How Italy Wins You Over While Testing Your Patience

A brutally affectionate look at the habits, hassles, and hard truths they don’t print on postcards — from radiators-as-dryers to the eternal cigarette next to your spritz.

I’ve been traveling to Italy since I was two years old. And while I love this country with the kind of irrational devotion usually reserved for dogs and espresso, let’s be clear: it’s not all sunsets and spritzes.

There’s a whole side of Italian life that no one posts on Instagram. The stuff you only notice when you’ve been here enough times to stop romanticizing... and start observing.

This isn’t a rant. (Okay, it’s kind of a rant.)But it’s also what happens when you’ve spent your whole life visiting a country you love — and finally admit it also drives you a little nuts.

1. The Cigarette Fog Machine

Italy’s addiction to beauty is rivaled only by its addiction to smoking. And not in some ironic, 1950s cinema way — in the actual, “I’m blowing smoke into your face while you try to enjoy your €12 Aperol spritz” kind of way.

I cannot overstate how disorienting this is for Americans — especially those of us from California, where you haven't seen a cigarette near a restaurant since the Bush administration. We’re not used to inhaling someone else’s nicotine haze while trying to taste our olives.

And the worst part? The butts. Everywhere. Tucked into cobblestones. Floating in fountains. Jammed into flower pots like nicotine mulch. It’s like someone’s constantly flicking the ashtray of Europe out the window and no one minds.

And yeah — we can all wax poetic about cultural differences, but it’s still secondhand cancer floating through your aperitivo hour. Hard to romanticize lung risk with your burrata.

I love Italy. But I’d love it more if I didn’t have to smell someone else’s vice every time I sat down outside.

The perfect Italian moment: €12 spritz, golden hour view, and a stranger’s secondhand lung damage wafting in from two feet away.

2. Shopping Is a Social Sport (But No One Tells You the Rules)

If you walk into a small Italian shop and wait for someone to ask, “Can I help you?” — you’ll be waiting a long time.

In Italy, you initiate. You say “Buongiorno” like you mean it. You make eye contact. You state your needs. This isn’t retail therapy — it’s theater. You’re not a customer; you’re a character in a social script that’s been running since 1869.

If you mess up the order of operations — say, touch the produce without gloves, or forget to greet the butcher — you’ll get a look. Maybe even a comment. But if you do it right? You’re golden. You might even get a free slice of mortadella for your trouble.

Also: yes, you have to weigh your produce and print out the sticker yourself before your take it to the register. If you get to the cashier without it, they will sigh, look disappointed in your entire life, and make you go back.

3. Italian Drivers Aren’t the Problem. We Are.

Every American I know complains about Italian drivers.

“They’re reckless!”

“They tailgate!”

“They zip through alleys like they’re in a Fast & Furious spinoff!”

And okay — yes, they drive with intensity. But you know what else they drive with? Skill.

Unlike the U.S., where you can get a license for $30 and passing a 15-minute test that doesn’t even include parallel parking anymore, Italian drivers go through the wringer. Months of driving school. Written tests that include car parts, first aid, CPR, and roadside emergency protocol. They know how to tell a seizure from a stroke. (Most Americans can’t even tell a turn signal from a gear shift.)

By the time they get their foglio rosa, they’ve earned it. So yeah, they’ll wedge their car into a space the width of a yoga mat and blast past you in the left lane — because they can. And I respect it.

Meanwhile in L.A., people are eating, texting, smoking weed, and scrolling TikTok while "driving" 55mph in the fast lane.

I'll take the Italians.

Italian driving school final exam: navigate a Roman alley while yelling at tourists, shifting gears, and parallel parking in a spot made for a Vespa. I’ll take that anytime over motorcycles splitting lanes in the 405 traffic.

4. The System Is Slow, and That’s Not Romantic

Americans talk a lot about “slow living” in Italy like it’s some kind of boutique lifestyle.

But what they forget is that slowness in Italy doesn’t just apply to lunch breaks and siestas. It applies to everything.

Bank accounts. Medical appointments. Phone plans. Getting a SIM card can feel like applying for a mortgage. You will wait. You will be told to come back tomorrow. You will be given conflicting instructions. You will photocopy things you didn't know could be photocopied.

And if you think you’ll speed things up by going early? Good luck. There is always someone ahead of you who has brought their entire extended family, a packet of documents, and an emotional monologue about their elbow pain since 1994.

Public bathrooms? Often require coins (although some take American Express), thigh strength, or prayer. No further explanation needed.

And if you find yourself at the pharmacy? Be prepared. You will wait while someone loudly explains every symptom they’ve had since the Cold War. No one rushes. No one whispers.

It’s a community event.

5. No Dryers. No Screens. No Central Heating. No Problem?

The charming stone apartment you fell in love with on Booking.com? It doesn’t have a dryer. Or screens. Or central heat. Welcome to real Italy.

You will dry your laundry on a line, in public view, like it’s 1954. And if it rains? Guess what’s staying damp for two more days. Just skip the underwear unless you’re ready to give the whole block a peek into your personality. (Maybe it’s time to add an affiliate link to fancy skivvies?)

Windows? Open-air mosquito portals. Screens are somehow not standard, and when you ask why, people just shrug like the concept of keeping insects out is exotic.

Heating? It’s there… and it works, just not the way you’d hope. Radiators are usually shoved into corners and pumping heat into rooms made of thick stone with the thermal retention of a cave. The result? You’re warm-ish in one spot, while your other foot slowly goes numb.

Air conditioning? Theoretical. It exists on paper and in some Airbnb listings, but in real life it’s a tiny wall unit whispering cold air into the void.

But here’s a hack: those radiators? They might be the best dryers in Europe. Drape your jeans, socks and undies right over them — direct heat, quick dry, no breeze involved. For everything else, you’ll be line-drying in plain view of your neighbors.

Laundry day in Italy: socks, briefs, and zero shame. Just your skivvies blowing proudly in the breeze like a tattered cotton flag of defiance.

6. “Customer Service” Is a Cultural Concept, Not a Universal One

In America, we’re used to being coddled. Servers check on you three times before your water hits the table. Everything is curated for your convenience.

In Italy? You sit down, you wait. No one rushes you. No one brings you the bill until you ask. And when you ask, it might still take a while. Not because they forgot. But because you’re not being pushed out. You have the table until you surrender it.

You’ll need to unlearn the idea that service = speed.

Also: no, there are no free refills. Yes, you may pay extra for sitting outside. And yes, they actually do care if it's your birthday. I've seen more candles and cakes in Italy than at Chuck E. Cheese.

They just won't be singing in matching polos while handing you a balloon.

And yet... it works. Once you let go of the idea that the customer is always right, you realize the experience isn’t built around turnover or efficiency. It’s built around being present. Even if that presence comes with a side of mild confusion and melted gelato.

Bottom Line? Italy Is a Beautiful, Maddening Masterclass in Letting Go

Of convenience.

Of control.

Of “the way we do things back home.”

But once you stop expecting it to function like the U.S. — and accept that it doesn’t want to — everything softens. You start to see the charm in the chaos, even if you’re still swatting cigarette smoke away from your spritz.

Just don’t romanticize it too early.

Let the flaws show up first.

They always do.

Still dreaming of Italy — even with the cigarette smoke and post office chaos?

You’re my kind of person.

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