The World Needs More Italians
I am perhaps the least Italian-looking person you may ever meet. People might mistake me for German, Eastern European, Russian, Scandinavian and yes, I even get mistaken for being Jewish more often than you might think (must be the Eastern European shtetl look I have about me). But for the three years I lived in Rome, the many times I have visited Italy and spoken reasonably fluent Italian and any time I meet up with some Italians anywhere in the world, the last thing anyone thinks I am is of Italian heritage. While my father definitely had that Italian look and way about him, if I tried to walk around with my coat draped casually over my shoulders trying to imitate Stanley Tucci, people would think I had a broken arm or something. They would not think I was Italian.
My father’s family came from Bassano del Grappa, a town north of Venice in the Dolomites. In the countries of Europe, I have always found that the border areas are dominated by the more dominant culture against which they abut. Go anywhere west of Turin and it will feel French. Go up to Locarno in Switzerland and it is totally Italian (the Swiss try NEVER to seem dominant…its how they have survived and prospered during all the wars). Go anywhere north or east of Venice and it becomes some combination of German (along the Swiss or Austrian border) or Slavic as you get closer to Trieste. In other words, my father’s family comes from on of these chameleon-like zones where you can be Italian or Slavic as you please. Add that to my mother’s 100% Slavic heritage (from not so very far north of Bassana del Grappa in Bratislava), and I pretty much come out as a tall Slav. That is decidedly not Italian looking.
But for reason having little to do with dear old Dad and everything to do with three formative adolescent years spent learning the ways of the world in an Italian context, I enjoy connecting with other Italians when I encounter them. Just today as I was heading out on my motorcycle I bumped into our friends Faraj and Yasuko on their daily walk. They were chatting with another neighbor, Frances, who was asking her French bulldog. For reasons I can’t recall, the topic turned to Italy and it was mentioned that Frances speaks Italian and is of Italian heritage. That immediately forced me to launch into my Italian explanation that I had lived in Bella Roma all those fifty years ago. Frances was amazed and pleased to find a kindred Italian spirit on the block and said she was planning to rent a house in Bari next September for a month to commune with her roots. I explained that I had done that several times in Umbria and Rome and that we would be in Rome in late February on our way to Egypt. There wasn’t much else to say, but I feel that Frances and I now have a connection we didn’t used to have and who knows what might become of that.
In a few minutes, I will leave for USD for my last class of the semester. That course is Advanced Corporate Finance, a course I have taught now twice and may well do so again next Fall. I have twenty-five students in the class and it is a required course for anyone in the USD MBA program that wants to concentrate in finance. On the first day of class, three students walked in together and took up position in the front row. That always impresses me, especially if they don’t look like nerds, which they did not. It only took a few moments for me to hear the dulcet tones of Italian coming from them. Even if I hadn’t been able to hear it, I still would have recognized it as Italian since the conversation was animated in a way that only Italians can do. It turns our Sergio is from Milan, Andrea is from Bari and Giuseppe is from Sicily, so they provide a broad representation of the Italian boot and football (Sicily).
Not only have these three Italian students and their sidekick, honorary Italian, Grant, who lives next door to Sergio in Pacific Beach, been excellent and attentive students who are really anxious to learn, but they are also a lot of fun. They and several other students make coming to class fun for me. In fact, at the last minute this afternoon, Grant emailed me and said he had screwed up and forgotten to tell me that the Italians and he wanted to get together for a drink before class. Prophetically, they decided we should meet at the University fine dining restaurant called La Gran Terrazzo, in good Amalfi Coast or Portofino style. So we met at La Gran Terrazzo and and bought the five of us sliders and beers. I have a policy of not letting students pay for an informal get-together. I do that for two reasons, first I never want there to be a conflict of interest at issue and second, they are poor students and I feel like its the least I can do for them if they show the interest to want to get together. We had a fine old time talking about Italy and the state of the world.
No matter what we spoke about, it was all light-hearted and fun, even when we spoke about Trump. They are like most Europeans, who wonder how the United States ever got to a place where we let someone like him take over. They compared him to all the worst of Berlusconi and then we talked about Latin America and how Argentina, Brazil and now, as of today (again), Peru is topsy-turvy yet again with the impeachment and arrest of their last President. With all the Trump indictments and potential convictions looming, it all is starting to feel more like Italy or, God forbid, Latin America, rather than the solid good old U.S. of A.
Somehow talking to Sergio, Giuseppe, Andrea and Grant made our whole political morass seem more like a joke than the tragic comedy that it really represents. And therein lies the charm of the Italian psyche. Nothing is ever so serious that it should get in the way of a fine meal, a nice glass of Chianti or a wonderful view out over the Mediterranean or the Adriatic Sea. When I lived in Italy there was a gesture that is pure Italian. IF you asked a difficult question to an Italian or if it was something too awkward to answer, they would shrug their shoulders and answer with a simple “Boh?” I don’t think it is actually a word, and I doubt it is even a contraction. It is simply a sound, and that sound is one that combines surprise, wonder and generally a willingness to let the issue pass unnoticed.
Italians have the right outlook on life. Victor or vanquished matter not beyond the moment. Life is what matters, not domination or winning at any cost. An Italian would rather get along than overwhelm. I remember my mother telling me that people in southern and Mediterranean cultures tended to swaddle their babies loosely versus those from colder climates that swaddled their babies tightly. One would think that creates a degree of certainty to be so swaddled, but the truth seems to be that repression has its price and I would rather be around Italians with their loose and “Boh?” attitude. Let’s face it, the world could use more Italians and fewer tightly swaddled sorts.