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We're All About Italy

Culture

Killer Italian Shoes that Can Actually Maim a Flirt?

4/30/2025

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I understand this was a long time ago, but really, stabbing someone for flirting? If the tipo actually puts his hands on the woman, perhaps. Puncture him all you want.

In reality, I've witnessed pappagalli (parrots or wolves) flirting with pretty ladies walking by in Rome and other Italian cities, and have found their comments are actually complimentary in nature, and because of their culture, can actually be fairly poetic...
  • "Sei così bella che mi fai dimenticare il mio nome". (You’re so beautiful, you make me forget my own name.)
  • "Complimenti alla mamma" (Compliments to your mother).
  • "Nel cielo manca un angelo?" (Is heaven missing an angel?)
  • "Dove sei stata/o tutta la mia vita?" (Where have you been all my life?).
  • "Hai una mappa? Continuo a perdermi nei tuoi occhi."  (Do you have a map? Because I keep getting lost in your eyes!)
  • "Come sei carina/o!" (How cute you are!)
  • "Questo vestito ti sta belissimo." (You look beautiful in this dress.)
  • "Il tuo sorriso è contagioso!" (Your smile is contagious.)
  • "Mi puoi incidere il tuo numero di telefono sul cuore?" (Can you engrave your telephone number on my heart?)
  • "Mi fai sciogliere come il gelato al sole." (You make me melt like ice cream in the sun.)

Flirting is part of life in Italy and it even has a poetic name: fare la civetta, which literally
means "to make like an owl", or as we might say, making googly eyes at a girl. 

When in Italy, young ladies have to keep this in mind: More so than American men, Italian single men--even into their Fifties--actually have a great respect for women. Many single Italian men are actually Mama's boys and traditionally live with their Mamma until they get married! 

No stabbing. Go easy on them. Va bene?

--Jerry Finzi

You might also be interested in:

Fare la Civetta: Flirting in Italy
Expressions of Love in Italian: Finding Love in Italy
Benefits of Kissing Like an Italian
Juliette's House in Verona: Phony! Fake! Falso!
Love Locks in Verona

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Parlo Italian-Americano?

4/26/2025

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My father was born in Molfetta, Puglia in the South. My Mom's mother and father came from Naples. Both spoke dialects of Italian. My mother often said that my father's dialect was so different from hers that she couldn't understand certain words. They were like different languages, far apart from Italian. In the late 1800s, most Italian immigrants came from the South: Campania, Calabria, Puglia or Sicily. In time, Italian-Americans have slurred local dialects even more... softening consanants, truncating words or even swapping sounds completely, like P to B, C tp G or V to F.

If you watch the Godfather, especially the scenes in GF II showing Vito Corleone as a young man, you can hear this sort of dialect from Sicily. The words in the South are often totally different. Lots of slang is used.
Liaisons happen... Usually, the end of one word attaches to the beginning of the next word. Beginnings of words are often omitted. Even Italians consider these dialects like another language... for example, the announcements on the train from Bari to Rome are in English, Italian and "
Dialetto". Dialect sounds nothing like regular Italian down South.

Now, add to all this the fact that Italian immigrants in American spoke a sort of second hand Italian dialect, much was lost to misunderstood pronunciations and the fact that many (like my parents) didn't want to speak Italian in the home. When I asked why my parents didn't teach us Italian, they said they wanted an "All-American" home for us. Even today in the South parents don't want their children to speak Dialect when they move to the big cities in Italy. They are looked down upon for speaking it by Northern Italians. What a shame...   These dialects are what makes Italian so interesting.

