Despite having voted in THREE presidential elections, consistently writing grocery lists that don’t include candy, and being carded approximately NEVER, I still  can’t wrap my head around this whole “adulthood” thing.

I’m fairly certain that someone fudged up the math, and we’ll soon find out that I’m actually about 12 or so. And while that revelation would be somewhat comforting, it would bring forth a whole bunch of problems, too (for example, Rand and I have been together for nearly a dozen years, meaning that we started dating when he was 22, and I was, um … zero. Making him, in a rather literal sense, a cradle robber. Also, let’s be fair: I’d look really terrible for 12. Like, I’d have to be a serious meth-addict in order to look as old as I do and still be in middle school. Like non-stop meth. Meth meth meth meth meth. Frankly, that sounds like a lot of work. And meth-smoking.)

Still, being 12 would explain why I can’t stop giggling when I see things like this:

-
I mean, come on. YOU GUYS. IT SAYS LABIA. 

Apparently it’s some sort of theater, and it’s named after an Italian count or something, but … seriously? Labia? In huge letters? IN THE MIDDLE OF A CROWDED SHOPPING MALL?

Labia! Conveniently located above Woolworth’s.

-

I’m not made of wood, people.

Oh, and then there was this:

-

Apparently it’s the name of an energy drink in South Africa.

I … I just can’t … I need to go take a nap. Wake me when you have proof that I’m no longer in middle school, okay? Thanks.

-

Indeed, that might be the understatement of the year. If my beloved is reading this, he’s probably done a spit take all over his computer while sputtering, “YOU THINK?”

My poor, maligned love. He puts up with a lot. From me. And during the holidays, from his in-laws, too. Which I argue is his fault.

I mean, I was born into them. I had no choice. He walked right into this situation, mostly sober. THE FOOL.

Don’t get me wrong: my family can be delightful, and they seem to really like Rand. But they are all, each and every one of them, certifiably insane. Absolutely mental.

There are a few exceptions – dear women who, for reasons I can’t quite articulate, decide to throw a crazy wrench into the machinery of their normal lives, and married into my family.

Other than this glaring lack of judgement, they seem rather sane. It’s only a matter of time, though, before they become as nuts as the rest. As any medical professional will tell you, being bonkers is highly contagious.

In the meantime, Rand has them with whom to commiserate, to look at with wide eyes and shake his head, or shrug and say, “Eh. The in-laws … am I right?”

This post is for them – it’s advice for people who are about to visit an Italian household (whether it be in Italy, or in the U.S.). Rand and those poor souls who married into my family learned most of this stuff already, the hard way.

It might be helpful to the rest of you, too. Especially if you have managed to fall in love with some hirsute Italian boy or girl, and are planning on spending time with their family this holiday season. (I’m not sure whether to congratulate you on your luck, or pray for your soul. I might do a bit of both.)

And with that, here are my 24 tips for visiting an Italian household during the holidays … or any time, really.

1. If you are staying in someone’s home, note that bathrooms will likely not contain trash cans, nor will any of the bedrooms. In fact, it’s incredibly hard to find any sort of garbage receptacle anywhere, and you will likely need to make your own. After collecting refuse for several days, and then presenting it to your hostess, she will be mortified that you have been hoarding trash, and will likely clutch her heart and may possibly faint. Be prepared for this.
   - 
2. If you say you are not hungry, know that the comment will be perceived in any of these ways:
   -
   “You are a terrible cook.”
   -
   “You have failed as a mother/grandmother/aunt/provider.”
   -
   “I don’t love you.”
   -
   (This goes ditto for not consuming seconds.)
   - - 
3. Note that saying that you are hungry can be equally disastrous. This is tantamount to claiming that you are near death from starvation, and may expire at any moment. Large quantities of food will be presented to you, and must be eaten in a frenzy. Instead, even if you are famished, state that you “could have a little snack.” Understand that said snack will be a banquet.
   

   Your starter will be pasta. Your main will also be pasta. And for dessert? Pasta.

   -

4. Though appearances might suggest otherwise, the house was not decorated by an aspiring club promoter circa 1986 (probably). Despite being abreast of most fashion trends, the majority of Italians seem about twenty years behind when it comes to interior design. A framed poster of the Colosseum? Sure. A few dozen Patrick Nagel prints? YES.
   -
5. The woman wearing knee-high boots and a leopard print top is someone’s grandmother. Don’t think about this too much.
   -
6. “What do you mean you aren’t Catholic? … Methodist? What the hell is that?”
   -
7. Espresso will be offered to you in the morning. Also at 10am, noon, 3pm, 5pm, and 8pm. You will be expected to partake in at least half of these opportunities.
   -
8. Should you get the shakes after consuming half a gallon of coffee, expect several people to gently squeeze your shoulder and tell you to calm down. They will blame your nerves on “city life”, “working too much,” or simply “being American.” But obviously not the coffee.
   - 
9. “You paid how much for that bottle of wine? You know Carlo Rossi is two gallons for $7 and it’s just as good.”
   - 
10. The greatest contributions to society have been made by Italians. Mostly by Galileo, Da Vinci, and DeNiro.
    

