A DIFFERENT BEAT ALTOGETHER

"Dad, have you already told Mum about the lady who shouted at you in the shop?" Daughter asked.

That prompted another story about a clash of cultures, while I had been away.

One day John had gone to a local supermarket to get some fish. It was around noon.  On arrival to the shop John noticed that it was quite empty and that there was nobody to serve him at the fish counter. Instead, a shop assistant was clearly having a cigarette and a well earned break nearby on the doorway. John waited a while and finally, the shop assistant came to tell him in Italian that it is closed.

  So, John thought that this applied to the fish counter only and carried on shopping. The shop assistant waited at the till for five minutes. When John did not approach the till, she lost her temper and started shouting at him. The message could be translated to something like: "Get out of the shop, you moron!"

  At this point the manager arrived to see what the problem was. He spoke English and explained that THE WHOLE SHOP was closed and would John mind coming back later, please. The shop assistant's goodbye was an icy stare and clearly, she did not wish to see John back any time soon.

  John knew that most shops close around noon for lunch and open again at 3.30 PM until 8 PM. However, there are exceptions and the larger supermarket chains, for example, stay open all day long. Since this was a supermarket type of a shop, John was not too concerned about the time and assumed that they would be open the whole day.

   There is a different beat to the day in Italy and it has taken a while to get used to it. The day starts early and morning buses to the city centre are full of people going to their place of work at 8 am. In the morning time coffee shops are busy offering shots of espressos at the counter for people. Then everything stops around noon as the lunch hour approaches. It is still quite common for school children to go home to have lunch as many Italian schools do not offer a meal for the students. The Italian mothers prefer this system, too. Most shops are closed for couple of hours. Everybody are having a lunch and a rest.  However, life returns to normal at 3 PM: shops open their doors, children return to the school for couple of hours and work continues in the offices.

  As dinner is typically not eaten before 8 PM earliest, there is a possibility to have an aperitivo between 5 PM and 7 PM. You buy a drink, which might cost a touch more than normally, but it comes with little nibbles such as pieces of bread, cold meats and cheese. Sometimes it is a whole buffet full of finger food and this might be eaten instead of a dinner.

   Any kind of an evening entertainment (concerts, plays, shows) start at 9 PM to 9.30 PM. Having a good night out means that you need to be prepared to stay up at least until midnight. Nobody arrives to a disco or a nightclub before midnight and then they dance the night away until the early hours.

   With a schedule like this, you really need your lunch time nap.

   We have learned our lesson.