The Ugly American Has Come Home

When I first went to Italy in 1971, I got my introduction to what people over there were calling the ugly American. Loud, overbearing, disregarding of local cultural norms ("What do you mean, you don't have ice?"), totally unaware that the rest of the world did things differently than we did in the U.S. of A.

A few years later I took a train from Mexicali to Mexico City - three days, stopping at every stop. More ugly Americans, unconscious and insensitive to the culture hosting them. Downright rude, and when drunk, dangerous. 

Over decades and many trips to Italy, France, Greece, Spain, and Portugal, I witnessed too many times the embarrassing and unconscionable behaviors - the attitudes, the mores, of American tourists. Fortunately, I blended in and took a side view to their ignorant ways.

But now, the Ugly American has come home to roost. There's no escaping their thunderous ubiety in the United States, no security in the homeland from the hordes of somnambulists roaming the countryside and city with their oversized vehicles and their propensity to disregard the law. Just try going through a green light without checking if stragglers are racing through the red. It happens all the time. Turns out the ugly American scaled perfectly - from loud tourist to national ethos.

Kicking the Bucket List Habit ~ Five Ways to Surrender to Italy

I keep seeing these bucket lists. Italy bucket lists. Five things, ten things, twenty things you must do before you die. And they're all the same: the Amalfi Coast, a Tuscan villa with an infinity pool, dinner at some Michelin-starred place in Rome where you need a reservation six months out and a credit card that doesn't flinch.

Nothing wrong with any of that, I suppose. But that's not the Italy that's stayed with me for fifty-some years. The Italy that changed me wasn't the one I planned. It was the one I stumbled into when I got lost, when I let go, when I trusted a stranger's gesture instead of a guidebook.

Italy reveals itself differently. Not when you grasp at it, but when you open your hands.

Are you ready for Italy? Or are you only ready for the Italy you've already decided on?

So here are five experiences for your surrender list. Understand this: these aren't things to collect. They're ways to fail by tourist standards—and succeed by Italy's.

"Spas, Tours, Golden Hour Too - We'll Be Blessed If You Come"

From the "Oops!... they did it again" dept. 

 

Apparently word hasn't gotten around yet. 

This arrived in my inbox today.

 

 Click images to enlarge  

 [Editor's note: This is a lampoon. Any resemblance to actual 

press junket invitations is purely... well, you know.]

 

 

© devised and photo-synthesized by Alfonso Cevola 

limited rights reserved On the Wine Trail in Italy

The Most Important Meal of the Day

Family outing Old California circa early 1930's - Nonna bottom right

Marion Nestle doesn't believe in breakfast. At 89, this nutrition expert who's spent decades exposing the food industry says most of the research claiming breakfast is the most important meal was sponsored by cereal companies. Kellogg's and General Mills needed to move boxes. They manufactured urgency. We bought it.

But nobody marketed the meals that actually mattered. My grandfather's brick bar-be-cue in old California. Every Sunday under the grape arbor. Probably the first place wine touched my lips. Those traditions—gathering, sharing a meal, an anonymous bottle or two of wine—they're gone now.