It Is 1am on a forlorn industrial estate on the outskirts of Rimini, Italy's tackiest seaside resort, now at the height of its tourist season. Every hundred yards or so stands a group of two or three prostitutes, their impossibly high platform shoes and outlandish peroxide hair illuminated in the headlights of countless four-wheel-drive cars being driven in slow procession by young men on the prowl.
A white estate car draws up in front of a group of trans-sexuals and - to general astonishment - an elderly priest in a slightly creased cassock jumps out of the front seat.
From the look of bewilderment in the prostitutes' eyes you can tell what they are thinking. What does this guy want? No, Don Oreste wants to talk to them. And, if they are willing, pray with them. And, once they have got to know each other better, encourage them to leave the street and help them find a regular way of life. At first the prostitutes are suspicious, then they begin to talk about themselves, where they come from, what they did before coming here in a deluded search for a better life.
One was a student, another a nurse. As the conversation warms up, Don Oreste's assistants get out of the car too and give each of the prostitutes a string of rosary beads, which they willingly hang around their necks.
An assistant called Mirko who knows the street well asks after other prostitutes who work this stretch of road - Andressa, Jennifer, Claudia and the rest. He sounds disconcertingly like a well-soiled regular customer, but in fact he considers them all to be his sisters and friends.
