MiMa no.3 Benvenuto Milano | Page 8

prejudices

There are a lot of prejudices about Italy. Although I have only been in Italy for a few weeks now, I listed some of them.

Everything is organized really chaotically

Because I wanted to do a language course at the university, I had to take a test. We were in a room filled with 300 people, all taking this test. When you were done, you had to go to the front where the professor would look up your name so he could sign off that you took the test. There were five assistens in the front, but only one could sign. For some people it took two minutes to look up their names. That does not sound like a lot, but when you have to wait for 300 people being helped for two minutes, you wait for 600 minutes which equals ten hours, which is 'quite' long... (Happily it took me only one hour.)

Tranquillo

Yes! Italians are really tranquillo! Last week the courses started. I went by bike, being 10 minutes early to look for the classroom. Then lessons start at 9:15, but for the professors it is really usual to be 15 minutes late, then he/she has to check how the beamer works, have a coffee and start half an hour late...

Italians use a lot of hand gestures.

Italians do use a lot of hand gestures. Even when they are on the phone, they use these. In the welcome week and at an Italian language event we were taught about it. Last week I was given a piece of salami in the supermarket, I waved with my hand along my cheeck, which means it is good, at least in Dutch in does. In Italian it is rude to do. In Italy you have to do like this!

Speaking of gestures, from some Chinese classmates we learnt that they can count up to ten on one hand... which is much more elegant then using two hands.

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