GL 350 Blog #5

Global Learning blog #5

Prompt: What is the point of leisure? Compare and contrast Italian culture to your own as it relates to leisure.

            Leisure in my opinion is free-time for doing something useful, and what we do to be productive is a personal choice. It is a time where the lazy individuals in the world get put apart from those that are not. If someone gave you five hours to do whatever you wanted, what would you do with it? This time that has been given is a leisure period, and leisure is productive when the individual uses it to their advantage. I believe that there is a large difference in the American leisure and the Italian leisure. One of these examples being that Italians close down their shops and restaurants every day between 1pm and 4pm. This is to make sure that they have time for leisure, calling it a ‘siesta’. In America, I don’t think we take enough time for ourselves, when that should be one of the most important things in life.

            Even Zak Tepus quoted today, “I always want to be on the run, and I never want to just sit somewhere. I feel like I am wasting my time.” As Americans, I think many people would agree with him, but those are the moments that human beings really need, to just sit, but also make the most out of that leisure time. We love to sit around the television and watch that screen for hours, as I have to admit I love to do at home. I also know that when I am home I always feel as though I need to take naps, here I don’t feel that way at all. We always have a plan for the day, and during free time we all want to sit and talk together in the lounge or work on our homework together. At Walsh back home, it is nothing like this. Italians take more time for themselves, friends, and family. It’s almost like they somehow know that’s what life is about.

            In The Italians book, Barzini talks about how difficult life can be for some Italians. He even talks about the ‘evil spirits’ that they must beat from the start of Italian life. It seems as though the Italians take a great advantage of their leisure time due to some of these evil spirits. Italians must take advantage of the great moments in life. Barzini quotes, “A few individuals manage to prosper in a decaying world.” Many Italians use their leisure time to paint, draw, relax in the gardens, or even go on bike rides around Rome. What is interesting about Italians is that they do this for themselves. They are not out to please anyone during their time of leisure, such as some Americans have a tendency to do. Take Machiavelli for example, he spent his life making beautiful paintings and wrote beautiful literature. Barzini quotes, “he died penniless. He never managed to get his immortal works published.” He spent his whole life working on different works, and never made much money. Machiavelli was happy, because he was beating the evil spirits upon him by making the most of his life with his leisure. He didn’t give up, and he worked hard regardless of his failures to grab attention during his life. Now look at him, every Italian knows his name.

            We took a bike ride through the Borghese Gardens just the other day, and it was very emotionally refreshing for all of us. On that bike ride we saw people reading in the park, meeting up with friends, going on jogs, parents playing with their children, and tourists getting a bit of Italian leisure. This is a good example of something we do not have in America. Sure we have little parks here and there, but this place was huge! It is about 4 miles long. It was a great feeling to share that Italian leisure time. Edith Wharton, who appears in our Smiles book, quotes, “In the Gardens you can take rowboats out on the artificial Giardino del Lago, studded with temples and statues. There are strolling grandmothers and daughters, fathers teaching sons to ride bikes, romping dogs, red-hot lovers, and friends arm-in-arm.” I think these gardens give us a grand look into Italian leisure, and truly make us understand their leisure is used solely for their emotional well-being.

“In our leisure, we reveal what kind of person we really are.” -Ovid