How to tell if you're an Italian

The latest response to the American culture test. Riccardo is from Naples, and splits his energies between computer science (he works at the Università di Salerno) and music-- he has his own jazz combo and writes and arranges music for ensembles of various sizes. His hobbies include languages, cooking, reading, and movies. The latest American movie he really liked: Magnolia; the latest European one: Merci pour le chocolat.
--M.R.

If you're Italian...

• You're familiar with Pippo Baudo, Mike Bongiorno, Raffaella Carrà, Maurizio Costanzo, gli Antenati (the Flintstones), i Simpson, Topolino & Paperino (Mickey & Donald), Fonzie, Derrick, Totò.
• You know the ins & outs of calcio (football, although the Americans like to call it 'soccer'). If you're male, you probably deem yourself entitled to give advice to the coach of the National Team. You like Formula I, too. It is plain to see that Ferrari is tops. You know about tennis and basket. Baseball, cricket? Ooh, yes, you've seen baseball in movies. People hit balls with sticks and then they run.
• You get about 30 days of vacation a year, most of which are in August.
• You're fairly likely to believe in God, at least in some personal way. You don't go to church much, and your mother isn't too happy about it.
• You think of McDonald's, Burger King, KFC etc. as cheap, fast food. There are better (tastier, healthier) alternatives for about the same price.
• You own a telephone and a TV. You possibly have one or more mobile phone numbers. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't kill your own food. You don't have a dirt floor. You eat at a table, sitting on chairs.

As piovra cruda, it sounds good

• You don't consider insects, dogs, cats, monkeys, or guinea pigs to be food. However, depending on where you live, snails, frogs, horses, donkeys, rabbits, raw octopus and nettles are considered delicacies.
• A bathroom may have either a bathtub or a shower in it, and it certainly has a toilet and a bidet.
• The telephone system, the mail, railroads, and power companies used to be state-owned, but now they are privately held. The government maintains varying degrees of control through a combination of ordinary and/or "golden" shares and regulation powers. They say competition will push prices down, but you didn't notice much improvement.
• You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine.
• The train system isn't too bad. It's getting too costly though: sometimes as much as a plane.
• You find a two-party system unnatural and restrictive, although some say it's the only way to go. The electoral law was supposed to turn your political system into a two-party competition, but you split your votes wisely in order to preserve an interesting multitude of parties or "party currents." Democracy is about representation, after all, and you'd like to be represented with some degree of precision.

Well, property is theft

• Socialism used to be respectable, when the Socialist party was run by anti-fascist heroes rather than a bunch of thieves. Now there are representatives calling themselves "Socialists" and sitting with the right-wing philo-fascist party. Communists still exist and represent more or less 10% of the electorate, but sometimes you think they're slightly out of touch with reality.
• People may be Black, Yellow, "Marocchini" (from Maghreb), Albanian, Slavic, Rom (Gypsy). A child with one black and one white parent would probably look black to you, but you never really saw one. Then there are various flavors of white European and Extra-EU foreigners (German, American, Swiss) and various flavors of Italians (basically, North, Center and South).
• You think most problems could be solved if only people would put aside their prejudices and work together.
• You take a strong court system for granted. You know that if you went into business and had problems with a customer, partner, or supplier, you could take them to court, but it would take quite a long time to obtain justice. On the other hand, criminal justice can often be eluded if you are powerful and rich enough. As a last resort, get elected and write your own laws!
• You'd respect someone who speaks fluent English or German. Japanese is black magic. You probably speak at least some English, if you're under 30. Spanish is easy to understand (if they are kind enough to speak slowly) and easy to fake (just stick random "s" sounds alla fines dellas parolas). French and Portuguese aren't as easy.
• It's a Good Thing to learn foreign languages, but if you know your basic English you get around nearly everywhere. They'll speak at least a little Spanish, won't they? As a last resort, you can always use your hands for gestures.
• If you live on fixed wages, you think a tax level of 50% for high incomes is reasonable; after all, the high income guys make much more than you, even after taxes. But taxes should be paid by everybody-- not only by fixed-income workers as it is now. If, on the other hand, you run your own business, you think the tax level is way too high and do anything you legally can to avoid paying what's due. You probably even do something you shouldn't.
• School is free through high school (at least, it's an option, even if you went to private school). University isn't that cheap, but not prohibitively dear either. Books are dear from sixth grade up.
• University is (normally, and excluding graduate study) four years long. Medicine and engineering are longer.

