Hey Sylvia.

Happy Travel Day.

It's almost time, you know, it's, Memorial Day, and then

I guess what, it's summertime.

It's like the beginning of the travel season.

My wheels are getting hot and ready to roll

that's true and it's midsummer now, so people are really taking off and have been

some places, so we'll have a lot to report on because they've already been out there

and been doing it and gonna do even more.

August is huge for travel, right?

Trains, planes and automobiles.

let's eat up and see what's going on.

Now you've got a couple of cool stories of when you started

yeah.

when you were kids.

Right.

I'm gonna date myself.

Okay.

Back then there was no interstate and we would go to my

grandmother's house in Kentucky.

I was raised in Ohio, and I remember it was so magical to get in that car

because at that time when no one ever ate out, it just wasn't a big deal.

It was the fast food was just emerging, and, but we, waited with just such

anticipation to get to the Ohio River ready to cross over into Kentucky.

There was the big boy,

Ooh.

boy and I don't even remember what we ate, but it was like, I'm sure

hamburgers and french fries and all the things I was always deprived of.

And there was that big boy

Was it like the big statue with a kid?

With a little curly do

yeah, yeah, yeah.

That people are probably buying up everywhere because I know they've

closed all the fishes here in, in Lexington and maybe even Kentucky.

You know, Nancy, one of these days we'll have to talk.

It's a, this kind of dying breed of those kind of places, and that's

almost a sad thing, you know?

they served a purpose, you know?

outside of the restaurants from cows to horses to big

Chickens.

Yeah.

Yeah, up in Massachusetts there was a giant seahorse, and I remember when

everybody was saying they were gonna take down the seahorse and no, it's a

No.

No,

There was nothing there.

But this ratty old seahorse in

but

mana poise at Massachusetts.

Special.

And it's sort of along the lines, and we've talked about this before.

when the interstate system came

Mm-hmm.

then that really started changing.

Family travel and chain restaurants sprang up.

And I remember talking about this, like, you know, cracker Barrel was

the place, and if you think about it.

The one thing in favor of all of that, and I love Cracker Barrel,

so but you had consistency of food, unlike the little tiny towns.

Now, if you went into the little tiny towns, you might

find something called a what?

A blue plate special.

Diners.

Oh my gosh.

Well, you know, diners were always the good place to find the right

food and the whole story about the blue plate special trying.

say that three times fast.

Right.

I found was really interesting.

So that was started back somewhere in the 1920s and it was a US and Canadian

was the thing in the diners and it went through about the fifties and apparently

they actually served the food on a blue plate, which I didn't know right.

Yeah.

I wonder who came up with that.

Fascinating,

right.

Well, and I, I don't know about you, but something about blue and food,

unless it's a straw, uh, unless it's a blueberry, not a strawberry, I

just like, ugh, you know, I don't,

I know

ShopRite up, up north had changed all the interior of their

stores to this bluish color.

I couldn't shop there.

Something about the color blue and food just, it just turns me off.

But anyway, I guess that was sort of a way to say, okay, they're the cheap people

eating on the blue plates, especially

But they sort of have become iconic, for the, when you think about

it, it was usually like, uh, what do they call those restaurants?

a meat and greet or something, where you get a meat, like a roast beef, and

then you get three of those kind of vegetables that are just absolutely

cooked to death, like green beans.

never heard of that term.

Meat in

Greet

Yea, Meet and Greet.

It's restaurant term, and, and here's why it's, such an interesting term

because it's a simple kind of restaurant.

' cause you have the choices of meats and then you can have

your choices of the sides.

And so it's kind of interesting.

People talk about it being a little bit easier than the cook

to your order kind of thing.

But Cracker Barrel.

Kind of took over Cracker Barrel and other kinds of things, the chain

restaurants that, kind of grew up.

And there's a variety of them today.

But, uh, the small town diners kind of went away, didn't they?

Along with some of the little

But

when you get a really good diner, if you're traveling

you can't help but going in.

And there's that sense of nostalgia.

Right.

And they're

usually,

the burgers are usually the best at a diner

I know.

I know.

Because they are probably not as good for you as they should be, but they taste good

Yeah.

But, a fried burger on a grill is, just like a grilled cheese sandwiches,

really good when you're traveling.

