Cultural differences would pop up at different times during the summer, which often happened at the grocery store and in particular the produce section. My first time of buying fruit again in an American grocery store I was so excited to be picking up lettuce with my bare hands, where as in Italy it is culturally-relevant to use a plastic glove while handling the produce.
Later in the summer there was an instance where I was buying a couple of apples. After putting the apples in a bag, I froze in place simply from confusion. I couldn’t remember what was proper etiquette in America: did you weigh the fruit with the scale in the produce section to obtain a sticker with the price, or did you weigh the fruit at the check-out line? I literally stood there for a minute or two before finding my mom in the store to ask “you weigh fruit at the check-out line, right?”
Oh, how I look forward to seeing what other cultural confusion I experience after living in Rome for another year!
