Well, it's without question that the strangest thing about being in Italy is the Italians. Most of the cliches are right. They are passionate, emotional, warm. I've heard 10 minute conversations consisting entirely of "ciao"; my theory is that they have only one word for both hello and goodbye, because it makes the transition between the two easier. Hospitality in Italy is part a passion and part of competition. One word that comes on the first page of most Italian phrasebooks is "basta" (enough); you need to know this, or you will be so weighed down with food that you will not be able to move for a week.
To the English sensability, it can be a bit much overwhelming. But Italian hospitality is like a pizza; what you down eat straight away, you can save for later. A week later the warmth of the greeting remains.
Unless, of course, they are in a car in which case they hate the entire world.
Italy has lots of things to go and see, particularly in the way of incredible architecture and historic buildings. They fall into three camps as far as I can see: Roman ruins, military buildings (castles and the like) and churches.
The extent of these ruins is hard to understand until you have seen them. I've been to Rome before, where they are interspersed though the city. This trip, I saw Villa Adriana — or the place where Hadrian used to hang out when he wasn't building walls.
The slightly unfortunate thing with Italian Roman ruins is that they have so many that they tend to be a bit under cared for, particular noticable in a tendancy for people to grafitti the walls. In Britain, we can build an entire visitors attraction around a few rocks and a bit of mosaic — around Newcastle we have lots of these.
These came as a bit of a surprise to me. I hadn't realised how much of a hybrid nation Italy is, with lots of invasions (in both directions). Many of the castles are relics of these. The best example I saw was in il Castella in the south.
There are a lot of these. Really a lot. Religion is everywhere. Italians even have more gradations of church than Britain with duomo falling between cathedral and church. Inside, they are filled with the most amazing statues, images, wood work. Outside, they are surrounding by junk shops selling the same crap souvenirs as everywhere else.
I have mixed feelings about the church. The fixation on pain, suffering and death seems a little ghoulish at best. Combined with beneficient images of Mary and Padre Pio smiling out at you everywhere, the experience is a little unsettling. Worth coping with, though.