Gaude felix Hungaria

O beata Ungheria! se non si lascia più malmenare! Oh happy Hungary! if she escapes further abuse! Dante, Paradiso, XIX.142-143.

Percentage of GDP invested in UNIVERSITIES
EU average 1.3%
Danemark 1.7%
Poland 1.6%
…
Hungary 1.1%
…
Italy-Slovakia 0.9%
=> WE ARE THE LAST ONES!

This tacepao requesting more money for Italian universities was photographed by Wang Wei at the university of Torino where he was a guest professor during the student manifestations of the last week. Finally a list where Hungary is not the last item, or: the garden of the neighbor is always greener. And in these days, with the Slovakian economy flying high and with the imminent introduction of the euro in Slovakia it is an especially pleasant balm on the aching Hungarian national pride to see our northern neighbor at the lowest point of the shame board, naši najhorší.

We should better not consider it more closely that the name of Ungheria is probably standing there between twice three dots as a negative rhetoric example, as to indicate the level of absurdity: “we are even deeper than this.”

Wang Wei has also made a great antiquarian bookshop tour in Torino. We hope to see his photoreportage here soon. The picture below he has sent ahead in any case suggests that there are a few things anyway in which Italy does not leg behind us.