Exotic condiments

• Mustard? Ah, mustard. Fairly exotic stuff. It comes in plastic bottles (or small bags at McDonald's). Peeled tomatoes (pelati) come in cans. Shaving cream comes in cans. Milk comes in plastic jugs or tetrapack bricks.
• The date comes first: 25/4/1945. (And you know what happened on that date.)
• The decimal point is a comma, but computer guys and tech-heads often use a dot.
• A thousand million is called a miliardo. A bilione is a million times a million, you think, but mille miliardi is easier.
• World War II was a quite troubled time for the country, with Fascists and Germans all around the place. The US helped to rebuild the country, but the price was that they remote-controlled our politics.
• You expect marriages to be made for love, not arranged by third parties. You get married by the Mayor, but most people like a church ceremony. You have a best man and a maid or matron of honor at the wedding--a friend or a sibling. And, naturally, a man gets only one wife at a time.
• If a man has sex with another man, he's a homosexual. Whether homosexual couples should have civil rights is a thorny issue.
• Once you're introduced to someone, as a general rule you don't call them by their first name and don't use the direct tu pronoun to address them, unless it is an informal setting.
• If you're a woman, you can go to the beach topless--you'll draw a few looks if you're in good shape, otherwise why are you doing that?
• A hotel room has a private bath.
• Foreign films are dubbed by real actors. You often recognize who is doing the dubbing by his/her voice.
• You seriously expect to be able to transact business, or deal with the government, without political backing? Hehe... As for actual bribes, they are getting to be rarer.
• Politicians aren't usually found cheating on their spouses. If it happens, you probably wouldn't care at all. In most cases, you don't even care if they are caught stealing public money.
• Large stores and most restaurants and hotels will take your credit card. Small stores will be fussier, especially if you don't spend much or if you buy articles on special sale.
• State-owned companies and the public administration can't fire just anybody they want. Privately owned companies can't, either, but things are changing.
• You don't eat bacon, but sometimes you do eat pancetta, which is similar. It appears in the Bucatini all'Amatriciana, a pasta dish.
• Labor Day is the First of May.

Aiutami, Don Obi-wan!

• You've probably seen Guerre stellari, ET, Ladri di biciclette, Titanic and La vita è bella. If you're under forty, add Lo squalo, Rocky/Rambo #N, and 2001: Odissea nello spazio; otherwise, add Via col vento, Psycho, Poveri ma belli, Don Camillo and I soliti ignoti.
• You know the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Michael Jackson, the U2, Madonna, Claudio Baglioni, Laura Pausini, Vasco Rossi, Eros Ramazzotti and Jovanotti. If not, you know at least Frank Sinatra, Louis Armstrong, Claudio Villa, Mina, Domenico Modugno, Gianni Morandi and Adriano Celentano.
• You count on excellent medical treatment. You know you're not going to die of cholera or other Third World diseases. You expect very strong measures to be taken to save very ill babies or people in their eighties. You think dying at 65 would be a tragedy. This is changing, they say. Privatization will make the system more efficient (and merciless, you suspect).
• You went over Greek, Roman, Italian and European history in school. Some US history, too, starting from Cristoforo Colombo. Some Russian, but no Asian or Latin American.
• You expect the military to defend peace, not get involved in politics. You aren't able to name one of the capi di Stato Maggiore (Heads of service). Military conscription is a thing of the past: the army is now a force of volunteers.
• Your country has been invaded several times in different areas. After the fall of the Roman Empire, it was reunited into one country only in the 19th century (apart from Charlemagne, who was an invader anyway).
• You're used to a wide variety of choices for almost anything you buy.
• You measure things in meters, kilos and liters.
• You can tell with good approximation the region someone comes from by the dialectal inflections in the language. Even the town, if it's close enough to you.

Maybe an Italian invented the Keystone Kops?

• You are not a farmer.
• Comics basically come in two varieties: newspaper comics and magazines/albums; the latter range from Japanese manga to American comics. There's plenty of Italian comics: Diabolik and Dylan Dog (action-oriented), Altan (satyrical), Manara and Crepax (dreamy, ethereal).
• The people who appear on the most popular talk shows are mostly entertainers, politicians, or rather strange individuals, including people from academia that are either entertainer or politician wannabees (or both). Football players are regulars, too, but they are generally unable to say anything remarkable, despite their popularity.
• Most artists, film directors, intellectuals, scientists, magistrates and pop stars are sympathetic with the left wing. Most merchants, small and big entrepreneurs, self-employed people and convicted former or present politicians have a soft spot for the right wing. Young kids, they mostly haven't got a clue.
• You drive on the right side of the road. You stop at red lights even if nobody's around. Usually. If you're a pedestrian and cars are stopped at a red light, you will fearlessly cross the street in front of them. If they are approaching the green (or red) lights, however, it gets a little tricky. Will they stop?
• You consider the Volkswagen Beetle to be a medium-sized car.
• The police are armed, but not with submachine guns.
• If a woman is plumper than the average, it doesn't improve her looks.
• The biggest meal of the day is in the evening.
• You make jokes about the Carabinieri (one of the Police forces, the military one). These jokes are virtually identical to English jokes on the Irish or French jokes on the Belgians.
• There's parts of the city you definitely want to avoid at night.

