So...I'm still off on vacation. I'm in Rome now. My wife already posted something to her blog, but I have a rant of my own. On the train from Paris to Rome, someone broke into our cabin and stole my laptop and camera. The laptop was her old G4 PowerBook and the camera wasn't too expensive either, so I'm not too upset about that. However, I lost all of my pictures from the first 6 days of our vacation. I had some really good photos from Paris, especially the tripod shots from the catacombs.

Stop reading if you're Italian.

Once we got to Rome, it was like arriving in a 3rd world country. We either went to or called 4 police stations to report the theft, and they were all...closed. Closed?!?! WTF?!? We finally got to an open police station today, and there was a couple from England who and been robbed (1.000€!!!) on the same train.

I get the distinct impression that the train conductors, who only speak Italian, are in on it. The didn't tell us to lock the doors or even tell us that there were locks. Since train theft is obviously common, it seems obvious to warn people. Not everyone rides these trains all the time. There shouldn't be anyone getting on or off the train in the night (at border stops, etc.), so they might also check people there.

Needless to say, I was pretty pissed all day yesterday. Rome may have been a great nation, but Italy not so much.