The Cat Lady of Rome
Visitors to Rome used to be able to witness the city’s “cat lady”, who is no longer alive but who gave life and food - miles and miles of spaghetti, to be precise - to the many cats living in her district of the old Italian city. One young woman who visited Italy from Texas as a child said that her parents were rather disappointed that after visiting so many famous tourist sites, the only thing that the little girl recalled was the cat lady. This anonymous cat lady was an elderly widow who lived in the historical section of Italy near the Roman coliseum, and every day at an appointed hour she would venture into the street outside her home, and unwrap several newspapers full of cooked pasta. Cats would begin to arrive by the dozens to eat the pasta, and soon by the hundreds. It is estimated that nearly four hundred cats may have been fed by the old woman, in what turned into an astonishing spectacle.
Although you can visit Rome and its ruins, you will not be able to see the cat lady. But if you ask around, you will find many locals who enjoy telling the story of how the little old woman used to prepare enough pasta to feed hundreds of cats and then wrap it in newspapers to spread on the sidewalks as the cats seemed to appear out of nowhere and eat it voraciously. If you are especially lucky, you might even find someone with a photo of the event to share with you.