But then there's also beyond that, I don't, I don't know about you, but I

remember getting in the car as a kid, half the fun was packing up all the

stuff that mom and dad would let you eat

Oh

yeah.

Oh yeah.

Oh, I know.

I don't know what that would've been.

'cause now it would be for me.

' cause I remember we went on a road trip to Maine.

this is wild Nancy.

Gotta listen to this one.

We got in a, they rented a gigantic suburban, which is

one of those gigantic Chevys.

It's like a living room on wheel.

And I remember at the time it was during COVID and it was with my son and

daughter-in-law and two grandchildren.

And we crammed ourselves into this suburban, I don't know why we had such

a tear to get to Maine, but we did, and we rented a beautiful house in Maine.

But to get there, we were 19 hours in this suburban, and I remember we had

like, popcorn in one kind of place.

I had enough room to just reach into a Doritos package.

There was more room for food than there were for people.

And there were no restaurants open.

So when you stopped, you could order it and they to go window, but

you had to eat it outside because remember, nobody could eat inside.

yeah.

Boy.

Talk

19 hours,

Right.

19 hours with how many kids in a car

two little kids, and they were tiny kids at the time.

It

are we there yet?

It was very strange.

But no, but Maine was beautiful though, I have to say,

So did you go and travel for the lobster

We did lobster rolls.

We did do that.

you could get 'em to go

now?

Did those lobster rolls have butter or were they mayonnaise lobsters.

Oh my gosh.

You know, I don't know.

Tell me about that.

So there's two kinds of lobster rolls that you can have.

One is the lobster roll that has the mayonnaise and the onions and

the celery and everything in it.

So it's, it's very good and it's on a hotdog bun, usually

a soft bun type of thing.

then there's another kind of lobster roll, depending upon whether, I

think you're like a traditional New Englander or a Southern New

Englander, and that's just a lobster.

Fresh lobster in the bun and it's slathered in butter.

Oh, now you're talking my language.

See, I I

don't like butter on my lobster.

Nope.

I just like, nope.

I just like, plain lobster.

Just, just give it to me plain.

Nothing on it, no garnishes.

Nancy, you're a weirdo.

Okay.

Did I ever

I'm not weird.

I'm a purist.

I'm a purist.

Oh man.

That butter on lobster sounds so good to me.

I don't know what I had, but it was good.

So,

But when we're traveling, but wait a second, but when you're traveling, don't

you always ask people where they eat?

I mean, where do you go?

You're traveling across country.

Where are good places to go eat?

Where should you eat?

What's the best thing to do?

And how do you create that experience and that food and that travel and everything?

And because I, half the memory is the food that you're eating along the way, right?

And it's that togetherness.

It bonds you with people They ask you, they knew you were in Paris, and

where do you go when you're there?

you've been there and you love telling them, and then you

love hearing the feedback.

And that's among the friends and.

So the question is how can you share that knowledge with more people?

And one of the things is you're encouraged to do online communities.

This is where the internet is very good.

It gets a wrap on a lot of things, but if you share, particularly if you have

a sharing group, maybe a travel group that you form on Facebook or something,

it's a good way to find out, like Duluth, Minnesota has some great places.

Now I don't suspect I'm gonna have very many people who will be seeking that,

but I mean, every place has its thing and

Yep.

Well,

and.

Right.

And one of the best experiences that I had, I think when traveling with, with

friends and with family members was with a, group that I belonged to a, group

called the International Women's Forum.

And I went to Italy with mom.

Mom didn't wanna go out one night, she was just exhausted.

So I went with this other couple and they always traveled with a Fodor's Guide.

You know, one of the fodor's Guide the

Yeah.

Oh yeah.

I love those.

Their, sort of goal was to go to all the four and five star Fodor's restaurants.

one of the best meals that we had in, the Amalfi Coast was there in, I think

it was Office of Outta Sorento, was this restaurant just overlooked the

Oh, I was gonna say the place made the thing, didn't it?

oh, the best tomatoes I have ever had on this planet.

And the best.

It was Buffalo.

It was like homemade, creamy, buffalo mozzarella cheese

that was just to die for.

And the view was amazing.

And of course, the company, yeah, was

Oh yeah, but you know, the place can make a place, you know,

The surroundings, the atmosphere.

you know, the best storytelling is the story you create in my mind.

