North America in Italy

I honestly never saw so many people talking about North America in Italy. Who would ever think that everybody there knows about Canada? Sorry, US are too mainstream these days. Just kidding.

I went to the bar with my friends one of the nights (Trinity College Pub in Rome, the most amazing bar ever! I HIGHLY recommend), I ordered margarita, and as I know in Canada they taste much sweeter and better because margarita in Italy is totally a different drink. I didn’t know that! Don’t make the same mistake there, so order margarita cocktail instead. 

(Unfortunately this is not the photo of the margarita I was stuck with)

Anyway, I came up to the bartender and I asked him to “exchange” the drink since I didn’t like it. As I said that, he stopped doing what he was doing, stared at me and smiled. I didn’t know what he was smiling about so I asked what’s going on. First thing he tells me “Are you from North America?” Since I’m originally not Canadian, I was totally surprised why he asked that. After that he tells me this “I know people in North America can exchange their drink if they don’t like it. Here, in Italy, if you order, you don’t like it, then you have to finish it.” Ugh. Yes, I wasn’t an exception, so I was stuck with that drink. If you’re ordering a drink, make sure you order it carefully; otherwise you’ll be stuck with it.

Another time, as my friends and I were taking a walk at the beach in Gaeta, we started talking to the guard that worked there. His English wasn’t perfect and I don’t speak Italian, but we had a nice conversation. Of course, he guessed where I was from. As I told him I was from Canada, he right away asked if I’m from Toronto. I was speechless. Toronto is known in Italy? He told me that Toronto is the place that every Italian would love to visit and that Toronto is on the news, newspapers, Internet and everybody talks about it.

I actually felt very honoured, because I didn’t know that North America was so popular in Rome and a small city like Gaeta.