My neighbor just returned from a trip to Italy and said that she really enjoyed Venice. However, she said that the Italians were really rude. (For instance, pushing and shoving and cutting in line.)

I visited Florence in 1998, and I had 0 problems. On several occasions, I overpaid for items and my money was returned. I should mention that I am half-Italian by ethnicity, but don't speak Italian. (My Grandfather came to the U.S. in about 1910. Just curious about Italy because I like to travel and would consider visiting Italy in the near future.

DB

 

Was the rudeness in Venice, or was It that she found Italians to be rude except for Venice, which she enjoyed?

 

She visited mainly Venice and found Italians to be generally rude. Also, visited Dbrovnik (sp) Croatia and found rudeness there. She said the tour guides told her that when she was pushed, she should push back.

 

Could your neighbor have encountered a rude person who cut in line? Certainly. Does that mean that all Italians are rude? Certainly not.

One of the first thing one learns when traveling: different countries have different traditions and, in my opinion, it isn't appropriate to equate different with "rudeness" For example, Italians do not approve of touching fruit/produce before one buys it while to sniff, touch, thump produce is considered perfectly normal in the US.

 

bd: "Could your neighbor have encountered a rude person who cut in line? Certainly." She routinely encountered that type of behavior. This was puzzling to me because I never had that problem 15 years ago.

 

i think the majority of the people in venice are not venetians, or italians. there is a mob entrance to the vaparetto sometimes.

lines where only italians are involved seem to me to be most polite.

 

I would be wary of making a general statement like this based on the experience of one individual. Personally, I would never say that all Americans are rude because I found several (Chinese) San Franciscans to be rude.

I have been several times to Dubrovnik and the locals were friendly and helpful enough, maybe a bit gruffer than I feel people in the tourism industry should be but that may well be an inherent trait to their culture.

People standing in line tend to get impatient, everywhere. I am not saying that that was the case here, but it may be that if your friend was lagging behind when the line moved, she got pushed or others tried to cut ahead of her.

 

was this person who suffered rudeness non-Caucasian, or non-caucasian in appearance?

 

Italy is a diverse country with many sub-cultures. Genoa is different from Bari, is different from Palermo, etc. One thing to know about Venice is that it is a very small city, just twice the size of New York's Central Park. In the warmer months it is absolutely flooded with tourists who are there for one day, usually disembarking from a cruise ship. The streets are very narrow. Some are too narrow to open an umbrella without hitting the walls on both sides. When you shove tens of thousands of people into those streets, all of whom feel they need to be at Piazza San Marco, it feels like trying to get out of Yankee Stadium at the end of the game with a sell out crowd. A bunch of pushing and crowding. Venetians can't go about their own business going from place to place when the bridges are clogged with 30 people taking photos, completely blocking it. Or 50 people window shopping in an alley, making it impassable. Some particularly elderly Venetians just lower their shoulder and make their way. It's the only way. Tourists often treat Venice like a museum, not an actual working city, and friction sometimes happens. Go away from San Marco Square except for early morning and late evening. Walk the back streets where Venetians live and few tourists go. The people are the nicest. Judging all Italians based upon what one experiences in Piazza San Marco is like judging all Americans based upon what a tourist experiences in Time Square in New York.

 

Agree completely - w/one minor correction: I wish all visitors treated Venice like a museum, unfortunately, some treat it more like a theme park....

 

Perche,

Your point appears to be very well taken, and is consistent with my own experience. It appears that the places visited in Venice by my neighbor are not representative of Italy as a whole.

Slaw: My neighbor is White.

Thanks for everyone's response.

DB

 

As a general rule to me (YMMV), and I've lived in several different parts of Italia, Italians do not do queues like Americans or Brits.

Do Italians often try to cut in line...yes, if there is a line at all. It has actually gotten a little better over the last ten years IMO but pushing and shoving is common for me to see. It could be considered rude if your mores are more American, if not it is just Italian. I've heard many an Italian say push back.

The big touristy areas of Venezia are full of foreigners as noted above, that can make things worse. Often times the hucksters you meet are not Italian also and they can be considered rude.

Has your neighbour ever been to New York... I know many folks that consider them very rude. YMMV

As an aside, my biggest problem with my fellow Italians, since I have dual citizenship, is littering and garbage and graffiti. A bit better in the north than south but still bad.

 

My family and I spent a couple of weeks in Rome, Venice, and points in between and didn't notice an excess of rudeness.

I did experience the queue thing at Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany. They have a bus that takes you up and down the hill from the castle to the parking area. A lot of people (maybe 3-4 busloads) were waiting in a sloppy line when the bus pulled up. A group of Italians who weren't near the head of the line pushed to the front, pushed others out of the way, and boarded, all while shouting "il gruppo" (group?).

 

Italians often will use any trick to get ahead in those situations. ^@:-)

I've seen stuff like that all the time, in and out of Italia. The difference in side Italia is that usually everyone else is trying to do it too so it is a more organised chaos. Again IME, YMMV

 

I find this surprising. While I don't consider Italians rude, I also don't consider polite queuing to be part of the Italian culture, at least in the cities I lived in or visited. It was always a bit of a scrum. It is always risky to assume that a culture is rude because they follow different social rules than your own.