Here are a collection of Italian-American wods and phrases that I grew up with... spelled phonetically:

Agida/Agita                   Acid indigestion/aggravation
Ah-fa Nabalee                Get out of Here/Go to Naples
Ah-shpette                     Wait!
Ah-Va-Fan-gool             Go f*ck yourself
Bah-Bookia                   
Papocchio, a mess, allmixed up
Bah-fongool                   Go f*ck yourself

Ba-cha-ga-loop              Wolf Hunter or Brave (not dummy, like some think)
Bish-Gut                         biscotti/cookie
Bock-owz                       Bathroom/stink house, Back House or outhouse. 
Bomba-lonee                 Little Kid
Boochach                       Bitch/c*nt
Boombotz                       Idiot/Crazy
Boo-tahn'                        puttana, whore

Baz-ih-nigole                  Basil
Brahgonne                      Drunk
Brah-jole                         bracciole/slang for penis 

Cabbadost                     Thick head/stubborn
Chooch                           Big Baby-a put-down, or vagina

ComoseeCyam?            What do you call it?
Coh-Yonees                   Balls
Dees-Gradseeyad        
disgraziad, misfortune, bad luck, screw-up
Gal-ay-mahd                  Calimari/squid
Facha-broot                   Ugly face

Fin-ook                           Finoccichio/Fennel, 
Gabba-Dost                   Thick Head
Gabeesh?                        Understand?
Gavone                            Pig/Slob/Overeater
Gobba-ghool                   Capicola (a type of cold cut meat)

Googootz                        A fool
Goombah                        Pal/Comrade/Friend
GooMahd                        Girlfriend
GOT-zo!                           What Balls!
Jadrool                            Lazy bum (cucumber)

Jamoke                           Idiot
Kay-Gotz                         What the F*ck

Keh -sa-deech?               How are you?
Mal-yOke                         Evil eye
Mamaluke                       Idiot/stupid/screw-up
Manageya                        Damn it/Curse it
Managutt                         Manicotti (pasta)
Mah-done!                       Madonna mia! (exclamation)
Mopeen                           Dish Cloth, Rag
Medz-a-medz                  So-so/half and half/not so much
Mutzarelle                       Mozzarella cheese
Nabolee-DAHN               Neapolitan/someone from Naples
Pasta-vazool                   Pasta fagioli (bean soup)
piezahn                            Friend/countryman/brother
Pitza-gain                        Pizzagaina, Egg-meat pie
Ooo-Fah                           I've had it/I'm fed up 
Rigutt                                Ricotta cheese
Rompee-Coyownee         Ball Buster (Rompicoglione or -palle, for balls)
Shka-roll                           Escarole/Cash money
sfatcheem                       a Jerk
SkeeVo                             Disgusting

Stroonz                            an Ass
Stroonz-a-medz              Half ass
Strombolone                   Clumsy

Stata-Geet                       Shut Up
Skutch                             Pest
Stoon-od                         Idiot
StuGotz                           Screw it/F*ck it
TooSee Batz                   You're crazy
Vena Ka, Vena Ga          Come here

--Jerry Finzi

If you found this post useful, please LIKE it and tell your friends about Grand Voyage Italy. Ciao!   



Copyright, Jerry Finzi, Grand Voyage Italy, All rights reserved     


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You Know You're Becoming Italian When...

3/8/2025

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... You wake up in the morning and the first thing you smell isn't coffee brewing, but the smell of last night's marinara and meatballs still wafting through the house.
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Blowing Noses, Using Bidets and other Italian Customs

5/20/2018

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The culture in Italy is very different than in the U.S... especially concerning rules of proper behavior. What is acceptable in the States might be considered disgusting in Italy. What Italians consider as normal behavior, we would never thing of doing at home. Here are a few differences...
PicturePopular tissues in Italy
  • Blowing your nose in public is perfectly acceptable in Italy. You don't have to hide... you can blow your nose while in the middle of a conversation. In fact, do like the Italians do and start packing tissues wherever you go. And when you have to blow, just blow! Va tutto bene.
  • Italians never eat on the street while walking along during the normal workday, they never eat in their cars (which at times seems to be an extended part of their bella figura), and wouldn't even consider eating on the Metro. For breakfast, they eat at home or go to a bar for espresso or cappuccino and a sweet pastry. For their 3-hour lunch, they go home for a larger meal. The only times you will see Italians eating outside is at street festivals or sagre, or in certain areas of Italy known for a particular type of street food, like arancini or panelle in Palermo, Sicily. Eating a gelato in public doesn't count against you, though, but Italians usually sit down to enjoy it.
  • At home, Italians always eat at a table--never on the couch. Families tend to eat their meals together.
  • Italians don't wear shoes they've worn outside while inside their home--they remove them and put on slippers. They are also very particular what shoes get worn where: shoes and sandals for outside; sport shoes for taking part in sports; flip-flops and rubber sandals for the beach or poolside only; shower shoes for spas/hotel showers; slippers for home. Most Italian homes have a sort of shoe garage... the scarpiera.

