Exploring Italy’s Unwritten Rulebook
‘Tranquillo’: Lessons on Mondays, meatballs, ossobuco, and the Olympics
I was on time for my first appointment with the Italian bureaucracy, but it was too late.
The line for first-time applicants for a permesso di soggiorno snaked through the lobby and out into the street, and it wasn’t moving fast. I stopped a passing staffer and asked in halting Italian if it was worth joining the line at that point.
“No, no, don’t get in line now,” he said. “There’s no way they’ll get to everyone already here.”
I looked at my watch: Friday, 9 a.m., the offices at the Questura had only been open for half an hour. The staffer told me that on most days the only ones sure to be seen were those who’d been in line by the time the doors opened.
The next Monday I arrived before 8, first in line, paperwork in a manila folder, book in hand, and a thermos of hot tea to keep me warm. By the time the doors opened, 20 or 30 others had queued up behind me. I led the line of extracomunitari through the lobby and into a badly-lit hallway, where we stopped at a closed door.
A few minutes later, a weary-looking man with wire-rimmed glasses and a rumpled jacket appeared, a thick and colorful stack of papers tucked under one arm and a ring of keys in his hand. The line went silent, but the man didn’t notice. He stepped inside and closed the door. The line started murmuring again.
After a few minutes, I politely knocked on the door.
From the other side: “Un momento!”
I waited a bit, then knocked again.
“Si?!” The voice was sharp.
“Lei sei pronto?” I asked. I’d been practicing the phrase in my head.
I heard some shuffling inside, and then the door swung open. “Ma tu non sei Italiano, vero?” the angry rumpled jacket man said loudly -- “Wait, you’re not Italian, are you?”
I should have asked how he figured that out. Was it my bad Italian? Or the fact that I was in line to apply for a foreigner’s residence permit? But I just shook my head.
“I knew you weren’t Italian,” he declared, “because no Italian man would disturb another Italian man on Monday morning while he’s reading the soccer scores in La Gazzetta dello Sport!”
I count that day as my introduction to the deep Italian tradition of regole non scritte -- unwritten rules.
Rules and respect
I’ve long thought that understanding unwritten rules is something that shows fluency in a culture. It’s more difficult and maybe even more important than understanding the history or the cuisine, or even speaking the language (though all those things help make sense of unwritten rules).
I wrote a previous post about one aspect of unwritten rules: How to Offend an Italian (without meaning to). If you haven’t already read that post, take a look for anecdotes about doggy bags in Italy, how not to show disrespect to the police, and about how phrases like vediamo and “dinner starts at 8” don’t mean what you may think they mean.
This post will discuss a different set of unwritten rules, ones that came to light since then -- many drawn from the lively comments for the How to Offend an Italian post.
A field guide
Over the last few months these are what appeared in my notes, loosely grouped by theme:
• Eating out
Something I learned since the last post: only order polpette (meatballs) at a place you trust. Why? Because, according to generations-old tradition, unethical restaurants sometimes made their polpette from half-eaten kitchen scraps collected the day before. Che schifo!
Everyone insists that no longer happens, but I admit the thought of it has made me stop and think before ordering once or twice.
And that rule against ordering a cappuccino too late in the day? I touched on this last time -- it’s not a thing.
Still, pairing appropriate foods and drinks is a thing. Just as you wouldn’t drink Prosecco with thick steak or beer with tiramisù, you probably won’t want a heavy, creamy drink after a carbonara or ossobuco. But a cappuccino after a panino or insalata caprese? No problem.
• Dress code
Rules on this topic aren’t unwritten when it comes to Italian churches: if someone isn’t dressed in what’s considered a respectful way, many churches will refuse entry.
But elsewhere, the dress code is less clear.
The notion of bella figura in Italy is often misunderstood. It’s not about showing off or looking good just to look good. It’s about social cohesion and mutual respect. This is unfortunately changing over time, but the general rule still applies: it’s better to wear out-of-fashion clothes than look sloppy or lazy. Stained, mismatched, or ill-fitting clothes can be a sign of disrespect.
Here’s another peculiarity: dress for the calendar, not the weather. Before June or after mid-September, beaches are empty, even on hot days. Locals wear scarves and coats until April and starting in October because it’s spring or fall, even if the weather doesn’t always show it.
A reader in Milan told me he was warned not to wear short-sleeve shirts in any month with an “R” in it -- May to August is fine; the rest of the year is off-limits. But the logic falls apart in Italian, where gennaio (January) doesn’t have an “R.”
• Language
In the last column I discussed vediamo -- literally, it means “we’ll see,” but in practice it’s closer to “probably not.”
Here are two more. Tranquillo means more than “relax” or “don’t worry.” It’s a kind of command: “stay composed” or “don’t overreact.” And magari is particularly slippery. Depending on the context it can mean “perhaps,” or “I wish,” or “that would be great,” or “why not?” or even “yeah, right.” But here’s the key: if someone uses the word with you, you can almost never reply, Sì, magari. It’s like trying to agree with a gesture or shrug.
But the best example from the previous post came from a friend who’s in the process of remodeling an old house in Venice. She quickly learned that when workers responded to an idea she had with, È casa tua -- literally “It’s your house” -- what that really meant was “It’s a horrible idea.” Luckily, most of what at first seemed questionable eventually turned into È proprio bello! -- “It’s really beautiful!”
• Everyday life
There are many unwritten rules in this area: knowing where you can (and can’t) double park, letting the elderly or people with just two or three items skip ahead in line at the supermarket, making eye contact during a toast, or deciding whether to kiss someone’s cheeks the first time you meet.
In the last post I talked about the consequences of breaking a small law -- and doing it in front of the police.
A similar example with a different lesson came from another friend who was pulled over after taking an illegal shortcut onto lightly trafficked road. She said the officer scolded her and counted out every law she’d broken. In the end, though, he only fined her for not wearing her seatbelt. Her takeaway? “Try not to get caught,” she suggested. “But if you do, everything will be easier if you are a young woman wearing shorts.”
📌And another thing
I arrived a day early for the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin. After picking up my press badge, I walked into the media center, where I’d be working most days. There were still ladders and open toolboxes in the back, and workers were still painting one wall. I could hear an electric saw from outside. In the journalists’ bathrooms, only some of the toilets had been fully installed.
All the reporters there -- myself included -- agreed: this is whole thing is going to be a disaster.
The next day, though, the rooms still smelled of fresh paint, and there were a few early Internet glitches, but nothing serious. There were early reports that the cross-country skiing course wasn’t completely marked, and that the banks on the luge course weren’t fully reinforced. But by the time those competitions began, everything was ready.
It was a perfect example of l’arte dell’arrangiarsi -- the art of making do, Italy’s unmistakable talent for pulling everything together at the last minute.
Italy will be hosting the Olympics again next year, in Milan and Cortina d’ Ampezzo. Once again, media reports say that preparations are behind schedule. So, to my colleagues covering the lead-up to the Games, I say: tranquillo, tranquillo. Don’t worry. Everything will be ready on time -- just not much before.
Acknowledgements
Thank you to the following Substackers and readers for directly or (more often) indirectly helping with this post by sharing their comments, opinions, and anecdotes:
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When a man says 'stai calma' to me, there is going to be a stabbing.
Thanks for the shout out and for many new insights, Eric. I especially like the art of arrangiarsi—something I have not ever been able to explain to outsiders. It’s a nice complement to the bella figura concept and to tranquilla (I usually hear the feminine form), as you explain it. One need be flessibile, non, to survive in Italy?