Stephen Vandrak, Engineering Perspectives of the Renaissance and Sustainability: Florence Summer 2023
Because this program started the week after the semester, I did not have a lot of time to prepare for this trip. I spent most of the time I had packing and getting my credit card and documents ready, but I didn’t spend time focusing on what I would experience in Florence.
To start, I wish I had spent more time learning some basic Italian. I took Spanish in high school, but I had never learned Italian before. The day I arrived in Florence I realized how lost I was in the language. Luckily, since Florence is a tourist destination, most people knew English. I was able to communicate with most people the whole trip, but I wish I knew more Italian coming in. I should have practiced a few sayings and used them in certain settings like ordering food or asking for directions. If I had prepared more, I would have been able to practice with the locals and left the trip with a foundation in Italian.
Secondly, I wish I had known more about the city of Florence before I arrived. Although I am very interested in history, I have never spent much time learning about Florence. Most of the knowledge I knew about Italy was about the Roman period. Fortunately, the classes I took allowed me to get an understanding of the history of Florence, but I wish I had known the significance of Florence in European history so I could build further on my knowledge of world history.
The biggest surprise I experienced was the culture of the Italians. I came into this trip with basic Hollywood stereotypes of Italian culture, and I did not expect the aspects of the culture I saw. From my experience, the Italian culture is much more formal than I had assumed. A main aspect of this is the emphasis on fashion and how formal the culture is with respect to clothing. The people in Italy dress very nice every time they leave their house, and the I felt pressure to mold to their standards. I was surprised by this because Italy is known for their art, so I expected them to be more accepting when it came to self-expression and fashion. I also noticed their social etiquette in public to be more formal than the United States. I saw this mostly on trains and public transportation, where it was expected to be quiet. My preconceptions of the Italian people are they are very outspoken people, but I did not expect certain social standards expected in public.
Below are some pictures of me in the first week of the program, where I was getting to know the city. The first is me on the Ponte Vecchio bridge, and the second is my and my roommates on the hill looking over the city.
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