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  • The Nonna next to you in the supermarket will more than likely stop you if you try to pick up fruit of veggies with your bare hands. There are plastic gloves in the produce section for this purpose. It's considered more sanitary.
  • Italian cashiers do not place your change into your hand. Instead, it's considered more polite to place the change onto a little tray for you to retrieve yourself.
  • Bread might be used by Italians merely as a scarpetta to wipe up the remaining sauce as they finish their pasta secundo course of a meal. Don't expect bread and butter to be placed on the table at the beginning of a meal. Bread tends to be used as a vehicle in and of itself, for bruschetta, crostini, etc.

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Avoiding la colpo d'aria
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  • Italians grow into life respecting their Nonna's warning about avoiding la colpo d'aria (literally, air blow). They fear any breezes or drafts (consider the ubiquitous Italian scarf) that will bring illness: Cervicale (stiff neck), raffredore (common cold), or febbre (a fever).
  • It's considered polite to use exact change when paying for things in Italy. If you hand someone a €20 note for an €11 purchase, they will likely ask if you have the €11 before giving change for the 20. Get in the habit of carrying coins.
  • In Italy, unless you've become friendly with someone, don't use "ciao". Instead, address people when leaving or arriving with buongiorno (good day), buonasera (good evening), buonanotte (good night, for late evening before bedtime) or arrivaderci (see you later). You may use a presto (see you soon) or a domani ('til tomorrow) with friends or strangers. Save ciao (bye or hi) or salve (hello) for close friends. 
  • Breastfeeding in the U.S. is still a fairly private thing, and Moms who do it in public typically hide the activity with the use of a blanket or wearable nursing cover. In Italy things are more liberal and you might see mothers breastfeeding without cover in the piazza or parks.

PictureIt's Chilly down there
  • Using the bidet is essential in Italy. It's an integrated part of going to the toilet. Italians couldn't think of not having a bidet to clean their, er... centro storico (historic center) thoroughly.  When Italians visit homes in the States, they will tend to take a shower after each and every bowel movement. In Italy, using a bidet is quicker. They use toilet paper after using the toilet, and then straddle the bidet either facing toward or away, depending on which end they are cleaning. They use a special soap for this purpose--Chilly--and water. Patting dry with a towel finishes the process. Both men and women and children use bidets. Hand washing is usually done afterwards. This is part of the bella figura attitude about one's personal appearance and grooming.


--GVI

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A Cabbage is a Cabbage, Except in Italy...

4/17/2018

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Mispronounced Italian Surnames?

4/17/2018

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Leave a comment!
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Only in Italy: Museo della Merda, the Shit Museum

4/12/2018

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No shit! There really is a Shit Museum in Italy... the Museo della Merda.
It was in 2015 that Gianantonio Locatelli founded the "museum" in Lombardy along with his associates: Luca Cipelletti, who manages its projects and products, Gaspare Luigi Marcone and Massimo Valsecchi.

The idea came into being in Castelbosco, in the province of Piacenza (just south of Milan) on a farm which makes milk for Grana Padano cheese and includes seven production units. Here every day 3,500 specially selected cows produce around 50,000 litres of milk and 150,000 kilos of poop.

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PictureLetame Essciato - Dried Manure fertilizer
The future-thinking Locatelli wanted to turn all this excrement into something useful with his ecological, productive and cultural scheme. Using highly innovative systems, electrical energy started to be produced from the manure. Today the farm produces up to three megawatts per hour! The buildings and offices of the farm are heated exploiting the warmth given off by huge processing tanks called Digestori (digesters) turning the manure into energy. The process also produces fertilizer offered for sale under the name MerdaMe (Shit me).

All these activities have drawn attention from various international institutions concerned with ecology and innovation, leading to widespread recognition and prizes, and making Castelbosco a point of reference.

