Latest news with #Sib
The Independent
4 days ago
- Business
- The Independent
Italians leave local beaches as summer sunbed costs spike
Beaches are surprisingly empty in Italy this summer amid claims that expensive concession stands are driving locals away. Renting sunbeds and parasols are a typical part of an Italian holiday in peak season. However, resorts have recorded a decrease in beach attendance of 15 to 25 per cent for June and July when compared to the same months in 2024, local media report. Antonio Capacchione, president of the Italian Beach Resorts Syndicate (Sib), said that a 25 per cent decrease in visitors had been observed in Calabria and Emilia-Romagna. According to a survey by consumer group Altroconsumo, the price of sunbeds and umbrellas across 213 beach resorts has increased by 5 per cent, on average, since last year. When compared to prices from four years ago, the consumer group found sunseekers are spending 17 per cent more in 2025 for the same beach space. For a beach umbrella and two loungers – in the coveted first four rows – the average price is now €212 (£183), compared to €182 (£157) in 2021. Fabrizio Licordari, the president of the beach club association Assobalneari Italia, said that the high cost of living has deterred Italians from spending. In a report by the Guardian, he said: 'Even with two salaries, many families struggle to reach the end of the month. 'In such circumstances, it's natural that the first expenses to be cut are those for leisure, entertainment and holidays.' While weekends still welcome crowds of beachgoers to Italy's sands, weekdays have become quieter, with visitors less likely to splash on eating out. Riccardo Padovano, an Abruzzo beach resort owner, told news agency Ansa: 'The problem isn't the high cost of beach umbrellas, but the high cost of living. Hence, the empty beaches we're seeing this summer. We're seeing more visitors on weekends, but they're local customers. Tourists are missing." Showers, cabins, beach games, toilets and fridge use are among other charges that can increase the beach day bill. President of consumers association Codacons, Carlo Rienzi, said that summer tourism had been 'brought to its knees by unprecedented price hikes.' He said that in response to higher costs, the middle class are 'deserting the beach' and mountains in an X post on Monday (11 August). Italian actor Alessandro Gassmann similarly blamed 'exaggerated' beach prices for empty sunbeds in a post on social media. The film star wrote: 'Dear friends, resort managers. I read the season is not going well. Why do you think? Maybe you've exaggerated a bit with prices, and the economic situation in the country is forcing Italians to choose a free beach? Lower the prices, and maybe things will get better. Get it now?' However, Maurizio Rustignoli, the president of Fiba, an Italian beach resorts federation, called the price hike reports 'misleading', arguing that small increases were worth it for improved security and lifeguard supervision.
Scotsman
02-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Scotsman
From California to the Capital, Joe Sib makes Fringe debut with Punk Rock storytelling
American comedian and former punk rocker Joe Sib is making his Edinburgh Fringe debut this summer with California Calling, A Story of Growing Up Punk Rock at the Gilded Balloon's Pip venue at Appleton Tower. Sign up to our daily newsletter Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to Edinburgh News, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... Running from 30 July to 24 August (not 11 August), the 9pm show promises a mix of stand-up, storytelling and music history, all drawn from Sib's own life growing up in 1980s California. Sib is no stranger to the stage. Before turning to comedy, he fronted punk bands WAX and 22 Jacks and later co-founded SideOneDummy Records, the label behind acts like Flogging Molly and Gogol Bordello. He also toured as support for Metallica during their 2018 to 2019 run, performing alongside US comedian Jim Breuer. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad California Calling is a fast-paced, personal account of how punk rock shaped Sib's life. From discovering skateparks as a teenager to sharing stages with some of the biggest names in music, his stories are full of energy, heart and humour. The show focuses on one life-changing day in his youth, with reflections on family, identity and the power of music threaded throughout. Joe Sib Now a father of two and living a very different life from his early days in the Santa Cruz Mountains, Sib brings a thoughtful perspective to his younger years. His son is now a signed musician himself, bringing the story full circle. The show has already attracted praise from punk icons. Chris Shiflett of Foo Fighters said, 'California Calling hits home for anyone that came of age in the 80s, and if you didn't, you'll wish you did.' Jay Bentley of Bad Religion added, 'No one will deliver the goods better than Joe Sib.' Whether you grew up with punk or just love a good story well told, California Calling offers a glimpse into a subculture that still resonates. Expect big laughs, a few surprises and a heartfelt reminder that your first band might just be your family.
San Francisco Chronicle
17-06-2025
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
Review: ‘Bug Hollow' a tale of family dysfunction in 1970s California
Bug Hollow is a big house in the woods of Northern California, filled with 'fat soggy sofas and tatty taxidermy, where girls in peasant blouses and short shorts serve up 'a loaf thing made of nuts and beans that looked and tasted like dirt.' In Michelle Huneven's latest novel, the house's hippie counterculture vibe (and Julia, one of those peasant-bloused girls) are so irresistible to straight A-achieving, baseball-loving Ellis that he moves in, only letting his parents know where he is through the occasional postcard (it's the 1970s, so no cellphones). More Information Bug Hollow By Michelle Huneven (Penguin Press; 288 pages; $29) A few pages in, Ellis' departure is less of a mystery. He just needed to get away. Life at home in Altadena (where Huneven lives — she recently lost her home in the Eaton Fire), is far less bucolic, largely due to Ellis' distant and often cruel mother, Sibyl (known as Sib). Sib is a bad mother. I mean, in the pantheon of bad literary mothers, many are far worse, but she's pretty unforgivable. Stingy with her affection, profligate with her critique, and far too cozy with her tumbler of Hawaiian punch and vodka, her three children mostly just try to stay out of her way. Her husband Phil, much kinder than her — and maybe even unrealistically chipper — provides emotional stability that she can't, but also ignores her obvious alcoholism. Sib is also, incongruously, a devoted middle grade teacher and admits, to herself anyway, that it's far more satisfying to take an active interest in the well-being of her students than in her own kids. When her son Ellis, the one kid she actually had made time for, dies in a freak swimming accident just before leaving for college, it's a little hard to believe that Sib hesitates not a moment to offer to adopt Julia's unborn child. Fittingly, the first thing she asks Julia is 'It is Ellis', you're sure?' The second thing: 'You haven't done any drugs, have you?' Julia, not eager to be a mother, agrees to give her child to this flawed one. The adoption results in a confusing family structure: The child, named Eva, is adopted by her grandparents (Sib and Phil) so their other children (two girls, Katie and Sally) are now her sisters but also her aunts. Family relations just get more complicated later on. The impact of Ellis' death and Sib's increasingly erratic (and drunken) behavior on the family is the focus of 'Bug Hollow.' It's a book about relationships that dissolve and form over decades out of necessity, compatibility or desire. Lost loves are reunited. Siblings, free from the parental home, form stronger familial bonds. Surprising results from a 23andMe test play a part. Huneven told the Los Angeles Times that this book, her sixth, didn't come easy: 'I initially wanted to write short stories but I didn't have any ideas.' That tracks: The book, built from a series of writing prompts, can feel a little too glued together, a little too pat. It feels arbitrary, for example, to all of a sudden be in the Aramco compound in Saudi Arabia. And then in Oaxaca. There is no big idea here apart from how families fracture and repair themselves; the Samuelsons are a family that has experienced tragedy and heartbreak as all families do in some measure. Huneven's writing can feel awkward, more clunky than literary: 'Sib slips into the house, pees, fixes a Hawaiian punch, and leashes Hinky. Dog and drink in hand, she heads out for a walk.' 'Bug Hollow' is not a book full of beautiful sentences but it is a compelling family story with the feel of a television drama. An actress could really eat the scenery if given the part of Sib.
