Ryan Chartrand“By the time you go home at the end of your program, you will have learned to live a much simpler life.” These were the first words our program director said to us, shortly after arriving in Torino, Italy.
Like many other American students, I mentally argued with her statement, feeling as if I already lived a pretty simple life. Looking back on the past three months, I was completely wrong.
In the beginning of our program, I went about my life in Italy the same way I would go about my American lifestyle. I went to the grocery store weekly, shopped at name-brand stores throughout town, and became incredibly impatient with the general slow pace of life.
After a few weeks of returning to my apartment in frustration, I realized that Italians clearly live a simpler life, and it was time for me to change.
Rather than stocking up on food for the next week, Italian women go to the open market or local butcher every morning to buy just enough food for that night. Being that there are no preservatives in the food sold here, you cannot store food for an extended period of time. It would merely be a waste of money.
Within days of exploring our neighborhood, I found, to my advantage, that there is a family-owned butcher shop right below my apartment complex. When I first began shopping there, I became slightly offended. Thinking that I was just another rude American, one of the brothers working there became insulted with my na’ve ways of ordering. Accustomed to the American way, I would refuse to ask for help, and would just go around the shop picking out my own items. One day, in particular, as I was reaching to grab some apples, the man came over to me, slapped my hand and pointed to the plastic glove to the right. Slightly embarrassed, I timidly reached to put on the glove, but to my surprise he wouldn’t let me. Instead, he chose my three apples and continued into the store, asking me what else I wanted to buy.
Once I showed him that I was an Italian resident and would be visiting him more frequently, his offensive behavior turned into a friendly one, as he immediately began teaching me Italian ways.
Knowing that I spoke very little Italian, he would teach me simple words every time I came into the shop. Rather than allowing me to point to items and ask for a specific number, he made me say, in perfect Italian, exactly what I wanted to purchase that day. Of course he’d laugh at my Californian accent, but through my irritation, I could tell he appreciated my efforts.
Similar to the man at my local butcher shop, many Italians throughout Torino are more than willing to help confused Americans.
While in a clothing store one afternoon, I became irritated trying to figure out European sizes. Creating a mess of the store, I kept pulling shirts out of piles and holding them up to me and wondering if it was the right size. The woman working the store noticed my pattern and was infuriated with what I had done (a trend which seemed to follow me). Using what little Italian I knew, and the minimal English she knew, we tried conversing with one another. Within five minutes, she had me in a dressing room and was helping me choose clothes with the appropriate sizes, colors and styles for me, a behavior rarely seen in America.
Finally, I was able to discard my fast-paced way of life. Particularly in Torino, Italians value the ideas of the Slow Food Movement, a notion to avoid fast food and enjoy the process of cooking with natural ingredients and spending meal time, not as a time to eat, but as a time to enjoy company.
In the first few days, going out to dinner seemed like a process. We were not accustomed to three-hour dinners, and could not understand how it took so long to make a simple pizza. Arriving to dinner at 9 p.m. and not receiving our food till 10 p.m., we would impolitely say to one another that the waiter was lucky his tip was included. With the slow service, he would never get a tip from us.
Once familiar with this process, we’d become embarrassed with our initial thoughts. Clearly it had become evident that it was not that the kitchen staff was slow, but that the restaurant workers deliberately wanted to allow their customers to enjoy the companionship at each table.
I can look back now and say that I have adopted a simpler lifestyle. The differences, however, cannot be pinpointed to one particular area merely because it is now just the way I go about my daily life.