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Locatelli began to gather together friends and artists, leading him to the idea of the Shit Museum. The Museum itself might be called a canvas onto which artists create... the Digesters themselves transformed into a bright colored landmark in the area. The idea for a new museum slowly took shape, emerging from manure to deal with the broader theme of transformation. The museum would be an agent of change which, through educational and research activities, the production of objects of everyday use and the gathering of artifacts and stories concerning excrement in the modern world and throughout history, was to dismantle cultural norms and prejudices.

The first stage of the project was carried out in April 2015 with the inauguration of the exhibition spaces of the Museum, in the rooms on the ground floor of the company premises, located within the medieval castle of Castelbosco. The museum is a blend of aesthetic, scientific, human and animal experiences, both modern day and historic. The concept is that shit is a useful and living material.

The symbol and mascot of the Museum is the dung beetle, considered divine by the Egyptians (and symbol of the Museum itself), to the use of dung in architecture, from ancient Italian civilizations to those in Africa, via historical-literary works such as Pliny’s Naturalis Historia. Right up to the latest scientific research and works of art drawing on the use and reuse of waste and discarded materials, the Museum is a contemporary cabinet of curiosities which finds its main guide in the science and art of transformation.

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Museum Activities
Right from the start, the Shit Museum was designed to be a production center not only of ideas and exhibitions, but also of objects and projects. The implementation and patenting of the Merdacotta® brand sums up the principle of sustainability. The poo is mixed with clay and gives shape to the first products to bear the Museo della Merda brand: vases, flowerpots, tiles, plates, bowls, a jug and a mug in simple, clean, rustic shapes, harking back to ancient principles.

The ‘primordial products’ of the Museum were presented for the first time during the 2016 Salone del Mobile, in an exhibition which won the promoters Cipelletti and Locatelli first prize in the Milano Design Award. The motivation given was as follows: “for the development of a process of great complexity and innovation, capable of destabilizing common perceptions. The educational itinerary breaks down all the commonplace stereotypes and offers a censorial experience, one which promotes a new vision of the culture of the project.”

Museo della Merda
Frazione Campremoldo Sopra
Loc. Castelbosco
29010 Gragnano Trebbiense (PC), ITALY
To Make an Appointment: [email protected]
For information: [email protected]
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True Love for Any Italian

1/29/2018

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Only in Italy: Highway to Nowhere?

11/13/2017

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While researching another subject using Google Earth, I came across this unusual scene just outside of Canosa di Puglia... a beautifully built Highway to Nowhere.

Oddly, the "street view" from several years ago shows nothing but dirt roads and farm fields. The satellite view taken in 2017 shows this beautifully built highway and a wonderfully wide roundabout in the middle. The only problem is, it goes nowhere and comes from no where. There are dirt roads and vineyards around all sides and the paved intersections intersect with dirt roads. There are no structures within the "development" area... just olives and grape vines.

Go figure. Perhaps the regional government thought, "If we build it, they will come."

--Jerry Finzi
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Only in Italy: Solving a Problem, Italian Style

10/5/2017

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There is that old saying (or aphorism), “Don’t raise the bridge, lower the river" that every engineering student knows. It describes the attitude about the obvious: there are no obstacles in getting things done. Just analyze the problem, and think of a way around it. But this doesn't usually mean literally.

"Lowering the river"  is what lies behind the design of most canal locks in the world. I've even seen canals built on viaducts, making the water travel over an obstacle, like railroad tracks or a road. But I've never quite seen the Italian solution to the problem illustrated above. In Manhattan, for example, if a work crew arrived, permits in hand, ready to dig a ditch for a sewer or communication cables, a call to the City's tow trucks solve the problem in no time at all. Tow the car out of the work zone. Done.
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In Italy, however, perhaps because of the lack of a reliable city department that would actually handle this problem--before the 12-3pm riposa--these workers figured they wouldn't wait for anyone else and solved the problem their way. Furbo. Look out for your own interests. Get the job done and get back to your own life. Why worry about some future contractor trying to locate that underground run of cable that he thinks should be in a straight line.

Besides, "Why have someone's car towed away and cause someone else problems? It might be my friend's cousin, or my cousin's cousin, or, Dio mio... someone's nonna!"

--Jerry Finzi
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