    Also, all art and history and culture and language and good things come from Italy and nowhere else.

    -

11. You will inevitably share a meal with someone who is dressed in only a shirt and bikini briefs. 90% of the time, said individual will be a male. Roughly 50% of the time, he will be over the age of 50. DO NOT BREAK THE HORIZONTAL PLANE.
    -
    
12. At some point, you will see a 100-pound, middle-aged woman demolish a plate of pasta roughly the size of a pile of laundry, along with a loaf of bread and maybe some salad. She will then skip dessert because “that stuff makes you fat.” Resist the urge to punch her, as she is probably my mother. (And all her goddamn genes are recessive.)
    -
13. If you are a vegetarian, you will be offered prosciutto as an alternative to meat. If you are gluten-free … please get over that, or leave the house immediately.
    – 
14. Andy Garcia is Italian, as is evidenced by his role in The Godfather, Part III. It is best if you do not argue this point, despite glaring evidence to the contrary.
    - 
15. Jon Stewart is Italian, too.
    -
16. Obviously Colbert is as well. (Your failure to know this stuff is just evidence of the media’s rampant anti-Italianism.)
    -
17. Unless you have been specifically instructed by the host to sit at the head of the table, do not even think of doing so. Ditto for the foot of the table.
    -
18. High decibel yelling and screaming, standing up and waving limbs, hysterical crying and slamming of fists on the table are all part of standard conversation and should not be misconstrued as signs of actual conflict.
    - 
19. The same can be said of the brandishing of weapons and/or rosary beads.
    -
20. If you are dating a woman in the family, expect to sleep on the couch, or in a twin bed in her little brother’s room, or possibly outside.
    -
    If you are dating a man in the family, you can totally sleep in his bedroom, but note that the hushed conversations, disapproving looks, and head-shaking are totally about you.
    -
    (Note: I’m presuming heterosexual relationships here. I don’t know how Italian chauvinism translates to gay and lesbian culture, but I suspect it would be a fascinating study.)
    -
21. If you give someone a gift, you will find that gratitude is often expressed through guilt and tears. For some reason, simply saying “thank you” and being happy isn’t appropriate. But serious grief and distress over the bracelet you bought them totally is.
    -
22. Do not, under any circumstances, attempt to rise from, or remove the dishes from, the dinner table within the two hours immediately following a meal. Your unwillingness to sit and talk to your hosts for 120 minutes is a clear sign that you hate them.
    -
23. At any given time, someone will be running around in a state of hysterical panic. It’s cool. Just let them do their thing.
    - 
24. “What are you wearing? You’re going to catch cold in that.”
    -

Man, I should have written this for my husband years ago. Eh, better late than never.

Happy Chrismukkah, baby.

—————-

Note: I know that stereotyping is lame. I realize that not all Italian families are the same. Hell, not even all crazy families are the same. I’m just sharing what I’ve learned from my family (a family that happens to be Italian. And crazy.) So if you are tempted to write me some hate mail, may I kindly suggest you take your anger and direct it back to Instagram, where it belongs? Apparently they are stealing your IP and setting fire to puppies, or something.

My dear, confusing mother.

-

I’ve just returned from California. I spent several days spent in the company of my family, which is always a fascinating experience. Nothing makes me question reality more.

I’ve tried explaining to my friends that my relations see things differently than the rest of the world, but my point is often lost.

“All families are insane,” they say, nodding sympathetically. And then they’ll tell me about some aunt of theirs with an excessive collection of hat pins and no hats, and laugh at how ridiculous the whole thing is.

Hat pins! How delightfully zany!

It is all I can do not to grab them by the front of the shirt and gently hiss, ”Really, pumpkin? HAT PINS? That’s the best you can do? Because until your auntie leads a massive police chase through your hometown while wearing nothing but a nightgown, I don’t want to hear about your damn hat pins.”

Until your mom gives you and your brother copies of Twilight: The Board Game for Christmas (with the enigmatic explanation of “You know how people who work for the same company always get the same gift from their bosses?”) YOU DO NOT HAVE GROUNDS FOR COMPLAINT.

Until your uncle steers your auntie (a different one; not the police chase one) through street traffic while she’s in a wheelchair BECAUSE HE SAYS THE ROAD IS SAFER THAN THE SIDEWALK, you can just sit down and hush up.

Trust me. I win the crazy family pageant. I have sashes upon sashes which I layer upon my body like a straight-jacket.

But just in case there was any doubt, let me share with you a rather interesting exchange I had this past Thanksgiving weekend with my mom.

I don’t actually remember how it began (really, who can say how the seeds of madness are sown?), but it had something to do with Halloween. My mother was remarking that sometimes people dress up as unfavorable historical characters to make a political statement.

I disagreed with her assertion. For example, I think when Prince Harry dressed up as a Nazi several years ago, he wasn’t so much making a statement as he was making a grievous error in judgement (for which he later apologized). I said as much to my mother.

