Napoli - Mamma Mia!

[joizy]

I just arrived in Napoli.

The train was supposed to be 5 hours from Reggio Calabria. It was very slow moving in the beginning and we arrived 50 minutes late. I thought Mussolini had gotten the trains to run on time…

Anyway, as soon as I started to get close to the central station my phone started blowing up. I was preparing for my arrival, checking the instructions Chat GPT had written for me on how to use the metro, and also looking for restaurant options in the station so I could eat before getting on the metro to head to my Airbnb. I wasn’t answering people, but I was looking at their messages.

One guy was very insistent. I finally told him I was on the train and was just arriving and asked him to please wait. He kept insisting that I send him photos, even though I have all of the photos I share on my profile, so I finally blocked him, even though I was kind of interested in him. He was way too aggressive.

That is one difference I have noted immediately between the guys here and the guys in Reggio. Only one guy from Sicily who messaged me when I was in Messina got aggressive with me. When I didn’t answer him right away, he wrote, “thank you for the response”, so I just blocked him. He was somewhere in Sicily that I was not going to visit, and isn’t a non-response a response anyway?

I arrived at the station and found a food court. Had some decent carbonara and a salad without dressing, and then took the metro to my stop. Successfully found my Airbnb, after some struggle with the host, got the WiFi code and finally got connected and settled.

All through this, Grindr was blowing up. Guys writing and asking where I was from, even though my screen name says “scambio 🇮🇹🇺🇸” and I say up front that I am an American in Napoli for a few days.

My profile is still that I am looking for someone to show me around and do language exchange, because honestly, that is what I want, but these guys are horny and insistent. They jump straight to the end of my profile where I say clearly, “I only suck”. Some question that. Some want to know if they can suck me. Some want to know if I get fucked.

In the short time I’ve been here (about 3 hours now), I have blocked several people because they just would not stop, even when I said, “I’m looking for my Airbnb, please wait” or “I just got here, give me a minute”, or if I didn’t respond at all, they continued messaging me and said things like “I’m too ugly?” Or “You’re not interested?”

The good news is I have several prospects lined up who look like they might be fun. Nice meaty dicks, nice bodies, handsome faces. One wants to fuck me but I told him I only fuck the second time we meet. If I’m going to do all of that prep, i want to make sure it’s worth it. He kept pushing, but I finally told him “that’s what makes it special” and I think he was satisfied.

One thing I did notice is that there are a LOT of visitors. So, I can add one more thing to my list of why I was so popular in Reggio - very little competition. If Italians are looking for foreigners because they feel they are more discreet encounters, then in Reggio there is very little competition because it’s not high on the list of places foreigners visit.

I only have a few days here, and I actually want to do some sightseeing, so I am going to be selective about who I meet. So far, it looks encouraging.

Oh, also, a guy wrote to me in English (all of the others were writing in Italian) and asked, “Are you in my home?” - he sent only a face photo. We chatted a little and he sent restaurant recommendations and suggestions about places to visit. It doesn’t really look like anything will happen beyond that with him, but it was nice to have a neighbor reach out.

Napoli is about 5 times the size of Reggio, so there will be more guys here, but also more competition. Stay tuned.

[12is12]

Recommendation for dealing with pestering when u r busy:

Either dont respond until u have time enough 2 chat,

Or msg "busy now chat later", and then block all those who continue pestering.

[PeterRS]

Have you had any problems with airbnb in Italy so far? I had a strange one in Bologna a few years ago. I liked its location near the station and had no problem walking there. As requested I had called for instructions about the code to open the main building door and then a second code to get into the accommodation which had four bedrooms.

Having gone across the road for a quick dinner, everyting worked when i returned. The following morning, though, it all went berserk. I could not get out! There was just a simple button to press to open the apartment door. It did not work. I tried calling the owner but it took 25 wasted minutes of no answer until the maid arrived. Turned out there were actually two buttons and the one labelled "Press to exit" was the wrong one! Yet it had worked the previous evening! When I got back that evening, this time I could not get into the  building. They changed the exterior door codes weekly and had not sent the new one to my phone! This was infuriating, even though the room was large and pleasant. Thankfully I was only there for 2 nights.