If you follow this blog you must know that I live in Bologna, Italy. Though I adore this town, this country and its people I can't help but sometimes feel upset about how they think. That is why for this WYSIWYG Wednesday I wanted to share with you a little bit of my experience in Dante's motherland.
"Ooooh Miss we are arrived ! We are finally there ! We are in Italy, Italyyyyyyyy !!!" This was me at age 17 shouting my joy out to my italian teacher.
"Italian banks sure have nothing to do than sucking money up from their customers..I swear you.." And this was me today.
This morning I went to deposit a cheque on my account. And to depose this cheque on my OWN account I had to pay 12,25 € of charges. It is always when being in this kind of situation that I come to hate (a little bit) Italy. It is also when being in this kind of situation that INEVITABLY I am thinking of all these little sentences that I often hear and that irritate me.
1.In Italy, France = Paris.
"Oh so you're French ? How great, I love Paris !" For someone coming from Bordeaux, hearing this sentence is far from being a compliment, above all when I know how italian people are chauvinistic, oops sorry regionalists (or perhaps both !). And they are so much like that, that even at less than 10 km of distance they even hate each other. In the region where I live, Emilia-Romagna, people have a very particular accent, they tend to pronounce their "z" as "s". Most of the foreigners don't know it but Emilia-Romagna were two distinct regions before, so eventhough they tend to have the same accent for me (a foreigner) it seems it's not the case. And one of my friend made it REALLY clear to me. This friend is actually from Cesenatico in Romagna, and one day I was telling him that I couldn't hear any difference between his accent and someone from Bologna, which is in Emilia. He just stared at me with anger and started yelling, telling me that people from Romagna and people from Emilia don't have the same accent AT ALL. So come and try telling peole from Romagna, Naples or Tuscany that they are romans and you'll see how happy they'll be !
Dear italian friends, if you are so very attached to your regions, know that for us french, it's the same. So reducing our country to Paris is a little bit..simplistic.
2. The 1789 spirit. Because we are French we are the heirs of the Revolution.
"But you are so revolutionary ! You're always protesting !" Yes, in 1789 and 1848. Italian by revolutionary mean that we protest to obtain more rights, that is why most of the time they are fascinated by our country and our Revolution. Here, Delacroix's painting Liberty Leading the People is also in every italian History book.
I don't want to disappoint you, but I must confess this : the revolutionary wind ran out of steam a long time ago. In my home sweet home, revolution means strike, and the French National Railways has become the champion of revolution using its right to strike during the most crucial times of the year : Easter, Christmas, All Saints' Day etc..
So put out of your mind this damn 1789 spirit !
3. French is a beautiful language, that is why I became a speaking puppet.
"
But french is such a beautiful language, it's only because I had a shitty teacher in high school that I don't remember much but I know how to conjugate some verbs. C'mon say something in french please ! It's so beautiful !" This is certainly my most heard sentence ever. And mostly when I finally decide to say something stupid like "Bonjour..je m'appelle..." (Hello..my name is..) it always ends up with a "wait, wait, wait you're speaking too fast !" or a " anyway I don't understand a damn thing but it's still beautiful to hear !" But now I convinced myself, next time someone is asking me to speak french I will recite some verses by Paul Verlaine ! It's way better than hearing the same old sentences !
Oh, dear italian friends don't worry I also have beautiful things to say about my home sweet home as there are no reason that my homeland don't get on my nerves too !
All this is based on my experience as a "francesina" (little french girl) living in Italy. If you are living abroad, I would like to hear your stories about your life in your new country, so don't hesitate to comment here or send me an email !
I know what you mean about the banks, I hate them!
ReplyDeleteAnd it's bad that every person who comes from France is from Paris...Exist lot of other cities :D
It's like " I live in Lazio" " Oh Roma is great" :(
Sad!
BTW your blog is so cute!
Bisous
Carolina
www.the-world-c.blogspot.com + GIVEAWAY
Hello Carolina,
DeleteThank you for your comment :).
I think I never hated so much banks since I arrived in Italy :p. I also understood that italian people don't like them and don't trust them. I was really surprised that a lot of people prefer using cash instead of credit cards, so unlike France.
Thank you for understanding my point ! It's not because your from a country or the region of the capital that you are necessarly from the capital !
Grazie di trovare il mio blog carino ;) Puoi anche trovare la sua versione in italiano !
baci
Shug
Hahah see, I found one!
ReplyDeleteItalian people can really be narrow minded!
But anyway such things happen in other countries as well: I have lived two years in London and whenever I said I was Italian a "ciao bella" couldn't be helped!
And whenever English people try to mock Italian accent they're actually speaking with a Sicily accent. It's a hard work explaining them that that's not the only Italian accent! All countries have different accents and it took me like one year to tell one English accent from another. Though they are so different and now I wonder how I could not tell a Canadian guy from one from South London (picking two random ones) XD Comunque, tutto il mondo è paese! Anche se gli Italiani ce la mettono tutta per fare una figura da contadini davanti al mondo intero!
Hello Elisa,
DeleteI am really happy you found this post I made a long time ago. Actually there's one post about France sitting back in the corner of my computer that I will soon publish, your comment here just reminded me of it so thank you !
I know how they can be narrow minded, but it's funny how some italian when I say that I have a degree in italian literature stare at me really strangely, like "why my dear ? it's not like it's gonna be of any use you know !", but they probably don't know that from a foreigner perspective Italy is very interesting in many areas.
Good to hear your experience in UK ! I can tell you that not only in UK they mock italian accent using the Sicily accent, even in France they do ! Actually I am curious about why the Sicily accent and not the Roman one for example.
Per gli accenti considero l'Inghilterra e l'Italia (possiamo anche aggiungere la Spagna) casi speciali per il fatto che permangano ancora dialetti, ragione per la quale gli accenti sono più notevoli per uno straniero che capisce più o meno queste lingue. Chiarisco meglio il mio discorso, al mio parere, anche per chi è straniero è più facile percepire che c'è un accento particolare per la difficoltà a capire e la cadenza rispetto all'inglese e all'italiano standard che ci viene insegnato. Uno non saprà mai la regione di provenienza ma percepirà che non è la lingua standardizzata che ha sentito fino ad adesso.
Ti ringrazio del tuo commento ;).
See you !
A presto,
Shug