1. Coffee, every meal, everyday. Maybe with the exception of breakfast… of course not.

And in this case, coffee isn't just any ordinary cup of coffee, it's espresso. A strong, tiny sip of espresso in those beyond tiny little cups they hand out in Italian cafes. You have a big cup of "normal" coffee for breakfast, an espresso after your pranzo and another espresso after cena. You get used to being asked for a coffee at the meal of your main course in which you would naturally, somehow say, "un/due caffeè" or how many you need. And then it just becomes part of your everyday must-drinks to get you through the long day. You can't live without coffee. 

2. Speaking of meals, you just automatically ask for the house wine during lunch.

Then you get all these looks from the strangers, "who drinks at this hour?"

3. Dinner is at 9pm.

The days are long in Italy, particularly when it comes to the summer, when the sun only sets at 9 every night. With the sun out for that long, you would naturally stay out longer and most likely sleep later because it probably feels awfully strange to be sleeping with that bright blazing sun still shining through your windows. I know when I was there, dinner every night was practically at 9 or 10 so you wouldn't end up being hungry like you would if you had eaten at 6pm.

4. Adding olio di oliva to everything. Oh and don't forget the sale (salt). 

One thing I've picked up from cooking is that you add olive oil to pretty much everything. You can add it to your pasta while it's boiling in the pot, you can add it to your bread in the morning together with the alceto balsamico and you can even add it to your salad, again don't forget the alceto balsamico! And salt, equally important. 

5. Grosso and fine sale. 

Two different kinds of salt which you would never take notice of because it's only a word difference on them damn salt packets. I've made the horrible mistake of making salads, for two, using the grosso sale when there's already smoked salmon in there, you can imagine the outcome. It was like eating a salad that had been drowned in the ocean. Not pleasant. 

6. Forget air conditioning, you've got to learn with a barely workable fan in the blazing summer. 

You develop these rather amazing heat resistant bodies after awhile. Really. When you're forced to stay indoors, outdoors, it makes no difference, wherever, where it's 33 degrees and you've got a fan that hardly works unless you're about 5cm away from it, you learn to slowly, very slowly, get used to the heat. After awhile, sweating while seated down on the couch is normal. Feeling warm and trying to sleep at night is already a blessing because things could be a lot worse, you could be sweating so much, and feeling so hot that it makes it unbearable and impossible to sleep. Yes, I've been there too. And if ever you're lucky enough and a roommate somehow magically gets his hands on a functioning air conditioning, it's no longer just an air conditioning anymore. It's feels like god's gift from heaven and you guard that magical cooling machine with your life. No one touches, or spoils it. 

7. Organization? It doesn't exist. 

I don't think there's much to say about this one, it's pretty self explanatory and all those living in Italy would understand perfectly what I mean. 

8. It's normal for things to move slow.

So the bank tells you it'll take 2 weeks for your new bank card to arrive. Wrong, what they are trying to say is, "if for some odd magical reason things have moved at the speed of light, you'll get your bank card in 2 weeks otherwise, expect it to arrive a least probably, well, a month later? Maybe? Two months?" Always, always leave about a half of the estimated time extra because that's how long things usually take. Another example? I sent a parcel from London and I was told a tracked and signed for parcel would take 3-5 days to get there. Wonderful… Not. It took 3-5 days to get to Milan, and it stayed there, "your parcel is being processed it's on it's way" for the next 2 whole damn weeks. 

9. Ice cream (or as the italians call them, gelatos) are a perfectly good reason to go out.

It's normal to just take a little walk down to the nearest gelato store to pick up a nice refreshment particularly in summer. You don't have to wait till after a meal to get it as a dessert, you can if you wish but it's perfectly fine too if you and your friends just wish to meet up outside that cool gelato store just for a little snack in the afternoon. 

10. You don't need a proper reason to go anywhere. Really. 

If you feel bored in the apartment, well then, just ring up a few people and head out. The idea is there doesn't have to be a fixed plan or destination, you will all just meet up and then decide then what to do and go. You don't need to go out to town because you need to buy new clothes but rather just to take a little walk on a nice sunny afternoon. I remember getting Skype calls from my parents back home, "So you're headed out now? Where are you going? What are your plans for today?" Simple answer, "I don't know, we'll see when we get there. We'll be spontaneous". It's all about the spontaneity, just taking a wonder around the place.

11. It's fine to sit in the park and do nothing.

That's all that you see when the weather's perfect, say during the spring/summer period between March to May. When the sun's out shining but it's just about 25 degrees, it's perfect weather to go sit in a park. Sure you can bring a book to read, or a ball to play in the fields but you don't have to do anything, you can be like the locals, sit, lie or sleep (heck i've napped for 3 hours!) on the grass and just forget everything for that moment. You just lie there, and watch time and the day go by and feel absolutely wonderful. It's what they call having no plans. 

12. You become a very patient and emotional person, both at the same time. 

When things aren't going right (which for most of the time, it probably will), you get frustrated and what's even more frustrating is when you can't communicate properly to get that point across. I've had the customer service of a telephone company hang up on me because I was asking for help regarding my SIM card and all of them non parlo inglese. Moments like that, when you really feel like just punching a hole right through that wall in your room, or tracking down those idiots and demanding a proper response. But after awhile, you slowly realise things are going to be like that, it's not going to change much and you'll just have to be patient. Very, very patient. 

13. Pizzahut and other pizza chains used to be your favourites, not anymore. 

They simply don't measure up to the authentic italian pizzas you've had in Italy. What is with all this stuffed, processed cheese in the crust, and all this awful pastey sauces. It's far  from that amazing to-die-for crudo pizza you had in Italy.

14. You're disappointed by the ice cream flavours they have in your country.

In Italy, there were all sorts of gelato flavours imaginable from chocolate, pesca, menta to panna cotta, tiramisu, riso, vela merde, zuppa inglese (still haven't figured out what that is till now) and if you're lucky to find one, mojito and many many more. Hundreds. But back here, at least in Hong Kong, all I see is, "chocolate, vanilla, strawberry". And when you're no longer as excited about Ben and Jerry's as you were before, you know it's bad.

15. You're still living in the european timezone after being back in Asia for 6 weeks.

Yep, my day runs from 2pm to 3am everyday.