It is a very good thing that this is our second trip to Italy and not our first, or I might never come back.

Now hear me out. I spent six weeks in Paris in 2001, five months in Lyon in 2004, three months in Los Angeles in 2005, two years in Manhattan in 2007, and 17 months in San Francisco in 2011. In other words, I am not a stranger to big cities, nor to cities geographically near Rome. But whatever legislative requirements or in-practice guidelines they have here for pollution are insufficient. Sure, I cough in a lot of places, but this is the first city in which I find myself regularly gasping for air. This is the first city in which I regularly smell exhaust and oil and what smells to non-automotive me like broken mufflers.

And if their car and motorcycle smoke weren’t enough, their human pollution is infinitely worse. Everything smells pervasively of smoke. You don’t even want to wipe your face with the towels, because it feels like you’re putting your nose and mouth into an extinguished cigarette. Standing in line is difficult, because there is inevitably smoke winding its way directly to your position. Sitting outside at a restaurant is impossible, since everyone smokes right next to the diners’ tables.

When we got off the train from Rome to Naples, we couldn’t find a single pocket of air on that platform. Now, I get that many of those poor people had been stifling their nicotine urge for the entirety of the three hour train journey. And I’ll grant that I don’t understand that kind of addiction, so it’s not fair of me to comment. But I do understand courtesy, and there is none to be had when every single person walks by you, trailing a cloud of smoke into your face.

The only way I can describe it is if you imagine holding your breath and going underwater, and every time you try to come up to get just a quick breath, someone pushes you down. You try to turn the other way or to move over, so they can’t reach you, but their hand finds you, and you have no air at all – but plenty of panic.

So, I’m sorry Rome (and so far, Naples). I want to like you! Your art and architecture are interesting, and I like wandering your little streets and alleys. But you also unfortunately make me sick – literally. I miss breathing and feeling healthy-ish. Until a widespread public anti-smoking campaign, I am happily through with you.