A man from Naples about his city...

I got a little grief from my American friends about my frank comments about Napoli.  Along the lines of, "Come on now.  You called the place a shithole!"  Maybe I was a bit harsh, but even though I was shooting from the hip -- not unusual for me -- I did and still believe that my assessment was correct.  As an arrogant American tourist anyhow.

E allora.  Yesterday I got an email from Vittorio D'Onofrio, who is from Naples.  He's lived all around Italy and in several other countries (and New York).  He had this to say about his hometown:

I think that Napoli is a very beautiful city, but most of (not all of them) the people that live in Napoli suck! Because they wanna be "smartasses", but they are stupid. And what you wrote is an example of it, they don't know how to treat the tourists. I feel sorry if you had hard time in Napoli, and in case you'll ever think to visit it again just write me an e-mail.

I feel sort of vindicated with a native son saying such things. 

How do you feel about this?  Are Vittorio and I wrong, are we being unjust?  Or have your experiences with that city by the bay given you the same feeling?

I don't know if I've been so terribly undiplomatic, when you think of what some big-time wine writers have written about the places they've had to go.  I remember Hugh Johnson, in his first Wine Atlas, writing about Partinico, Sicily.  He traced the name of the town back to the Latin Pars Iniqua, which he thought was an accurate description of the place.  It means "the dump."