Small pleasures as Italy reopens after Christmas lockdowns
ROME (AP) — Much of Italy gingerly reopened Monday from pre-Christmas coronavirus closures, with the Vatican Museums welcoming a trickle of visitors to the Sistine Chapel and locals ordering their cappuccinos at outdoor tables for the first time in weeks.
While many European countries remain in hard lockdowns amid surging COVID-19 infections and variants, five more Italian regions graduated to the coveted “yellow” category of risk starting Monday. That meant museums and the Colosseum could reopen, sit-down restaurant and bar service could resume during the day and many high schoolers could return to class part-time.
“Finally we can breathe again after this long period of staying at home,” waiter Elsafty Rashad said as he set up tables outside La Nonna Betta restaurant in Rome’s Ghetto neighborhood. “Without work, staying at home every day is too difficult for us young people who work, who have to pay rent and everything else.”
Italy is by no means out of the woods: The country is averaging around 12,000-15,000 new confirmed cases and 300-600 COVID-19 deaths each day. But it appears to have avoided the severe post-Christmas surges in Britain and elsewhere thanks to tightened restrictions over the holiday that kept ski slopes closed and prevented residents from traveling outside their regions for big family get-togethers.
Many travel restrictions remain in place, along with indoor and outdoor mask mandates, a 10 p.m. curfew, limits on public transport and other social-distancing norms aimed at preventing the health system from buckling under.
Tuscany, for example, was declared “yellow” last week and on Monday its famed Uffizi Gallery reported that around 7,300 visitors had already passed through its doors. Museum director Eike Schmidt said he hoped the government would allow the museum to reopen on...