“I think dressing up as someone – even for Halloween – is a tacit endorsement of them. So you have to pick someone you are a fan of. You can make a political statement, but it has to be someone favorable,” I said, thinking of this clip from Louis C.K.’s show. “Otherwise, it’s just bad taste.”

“So then why did Rand dress up as a pedophile for Halloween?” my mother replied.

“Wait, WHAT?”

“Rand’s costume …”

“Yeah?”

“He was Jerry Sandusky.”

“Wait, WHAT?”

“The Boy Scout costume he wore.”

“Wait, WHAT?”

“Didn’t Rand dress up as Jerry Sandusky?”

“Wha … no. NO. NO. NO. Why would you think that?”

My mother sighed in frustration. BECAUSE CLEARLY I AM THE CRAZY ONE. She then explained to me that she was under the impression that this year, Rand had dressed up as former assistant football coach and convicted serial child molester Jerry Sandusky.

For the record, here is a photo of Rand and I on Halloween.

-

We dressed up as the kids from Moonrise Kingdom. On Facebook, I noted this, mentioning that Rand’s character’s name was Sam Shakusky, and that I had dressed up as Suzy Bishop.

Now, I haven’t really been able to follow my mom’s logic (because I’m pretty sure there isn’t any) but here’s how it went:

• She has not seen Moonrise Kingdom, so she obviously didn’t get the reference. That’s totally reasonable, actually. I asked her why she didn’t simply think we were characters from a movie that she hadn’t seen. After all, my posts on Facebook mentioned the film title. She said she “didn’t see the movie mentioned”. She just saw the photo and figured we were making a political statement.
  - 
• She claimed Jerry Sandusky was involved with the Boy Scouts, so Rand’s scouting costume was pretty self-explanatory. (Incidentally, Sandusky was never involved with the Scouts.)
  -
• I asked her why she assumed that Rand was dressed as Jerry Sandusky, and not, say, a generic Boy Scout, and she said once again, that she thought it was part of the political statement we were so obviously making.
  - 
• When asked about my costume, she said she thought that I was Jerry Sandusky’s wife, Rose. And that I had worn pink as a reference to her name.
  -
• I feel it pertinent to note that Jerry Sandusky’s wife’s name is not Rose. It’s Dottie. And she doesn’t wear pink, nor does she have long brown hair. She also stood by her husband during all of his molestation charges. Ick.
  - 
• My mother also noted that she saw a lot of photos online of people dressed similarly to us. When I asked her about this, reasoning that it seemed strange that everyone else would have the same vague costume that we did (and also the same horrific taste as to think dressing up as a pedophile and his doting wife would SOMEHOW BE A GOOD IDEA), she did note that she thought it a little weird. But then she just figured we were all making the exact same political statement.
  - 
• When I asked (assuming that we had somehow thought it would be a good idea to dress as Jerry Sandusky and his wife) why we wouldn’t have gone with more obvious costumes, my mother remarked that she simply thought we were “being artistic.”
  - 
• I asked her if she thought it was strange that all our friends noted how cute we looked when I posted the pictures on Facebook. She admitted that had alarmed her a bit, but not enough to rethink the situation.

And that’s it. That’s my mom’s reasoning behind why she thought that this rather sweet scene …

-

… was actually us recreating a pedophile and his twisted, enabling wife.

Although in hindsight, it does explain the confusing phone conversation my mom and I had shortly after Halloween.

Me: Did you see our costumes?

Mom: I did.

Me: Weren’t they adorable?

Mom: Um …

Me: You didn’t think the costumes were cute?

Mom: Well … you know, you made a statement. Which is what you wanted to do.

After I explained to my mom what our costumes actually were, I think she felt a little guilty about her assumption that we would dress up as people as reprehensible as Jerry and Dottie Sandusky. After she and I had cleared the air (which took the better part of an hour, mind you), she posted a picture of me and Rand to her Facebook wall. Note my brother’s reply.

-

I thought his comment was hilarious. Mom didn’t appreciate it all that much. But I’ve learned that she and I? We see things differently.

Rows and rows of cottages.

-

Folks, I am ill, ill, ill. I was supposed to leave for California this morning, but changed my ticket last night. It was around that time that my nostrils decided to be The Blob for Halloween (they like to get started on their costume early, it seems).

Blerg.

All energy has been sucked out of me and replaced with mucus.

But I feel I need to reply to some of the comments on yesterday’s post, during which several lovely folks noted that Castle Leslie seemed more like a manor than a castle. There was a bit of protesting about the lack of a moat, and there was certainly no drawbridge, and from my vantage point, I saw absolutely zero people wearing crowns and making decrees.

And because I love pouring gasoline on a fire, to those folks I say this: you are going to be even more disappointed with our cottage.

Don’t get me wrong: it was lovely. It had a gigantic kitchen, and a nice living room with plush couches, and there were no less than four (FOUR!) bedrooms.

-

This bedroom remained empty because it had a pair of twin beds in it, and none of us wanted to spend the weekend pretending we were a TV couple from 1953.

-

But when I was told we were staying in a cottage, I had imagined a tiny little place with a thatched roof and shuttered windows, occupied by the occasional runaway princes who was trying to pass for a commoner.

