Apertivo

Definitely the coolest thing about Italy. If a restaurant offers apertivo, it means they have snacks or a buffet available to you with a drink purchase. These can be light, like pretzels and potato chips, or heavy fare like pastas and salad. They cost between 3 and 8 euro, depending on the amount of food, and exist to bring in more drink sales. However, for a student, it’s a great way to eat out and get a free drink in the process! It’s so fun to try new drinks this way J

Carta di credito

They don’t take credit cards everywhere, and it drives me nuts. The vast majority of businesses wont take them, and very few will accept them for purchases under 7 euro. Its not a “we aren’t capable” it’s a “we’re a small business, and there’s a fee on the transaction, so its not worth our time” If they see cash in your wallet, they won’t take your credit card. It’s ridiculous. McDonalds wont take your credit card half the time (don’t get me started on them, with their prices differing within 4 blocks of each other).
Having cash is always a pain, and it always gets lost/stolen easier.

Backpacking

When I first thought about traveling Europe, I figured I’d go backpacking after I graduated high school in the summer. I told my parents this, and they didn’t really react at all, which surprises me now. I now realize this made total sense as 1. It was so expensive, and I had no idea how much it would cost, so it was entirely impossible and 2. If they freaked out, I would have insisted more, and it might have happened based on my stubborness alone.
When I heard about backpacking, the following image came to mind: me, by myself, with a huge backpack, sleeping on benches in London by night and chatting with locals and taking in sites by day. I figured I’d need about 600 dollars for my airfare, and nothing else.
Having actually traveled, I now realize I was a stupid teenager. I am still probably this.

Food food food

--Apparently Claudio got us the typical Veronese dish of horse meat in Amarone on our 3rd day in Italy, and didn’t feel the need to tell us
--SO MUCH COFFEE! Never more than one sugar at this point, and I’m addicted to cappucino (with a little sugar sometimes)
--Baklava and legit gyro, fancy shmancy olives, and shwarma in Greece with my lovely tour guide, Becca.
--Parisian cheese crepey thing, and Parisian coffee
--Doner Kebab--which is not what Americans think it is.
--Italian McDonalds--it tastes the exact same (thank the Lord), but they have ridiculous things on their menu like fried shrimp and chicken wings (???) or mozzarella on foccacia.
--paella, and traditional tapas in Spain
--A special type of champagne made from apple juice in Barcelona, and sangria! Yummm.
--Heineken and Croquettes in Amsterdam
--Chocolate salami (my heart belongs to you forever) and huge meringue things they love here
--Panettone, the traditional Veronese Christmas cake, and Columbo (Dove), the Easter version

Come sto

Since I’m entering the last quarter/month of my study abroad experience, I figured I’d let you guys know what life is actually like over here. There is no such thing as a routine, because my classes are so randomly situated. The first month was nothing but Intensive Italian, so we had class every morning for 3 hours, learning the language. We then went home and crashed, went out to eat for apertivi, and then watched TV in Italian and went to sleep. It was, in fact, sort of boring. We traveled some places on the weekends, which you’ve read about, dear follower.
Now, classes are random (I have more Italian, Italian Business, and Painting….lol). We don’t have homework. Our classes are still 3 hours, but I will never go a week without a day with no class. This brings in day trips, sleeping in, etc. If I’m out getting groceries (once a week), I will normally get caffe for takeaway (NOT to go), or some gelato at a random place. Every Tuesday and Thursday I Skype with CJ and school, since I don’t have unlimited internet in my apartment. Natalie and I both read a fair amount, and devour books.
Minus the traveling part, its sort of dull, to be honest, but the food is 80000x better and theres plenty of down time, to the point that I will be happy to get back to work this summer.

Overcoming (the lack of) diversity

Italy isn’t as diverse as the United States. Mostly everyone has dark hair (or previously dark hair, dyed garish colors), and is white. The Asian population is extremely low, and whenever you see large groups of Asian people, you know that it’s a tour group, and you’re near the tourist section. My friends Erica and Fire are both Asian, and dislike that they always look like tourists based on their skin color.

That said, Veneto is a racist region. It’s the wealthiest part of Italy, and thus hates all the poor people “eating their tax money”. This essentially means Southern Italians. It threw me off: sure, in the US, we have some friendly adversity towards the South (hehe, they have an accent and tried to succeed lol), but it’s more like New Zealand and Australia instead of Ireland or Belgium. In any case, that racism and bias is also thrown towards Africans. There was a Maddox post a long time ago (they all are, after all..) about how “African-American” is a silly term, since not all black people are American. It always surprises me here that most of the black population is from actual Africa, which is after all, not very far at all. It’s actually really cool! Minus the whole racism part. It’s unfortunate, as most of the black population speaks better English than the Italians, and yet they are still poorer on average. One African man asked me if I was scared of black people, which I thought was ridiculous.

Bidding Bidets Bye Bye

The Bidet gets a lot of flak in the united states. When I first discovered we had one, I vowed never to use it. That said, with the rest of the European toilet situation, I have learned that the Bidet is the least startling thing about hygiene culture here.
First off, the Bidet itself: It is a sink that is at toilet level. That’s really all there is to it. It is for rinsing your business (both businesses, you entreponeur, you), there’s a tray for your bidet specific soap, and a towel. To be honest, they’re probably great for the enviornment because there’s no need for toilet paper after using them. Which is good, because in some places, you can’t flush toilet paper (I’m looking at you, Athens!)
I apologize if this is sort of awkward. But I seriously want to bring them back to the US.
More startling is the actual toilets here. Specifically, public ones. Most of the time, you have to pay for them: train stations, public places, etc). This ranges from .50 to a Euro. It sucks, and you learn to wait until you’re in the airport, or home, or your hostel, or a museum that you payed hxc to get into, before you use the bathroom.
Sometimes you don’t have to pay for them, which is worse. Public, non paying bathrooms, such as the ones in the high school attached to Idea Verona, or in the Brescia train station, are holes in the ground. Like seriously, its like the implanted a urinal with foot holds into the ground. It is disgusting. I will not miss this at all. Seriously Europe, what were you thinking.