back from italy-le marche
 

returned yesterday from the le marche region.<BR>visited san benedetto del tronto and the villages of my grandparents.<BR>met many family members for the first time<BR>and found them to be very loving and kind.<BR>however, in general, the people in the area<BR>(shops and hotel) were not very attentive<BR>nor helpful. at our hotel, the owner/manager was quite rude regarding our inability to speak fluent italian. i was quite disappointed with the people-overall. during my trip last year, we were in the abruzzo area and people seemed to be much friendlier. <BR>loved the small villages and felt most <BR>comfortable there as family was there.<BR>i will travel there again next year and <BR>try again. i have been to europe quite a<BR>few times and never experienced this much<BR>rudeness. am i alone in experiencing this? <BR>

Guess you never know what you will run into when you travel. I did not get to San Benedetto del Tronto last August. We spent most of our Le Marche time in Ancona. But I had the opposite experience. People at the hotel (Jolly Hotel/Miramare Ancona) were very friendly and spoke some English. The owner and the waiters at our favorite restaurant (Trattoria Moretta) made us feel so welcome that we returned more than once (the seafood was terrific, too!). The owner had one of his staff, who spoke some English, translate for him as he checked to see that all was well the first evening we had dinner there. On another occasion, when I wandered into a bookstore, a clerk immediately tried to help me. Upon discovering I spoke little intelligible Italian, he took me to all of his English language material and, when I selected some to buy, he took me to another clerk who he knew spoke some English. She was apologetic that she only spoke "school English!" And, she helped me to locate a taxi stand. As I left, I did my best in my (awful, I assure you) Italian to thank both for their help and was again compimented on my Italian. Definitely, they were being polite! A woman in a newspaper/tabacco shop couldn't understand my companion's request for an international telephone card; when I took a stab at it and got the accents on the correct syllable, she understood and her eyes lit up & she acted as though she was very pleased to be able to help us. Even complimented me on my Italian! We had these experiences the entire time we were in the area. Perhaps we simply were lucky.

In 1999 we were trying to sell our house while we were in Italy. We were in Marche when our realitor left us a voice mail message the we had an offer on the house. We were at a wine bar in Cagli on a Sunday. The very lovely propriteress of the wine bar then spent the next hour looking for a place with a working fax machine so we could get the offer. At each stop, our helper had to introduce us, tell the person what our situation was and then ask if they would let us recieve a 23 page offer and refax it back. <BR>at each shop or business we visited, the owners were courteous and wanted to help us, but either their fax machne was broken or they were using the phone lines for their computers. Each shop owner suggested somewhere else where she might find a fax machine. <BR><BR>Finally after half a dozen tries, she located on in a stationary/hardware shop. The owner was almost 70 and spoke no English. His helper was his mother. They had an old fashioned machine with a continuous roll of heat sensitive paper. The fax was over 20 feet long and they rolled it up on two plastic sticks for us. <BR><BR>We took it to the wine bar and drank a bottle of Vissner, a highly fortified fruit and herbal wine that probably dates back to the Roman era. We were sitting in a wine bar on the Flaminia road which also dates back to Imperial Rome, reading a scroll! I have never before or since felt so like a Ro,man general in my life!<BR><BR>Finally we initialed all 33 pales we had to (the house was in California mind you) and were ready to fax it back. The stationary shop owner could not feed the continuous roll back into the machine so he cut it into pages. He then fed each one individually. Recieving the ffax had taken an hour and sending it back took two. We had arrived just at closing time on Sunday! We asked how much the charge was and he replied L33,000 or about $18.00. We would have paid at least $69.oo at a Kinko's back in the states and that would be without the international charges. We bought our benefactor and his mom a bottle of the best wine at the wine bar and proceeded to drink ourrselves silly as we had recieved a full price offer!<BR><BR>Without the utter friendliness and helpfullness of all the folk in Cagli who offered their help I doubt that that offer would have gone thru!

In 1999 we were trying to sell our house while we were in Italy. We were in Marche when our realitor left us a voice mail message the we had an offer on the house. We were at a wine bar in Cagli on a Sunday. The very lovely propriteress of the wine bar then spent the next hour looking for a place with a working fax machine so we could get the offer. At each stop, our helper had to introduce us, tell the person what our situation was and then ask if they would let us recieve a 23 page offer and refax it back. <BR>at each shop or business we visited, the owners were courteous and wanted to help us, but either their fax machne was broken or they were using the phone lines for their computers. Each shop owner suggested somewhere else where she might find a fax machine. <BR><BR>Finally after half a dozen tries, she located on in a stationary/hardware shop. The owner was almost 70 and spoke no English. His helper was his mother. They had an old fashioned machine with a continuous roll of heat sensitive paper. The fax was over 20 feet long and they rolled it up on two plastic sticks for us. <BR><BR>We took it to the wine bar and drank a bottle of Vissner, a highly fortified fruit and herbal wine that probably dates back to the Roman era. We were sitting in a wine bar on the Flaminia road which also dates back to Imperial Rome, reading a scroll! I have never before or since felt so like a Ro,man general in my life!<BR><BR>Finally we initialed all 33 pales we had to (the house was in California mind you) and were ready to fax it back. The stationary shop owner could not feed the continuous roll back into the machine so he cut it into pages. He then fed each one individually. Recieving the ffax had taken an hour and sending it back took two. We had arrived just at closing time on Sunday! We asked how much the charge was and he replied L33,000 or about $18.00. We would have paid at least $69.oo at a Kinko's back in the states and that would be without the international charges. We bought our benefactor and his mom a bottle of the best wine at the wine bar and proceeded to drink ourrselves silly as we had recieved a full price offer!<BR><BR>Without the utter friendliness and helpfullness of all the folk in Cagli who offered their help I doubt that that offer would have gone thru!

well i am glad to hear that it is not<BR>the norm. i have really enjoyed italy<BR>in the past; so much that we are considering purchasing a small house<BR>there. we will travel there again<BR>next june.