So I was taken aback when I saw the sheer enormity of the place.

So, I guess it’s a jumbo cottage?

-

Team Handsome was meeting just outside.

-

I certainly did not anticipate that it would have a CD player/alarm clock that also played white noise and babbling brook sounds on command.

We got ourselves a swank cottage is what we did.

-

It wasn’t all good news, though. We had a few sad revelations. Like, that there was no pie. NONE WHATSOEVER. Aren’t cottages supposed to have pies baking in little woodstove ovens at all hours of the day? And little birds that fly in through the window and do your hair for you?

Needless to say, I had to do my own hair. I was disappointed substantially by this.

The sign out front, however, met my cottage-y expectations:

I want one in front of our place that says, “Everywhereist … Unemployed Professional Dessert Eater.” Because I live up to a title like that.

-

I had to ask what a scullery maid was, and everyone explained (because my friends, it seems, know the hierarchy of household maids by heart) that she’s the lowest-ranking of maid in a household. She would have to do a lot of the grunt work in the kitchen, like scouring the dishes and cleaning the floor and making sure the stoves were lit to heat water before everyone else got up.

Oh, and if it was her birthday or something, she’d get to do something fun like scale a fish or pluck the feathers off a chicken.

The sign was all for show, of course. I’m fairly certain the cottage we stayed in was quite modern, and no scullery maid had ever lived there. But I can’t help but think that I might consider scaling a fish or three if it meant that I got to stay in a place like that.

I’d just have to supply my own pie. Fortunately, I usually travel with a couple on me. And a peach cobbler. Just in case.

I know, because I spend most of my days wrestling with them, trying to manipulate them into what I want them to be, often to no avail. Have you ever tried chiseling someone’s likeness in a a hunk of jell-o? It’s something like that.

But I love them, and I can’t rightly abandon them, because my blog would be oh-so-boring without words. It would be nothing more than photos of cupcakes and me making out with my husband. (I realize it’s not much more than that now, but it has the potential to be more, thanks to words. Or so I tell myself.)

And so I struggle to understand them. I even went so far as to read Steven Pinker’s The Stuff of Thought. I mean, I read part of it – somewhere in the ballpark of 24 pages. Which doesn’t sound like a lot, but believe me, it is. That book is excruciating and fascinating. It likes watching a documentary on space while having someone scream into your ear and slap you repeatedly with a fish.

Yes, it’s interesting and all, but DEAR GOD make it stop.

In the two dozen odd pages that I managed to get through of Pinker’s treatise on language and how we learn it, he touches on the topic of how we, as a society, accept new words into our lexicon. Email caught on, as did gerrymander, but teledildonics didn’t (mankind’s loss, as I am sure you will agree).

As Pinker points out, we don’t even know what to call the first decade of the 2000s. (The naughties? No. No one called it that.)

One of the most salient points that comes from the whole thing is this: it’s really frigging hard to get people to universally accept new words. And yet, despite this, Cockney Rhyming Slang exists.

It makes no sense.

Are you familiar with Cockney Rhyming Slang? It’s crazy stuff. And I’m sad to admit that Wikipedia will probably do a far better job of explaining it than I will. But here’s my feeble attempt:

It originated sometime around the mid-1850s in London, and was designed so that folks could have discussions without those around them understanding what they were saying (for the record, I usually barely understand what’s going on around me, anyway, so it would be a totally redundant measure).

Here’s basically how it works:

• You start with a word. Let’s say “stairs.”
  - 
• You take a phrase that rhymes with that word. For stairs, there’s “apples and pears.” (This is the part that confuses me, because I don’t know how these words are arrived at. I mean, lots of stuff rhymes with stairs.)
  - 
• Then you DROP the rhyming word from the phrase, and just use the remaining one. In this case, you keep “apples”.
  -
• So now stairs = apples. So in Cockney Rhyming Slang (or CRS), one would say, “I’m heading up the apples.”

I SWEAR I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP. This is actually how CRS evolved. And it changes and evolves to reflect current events. For example, to get into a “barney” means to get into trouble. Because “barney” actually refers to “Barney Rubble”, whose rhymes with trouble.

WTF, England.

And yes, it still lives on today. Rand and I saw this on a menu at an Indian restaurant in London:

-

Can you guess what a “Ruby Murray” is? Sometimes it’s just called a “ruby” (it originates from the name of an Irish singer who was popular in the UK in the 1950s). To be fair, the description of the dish kind of gives it away.

Here it is!

-

Yup. A “ruby murray” is a curry.

I know.

To me, it’s unfathomable. I can’t even get people to call me by my correct name (Jennifer, Gabrielle, Genevieve, and Gretchen have all be directed at me in the past by desperate coworkers and new acquaintances trying to get my attention). But here is a whole subset of the English language derived from totally non-intuitive origins that is so universally known in England that IT APPEARS ON MENUS TO SHEER BEFUDDLEMENT OF TOURISTS.

I know what you’re thinking, and I had the same realization: we NEED this in America. You’re with me, right? Here’s how we get it started. “Drinking straws” rhymes with “panties and a bra.” So we’ll just nix the bra part, and a straw is now panties.