I can see myself sitting there and, but I also have to tell another

thing about traveling or anywhere.

having just reopened my restaurant, I'm kind of interested in this.

I had a fellow, Signal me to come over and say he was a martini snob and I'm

waiting ' cause I don't drink martinis.

Right.

And he said, now the restaurant was open for one day at this point.

Okay.

So we're still putting a lot of things together.

And he said, where are the martini glasses?

I was appalled when I figured, when I looked down and saw what

they had put his martini in, and I said, well, the next time you

come, there will be martini glasses.

And so we got them the next day, but how did that happen?

put a martini in an old fashioned glass.

Don't do that.

you know, I agree.

So when you're traveling, it's not just the environment and the people

you're with, but it's everything else.

As, as my uncle Ken, who was quite the actor and singer would say the.

That, that's round everything

Cout.

So,

Ah,

but I am a, I'm a glass knob too.

if I'm at a lovely restaurant and my wine glass has that little rim on

that sort of like a bubble edge rim,

it's like, You know, they cheap down on the glass.

Really?

Give me the glass that has the

think about that.

yeah.

It's like little Cokes taste better than big Cokes.

Okay.

I'm just

right.

But how do you get the best advice when you're traveling for beyond

friends and family members of where to eat and where they've been?

How do you get the best advice on where to go when you are someplace?

And I think, you can talk to the concierge or the hotel or someplace else, but just

talking to people who are on the streets or next to you or in line somewhere,

right?

Yeah.

yeah, yeah.

Oh no, that's what they say.

Like for instance, when I was looking into all of this one thing,

I looked at my kids just got back from Mexico City and ate street food,

and I'm like, for a minute I'm like.

Street food.

Wait a minute, Mexico City, wait a minute.

And then I started researching it and there are some dangers with street food,

but they said, look for the locals.

Look where the locals are going, not the touristy places.

And also look for food that's not been prepackaged.

And you don't want something that's been laying around and you wanna

see if people are using gloves.

Just these little tiny tips that you can follow to find, you know,

safety when you're out there because you don't wanna be Anthony Bourdain

and eat whatever in the world.

He did, oh, by the way, I was in Japan for a sabbatical and they asked me

before I went three weeks, and they said, what kind of food do you eat?

This is the meat story,

Yeah.

And I said, I don't eat any like raw stuff.

Well, I eat seafood.

But no.

What they did is they would get every meal, I mean, every

meal, I got a giant steak.

Well, I'm not, I am not a big eater, but I think the prize was taken by

one of my colleagues on the trip, about 15 of us, he ate dancing shrimp.

Now you know what that is.

I sure do.

Oh, yeah.

No, you bite the head off first, but no, no, no,

no.

No, I am not biting the head off something that was alive and then No.

Who was that?

yeah, no, I'm drawing a blank on his name.

Who, who was the, the musician who, the rocking, who did it?

Ozzy Osborne who would eat to

bite the head off of, bite that head off of a bat on stage.

Ah, Ozzy Osborne.

Sorry, Ozzy, I'm not eating with you.

But anyway,

Ah.

so, so there's a big effort or there's a big, travel interest in food festivals,

Yeah.

It's festivals, big deal festivals.

But but I wanted to say that culinary tours are on the increase.

And who would you think, which age group would you think?

Are the top attenders of, people who invest in these tours.

That's tours, not festivals.

the tours, I would say the 50 plus.

I would've too, but it's research I found now.

Maybe you could find other, most popular among millennials.

Really

looking for authenticity.

Followed by, yeah, followed by Gen Z. They like novelty followed by Gen

X. Are seeking culture and comfort.

And finally, baby boomers,

Who want meat and potatoes.

tradition, comfort.

Well, let's take a break and then we'll come back on, different food

tours and travels and, really how to get the best meal while you're out

there traveling and experience right.

So let's jump back into the car or, I'll strap myself into the plane

seat and talk about the next food adventure and travel where we're going

because, everything tastes better.

I think when you're on the road.

I don't know what it is, even if it's bad, it's always good, isn't it?

Just sort of the anticipation of it.

and by the way, you might just be having to strap yourself into a

space capsule at some point, right?

Culinary travel in the

stars.

Maybe it doesn't matter, I mean, you're not gonna make it too long.

Yeah.

E Elon.

Musk.

