Shopping in Italy

One year we attended the street market, complete with “fleas,” held at Cavallino, Italy, on the peninsula just north of Venice, near Punta Sabbioni. This market went on for a mile on both sides of the street and in the market square of the town. Italian street markets often consist of trucks set up as stores on wheels. The sides of these trucks are unfurled, and there are plenty of shelves on which to display their wares. Shoe stores, kitchenware and gadgets, dresses, toys, hardware, the meat market, cheese store, bakery, fruit and vegetable dealers, fishmongers, antiques and “fleas,” and on and on.

In a heavy rain, from Lucca to Florence, we drove past a small shopping center that should have been investigated, but even without a schedule we don’t have the time to stop and see everything. These beautiful little towns and villages, the shopping centers, flea markets, and street markets, are truly living museums. By wandering a block or two in the town, and browsing in a grocery, hardware, or department store we can learn so much about the people and how they live.

Unexpected works of art and the “key” to understanding the city of Génova, will be found while walking through the “carrugi,” the narrow alleys in the old town, left undamaged by wartime bombing. In Piazza Lavagna, a Flea Market permits the visitor to browse, bargain and perhaps buy a treasure that may be a century or two, or a week old.

In Assisi, small buildings with shops that sell all kinds of things, line the parking lot below the St. Francis’ Basilica. One year I bought Emmy a nice embroidered cotton dress for $15 and paid $5 for a purse. Years later that “parking lot” dress is still in use. (That’s because it’s still a pretty dress, not because I haven’t bought her another one.)

On the Isle of Capri Emmy went shopping and found a dress she wanted to buy, and a shopkeeper who was more than eager to wait on her. When Emmy indicated she wanted to buy the dress and quoted a price, he indicated agreement, then quickly kissed her on the neck and said “Bella, Bella.” But when Emmy indicated a lack of interest in what he was really trying to sell, he showed a lack of interest in selling the dress for that price, so no buy, and no sale either.