Confusion in Bern

Walking along the river in Bern, my attention was attracted by two large notices on the wall of a school building facing a playground. One read ” Fussballspiel verboten” ( football is forbidden); the other, immediately below and just as large, was “Fussballspiel gestattet” (football is allowed).
Tourism in Italy registered a record year in 2017, and the beginning of 2018 also appears positive. Therefore all is well, with brilliant prospects which encourage investment in the industry. Here, too, like in the case of the Bern school, we can share this view or think the opposite. The country is getting ready for general elections where the various political parties are making scary electoral promises, if we think of the high public debt. The world news are in turn disquieting – the USA administration, Korea’s nuclear impact and so on and so forth.
The large hotel companies in the world are intent on placing their flags on the more touristically important countries, and Italy, too, should benefit from this in a global development perspective. But here is where the “Bern syndrome” applies; on the one hand our country is attractive, but, at the same time, it is undermined by red-tape constraints, high taxes, and the cost of labour (in spite of sometimes inadequate salaries), which affect investments and often lead to forgoing plans to be present in Italy.
Everything and the opposite of everything.
At any rate, we are tackling the new year with commitment and optimism, and preliminary data from the accommodation and tourism business are encouraging, in the hope that, during the year, we won’t have to add a new notice, like in Bern.