The president of the United States, Donald Trump, threatening tariffs on allies and a couple of islands inhabited only by penguins. (Yuri Gripas/Abaca Press/Tribune News Service)
I’ve traveled from Istanbul to Xi’an to Capetown to Lake Titicaca. The only other time I’d flown with this tiny flutter of anxiety in my belly was after 9/11, when I covered the 2004 Olympics in Greece. Don’t draw attention to the fact that you’re American, they warned us at the time. Don’t fly the flag. Don’t make yourself a target.
And then the plane landed and the Italian vacation started. And it was lovely.
If I post enough vacation photos, can I expense my gelato? An investigation.
I can’t speak for everyone on the planet, but the locals I met were friendly, welcoming and deeply, deeply uninterested in talking about Donald Trump. They weren’t angry at Americans. If anything, they seemed to feel a little bit sorry for America.
“You seem nice,” said the clerk in the Roman pharmacy where we had stopped to scan the shelves for a wild brand of Italian toothpaste that comes in flavors like rhubarb, anise and jasmine. Emphasis on the “you.”
OK, maybe the rest of the world hates me a *little.*
In the middle of our trip, white smoke rose above the Vatican. We had a new pope. An American. A Midwesterner. Our first Ope.