So next time you order a drink, be sure to ask the bartender to put some panties in it. I see no downside to this.

Or maybe I’m going to get us all into a huge barney. But at least it won’t be boring.

What? It could happen.

Besides, it’s not all untrue: I do have enough basic knowledge left over from high school Spanish that I can be of some help when we’re in Spain or South America. Not much, mind you, but enough to (hopefully) not get him arrested. For example, when were in Madrid he saw a sign that said señoras …

-

… and he reacted thusly:

-

Sorry, darling. That is incorrect. Let’s try again. Here’s another sign. What do you think it means?

-

OH THANK HEAVENS, YOU ARE NOT JUST A PRETTY FACE:

-

Very good, darling. I’ve never been prouder.

-

Yes, yes, you are fantastic. I’m getting you a churro, Mr. Grant. Maybe even two.

For those of you unfamiliar with this specimen of early-90s cinematic glory, here are some fun facts:

• It is rated R.
• It involves a terrorist plot … at the Hoover Dam.
• It stars not only Jean-Claude Van Damme, but also Dolph Lundgren (psst- you should totally check out that link to Mr. Lundgren’s personal site, because it is DELIGHTFUL).

If you are playing along at home, I’ve just given you at least four reasons why you should not let a child see this movie. But let’s not judge my mother, because she really did her best, and (despite being totally desensitized to violence and suffering a crippling fear of most national parks) I turned out okay.

Please consider this the next time you can’t find a babysitter and really want to see a low-budget action flick.  Your kid will probably be fine! He or she may even grow up to be an unemployed travel blogger!

There was only one part of the movie that I had trouble with: it’s when Mr. Van Damme has just woken up from some sort of cryogenic sleep or something (I apologize for my vagueness, but I refuse to look up the plot), and he’s wandering around outside, completely naked.

While I later handled Dolph Lungren getting ripped apart by a thresher at the end of the movie (Technically, this is a spoiler, but I would argue that I did you a favor), 11-year-old me apparently could not deal with the sight of J.C.V.D.’s firm, glistening posterior, and I starting cackling like a madwoman for the entire time it was on screen.

Which was, like, a while.

I mean, I was in hysterics (though really, I could have been laughing at the absurdity of the plot in general). It wasn’t until my brother very gently leaned over to me and delicately whispered something in my ear that I was able to regain some composure. I will never forget his words.

“If you don’t shut up, I will kill you. I swear to god, if you do not stop giggling right this minute, you will not live to see tomorrow.”

The point is, I apparently laugh at inappropriate times, at inappropriate things. Which is probably why I find Germany – and German words – so damn hilarious.

I realize I’m going to get a whole heap of mail about this. About how I’m everything that’s wrong with America, how I’m ignorant and narrow-minded, and how I clearly don’t travel enough, because if I did, I would be able to appreciate the beauty of other languages, instead of laughing at funny-sounding words like a moron.

But whatever. German words are inadvertently really, really funny.

Just like Universal Soldier.

Here are some things that had me laughing during my last trip.

—————

Ausfahrt.

What it actually means: an exit. (You’ll most commonly see it on the freeway, denoting off-ramps).

Ausfahrt

-

What it sounds like: something an Aussie would do after ingesting too many bratwursts.

Fact: Rand and I have this exchange almost nightly.

-

—————

Fohnsee

What it actually means: Fonhsee is a rather picturesque camping area in Bavaria, near the town of Iffeldorf.

-

What it brings to mind: Fonzie.

I would, however, totally visit a place named after Ralph Malph.

-

—————

Schmuck

What it actually means: jewelry

Schmuck!

-

What it brings to mind:

NARD DOG!

-

—————

“Ich Liebe Dich.”

What it actually means: “I love you.”

-

What it brings to mind:

Me: What does “Ich liebe” mean?

Rand: It means “I love.”

Me: Oh, sweet heavenly father. It says, “I love … DICH?”

Rand: Dammit, Geraldine, it means “I love you.”

Me: Suuuure it does … dich.

-

—————

Haarschmuckfachgeschäft

What it really means: Haarschmuck is ornaments for your hair (makes sense, when you see the above definition of schmuck). And fachgeschäft means a specialty shop. So Haarschmuckfachgeschäft is a specialty shop that sells hair ornaments. Obviously.

Giggle.

-

What it brings to mind:

-

—————-

Rathaus

What it actually means: a city hall or town hall.

-

What it sounds like:

Sadly, the rathaus was not made entirely of cheese. YOU MISLED ME, GERMANY.

-

—————-

Wirtshaus

What it actually means: a pub or saloon

-

What it brings to mind:

Me: Hey honey, do you know why you shouldn’t go there?

Rand: Why?

Me: Because it would be the wirst haus ever. Get it? WORST HOUSE?

Rand: You realize you that’s not what the sign says, right? You just transposed two of the letters.

Me: WHY MUST YOU ROB ME OF LIFE’S JOYS?

-

—————

Schlosswirtschaft

What it actually means: a restaurant (or some sort of shop/office) inside of a castle (a big thanks to @PetraKraft, who explained this all to me.)