Down with the Roman Empire!

• You feel that your kind of people aren't being listened to enough in Rome. If you are from the North and run your own business, you probably think Rome has way too much power.
• You wouldn't expect both inflation and unemployment to be very high (say, over 15%) at the same time. Unemployment alone is quite another matter, especially in some Southern areas.
• You don't care very much what family someone comes from. Unless he dates your daughter, that is.
• The normal thing, when a couple dies, is for their estate to be divided equally between their children.
• If you're over 50, you know arias from a few operas and sing along when you hear them. However, given the current ticket prices, you still think of opera and ballet as rather elite entertainments. It's likely you don't see that many plays, either.
• Changing your name is very difficult. It takes a lot of paperwork, as you need to convince the authorities that you have a good reason to change your name.
• Christmas is in the winter. You spend it with your family, give presents, and put up a tree or a presepe, a representation of the Nativity with Giuseppe & Maria, the ox & the donkey, the Mages, and, of course, the newly born child, who is not put in place before Christmas night.
• If you live in the Center, the Church was the State until 1871.
• You have never heard of Creationism. If you have, you think it's a fairy tale, and much less amusing than others at that.
• You'd be hard pressed to name the leaders of all the nations of Europe. The capitals are easy though.
• You are familiar with Dylan Dog, Tex Willer, Diabolik, Altan, Corto Maltese, Milo Manara and Guido Crepax. Gotlib and Moebius are less widely known.
• You've left a message at the beep.
• Taxis are generally operated by locals, who are usually knowledgeable about the city.
• You think that Social Security should help the less lucky people, but it often gets abused, which is a Bad Thing. You would not be in favor of eliminating Social Security and Medical Assistance, however.
• If you want to be a doctor, you need to get a laurea (master's) degree first, and most likely a postgraduate specialization degree if you really want to find a job.
• You are proud of Italian cuisine, wines, Ferraris and fashion designers. Furthermore, Italian pop music is the only one worth a listen here in the EU (apart from the UK, of course). And then there are Rome, Florence, Pompei, Venice, Capri ...

Space and time

• If you have an appointment, you'll mutter an excuse if you're fifteen minutes late, and apologize profusely if it's more.
• If you're talking to someone, you don't get uncomfortable if they approach closer than half a meter.
• You expect to bargain for houses, cars, antiques, and most items sold at open-air markets or by Marocchini.
• Even after you're past college, you might still show up at a close friend's place, especially in the south. In general, however, people have to invite each other over if a meal is involved.

Other people

• Italians from the north are rich, selfish, and drink too much. They don't go to the university: they want to start working (and earning) soon. Some of them want to have a law to outrule an invasion from the South.
• Italians from the south are lazy scoundrels at best, criminals at worst. They study a lot (that's because they are too lazy to get a real job), so they end up being public administrators (even in the north), or teachers (even in northern schools).
• People from the center have mixed characteristics, but in general they're a bunch of Communists or half-Communists. You wonder why all of the "quality of life" surveys alway end up giving maximum score to some mid-sized town of the Center. People from Rome are southerners under all respects, whatever they might believe or say.
• Your EU cousins: The Spanish are much like you, but they speak in an amusing and sometimes hard-to-understand way. The French are much more arrogant. The Germans make wonderful cars but have very little creativity. The British are civilized but crazy people. They think in pounds and pints and drive on the wrong side of the road. They need (and have) laws to stop sale of alcohol at 11:00 lest everybody gets totally drunk.
• The USA provides a good part of your entertainment, as well as technical innovation. Many Americans seem OK, but their "I-am-now-suing-you" attitude ranges from comical to dangerous. Their social situation (education, crime, welfare) looks unexplicably primitive to you.
• You think of Canada as country much like the USA, but more civilized: they don't own as many guns and don't kill people on the electric chair.
• Japan is a faraway country that hoards Mediterranean tunafish and produces cars, video recorders, sushi and bad cartoons. Unless you are a manga fan, you think of Japanese anime as children stuff.