Category Archives: Italian culture

Italian Law and Naming Your Baby

above: “What were they thinking?” department: This monument to those fallen in WWI in the Lake Como town of Gravedona shows someone whose parents named him “Troppotardi” – “too late”.

An article in Il Corriere della Sera points out that Italian law aims to prevent children being given “ridiculous, shameful, or embarrassing” names by their parents.

The official whose job it is to decide these things (the Public Prosecutor of the Commune where the birth is registered) sometimes has to sort out perplexing problems, such as whether to allow an Italian child to be given an American name taken from a soap opera. Good question. The other day I heard a mother in Lecco calling her small daughter Karen. She pronounced it CAHR-en – not ugly, but strange-sounding to both English and Italian speakers.

The article also mentions that it is illegal to give masculine names to females and vice-versa, which has stymied some parents who wanted to name their daughters Andrea. Pronounced an-DRAY-uh in Italian, it’s a masculine name, the equivalent of Andrew. In English it’s pronounced ANN-dree-uh, and is feminine.

An Italian colleague who moved to California discovered just how much trouble this can cause. He made a health insurance claim for a decidedly male complaint. When the check didn’t arrive, he called the insurance company to inquire. “This is obviously a fraudulent claim,” they told him nastily. “How can someone named ANN-drea have a prostate problem?”

Born into It: Why You Can’t Become Italian

Most of the world’s major religions proselytize (for some, it’s a major facet of the faith), and eagerly accept converts. Except Hinduism. Hare Krishnas notwithstanding, you really can’t convert to Hinduism, because it is much more than a set of beliefs and practices. Hinduism is a system that you are born into, a fixed hierarchy of families and castes. You are who you are because of your birth, and nothing can change that. Therefore, logically, anyone born outside the system must forever remain outside.

A non-Hindu can’t become a Hindu.By analogy, I’ve been wondering: can a foreigner become an Italian?

I don’t think so. Not in the same way that an immigrant to America becomes American. I think this has to do with the Italian concept of paese (hometown). You’re born into a paese, you grow up in it, absorbing its cultural and linguistic nuances, its history and traditions. “Italian” isn’t enough to define you; you’ve got to have a paese (and, often, a dialect) as well.

The attachment to paese begins early. Rossella has had trouble finding kids to hang out with after school, because most of her classmates commute to Lecco from smaller towns, where they already have firmly established social circles with whom they spend any leisure time left over from school and family. The frightening part (to me and Ross, anyway) is that, at age 14, they already consider themselves set for life, and will not move outside of their established places and groups unless forced.

They don’t get out, and no outsider (estraneo) gets in. This goes for other Italians as well. Italians who leave their paese to live elsewhere in Italy don’t fit in – they are not part of their new paese of residence, and never will be. One exception is Milan. I recently met an Italian who told me that, when he wanted to return to Italy after years abroad, he deliberately chose Milan as the most welcoming city in Italy, both to foreigners and Italian strangers.

Which is not to say that people in smaller towns are cold, far from it. My experience of the Lecchesi is that they are warm and welcoming and happy to have us here. But we’ll never be Lecchesi.

That’s okay with me. As a third-culture kid, I long ago resigned myself to never fitting in anywhere (except Woodstock). We have friends in Lecco whose company I enjoy, but these days I am expanding my social circles among expatriates. Interestingly, some Italians also seek out opportunities to socialize with expats, because they have themselves lived overseas and, as often happens to travellers from any country, find that they no longer quite fit in when they return “home.”

Apr 27, 2004

This article was widely read and responded to. One interesting thread came up on eGullet (I posted the article there at the invitation of one of the moderators), where some very knowledgeable people discussed the phenomenon in terms of Italian and European history.

Randy Newman in Milan

Monday night we went to hear Randy Newman in Milan, on the last date of his European tour. I didn’t realize it was the last til I looked at his site just now – he certainly didn’t look any worse for the wear of 22 shows in 30 days. This was the Songbook tour, just Randy and his piano; I’d heard about the tour (and bought the CD) thanks to a review in the NYT or somewhere. It was sheer dumb luck that I stepped out of a hotel in Milan a few weeks ago and found myself face to face with Randy Newman on a poster, glued to a fence around the Pirelli tower (re)construction site (this is how I usually learn about concerts I want to go to, usually too late).