-

What it sounds like: a place where infectious diseases would be highly communicable.

For some reason, this came to mind.

 -

—————

Sigh. So that’s it. I know, I know. I’m going to get tons of mail about this. And believe me, I realize that there are just as many English words and “Americanisms” that sound ridiculous to native speakers of other languages, too. And I wouldn’t blame anyone for laughing at those either.

Like onomatopoeia. Or flagella. Or … well, I could go on and on.

-

This is a story about one such argument.

I don’t remember how it began. Few great battles in history have marked beginnings. We say it was the assassination of Ferdinand, we suggest that it may have been the killing of Crispus Attucks and four others on a chilly night in Boston, but we are only guessing – trying to add sense and order to a situation where there likely isn’t one. Where there is only chaos and conflict.

I can tell you this: we were in London, and the turbulence at our table was in stark contrast to the unseasonably warm and sunny weather outside. I stated my piece, firm and reasonable, and was refuted by sheer madness. I shook my head. He shook his. Our voices grew louder. Our (okay, fine – my) attacks grew personal. I said some things about his mother, and her lack of a gag reflex, that I now regret. But still, I maintained my position. And that position is this: IT IS CALLED CILANTRO.

He disagreed, of course. “It’s called coriander,” he said, a claim which sounded all the more legitimate thanks to his English accent. If Patrick Stewart claimed that the sky was pink, we’d all believe it, on account of that damn accent. But I wouldn’t be so easily swayed.

“No one has ever been more wrong that you are now,” I said. Not even the guy who occasionally comments on my blog about how the holocaust never happened.

“I don’t see how I can be wrong if I’m telling you, factually, that’s what we call it,” he replied.

“And I’m telling you factually that YOUR FACE IS WRONG AND YOU ARE A TERRIBLE PERSON,” I screamed, and told him that I recently saw his mother servicing a fleet of young sailors. That was cruel and wrong. I really shouldn’t have said that, and most definitely should not have recreated the scene using Photoshop and some old beloved family photos.

He was undeterred, and kept pressing his point. I kept shaking my head. No, no, no. It made no sense. Perhaps we had misunderstood each other. Before it turned into an unfounded bloodbath, I needed to clarify that we were talking about the same thing.

“It has green leaves,” I said, my voice strained by vitriol, but still clear. “… it  resembles parsley, and can be found in many Mexican dishes. Do you know what I’m referring to?”

“Yes. It’s a herb,” he said, making a point of pronouncing the “h” in front  of the word “herb.”

I let out a half sigh, half growl. I could only handle one epic disagreement at a time. We’d address the proper pronunciation of “herb” later.

“Yes,” I said, teeth gritted. “The HHHHHHHERB.”

“Yes. The herb. Coriander.”

“CILANTRO.”

“It’s called CORIANDER.”

“AND YOUR MOTHER IS CALLED FOR A GOOD TIME.”

I don’t know how long we went on like that. It may have been minutes, or days, or weeks. Time has no meaning when you are yelling at an Englishman. My aunt has been married to a Brit for 50 years, and I am certain she would agree with this sentiment.

Looking back, I realize it was an entirely absurd argument. Here in the states, the entire plant is called coriander, as are the seeds. But the leaves are called cilantro (the Spanish word for the plant) and for clarity’s sake, it makes things much easier. Go to a store looking for coriander, and you’ll find a dried spice. Search for cilantro, and you’ll end up with a fresh, leafy herb. In the U.K., so I am told, the whole dang thing is called coriander, and the leaves are called, intuitively enough, coriander leaves (or, on occasion, Chinese Parsley). Ask for “cilantro” and you’ll get wrinkled brows and confused looks. It’s just not as common a word over there.

We might as well have been quarreling over eggplant versus aubergine. Like the superfluous “u” in “humour” and “colour”, the transposing of the letters “e” and “r” in words like “centre”, it was just one of many inconsequential things that separates the English and the Americans. There would be no resolution to this.

In the end, we agreed to disagree and I promised to stop pledging money to neo-Nazi organizations in his name.  I suppose it was all for the best. After all, is it not our differences that make life interesting? If everything were the same everywhere, wouldn’t travel be pointless? Yes. OF COURSE. Of course. Our idiosyncrasies and foibles make the world grand, I reminded myself.  And I believed all that nonsense of tolerance and goodwill until our last day in London. Right up until we were in a cab on our way out of town. That was when we saw this restaurant’s sign:

Forgive the terrible photo. I had rage fingers.

-

If you supposedly call the whole thing coriander, WHY THE HELL IS THERE A WHOLE CHAIN OF CAFES (with reportedly terribly food) CALLED CILANTRO? HUH? EXPLAIN THAT.

Your move, buddy.

We're not in hell, I promise. Hell's flags are different.

-

You know that old joke about heaven and hell? How in heaven, the police are British, the engineers are German, the cooks are Italian, the lovers are French? And how in hell, the roles are jumbled up? The police are German, the cooks are British, and, perhaps most cruelly of all, the bureaucrats are Italian.

