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My apartment in Trastevere is heaven during the day. I can sit on my two terraces enjoying the views, reading or do some gardening.  

However, at night the scenario changes completely. The historical center is home of hordes of rowdy youngsters that get drunk and litter our most beautiful piazzas leaving behind a carpet of broken glass and trash. 

Today(June 26) the NYTimes has published an article with the headline "Rome welcomes tourism con brio, but non troppo". The journalist Peter Kiefer faithfully depicts what happens at night also publishing a picture of Piazza Trilussa, right downstairs from where I live.  

One morning after a wild & noisy night I am so angry to be awaken in the early hours
of the morning by fights that take place downstairs. So I throw out eggs very often now on to the wild people that don't seem to care about us residents. 

Many of my friends know this. Elvira, in particular, thinks it's a shame using fresh eggs as bullets and is so nice as to provide old ones that she carefully keeps aside for me. I appreciate that.

"NYTimes Photo"

Better believe it, the 25-year reign of the Copper River salmon is over. The new king comes from the mighty Yukon River, and the architect of its ascendancy is (no real surprise) the same power-behind-the-throne, Jon Rowley.

Nothing personal, the assembled court seemed to say (to the Copper) at a luncheon at Elliott's Oyster House. You've had a remarkable run, leading Seattle diners into new realms of taste. But the new guy, well, he's everything you were (and still are) only more so!

Technically, the more intense flavor comes from additional fat: up to 50 percent more of those nutritious Omega 3 oils. The Yukon River is 2,000 miles long and the salmon have to swim for up to two months without eating before they reach their spawning grounds. (The Copper is much shorter, though more rugged.)

Until last year, most Yukons were frozen and shipped to Japan; very few fresh fish ever made it out of Alaska. It's a long, tough slog from the village of Emmonak, pop. 767, so remote that a dozen eggs cost $5.50 past-pull-date milk is $10 a gallon, and an airplane ticket to Anchorage, 1,000 miles across the tundra, is $800. What's made the difference in this remote location is a five-year-old cooperative established by the local Yup'ik Eskimo community called Kwikpak Fisheries, which hooked up with Rowley to work out logistics and marketing.

Down on the Copper, the fishery is sophisticated: big boats with communications gear and power winches to reel in the gill nets. The mouth of the Yukon is broader and shallower, so boats are open skiffs; it's not unusual to find an entire family aboard to haul the nets in by hand. The natives have been fishing like this for the past 10,000 years.

What's different for the Yukon fishery this season is simple: ice. Kwikpak, buying only from boats that keep their catch iced, ships them by bush plane to Anchorage, then by regular airfreight to Seattle.

The season starts tomorrow and it's a short one, maybe three weeks, 30,000 to 60,000 fish max.

Rowley reminds us that the oilier the fish, the denser the flesh, and the more important to cook it properly. No rare, pink-in-the-middle preparation here; it needs to reach an internal temp of 115 degrees. A bit of salt is all it needs for seasoning. Sear it quickly, then let it absorb the heat of a 250-275-degree oven for ten minutes or so. It will ooze that nutritious Omega 3 oil all over the plate, speading its rich, deep flavors to a few simply grilled summer vegetables.

The fish will taste like velvet.

Air France 046 touched down in Seattle right on schedule last Monday–the first-ever nonstop flight from CDG to SEA, water cannons spraying the Airbus A330 in a festive salute, the pilot waving French and American flags from his cockpit window. Champagne toasts and official speeches followed, blessing this long-overdue rapprochement of the Eiffel Tower and the Space Needle.

Francophile Seattle Times columnist Nicole Brodeur said we'd finally been kissed on both cheeks by the standoffish French. But the rest of Seattle's media reacted with a yawn. No mention at all in the Post-Intelligencer, which hasn't prevented them from prominent displays of Air France ads for the past several weeks. KING's Glen Farley's workmanlike, two-minute clip covered the basics (50,000 passangers a year fly to Paris out of SeaTac, but have to make a connection), while KOMO's Akiko Fujita whined about the price of the nonstop trip. Got news for you, Akiko: if you think the flight's expensive, wait till you order the escargots when you get there (about $21 a dozen most brasseries these days).

Seriously, this is not about the cost of air travel. A nonstop flight from Seattle to Paris is about our own sense of identity. Sure, we've been able to reach London, Amsterdam or Copenhagen overnight for decades. But Paris has always eluded us. Now we can live happily in Seattle, just knowing that we can follow up today's lunch at Le Pichet with lunch tomorrow on the Champs Elysées. I tell you, it's life-changing.

What's more, some of those 65 million Frenchies now get to do the same thing: visit Seattle. Little-known fact: the average French visitor to the US is on his <i>third or fourth</i> trip. Air France knows that travel demand can't be one-sided, but until recently, Seattle was in the backwoods of French consciousness. Now, with media exposure and the boom in hi-tech, that's no longer the case. The clincher, for Air France ceo Jean-Cyril Spinetta, came at a dinner with French business leaders (carefully orchestrated by Port of Seattle officials) just a few months ago. Finally convinced of the pent-up demand from the European side, Spinetta okayed that 200-seat Airbus, promising to switch to a Boeing 777 if the extra 100 seats can be justified by the headcount.

Allons, les enfants! On va à Paris!

This is too good. First, Seattle Opera got in on the frenzy of Seattle's boosterish Pigs on Parade, whipping up an "Opera Pig" named Rusty. Then the scenic studios manager, Michael Moore, composed a 20-second "aria" for the pig to sing, and persuaded baritone John Boehr to lend it his voice.

A bit of electronic wizardry in Rusty's snout senses when people come snooping around the plaza in front of McCaw Hall, prompting Rusty to belt out "La Canzone del Maiale." Rough translation: Whatta day, whatta song, what great singing, this (snort!) song of the pig!"

Didn't sound rusty to me. More like Pigoletto. Or Pigliacci. Or Le Nozze di Pigarro …

The whole thing's on YouTube; here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/v/MR3bvgG2XgA

or try clicking on the pig.

Inside Berlin with Henrik I experienced Berlin so very differently because of Henrik (Henrik Tidefjaerd, our InTouch Travel host in Berlin). He's not a true Berliner but, rather, a Berliner by adoption (originally from Sweden, who studied in the UK and Spain before moving here), a Berliner who does not take things for granted.

 He walks through this very green and lush city with open eyes and opens doors & windows literally to show you the life of the local people: Huge courtyards that open up, where you find little stores, art & galleries many cafes & restaurants with benches, tables & chairs under shady trees; chic and traditional, old and faded, as well as techno modern.  

We sat four hours in his favorite Café Bravo in the Hacker’sche Hoefe discussing cultural differences: A German from the US, a Swede in Germany. Henrik is very impressed and considers Berlin a city where everything is ssible. He explains: Every thing you do in Berlin it is about being out and about. It is about meeting people, of coming together, discussing serious and not so serious topics, being stimulated or inspired, and all this around a huge dining room table he calls Berlin!