Italy

Population: 60.77 million

Capital: Rome

Language: Italian Phrases: Hello (Ciao) Goodbye (Arrivederci)

Currency: Italy uses the Euro

Climate: Italy can be divided into two parts when it comes to climate.  In the north of Italy the weather is harsh, cold winters and hot summers, in the south of Italy the winters are mild and the summers are warm.

Religion: Catholicism is the largest religious group in Italy, they make up 87.8% of the population.  There are different kinds of Catholics that can be found in the country, Latin, Eastern Rite, Italo-Albanians, Romanian, Ukrainian Greek and Armenian Catholics.

Sports: Italy has a long tradition with several sports but soccer is the most popular.  Italy won the World Cup in 2006 and is second (behind Brazil) most successful soccer team in World Cup history.  Basketball, volleyball and cycling are also sports that Italy does really well in.  Some other popular sports are rugby, tennis, athletics, fencing and winter sports.  Italy has a total of 628 medals from both the summer and winter Olympics   They are the 6th most successful country in the world at the Olympics and 3rd behind the USA and Soviet Union for most gold medals.

Famous people:  There have been countless famous Italians, among them Christopher Columbus, Galileo, Da Vinci, and Caesar Augustus.  But some other less known famous people who have Italian heritage are: Kaley Cuoco (half Italian) who we know best as Penny from the Big Bang Theory and Hayden Panettiere (half Italian) a popular actress known for her roles on Remember the Titans and Heroes.

Flag:

Facts:
* It is one of the most crowded nation in Europe
* Home to the most UNESCO World Heritage Sites
* The author of "Pinocchio" was Italian
* Parmeasan, gorgonzola, mozzarella, provolone and ricotta all came from Italy
* The University of Rome is one of the world's oldest universities, founded in 1303
* Over 50 million tourists a year visit Italy
* In the 1930s and 40s Mussolini tried to eliminate foreign words, so in soccer "goal" became "meta" and Donald Duck became "Paperino," Mickey Mouse became "Topolino" and goofy became "Pippo".
*It was thought that Michelangelo's paintings were somber, but after being cleaned they discovered they were actually painted with bright colors, all the years of dirt and smoke from candles had toned down the colors.
* Soccer does play a large part in the Italian culture, their fans are called tifosi, which means "carriers of typhus".  They are known for their rowdy behavior and lack of inhibition.

Rialto Bridge

Culture:  There is so much history and interesting facts that make up the culture.  When I was reading some of these facts I wanted to include them all, things like the first violin was made in Italy, Italy claims to have taught the rest of Europe how to cook, they wrote the language of music, it is the birthplace of opera, they play life-sized chess in Marcostica every other year, in the past the winner would win the hand of a beautiful girl.  So there are all these little lesser known facts that are so interesting   Obviously Italy is known for it's ancient ruins, artists, fashion,  the Vatican, and dictators, but the country is so much more than that.

Activity

Our original plan was to go through the countries alphabetically  but we were running into some issues with that idea.  The main issue was things were coming up that we were either invited to or just happen to be going on in the city, so we have decided to take advantage of those experiences and record them as they come up.  This happened with Italy since my work had a culture week that I participated in and my department decided to represent Italy.

Italy is one of the countries that we have actually visited.  We went to Rome and Venice.  We loved seeing all the ancient ruins and learning about the histories of the cities.  Probably the coolest thing that we did was just walk around the city at night.  It was like the city did not sleep, we were out all night, but we weren't alone, there were tons of people out with us. It reminded me of Ecuador.  The most impressive part for me was all the ancient ruins.  We went on a walking tour and it was then that I realized just how much history Rome alone held.  We went to the Vatican but did not have time to go inside.  Venice was a beautiful city.  We made it a priority to go on a gondola ride and it was magical.

Roman forums

Colosseum

masks in Venice

For our family activity we actually combined it with my work project for the culture week we had.  Each department represented a different country and because my supervisor's grandparents were from Italy we decided to represent Italy.  I was in charge and with help from Megan created pictures, facts, quotes and even stamps for our "passports".  We went to work late one night and put all our pictures and facts up around the department and kept it there for a week so everyone could enjoy learning about Italy.

The sign we made and pictures and quotes, all the pictures are ones we took from our trip

the passport stamps Megan made

setting up at work

the kids were there, but they were tired

the final display

My supervisors grandfather, Leonardo "Leo" Italasano (1899-1998) came to Utah to pursue a better life.  He moved to the immigrant area off of California Ave and 1300 West.  Leo married a girl who was born in the US, but both parents were immigrants, he gave her father chickens and goats as a dowry and it was accepted.  He married his wife without ever officially meeting her first.  Leo worked hard to send his kids to a Catholic school, this was a priority for him.  My supervisor was just able to get her own kids into a Catholic school as well, so she is carrying on the tradition.