The promoters missed a marketing opportunity – I think Rossella and I were the only Americans in the theater. Ross was also very much the youngest person there, but that’s less surprising. I watched as the crowd entered, and amused myself speculating on who these people were. My guess is that this concert brought out every old-school lefty to be found in the Milan area: I have not seen so many beards in one room since about 1975. There was even one guy with long sideburns and a gold corduroy jacket – thirty years of fashion had passed him right by, even in Milan! Or maybe that stuff’s back in now, and I, as usual, am the laggard follower of fashion.

We hoped not to be subjected to a constant audience singalong such as we had suffered through at the Alex Britti concert. This was a very different audience, but Ross was plagued by the two guys behind her singing along through most of the show, albeit so quietly that Enrico and I didn’t hear them. Unfortunately, she didn’t mention this til afterwards; she hadn’t wanted to disturb anyone else by shushing them, though she might have said something during intermission.

There was one song that Randy asked us to sing along on: “I’m Dead and I Don’t Know It,” about all the geriatric rockers still on tour (referring to himself as well). I had recently been thinking about this phenomenon: my daughter is the third-generation Who fan in our family. That’s a bit scary, but at least it’s something we can share, though my tolerance for her generation’s music is limited.To sum up, the concert was wonderful. If you don’t know Randy Newman, or only know him via such pop hits as “Short People” or “I Love LA,” or his movie scores, I recommend a closer aquaintance. He writes songs unlike anyone else’s: three-minute stories narrated by characters very distant from himself, sad, funny, touching, and often with an ironic punch that gets you thinking.

Songbook Vol. 1 Amazon UK

About Randy Newman

Colpo di Fumo

I wrote earlier about Italian superstitions, including the dreaded colpo d’aria – a draft of cold air, blamed for everything from head colds to paralysis. Zeev responded:

“Christmas of ’87 was the first time I went to Italy. At that time I was living in Ticino [the Italian part of Switzerland] for an extended period; I have good memories from the area, but being in Mendrisio in the evenings is like being alone in the desert. A few days before Christmas, I realized that being there during the holiday season would be even worse, so I decided to use the time to see some people in Germany and Sweden.

I took the train to Köln. The cars were full of happy Italians travelling north for a vacation. There was one drawback to the company: everybody was smoking heavily. I had quit smoking about 10 years earlier, and had difficulty with smoke. I asked them to do me a favor and stop smoking in the compartment, but their understanding of the situation was that it was my problem, so I should leave the compartment – which of course wouldn’t solve a thing, as the corridors were also full of smoking Italians. So I opened the window. To my surprise, everybody fled the compartment within seconds. Now I finally know why: colpo d’aria.”


I wish that approach worked for me. We often find ourselves surrounded by smokers at restaurants, but occasionally we also happen to be near a window. If we open it, however, someone is bound to whine about the corrente (draft), a complaint which is always considered reasonable, whereas our complaining about smoke is not taken in the same spirit. One of the few things I miss about life in the United States, and especially California, is the lack of smoke. I will be relieved when Europe catches up.

Which may take a while. Italian restaurateurs are up in arms over a new anti-smoking law, due to come into effect next January, which will force them to create ventilated smoking areas physically separated from non-smoking areas.

A few larger restaurants already have non-smoking sections, though it can be difficult to get seated in them. One place we used to frequent had such an area, but closed it off sometimes when there was a shortage of waiters. Recently, at another restaurant, they didn’t want to seat only three of us in the non-smoking section, because the tables were set for four or five. I had to insist that we were non-fumatori accaniti (ferocious non-smokers). One very good pizzeria near our former home in Milan never had a problem seating us in one of its two large non-smoking rooms, though these were always more crowded than the smoking area. It seems that there is unmet demand, even in Italy, for smoke-free dining.

Sadly, smoking is still very much in vogue here, and socially accepted even for 13- and 14-year-olds. Many kids consider it a declaration of adulthood, and begin as soon as they reach high school, if not earlier. As far as I can tell, their parents don’t even try to combat it, and tobacconists have no qualms about selling cigarettes to young kids. Rossella is one of few non-smokers in her class (students are allowed to smoke on school grounds, although, as of this year, not inside the building); by now she’s made such a fuss about her friends smoking that she’d look like a complete idiot if she ever tried it (good!).