I'm saying Leon Musk,

Anyway, uh and so yeah, there is this skyrocketing interest in culinary tours

that's brought on by the internet.

It's brought on by just, we know all these things now, like, at my

restaurant just hired at Puerto Rican, I. Chef who also was given kind of an

infusion of that Kentucky Southern food and kind of does a combination thing.

So you have all that international interest, and so you're looking

around and you're looking for local sustainability.

Nancy, this is what we are about.

Family tree, food and stories.

People are seeking something and we know that, that's why they're doing

cooking classes, culinary trails, food festivals, study culture, because food

doesn't happen in a vacuum, right?

Food happens with culture all around it.

There's just something about Italy, You imagine grandma's in the kitchen,

I mean, whether grandma is or

Nonas Nonas are hot right now.

Yeah.

Nonas are hot and and you're finding your roots through food.

ancestry.com and all those places are also saying, come and join us

I have a question for you, Sylvia.

You know, everybody talks about what you want eat when you're traveling.

You want to eat Italian, you want to eat Chinese, you want

to eat French, you want to eat

Greek, whatever it is.

Do you ever hear anybody saying, we're traveling, I wanna eat American?

No.

You know, you don't, unfortunately.

Right.

However.

Wait, I've got a story on that one.

So there was a friend years back who, was doing some studies over in Italy

and she was in a little town outside of where the university, I'm not sure

where it was, where she was traveling, where she was studying, but she would

make, try and make apple pie there.

Well, it was hard to find the apples and make apple pie, but when she

did, all her friends said, oh my God.

And they asked her in Italy, her roommates and her friends.

To make American food for them.

I love that.

So she went back one year later on after she graduated and, got a

job and decided to quit her job.

She went back to Italy where her grandmother lived and wanted to open

up a little bakery called American Pie and it, well, chocolate chip

cookies, apple pie, everything.

Strawberry rhubarb pie.

But you know what?

Her downfall was not her food.

Her downfall was all the regulations in Italy that she had to have a, she

had to have a, a permit to serve milk.

Milk and cookies.

You can't have milk without cookies, right?

And vice versa.

She had to have a permit to have a sign.

She had to have a permit to have not just one chair, but two chairs.

She had to have a permit to serve water.

She had a permit for people to sit down.

She had a permit for people to stand up, and it was just crazy.

she said eventually.

You kind of had to learn to like ignore the permits and hope you

didn't get caught or pay them off.

I'm like, oh, well, I guess that happens here.

But I thought it was a fascinating story about how American food was hot

Yeah, I think that is fascinating.

I've heard other Italy stories like that too.

But you still don't hear about Americans asking for American

Yeah.

Well, you make me think we call our food New American.

What is New American?

Come to think of it.

Hmm.

I don't know.

I don't know.

Is it a burger piled high so you can't get your mouth around it

It depends on where you are.

Yeah.

I think there's too much of that with American food.

It's like trying to outdo each other with the biggest thing.

to taste

I've seen these things advertised on, television.

They're awful looking.

I mean, they're just huge.

Right.

imagine

getting your mouth I can't believe I ate the whole thing.

It's the old, it, um, Pepto-Bismol or even the Salzer, plop,

plop, fizz, fizz commercial.

I mean, no way.

Uh, I think.

One of the things that I like are places that do portion size as well.

and American food is kind of noted for being huge portions

and I don't think that's good.

I think, I think we should savor food, not just gorge ourselves on food, but you

know, who am I?

Who am I?

But there is some reasons why people are, and we've talked about that.

And then food festivals.

Hey, food festivals are big.

Some of the ones are bigger than others.

so you've got Taste of Chicago, deep Dish,

Well, and you have you, I think you have the garlic festival out in California.

Mm-hmm.

Here's one I love the Salon.

The Chalo

Paris

up.

Chocolate Fashion Show.

It can take 20 hours up to 20 hours to construct a suitable chocolate dress.

Oh, I think it did melt me in chocolate.

You, it can't crack and it can't melt.

So, you know, I mean, you know,

How

kind of heated up.

I don't know how you would do that.

I don't know if they, it's additives or what and don't even

why it takes up to 20 hours.

I mean, it's like, it take me like 10 days.

But anyway, uh, I love that.

and

I'd walk outta there naked because I'd eat my, I'd eat my

dress.

I would be eating my there somes.

It was pretty good.

Yeah.

