same rules and stay alive thus far.

‘Furbo’ is like a war, the individual against the state, the legislature, the police and the judiciary.

Everything is a competition in Naples. Let me take you through a typical day. I leave the house, and straight away have to compete with the market stalls that are illegally set up along our street. They have been plying their wares here much longer than I’ve been a local resident, so I weave my way through them only to compete to cross the road. Scooters fly along in both directions, delivery vans block the way, and cars with haughty horns drive along at a helter skelter pace. Judging the traffic, distance and speed, I walk across the road, cursing myself if I have to break my stride to pause while someone on wheels with more arrogance and bravado than me wins that round. At the newsagent, I slide into place to buy a bus ticket that I won’t use, but will have with me just in case the ticket inspectors show up. Across the road at the bus stop I wait for the bus, surveying those that are also waiting, weighing up how pushy I’ll have to be to get on the bus if it arrives already full of people. With two of the three bus doors used for boarding the bus, I may decide to wait for exiting passengers to get off before using the exit door to enter. I’m not so Neapolitan in my thinking yet that I can push my way onto the bus before others get off…too much time in London on the underground I suspect where it is clearly etiquette that you wait for those alighting before boarding.

Once on the bus it’s a competition for position. A seat near the exit door is prime position. You are expected to exit through the central door, and generally people will start jostling their way towards this door one or two stops ahead of time. This results in a crush of people standing in the middle of the bus, all asking those in front ‘are you getting off?’ in order to clearly indicate that they should have a priority spot. The bus pulls up at the stop and it can get very messy as the competition heats up. Fat loud teenagers, little wrinkly people with walking sticks, talk African guys with enormous plastic bags of stock, distrustful Chinese people with trolleys full of stock and short-tempered mothers with prams (that they fail to fold up to save space although this is the rule) loaded with babes and groceries compete to get off before the doors swing close. All the while people are trying to get on the bus through the same doors, knowing that if they use the other doors they may not manoeuvre to the right getting-off position in time for their stop, which maybe only 100 metres down the road.

I fall out of the bus and walk another twenty minutes to school. I walk along the footpath and compete with cars and motorbikes parked on the footpath. I step onto the road and compete with buses, trucks and more mothers with prams for space and right of way. Back on the footpath, I step into the gutter to avoid tables displaying cakes, biscuits and juices from the grocery store, and a card table with six men sitting playing cards as four others standing watching the game.

As I cross the piazza I compete with boys playing soccer, and prepubescent teenagers racing around on scooters, throwing wheelies as girls hold on tight their hair streaming behind. The tram sounds its dismal horn, delayed by Smart cars blocking the tram tracks. The Smart cars compete with each other. It’s important to know which tin can of a car has the most accessories, plays the worst music the loudest, as the drivers cruise around sussing out what other Smart car drivers are wearing, attitude exuding from every shiny panel.

Entering the business district, I compete with scooters parked in front of the pedestrian access, sometimes having to step up over the chains rigged to keep vehicles out. Inside the building I assess whether two of the four lifts are still out of order, the other people in suits and tight fitting low cut jeans waiting for the elevators and how pushy I’ll need to be to get up to the 13th floor quickly. Inside the school, I compete with the other teachers for the use of the internet. And I wrestle with the photocopier that too often fails to work, or takes forever to meet my photocopying needs in the time I have available. It is a competition to get resources, textbooks, white board markers and assistance. It is a struggle to be paid on a timely basis, and eventually you realise it’s an impossibility so asking for an advance is unavoidable. Getting the advance when you need it, for the amount you want, is another test.

In the classroom, I compete with the students for their attention, application and interest. I battle to stop them from speaking Italian, and occasionally clash with their sense of timing as they demand a coffee break or that the class finish ten minutes earlier than scheduled.

Back home I compete with a throng of homemakers at the bakery scrambling for bread freshly out of the ovens. In the supermarket, I compete to be served at the delicatessen counter, and squeeze by the woman with hips wider than mine as she decides what type of toilet paper to buy. It is a challenge at the checkout, especially when some local keenly aware of their right to ‘furbo’ has placed a basket of groceries in the queue, only to disappear to finish their shopping. Once the basket takes priority in the queue, with the owner still missing, we all wait, wait, wait, until either the owner arrives in a flurry of noted non-apology or the checkout operator dismisses the attempt at ‘furbo’ and serves the real people lined up behind the basket.

The girls on the street compete to have the fakest of orange tans, the heaviest make up and the tightest stretch T-shirts with some crass logo in glittery English. They also compete to see who can wear the most uncomfortable shoes, and I mentally give out first prizes left, right and centre. The guys vie with their haircuts and sparkling ear studs. Moreover, it’s a stand off to see who can wear the baggiest jeans, exposing the most underwear - of the white jock variety, not the groovy boxer short kind.

At home I decide to hang the washing out on the clothes rack on the balcony, taking advantage of the spring sunshine, only to bring it in later and realise the pigeons have outwitted me. I wash it again and hang it inside. I sweep the floors, only to see that more dust has floated in from the street and settled once again just hours later. I try to keep up with our consumption of coffee, sugar, pasta, bread and cherry tomatoes, but it’s a lost battle.

Everything is a competition in Naples. Everything is tied up with the idea of ‘furbo’.
You might ask though why do they all stay if everything is a race? A fight? A battle? If it’s all so difficult, why continue this way?

I think it’s a mindset. Neapolitans don’t consider their way of life a competition. They consider it a game, a challenge, a test. And if they can’t find a way to win, they simply change the rules, or ignore the problem, or turn to something guaranteed to leave them with that winning feeling like soccer, shopping, eating or talking.

Why wouldn’t you when the biggest competition is something that you have no chance of winning against should it decide to re-enter the game. Neapolitans know it, they embrace it, and they love it. Neapolitans live under the shadow of a fierce competitor, the Vesuvio volcano. Should it decide to play ball again no amount of ‘furbo’ will work.