Rome has started to buzz again as residents of the Eternal City eagerly look for ways to return to some semblance of life as it was before the coronavirus caused it to shut down for nearly three months.
Almost all stores and shops were able to resume business on May 18, while on June 3 people could start traveling to other regions of the peninsula. All the countries in the European Union also opened their borders.
Restaurants and cafes in the Italian capital, especially those with outdoor seating, are showing encouraging signs of life again. And the traffic is back, as the Urb's notoriously aggressive motorists try to reclaim the city's potholed streets from a surprisingly significant chunk of the population that recently discovered how to ride a bicycle.
But the tourists, whose presence and pocketbooks have become increasing essential to the local economy, are still few and far between. So few, in fact, that Rome seems like a "normal" city right now.