You don't want pictures of that one, sorry.

Charleston Wine and Food Festival and I've been to that one with my chef.

But low country culture in food and low cul, low country culture

in food is really interesting.

Uh, what they call it, the gula, Geechee hop, and John came from that

cultural microcosm, Carolina Gold Rice.

Came from there too.

so yeah, that one's a fun one because, you know, it's like everything

that's just like shrimp and grits and all that kind of stuff, a very

similar thing to your New England.

the low country boil kind of looks.

New England dish.

It is, but it's very different.

Very

It's very different.

It's spicy and they tend to have crawfish, not lobster, not

Maine Lobster in, New England.

a lobster boil is lobsters, corn, potato.

and depending upon where you are, it could be linga or sausage stuck in there too.

So Massachusetts a little bit more, the Portuguese has linguica

And it adds a little bit of spice, but we did a low country boil for

mom's celebration of life at home.

And I tell you, it was delicious, but it was yy, it was, uh,

light your tongue on fire.

But it

was

Really.

Ah, but if I went to Charleston, that'd be something I'd wanna partake of.

I

Right.

soup or

something else.

So, very

good.

Yeah.

Sounds really good.

And

then.

Carolina Rice is really good too.

Yep.

And of, of course, when you travel out west, we think of from here on the east

coast, traveling west is like California and and Arizona, but you've got central

states, big corn festivals, and I would call that all American Central.

Central American food.

It's burgers, it's corn, it's potatoes, it's

beans, it's everything simple and fresh and good and fried,

like fried butter, right?

Food, fries, butter.

Well, you're making me think of state fairs

Right.

on a stick, right?

Anything is a mistake.

So, but that's part of, part of that is part of food travel and food tourism.

You know, there's actually a World Food Travel Association, which

I find was rather interesting.

And they focus on, gastronomic heritage and destinations, and that's kind of cool.

I mean, I would love to travel the world and

Well, let's do, yeah.

right.

Wouldn't that fit our mission?

I mean, finding all these different traditions.

I'm there.

I love it.

Um, October Fest, who hasn't heard of that?

Right.

now I will tell you there are some dangerous places to go on

culinary tours for food safety.

At the top of the list is India.

Hmm.

I don't know why.

Kenya, Sri lanka.

Indonesia, and then Mexico is right there in the middle.

Egypt, Singapore, Morocco, the Caribbean, and El Salvador,

you know, I think this is really an interesting subject because

as kids we always, don't drink the water, that kind of thing.

But as we've gotten more sophisticated over time and a little older, my

assumption I. I say never assume, but No, I'm gonna say assumption

was that that's all gotten better.

So you can travel more in a culinary kind of style and not worry about

that, but I would imagine still you have to be careful about health and

sanitary conditions no matter where

you go.

Uh, particularly with street food, and unfortunately that sounds

like the best kind of stuff.

you're wandering around, um, bull and there you're wandering around that.

The

Gigantic market, and you're going from place to place, then what you

want is that local flavor in the little booths and things like that.

and you know, I guess sometimes you just build up your resistance.

I don't know.

Or you just put up with the stomach ache you have afterwards.

I'm not real big into

No, I'm not real big into that.

I don't wanna, I, if I'm traveling, I don't wanna live in the

bathroom unless it's gold plated.

I, I know.

But the other thing is that I know my, our good friend and our frequent contributor

to our Facebook pages, Freda Merriweather, went on a pasta making tour of Italy.

And so you go over there and you make real pasta and supposedly, I have no proof

Well, isn't all pasta real?

I don't know.

Well, one of the things, pasta in Europe is made from.

The kind of flour that is lower in gluten and yeah, they say it's better.

I don't know.

I think we need to do a field trip and find out,

I think we have to, yeah, we have to do a write off on this one for

sure.

this would be Ethel and Lucy.

We would love it.

stomp some grapes while we're over there.

You know,

But on travel I. One of the first places I will ask somebody for before we go

anywhere is what's the big fancy food market like when we were in Berlin?

KeDaWe amazing.

I mean, it's Oh yeah, they're like, they're like sax fifth avenues of food.

Or Bergdorfs of food and they're gorgeous, how things are packaged

and just it displayed as an art form.

So, I enjoy that when we're traveling anyway, versus just having my

meatballs rolling around on a plate.

