Men

All of my male Italian friends are going to read this and come straight to me to give me a piece of their minds. Oh well...these are observations, not facts.

So Italian men, right? Two words that are famously put together to synonimize tall, dark and handsome, right? When people ask me why I picked to learn Italian and why I wanted to spend two years of my life in Italy they usually just assume it's because of the Italian men. Because any American girl would be all over that, amIright?

Well no, turns out I'm extremely wrong.

They (let me get this straight--it's not just ITALIAN men, it's ALL of them) whistle and cat call and make kissing noises as you pass. The older men stare you up and down shamelessly and relentlessly. They invite you to "coffee" and to "come up to see their apartment real fast". They whisper under their breath that you're the most beautiful THING they've ever seen, then as soon as you pass them they call you a dirty whore.

And this is on the daily.

The advice given to me was to ignore it because there's nothing I can do. Which there really isn't, but it's still really sucky advice. It's pretty clear that the way this society thinks of women is about 30 years behind the U.S. One day I got to a breaking point and flipped off a group of men making kissing noises at me as I was passing on my way to class.          And then all hell broke loose.           They jumped up from where they were sitting and shouted the nastiest things I've ever heard someone call me in my life. Everyone started staring. Then this really sweet old man came over and started yelling at them for not respecting women and how their mothers should have taught them that. So clearly all men in Italy are not like this. Shout out to my 3 dude roommates for keeping it real. Real respectful that is! And on that extremely dorky note, I will leave you all to the rests of your day. :)

What I've been up to...

Besides observing Italians and writing RIVETING blog posts, I've also been doing other things! I was in a hotel for a week and found an apartment during this time. I saw 7 apartments, but ended up being picked for the second one I saw (yes, being picked--this was basically a competition). The apartment I'm in now was my very 1st choice and I LOVE IT! My room is HUGE (see pic below), my roommates are fabulous and the location is prime (although loud).  I live with three Italian law students and a French girl.  This week they have exams, so I haven't been able to get to know all of them too well, but I think we're doing a dinner altogether when they're done and I have been asked to make a cheesecake.

I've also been eating a lot, but have yet to gain 203958049 pounds...maybe that Italian magic is rubbing off on me ;) The food here is outstanding and not just prepared dishes. The produce tastes like it's supposed to. Carrots taste like midwest carrots on flavor steroids, but of course they're not on steroids. In fact, they aren't genetically modified or mass-produced, they're just grown simply and they're amazing.  I've been going to a street market lately and buying ingredients to make a sandwich, the prosciutto, formaggio, pane e verdure. One of my taller friends hit his head on a hanging prosciutto in one of the shops, I guess 6-foot+ people aren't too common here so low-hanging prosciutto is okay.

I've been drinking well...and not a lot. Which is a little different from wisco, but definitely tastes better. One thing that is very common here is the "Spritz", which I'm tryin' to being back to the Nitty Gritty;)! It's sparkling white wine, an orange, sparkling water and something called "Aperol" which for lack of a better explanation, is a mixture of alcoholic grenadine and bitters.

Unicorn Italians

So since I've been here all that I have noticed is that Italians are thin, but they eat pasta and croissants and COOKIES FOR BREAKFAST all while NEVER going to the gym. They stay up until like 4am, but they're energetic and very feisty. They work like 30 hours a week, taking long breaks for lunch.... and then just go up and take a whole month off work the month of August for "ferie" (summer vacation)...but they somehow still are able to sustain themselves? They're not allowed to wear shorts in the city or any dress that's too short, but can wear no bra with a thin top (NIPPLE-CITY) or be topless at the beach and it's just totally chill. The Italian men, instead, enjoy thin, white, tight speedos...which is great, especially when wet -.- The Italian women also always wear high-heels or wedges in whatever terrain. We're talking cobblestone, rocks, grass, slippery mosaic pavement...ANYTHING! All of them smoke also and even when they're old they look down right fabulous.

Which leads me to believe that they're just down right magical, like the mythical creature the unicorn.