Wednesday 15 January 2014

What they don't tell you about living in Italy

1 You will, sooner or later, become trapped inside a building because you can't find the switch that opens the front door to let you out.

2 Nobody is scared of eating seafood. And nobody has heard of salmonella.

3 Everybody is scared of the rain. And everybody knows the fatal powers of a cold draft.

4 You will feel fat

5 You don't have the right hair. Or shoes. Or bag. If you live here for a hundred years, you will still look foreign. People will tell you this.

6 The Post Office doesn't sell stamps, or indeed provide any kind of service beyond selling those brightly coloured kids' books with padded covers and being a cosy warm place for elderly people to gather in winter.

7 Your children will be the only ones in the park allowed to play with sticks and dirt.

8 Italian women clean their houses EVERYDAY. Your house is filthy. A bit like your children.

10 If you drink a really cold drink on a really hot day, something dreadful will happen.

11 Good customer service is as easy to come across as Hawaiian pizza.

12 If you (female) dare to eat out by yourself (say, to spend some time updating your blog or something) then women will stare at you like you have some kind of disease and men will stare at you like they want to give you some kind of disease.

13 People will tell you that you're beautiful. You will bask in this. Even when it's that creepy mechanic guy or the ancient barman up the road. This will make up for no.s 4 & 5 above.

14 Strangers will literally swoon and gush at your children. They will stop other complete strangers to point out the beauty of your off-spring. You will bask in this A LOT. Then they will tell you that your children are under-dressed.

15 The concept of an over-dressed child doesn't exist in the Italian psyche.

16 There's no Hawaiian pizza. The food is better than you can possibly imagine. Especially the seafood.

17 In the winter, the weather is shit.

18 Your family doctor will refer you to a specialist. You will never have a simple cough again: you will have bronchitis.

19 There's nowhere to park.

20 Despite, and indeed because of, all of the above, it is the very best place to live.

2 comments:

A Mum in London said...

This is hilarious and so true. Life in Italy much resembles life in Greece, esp. the overdressing the kids – Athens, sunny, 20 degrees: toddler with puffer jacket, wool hat and ski gloves!

DrSpouse said...

We went to the southern tip of Western Mexico - December, 20 degrees - everyone in their winter woolies...