Where Everything is Beautiful and Nothing Works

In class on Tuesday, a woman named Lisa Kramer Taruschio came to speak with us. She is an American who fell in love with Italy (and an Italian man) and is now a dual citizen who lives full time in Macerata. She came to talk to us as an American who experienced the same sort of cultural clashes we had when we moved to Macerata. She is a published author and professor, and we had actually read her article without knowing she'd come to our class, so that was pretty cool. One thing she said that I loved was that in Italy, everything is beautiful and nothing works. So true. Now that I've been here for two months, I'm starting to be aware of the pluses and minuses of both American and Italian culture. And the one thing that I don't think I'll ever get used to is how inefficient some things can be. Like, sometimes, I just want to be able to go to the grocery store at 9:00 at night and get a candy bar, but if I don't plan ahead.... things are closed and my sweet tooth goes unsatisfied. And the trenitalia.com website (trains) refuses to work in a manner that makes any logical sense.

Taruschio argued that in Italy, people pay attention to the beauty in the detail because it’s their way of living in spite of a government that controls everything (example A, we don’t have a “population office” in the US; here, everyone has to be registered in their city, also when I went to get an internet stick, I had to show my passport....).  They are much more resistant to change, because their history is longer, and they aren’t responsible for the creation of society. Theirs is a top-down structure, and a structure has always been in place, unlike America, where in theory, we created the structure and so therefore we are able to change it if we wish. Here, she asserts that this top-down attitude manifests itself in little ways, like how there is no such thing as the “customer is always right” – here, the customer is always wrong. I haven't noticed myself running into this attitude much, but with the language barrier I don't even think I would really be able to notice.

One of the other things she talked about is how this region (the Marche) is very traditional (and she claims the dress code has relaxed in the past ten years, so I can only imagine how much I would’ve stood out ten years ago… no matter what I wear, I feel like I look so terribly American and sloppy). She says that people here are very frugal with their money, very Catholic, and not very into showing off their wealth. She’s going to come back for another session and she’s promised to talk about the Amanda Knox trial from the perspective of an American living in Italy at the time; something I'm very interested in.

I’m so impressed that she moved here full time. She’s fluent in Italian, which I guess makes all the difference because I can’t imagine doing living here for years without being fluent (although I guess you'd become fluent). I can easily imagine having been born here and growing up Italian, but I’m not sure I could move here after having lived in America for twenty years. I know my parental unit is very happy to hear that.

The other reason I wanted to post today is that today is International Women's Day! Which is totally a holiday the US should adopt and actually celebrate. The date is in honor of the Triangle Fire in New York, in which about 140 women were killed in a factory. Here, women get little yellow flowers from men and everyone goes around wishing women "Auguri!" and "Buon Festa della Donna!" In fact, when we went to dinner tonight, the restaurant had Women's Day themed dishes and gave all the women gifts as we left! What? I love Europe (also, Daddy, next year I'm expecting flowers... just a heads up)! Anyway, they gave us the traditional mimosa flowers and a Max Mara catalog and dress bag. Fancy.

The yellow flowers are mimosas!

After two months in Europe I look just like that woman on the cover.