Torpignattara/Banglatown - Global Rome: Changing Faces of the Eternal City - page 67

torpignattara 2010—what is left of the marranella borghetto.
Photo by Alessandra Broccolini.
ment blocks that are between two and four stories, some of them today in a very
poor state, and the ubiquitous 1960s and 1970s “mega-blocks” with eight to ten
floors. scattered around, one can also find semirural buildings, today cottages,
that are linked to small plots of land, and some abandoned farmhouses typi-
cal of the “agro Romano” (the Roman countryside). finally, the district counts
some important archaeological remains scattered about the Casilino territory:
the mausoleum of saint helena, the alessandrino aqueduct, and the catacombs
of saint marcellinus and saint peter.10
The bangladeshis have moved into the network of streets starting from Via
della marranella and continuing along Via eratostene, Via pavoni, and Via mag-
giolo. The leopard's spots give a good idea of the social and cultural configuration
that this area is experiencing.
a young woman working for the government, originally from Calabria, had
lived in torpignattara for about ten years and was trying to move house; she
did not like this area with “all those black people” and identified a clear fron-
tier between one street and another; beyond a certain “zone” there were “the
blacks,” she told me, where she would never go and live. another woman, also in