Cultural Shock? More like cultural embrace!
Half of my family is from Italian descent, and they are indeed very Italian. The more time I spend here, the more I realize how Italian my family was and is. Even my mother’s side of the family, who is not of Italian descent has a lot of the Italian family traits: most of the children live with their parents until they are thirty or so, hugs and kisses all the time, lasagna and pasta family lunches on Sundays, and the conviction that family is the most important thing in one’s life. Moreover, because of the great amount of Italians that immigrated to Brazil after the Word Wars (including my own family), Brazilian culture is very touched by the Italian one, and they overlap in many areas.
In addition, people here in Italy have a really good heart. Okay, I am sure not every Italian or Roman person has a really good heart, but from my experience, yes they do! Every time I had a problem here or did not know where to go, someone helped me. They gave me food when I found myself with no cash to pay, kids held up stairs so I could climb up without falling over, old ladies filled out forms that I did not know how to read, and they put whipped cream on my gelato. I mean, come on.
Italy is very different from the United States. The people here are much louder, do not care that much about respecting lines, punctuality or “personal space bubbles”, and also are much more community oriented than individualistic. Italians live with their parents for a long portion of their lives, so they also value constant contact with family way more than Americans. None of those traits should be much of a “shocker” to most Americans, I believe, and they are very easy to adapt to as an American in my opinion.
Nevertheless, my culture is Brazilian, and I have to say I feel very at home with Italian people and the way they live their lives. The ton of bureaucracy for every document you want to get done, the loud voices discussing laughing and arguing on the streets, the transportation strikes which occur almost every other week, the in love couples kissing and touching in public, the late buses and trains that sometimes never arrive, the little kids running around and driving their mothers crazy, the terrible car traffic, the friendly old men trying to sell you postcards, the fallen leaves everywhere, the striking beauty of everything around you. Italy is so much like Brazil in all of those ways and so many more… I cannot say it was hard for me to adapt to this culture. Rome gives me a wonderful feeling of safety and home.
