Sidewalks in Rome are worst I've ever seen. Even in Russia, where roads "quality" is a joke for locals, sidewalks are more usable. In Rome, sidewalk might disappear suddenly and you are on the road with the baby carriage and cars around you.
It's far from the only city with bad sidewalks. It more than made it up for me that just like in most other cities, manhole covers and the like carry the insignia of the local communal administration. Here: S.P.Q.R. - suddenly branding efforts of Apple, Nike, the Coca Cola Company and so on seemed almost amateurish.
Far from what? I didn't say “the only”.
S.P.Q.R. is one of the oldest current brands, comes from the Roman Empire. Translates from latin to "The Senate and the people of Rome" I worked there for a year in 1974. Italians visiting from other parts of Italy claimed it stood for "Sono Porci Questi Romani". I love that city, need to find time to go back.
The Italian translation of the Asterix comics makes the Gauls spell it as "Sono Pazzi Questi Romani", these Romans are crazy. Asterix became popular at about the time you were working in Rome. I guess that this translation is the most popular one nowadays. Of course we know it's Senatus Popolusque Romanorum.