The reverse experience

The beginning

When I first came to Florence and everything was new and scary, driving here was a real challenge. I have written about this before, it took time for me to get used to the Italian style, but I can now say I’m a MASTER!!!  Recently when faced with a potentially very difficult experience, it was interesting to see how well I took it and how much I’ve changed in my time in Florence.

A few weeks ago, I was going to a friend’s house where I had never been before, it was on a private road, so no way for Google Maps to show me how to get all the way to the front door, I had to improvise. “What’s wrong with that?”, you may ask, well let me tell you. Here in Florence it happens that sometimes, the road can only fit one car, and it’s very much two-way. You’re going forward and know, just know, that you’d better get it right the first time, as turning around is not an option. So picture this, it’s dark, these dark winter nights, and I arrive where Google Maps thinks is my friend’s address, except it’s clearly not. The number is all wrong and there’s literally a field behind the gate, I know she doesn’t live here. I have to try to find the house by driving up this very narrow road, looking for the correct house number, in the dark. Someone who has never been to Florence reading this will think I want a medal for nothing, but no! When I say narrow, I mean narrow, and house numbers in these country roads, oh boy… they sometimes don’t even follow a normal numerical pattern, they don’t necessarily have evens and odds on either side of the road, and never ignore the little R next to a number, it will be to your detriment. So I drive up, I go slow, I keep going, I get to the end, the very end, the point of no return, and still her house number was not there. Maybe I went entirely to the wrong place, it wouldn’t be the first time. 

The time before

In the past, when I first got here, this situation would have sent me into a panic. I didn’t want to be late to my friend’s, I’m never late, I didn’t want to have to call and be the helpless woman either, what could I do? I reversed, slowly but surely, and yes, it was a winding road. All of a sudden, headlights behind me, I have to let someone pass. A magic driveway appears on my right, I can pull in, the car gets past and nobody dies. With this, my confidence, which is already pretty high, I’m reversing down a winding country road, grows even more, I’m determined to find the house, I will go to the party and I will not be late, my time buffer is still intact. I continue going the wrong way down the road and see a familiar face, a client of mine, who has also been invited and alas she’s ringing a bell at a house, the number is nowhere to be seen, the house number before that was not what you’d expect, but I don’t care. My client was braver than me, she walked up the road, she took the bus and walked the rest of the way. She was apparently more efficient than me as well, but a good teacher is always surpassed by her pupils. I tell her of my tale and she explains she was here only yesterday, to pick up some skiing gear, I feel better and more adequate. She also tells me that to find it originally, she had had to call our common friend, who gave her full instructions, so I’m good, I don’t feel completely useless. We go to the party and it’s a lot of fun.

Now, why is this important, why is it even worthy of a mention? Well, here’s the thing, before I came to Florence, the thought that I could be so calm about driving on a dark road that I didn’t know at all, was laughable. The thought that I would reverse down this road, as if nothing mattered, was ridiculous. Italy transformed me. Don’t get me wrong, I was always a confident driver, but I consider this ninja level. How did this happen? Italy happened. Driving here, as I’ve said before, is organised chaos, but as you learn to do it, you realise that in Florence at least, drivers are courteous, you can get it as wrong as you like and they leave you to it. It’s so rare that someone will tell you off for making any kind of mistake. You can park where you like, you can drive how you like, just don’t be overtly aggressive and Bob’s your uncle.

Today

Ok, but how does this permeate into the rest of my life here? In every way. Being an expat makes you brave, because you have no choice. It’s like the post I keep seeing on social media: “A foreign accent is a sign of courage”, it is. When you move to a new country and have to learn so many new skills, you also acquire a good deal of courage in the process. You have to. One of my clients once described being a new expat like being a toddler, and she’s very right. You can’t speak the language properly, you don’t know your way around the place, you need help to complete simple tasks, you’re learning everything from the beginning, and the rewards are huge. Can you imagine leaving a toddler on their own, to navigate the world all alone and expect them to make it? Would you blame them if they didn’t, if everything went south, of course not! So why on earth would you try to make a move to Florence on your own? Why would you try to add so many layers of complication to an already complicated process? Move to Florence is here for you, we can help. Get in touch for a free consultation and we’ll take it from there together.