And while the more culturally sensitive of you are rolling your eyes at the broad brush with which that joke paints Europeans, a few of you, like me, are knowingly nodding your head. If you’ve traveled at all, you know that the police in the U.K. are generally lovely, and you know the feeling of pure relaxation that comes after hearing your airplane pilot speak to the cabin in German-accented English. And if you are truly unfortunate, you know the hell of any organizational, governmental, or bureaucratic system in Italy.

For those of you unfamiliar with it, here is pretty much things go: take a bunch of screaming people. Put them in a room. Make sure no one has any idea of the specific details of their jobs, and that, upon any request to do the work for which they are paid, they look at you with scorn and exasperation. Add a coffee break every half-hour or so, and a cigarette break every fifteen minutes. And give substantial days off in the event of local festivals, and the birthdays of any saints, including all of those minor and fictional (“We can’t go into work! It’s St. Giuseppe the Flatulent’s Birthday!”). You know now what it’s like to work in Italy.

In every airport, train station, museum, or governmental office I’ve been in, I’ve scratched my head wondering exactly how anything gets done. Like, at all. I don’t expect big things (like citizenship or passport applications) to go through, but I don’t understand how all the small things, like the fixing of  leaky pipes and grocery-store deliveries, happen at all.

This is the miracle of Italy. Not the ancient ruins or the amazing food or wine or the art that spans centuries. No. It’s a miracle that the entire boot-shaped peninsula (and the island it’s been mercilessly kicking since god was a boy) hasn’t been swallowed up in a black void of nothingness. Bill Bryson puts it best in the delightful Neither Here nor There (read it immediately if you haven’t already. I’ll wait.):

The country has the social structure of a banana republic, yet the amazing thing is that it thrives. It now has the fifth biggest economy in the world, which is a simply staggering achievement in the face of such chronic disorder. If the Italians had the work ethic of the Japanese, they could be masters of the planet. Thank goodness they don’t.

And so, given this bacchanalia and chaos, you can imagine my concern when Rand and I were departing from Fiumencino airport in Rome for London a few weeks back.

We were, I was sure, going to get sucked into that black void.

We approached the security checkpoint not in a line, for queues don’t exist in Italy, but in an amorphous blob of people. The smell of humanity was thick in my nostrils as I braced myself for being yelled at (I am always being yelled at in Italy. But that’s another blog post. One I promise I will get to). Despite an entire lifetime of being screamed at by Italians, I have built up zero sensitivity to it. Quite the opposite really: my response to it is Pavlovian – my blood pressure spikes in anticipation. This is a problem when one considers that essential yelling is to Italian life – people do it constantly – even whispering in Italian requires you to raise your voice.

Given how often I was yelled at stateside by security agents, I could not imagine what the Italian equivalent would be. From our position (mid-blob, slightly to the left), I could already hear the Italian-equivalent of the TSA barking at people. I nervously started wringing my hands as the blob lurched forward, and a young mother with a baby strapped in a carrier to her chest was thrown to the front.

I watched intently as the agents explained she couldn’t go through with the child in the carrier, and that she’d have to remove him. The young woman looked nervous – she didn’t seem to speak much Italian. Finally, one of the agents snapped impatiently, “Stai da sola?” Are you alone?

The girl nodded.

“Okay,” the agent said. “I’ll help you.”

And in that moment, I remembered why, despite all the crazy, I love Italy. The mother handed her child to the agent, who in a blink transformed from a disgruntled Italian airport worker into the Roman equivalent of Maria Von Trapp. She bounced the baby up and down gently, cooing at him, while his mother finished removing the carrier and walked through the metal detector to join him.

No shouting. Not even a single tear.

Moments later, a second child arrived at the security gate with his mother. He looked about five years old, green-eyed, with a mop of curly ash-blond hair. Another agent was monitoring his side of the line – a large, gruff man with slicked back shoulder length hair.

“Veni,” he barked at the little boy. Come.

Here we go, I thought to myself. The black void, come to swallow this little Christmas card of a boy.

“Veni,” the agent repeated. “Veni, tesoro.”

Wait, what? Tesoro? Seriously? It’s what my uncle called me when I was little. Tesoro mio. My treasure.

Come, treasure.

And the little boy skipped through, and the agent ruffled his hair absent-mindedly as he passed.

In this manner, something crazy happened. The blob advanced. No, it wasn’t lightening fast. And yes, there were raised voices. It was chaotic and noisy, punctuated with the occasional burst of laughter, the ruffling of a child’s hair, the cooing of a baby. This is how things happen in Italy. It doesn’t have the cool, mechanical efficiency of Germany, or even the U.S. for that matter. It is grimy and crowded and intimate and a bit pungent. But things do happen.

On the other side of security, Rand and gathered our belongings. A woman behind us had just walked through the metal detector, and set it off. Her eyes widened, mortified. She held her arms up above her head, and froze.

The agent, the gruff one with the slick backed hair looked at her impatiently.

“Madame,” he said, “Put your arms down. I’m not a police officer and you aren’t under arrest.”

