How To Master Italian Hand Gestures

When our Ciclismo Classico guests arrive in Italy, often they notice and comment on the the fact that Italians stare. They stare at you when you walk into a restaurant, they stare at you while you’re eating, they stare at you while you walk down the street. Believe it or not, it’s not because you’re foreign, or a woman, or because of your hair. Sure, they might stare a little more for these reasons but the truth is that Italians stare. They stare at other Italians too. It’s not considered rude here and people are really into watching other people.

The second thing you might notice is that everyone seems annoyed or angry. There is screaming in the street, screaming in the coffee shop, and when you ask a question someone answers you quickly and without a smile. Oddly enough, they’re not being rude. Italians don’t smile a lot when they are conducting customer service. They also scream when they are talking about nothing at all and gesture wildly pretty much all the time. What looks like two men screaming at each other is usually just two men talking about their wives’ cake, or a soccer game, or how warm it is outside. The Italian people practically convulse when they speak, they often lock eye contact, and raise their voices mostly because they are just so excited about what they’re saying.

Gesturing is a cultural “language” in Italy. Gestures are just a part of every day life in Italy. Italians use them in their speech, consciously or unconsciously, and there are some very distinct differences in gesturing as you travel from North to South.

Here are a few great videos we recently shot with our expert gesture guide Massimo Marenco (from Piedmont).

Enjoy!