Re: Napoli Away
This was sent to the fanzine King of the Kippax by a Liverpool fan and is his advice and experiance of Napoli away.I haven't posted it to scaremonger or frighten people,before all the ''I have heard all this bollocks before'' threads start,it is just to hopefully prepare and help blues going out there who may have no idea of the place.Article below:
Been given your email address via Ste Kelly. Funnily enough, I was going to put something on one of the City fanzine sites over the coming week or so anyway. Napoli - are you SURE you want to go? ;-)How much detail do you want?
Our group did two nights there. The place is virtuallly lawless. Totally controlled by the Camorra and has been for many, many years. It shows. Graffiti and rubbish adorn every street - we're not talking 'looking untidy like it's bin day' - we're talking ROADS COMPLETELY BLOCKED by MOUNTAINS of rubbish. And we're not talking about a bit of tagging being the current 'street' thing to do - we're talking every wall of every building, every staircase, every fountain, every statue, every monument, everything that resembles class or culture virtually blotted out of existence with spray paints and rubbish.
It's an absolute travesty, because if the place wasn't lawless from one decade to the next, it would be beautiful. Instead, it's at the other end of the spectrum.But that's not the biggest problem with going to Naples.
Now your 'getting in the way of having a few bevvies and a giggle with your mates' is split into two different, yet instantly interchangeable, groups;1. The street gangs.
I hope you've seen the Warriors and Escape from New York, because you'll be getting an idea of the kind of city and the 'after dark vibe' I'm trying to create here. There are little gangs of street urchins, bloody everywhere. They're there during the day and night - it's just that during the day, there are so many people around they're not immediately noticable, and the sheer hustle and bustle of the city provides an actual physical barrier to them getting 'in your face' as they seem so keen to do. But this isn't in an avuncular over-enthusiastic Istanbul type way, this is ‘ in a getting a kick out of seeing people as intimidated as possible’ sort of way. The later it gets, the more danger you're in if you're walking around. None of us in our group are particular shrinking violets, which probably saved us in a way. We were 'buzzed' by scooters, shouted at, had cars with 5/6 people in literally crawl alongside us all the way down certain streets late at night, staring at us, but there is something very distinctive that these 'street gangs' do and that's to try and amass numbers quick, because at the end of the day, like most gangs of little twats, they're cowards and want to vastly outnumber you. They do this in quite an effective way - like the old 'police whistle' system. If you get spotted, you'll get followed and they'll start doing their 'whistle', with fingers in mouths like they're trying to attract attention. You'll notice that other little shitbags will start gathering. It's almost like the pied piper. I'm sure there are enough rats in the city to create quite a scene..... That happened over both nights and we sort of fronted them out, got aggressive back (surprising how many languages 'fuck off' translates to isn't it) whilst sort of darting down a few side roads to get where we were going quicker than normal (think 'trying to look hard whilst going as quick as you can' speed). On the first night, whilst it was noticeable what they were trying to do and that they were trying to intimidate, we didn't exactly feel the need to start changing underwear - but what became apparent that other people had experienced made our little verbal exchanges a bit more sinister, upon reflection; Fella in his 60s getting slashed in the face, small groups of reds getting picked off and battered with weapons, somebody else stabbed. There are a few 'alfresco' bars around the city - a few of them were getting charged at by these gangs who were just running in with weapons and hitting or waving blades at anybody that looked slightly English (hence the fella in his 60s getting slashed). So that's two pieces of advice. a.) Try to minimise being on the streets too late, and if so, go in numbers - make your foot journeys as short as possible. b.) Don't sit alfresco in the early hours, because near enough all these slashings, batterings and stabbings happened after midnight, where these street urchins have got fuck all else to do. The whole city is FULL of them, so picture being in an outdoor cafe in Moss Side or Toxteth, as an out-of-towner, very late at night. You wouldn't do that would you? Yet when you're abroad on the ale, it feels safe and you relax. This city is like the worst areas in the worst English cities, all the time. If you keep that in mind, you'll be fine!