Feb 9, 2004

From March 1st, smoking will be completely banned on all Eurostar and Intercitytrains in Italy. It is already banned on all most regional (local) trains, which leads to scenes of smokers lined up at the door, cigarettes already in hand, as the train pulls into the station. They barely get one foot on the platform before they light up, one after another, hurrying away in a desperately-puffing line.


Apr 16, 2004

I’m pretty certain that Italy’s new rules about non-smoking sections in restaurants will only come into force next January, but, to my surprise and delight, several of our favorite restaurants have already gone completely non-smoking. It appears that some restaurant owners and staff were glad to have the excuse. I wish Austria were as forward-looking. We didn’t get to enjoy any of Vienna’s centuries-famous coffee bars; every one we stepped into reeked of stale smoke and beer. So we ended up at Starbucks, that bastion of American cultural imperialism, where smoking was not allowed.


Apr 27, 2004

I finally asked a bar owner why some bars and restaurants have already gone totally non-smoking; I thought the law didn’t go into effect til next year. He explained that the law actually went into effect THIS January, requiring all public places to have a completely separate and ventilated room for smokers, or to ban smoking completely. Those who choose to separate out the smokers have a year’s grace period in which to do the construction; those who have no such intention are supposed to already be completely non-smoking. Of course, this being Italy, there are probably some (many?) who have not yet done anything and will claim, if asked, that they intend to build a smoking section by next January, when in fact they have no such intention (or ability – some places are simply too small), and are just buying themselves and their smoking customers another year.

Interestingly, the recent ban on smoking in pubs in Ireland seems to have gone down well, in spite of strident protests before it went into effect. It was widely supported before the fact by the union of pub employees, and many customers seem now to find that they actually prefer their pubs without smoke. The die-hards are reportedly organizing booze-and-smoking parties in their own homes, which will cause the pubs to lose business (and the neighbors to complain), but won’t damage the alcohol industry.

Sandokan – an Italian Children’s Classic

We saw Pirates of the Caribbean in Italian, though I felt it lost something in translation. But it was fun, pretty much what you’d expect from a movie developed from an amusement park ride. And it reminded me that I’ve been meaning to write about Sandokan.

Sandokan, a character created in 1883 by an imaginative but completely untravelled Italian named Emilio Salgari, is a Malaysian prince, deposed by the British and Dutch colonialists who have taken over his country. Unable to reclaim his throne, “the Tiger of Malaysia” takes to piracy, harassing the colonialists, along with his fearless band of seamen and his Portugese sidekick, Yanez.

I find very amusing the reversal on typical colonial literature of the period: here the baddies are the white men, such as the real historical character, James Brooke, the “White Rajah of Borneo.”

Salgari wrote over 80 novels, stories of adventure set in exotic lands from Malaysia to India to the Caribbean. His work enjoyed periods of great popularity in many languages and countries, but has only very recently begun to be translated into English. For those who read Italian, some works are available for download.

Sandokan was made into several TV miniseries in Italy in the 1970s, starring Kabir Bedi, a half-Indian half-Italian actor. Rather too tall for a Malaysian, but awfully handsome, so who’s complaining? Besides, the Englishman James Brooke was played by an Italian (who also once or twice played James’ Bond’s nemesis Blomfeld), and Yanez the Portugese by a Frenchman, and since the series was apparently shot in India, all the “Malaysians” must be Indian. Oh, well. Inaccuracies notwithstanding,the series is fun, and is available on DVD.

Pictures etc. from the TV series

learn the song!

Salgari was never high literature, and even in the original Italian the writing is a bit clumsy (how many times in one paragraph can you use the word cupo – dark?). You read these for the grand adventure tales they are, so, if that’s what floats your boat, I do recommend them – and now two of them are available in English:

Nov 24, 2007

The kind people at ROH Press wrote to let me know:

“ROH Press has just released a new modern translation of The Tigers of Mompracem. You can read sample chapters on our website.

Next year marks Sandokan’s 125th anniversary so we’ve also issued The Pirates of Malaysia  and The Two Tigers.”