And yet, her position, almost absurd in its vulnerability, is required of people going through the backscatter machines in the U.S. And here, he was rolling his eyes as she held her arms up. The entire scene? It was downright un-American.

It was Italian.

The waiter comes by with the haughtiness and exasperation of someone who knows that the gratuity is included in the bill. My uncle will remind me that this isn’t just because we’re in Italy, but also because we’re in Rome. It’s somewhat like New York – people are rushed, people are busy, people are yelling. It isn’t because they are angry at you (or if they are, it isn’t because it’s personal). It’s simply what life in the city is like. As we rattle off our orders in Italian (yes, Rand included), our waiter seems less disgusted with our table. My uncle’s Roman accent surely helps, as do, I suspect, my cousin’s big green eyes.

My family laughs at my reaction to the service, but I tell them I’m just glad I haven’t been yelled at. It seems that I’m always getting yelled at in Italy … or by Italians (that is another post. I promise you).

I order cacio e pepe pasta – a dish so absurdly simple, I’m wondering why I’ve never ordered it, much less made it. Butter, pecorino, a tiny bit of pepper swirled over fresh pasta.

Carciofi romani in the background.

-

Rand  doesn’t get what the big deal is, but trust me: it is fantastic. My cousin orders the same thing, and my uncle, ever the local, goes full-Roman:

Trippa Romana. Notice the hands, so constantly in motion, that they're blurry. It's my belief this is how Italians burn off all the extra calories.

-

Tripe doesn’t scare me. I actually like it a lot, and I grew up eating it. My grandmother would make it in a runny, tomatoey broth, and I’d gobble it up without the addition of cheese. I remember my brother hating it, but I loved it. I ordered it once stateside, at Lidia Bastianich‘s restaurant Felidia in New York, and was disappointed. It was mushy and tasted – forgive me on this one – too clean. I ate barely half. The waiter looked at me sympathetically – I was the girl who was trying to be a foodie, who took a risk and couldn’t stomach it (sorry, again). I wanted to explain to him the whole story, but obviously didn’t.

Here, though, in the touristy-restaurant that isn’t touristy at all, my uncle’s tripe is perfect – salty and chewy and intensely flavored. I keep stealing pieces and dragging them onto my plate, a streak of orangey-red against the white of my noodles, and feel suspiciously like I did when I was a kid.

The tripe is salty, and it makes me thirsty. I notice that our bottle of water – ordered with our food – never arrived, and I decide to ask the waiter about it. My family warns me – service in Italy isn’t like it is the states. Water glasses never reaching empty, bottomless baskets of bread – these do not exist in Europe. And so, out of fear of committing a huge Roman faux pas, I gently grab the waiter’s attention.

“I am terribly sorry,” I tell him, flashing the brightest smile I can. “I know the gentleman is busy” (yes, I used third-person formal) “but when he has a moment, could we please have a bottle of water?”

Now, compare this the traditional Roman way of asking:

“Hey, asshole, where the fuck is my water?”

No, I’m not kidding. Cuss words pepper Roman dialect and no one bats an eye. But here I am, at the equivalent of the local diner, using third person formal to ask for water that we had already ordered. There were two ways in which this could go down: I was either going to make someone feel very badly, or I was going to get laughed at.

In actuality, both happen.

The waiter, after looking shell-shocked for a few long seconds, cracks. I have caught him so off-guard, this foreigner with her extreme politeness, that he is immediately apologizing. “I am so sorry,” he says. “My colleague brought your bottle to another table.” He immediately brings us glasses and a bottle, again blaming his coworker and apologizing.

I smile and thank him profusely. Someone feeling badly? Check. Someone laughing at me?

She lost it.

-

Check.

My little cousin (and my aunt and uncle for that matter) can not keep her shit together. She, my aunt, and my uncle, all collectively lose it when I ask for water, and again when the waiter responds so sweetly.

“That’s not how people talk in Rome!” she manages to spit out.

“Well, it’s how I talk to waitstaff,” I explain, smiling.

After lunch – one of those midday too-long extravaganzas the Italians are known for – we go for a walk, and I feel slightly out-of-place. A stranger in a familiar land. It’s an odd feeling. I take to my camera, snapping pictures of things here and there. When a tourist in Rome, act like one, right?

I see a boot on a car, and I take a picture, because I find it so ridiculous (seriously, if someone is parked where they shouldn’t be, tow their car – don’t immobilize it!)

This is just bad practice, but I'm guessing it's the only way to get a Roman to pay a parking ticket.

-

As we walk away, I hear some gentleman talking about the boot.

“Well who the hell put it on here?”

“That woman just took a picture of it.”

“Well, did she put it on?”

Now, I don’t know why on earth they think this, but I turn around, abruptly. And without thinking, my hand is up, my index and middle finger pressed against my thumb in a pinched gesture, which I am waving back and forth.

And I am shouting.

“What, now you think I did this?” I scream.

And the gentleman are taken aback. No, no, of course not, they say. They are just curious as to who it was.

Okay, then. Well, it wasn’t me. And I turn and walk away. My response, this time, is quick and instinctual, and purely Roman.

And once again, my family is laughing.