Last night I got back from a ten day trip to Italy with my family. We had a great time exploring cities, small towns and the countryside. It wouldn't have been possible for us to even go on the trip if it weren't for a nice Icelandic couple who knew my parents and invited us to stay in their fancy vacation house for free. The house was a mansion with several fully furnished rooms, long couches and a nice Kawai piano that had a recording system built into it.
We arrived to Italy the first day after taking an hour bus ride, waiting in the airport for two hours and sitting on the plane for an hour and a half. Once in Italy we picked up our rental car and tried to maneuver out of a tight parking spot surrounded with cars parked too close to each other. It took us about twenty minutes of backing up and inching forward by centimeters until finally we exited the lot and hit the road. We got lost a lot that night mostly due to the fact that my dad got confused and went the opposite direction than the car rental lady told him to go.
Surprisingly, Italy fit the exact stereotypes that Hollywood depicts. For example Italians eat a lot of pizza and pasta and that they are very dramatic when they speak, using lots of hand gestures and voice intonations. Overall every Italian person we ran into was very helpful and friendly. My dad doesn't know any Italian but could still get his point across speaking in Spanish because it's so similar.
One thing that really shocked me was the prostitution in Italy. As we were driving to our house the first night, there were young girls dressed up all along the road and stationed at almost every gas station. I wasn't aware that prostitution was common in Italy and it really impacted me to see all those young girls selling themselves.
The rest of the week we spend there was really fun. The weather was very strange and unpredictable because one moment it would be sunny with clear blue skies and the next it would rain hard with thunder and lightening. We drove all over the countryside which was lush and green with many wine orchards and forests and visited small villas and cities, peeking into shops and walking through cobble stone streets and alleyways. On most of the nights we ate at pizzerias or made pasta at home. The pizza there was delicious and much better than any I've tried elsewhere.
I realize that this has gotten quite long and I wish that I could add all the other interesting details to the trip but that would take a long time to write. I am so grateful that I was able to visit Italy with my family this year. It was a rich experience for us all and filled with many memorable moments.