2. I mentioned the other thing that'll get in the way of your general enjoyment. The Mastiffs (the Napoli hoolies - I'm not even going to call them Ultras because quite frankly, Real Madrid have Ultras and the latter would run away if you coughed). Whilst they are also c*nts, they do seem to have SOME sort of code of conduct, but that's not to say that they're not infiltrated by said street rats, and will intersperse with them where they see fit.The Mastiffs will gather in the Piazza Bellini (a small, quite charming square) in the middle of the city on VIA SANTA MARIA DI COSTANTINOPOLI from as early as midday on the day of the game. I know all this because guess where our bloody hotel was! The hotel manager explained in detail about the Mastiffs effectively considering themselves as 'owning' this specific part of the city. You can tell where it is because the pale blue and white graffiti is everywhere around there. It's mainly a student area. They were gathered the night before the game in the square as well - this is before we were brought up to speed by the locals and the manager about them. We turned the corner and instantly knew it was their 'boys' - about 100 of them all drinking together. Most of us have travelled a lot all over Europe following the reds and we're pretty clued up. We crossed the road (6 v 100 wasn't great odds) and they didn't give us any shit at all. It's a bit like the old 'top firm' mentality. We were a soft target so they didn't bother.
The next day, we thought we'd be alright having lunch and a couple of beers in the square. We couldn't believe it when they were forming up at about 12.30. They were getting orders from their 'capitans' even at that time. After we'd been there about an hour, we were attracting a bit of attention from them. A fair few kept staring at us from across the square (we were the only three English looking people in the area!) and I think, in the end, they must have thought we were taking the piss because we didn't automatically leave their 'manor', so they started wandering over to us in ones and twos, walking past our table ridiculously slowly, staring at us. They might as well have just said 'fuck off out of our square', that would have done. We took the hint once the sixth person had virtually stood right at our table looking straight at us.Everywhere we went that day, the locals kept telling us there was going to be trouble. Looking at us like we were fucking mad going there in the first place, and even more mad considering going the match. We were beginning to think about jibbing the match, but considering that would be the first time in history we'd not gone 'out of fear' and the stick we'd get back home, quickly called each other names and accused somebody else of coming up with the idea first of staying in a bar, and that they're a softarse etc. etc. No, fuck you Mastiffs, we were going, end of. But we came up with the idea of going in taxis to avoid the buses which were obviously going to get bricked. Which brings me on to...Important point c.) Go on the official buses for fuck's sakeThe taxi drivers, because they are C*NTS, WILL drop you right in the middle of the home fans. Because of the layout of the ground, the roads around it and road closures etc., it's too much like hard work for them to drop you anywhere other than the wrong side of the away end, so you have to work your way through all the Napoli fans and most significantly, past the Ultras/Mastiffs gate, to get to the away end. Well that was mayhem. To actually have home fans visibly frightened ON YOUR BEHALF, and physically trying to usher you away from the worst Mastiffs purely out of wanting to avoid carnage, does heighten the senses somewhat. The ten of us end up pretty much separated, and instantly a big battle erupts between the Mastiffs, the Police and a few of us (plus one or two further straggler reds). There are baton charges, smoke grenades, stun grenades going off, bricks, bottles, signs flying through the air, the lot. I must admit that's the most scared I've been at a match (I was at Hillsborough but it's a long story) because I simply didn't know where to go and I ended up on my own in the middle of a riot, where loads of them didn't know whether to have a pop at me or at the police. Some fella ran after me with a lit flare in his hand, but luckily I'm quite quick so in the end he gave up and threw it at the riot police. I thought about twatting him but the 50 or so fellas behind him also running in my general direction had me thinking again. After running around like a single gazelle in a pack of lions for about 2/3 minutes, I decided that my best course of action was to run at the police shields and try and get behind their lines.......fortunately, I don't look Italian so they decided I wasn't worth battering. You should have seen the look on the stewards when I made it through the lines - given that the stun grenades were still going off, they couldn't have ushered me in behind their barrier with any more desperation - they were shitting it. I was bloody glad to get in there, I have to say :-D Everyone else turned up in the buses, encountered no problems whatsoever (from the opposite direction) and couldn't understand what the fuss was about. Thought we were making it up :-E Luckily all of our group came through pretty much unscathed. We got the buses back. They took us on a ridiculously convoluted route right out of the city and in again, which took a good hour, not including the 45 minutes or so between the end of the game and us getting on the buses. We were escorted by untold police. Just a quite beer after the game, but we had our second night of the street rats getting 'in our faces'. By that point, to be honest, we were sick of it and just wanted to twat them. We ended up getting an unofficial police escort back to our hotel. Day after the game, important point d.) Get out of Naples and go to Pompeii on the train. About half an hour away. No explanation needed.Well, good luck and that!I was on tripadvisor doing a review. I had to complete the sentence 'when in Naples, make sure you'.....wear a stab-proof vest. Not sure whether they published it or not.