I don't,

the most exotic thing you've ever eaten

on the

exotic thing I aver ate, I would say.

Probably not that exotic.

I had never had rabbit before we went overseas and so I tried Rabbit, a

rabbit pate and that was very good.

I love Escargo.

That's pretty good.

To me that's exotic and some people tricked me into that in Florida.

Was the scene of the crime and I was in a job interview and we were

having dinner and they said, here, Sylvia, this tastes really good.

I didn't know it was escargo and I'm just not an adventuresome eater and ate it

Well, when we moved to, when we moved to Florida, Bob kept, I'm looking for

Gator head, I wanna eat gator head.

So

they're doing a lot of gator up here.

Yeah.

yeah,

we've, we've,

your gators this

we've had some alligator.

That's okay.

I've never had bear, I've had elk and.

Is

Never had, oh, you know what I had, which was strange, and I

thought this was also traveling.

I was out in Arizona with some, some friends.

We did a girlfriend trip and had, pickled prickly pear strips of the cactus.

Yeah.

I don't think I'd eat it again.

It wasn't that it was bad, it just wasn't

great.

Yeah, just didn't, wasn't

It didn't, no, it didn't ring my taste buds,

didn't, didn't z

Yeah.

No, no, no, no, no.

no.

But other than that, I'll try things.

I eventually like calamari if okay, I don't do tentacles.

No.

Uh, no, no,

no.

Octopus is not on my to-do

list.

are too smart.

Octopus.

They are.

an octopus is my spirit animal.

I say because gosh, you know, you can change your outfit at the blink of an eye.

I know they're amazing actually.

They're very amazing.

one of my fun trips as I went with our governor on an economic development

trip to Mexico and got to see the plants that they make tequila from

agave.

the, got it.

Yep.

Yeah, it was beautiful.

Just acres and acres of agave.

That's another fun thing to do is see the origins of some things.

' cause now I pay attention to tequilas.

We have a baby blue agave.

I'm not sure it would, it would create anything more than a thimbleful, but

I have a little baby blue agave that I hope will grow big one day that, I call

my Audrey plant after my mom because.

We traveling and saw when it was huge.

It must've been like nine feet tall, probably ready for, being, harvested

outside of an Airbnb that we're at.

And I thought of the little shop of horror.

The plant's name was Audrey.

My mom's name was Audrey.

So guess what, we have a baby audrey

Audrey.

Oh, that is so cool.

It is so funny how we, uh,

do you name your food after your parents?

well, I'm on the search for a single tomato plant.

Just want one.

Don't want more than one.

As a tribute to my dad.

There you go.

I wanna find one.

I've just gotta go out there and find one.

I mean, I sneak into somebody's garden and take one tomato

plant.

should not be too difficult.

it?

Should be not too difficult to find.

And speaking of tomato plants, the one, they have very unusual

tomato plants down here.

When you're traveling, it's always interesting to see the sort of

the flora and fauna from a food perspective wherever you are.

But I had never heard of everglade tomatoes.

Have you?

No, I haven't.

They're apparently, little teeny tiny.

They're like the size

of small like currents.

They're tiny.

They're tiny, and they're sweet, and they grow abundantly on these bushes.

So I've had one that a friend gave me and said, try this.

Like, oh my gosh, it was like candy.

It was so

Oh,

delicious.

But.

Everglade tomatoes.

So anyway, but traveling the world is really fascinating when you do

it with your taste buds and a fork, I think it's better to travel with

a fork than a friend sometimes.

Right?

So,

And it's all about capturing that culture, tradition, taste.

And the beauty of the world today is we can do that.

and the memories, the memories that, that make it real and

strong is.

You'll always bring it back and try and recreate it.

And I do that a lot.

It's like, it looked like that.

Let's see if I can make it taste like that.

Yeah, that's the challenge the place isn't there.

No, no, it's not.

It's not.

But, um, you put a little Parisian music on in your kitchen or a

Mexican, we can vex

absolutely.

Put the

music on and fire up the grill and see what you can create.

Recreate your food, travels

at home.

So with that, I'm ready to fire up the grill back here at home and well

fire up the oven and see if I can make something French and delicious.

you go girl.

We'll see you soon and we'll hear you soon.

Take care.

Bye-bye.

Goodbye.

I.

Um, you wanna hear a story about Italy?