The Mafia and Italy, the Continent

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Over the past few days of Italian class, instead of learning Italian we have been learning about the Mafia and the several dialects of Italy.

In Italy, there are three distinct types of Mafia. One is in Calabria, the very bottom of Italy and is called 'ndrangheta. Say it with me, 'ndrangheta. The real danger with that form of the Mafia is how to pronounce its name. The second type is located in Naples and is called La Camorra. Both of these groups are dangerous obviously, but the one we Americans know and love (from movies and from America itself - think Al Capone) is located in Sicily and is called, endearingly, cosa nostra, which roughly translated means 'our thing.'

Unfortunately I won't have enough time to visit southern Italy, so I'll be missing out on all the fun. As they told us in orientation, "Sicily is beautiful, and don't worry about the Mafia because they tend to only shoot each other."

Another Ineresting thing I have recently learned, and that they never told me in school, is that Italy is basically a small Europe, with each region speaking a different dialect, or more accurately, a different language. A long time ago, before Italy was a country, there were the regions. Each region spoke it's own language and no one could understand each other without learning each language. Then, along come's Dante, who writes his Divine Comedy, and when Italy decides to become a united country they choose to use Dante's Italian and the official Italian. Luckilly for me, Dante was from Florence, so this is the city where they speak a language most similar to the Italian you learn in school.

Now, after a few hundred years, Italy is a united country, with an official language, and you can freely travel from region to region without fear. Just still don't expect to understand what someone in Naples tells you, or even worse someone in Sicily. As for me, I'll stick with Florence, where everyone speaks the official Italian...as least to us Americans.

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