Now, anybody who has ever been to Italy knows that there are people on every corner of any tourist destination attempting to sell you a variety of useless baubles, knickknacks and designer knockoffs. Despite however many times you tell them you aren’t interested in buying a bracelet or a “prada” bag they’ll be up in your face a few seconds later once again attempting to sell you the same piece of garbage you declined to buy earlier. My story begins in Pisa, one of the absolute worst tourist traps in all of Italy.
At this point on my trip I was full of excitement, we had just left Rome earlier in the day, and we were en route to Florence when we stopped at Pisa to see the sights and to grab a bite to eat. Our time we had to allotted was quickly spent and I was doing a bit of window shopping with my grandparents back on the way to our meeting place. We finally arrived there and there were more vendors than when we got off of the shuttle. There were at least eight men and one woman vendor waiting for our group. My grandma, being the crafty devil she i,s decided to distract them by carrying on a casual conversation with the group of male vendors, while I sat talking to another woman in our tour group. I really didn’t notice that several men had drifted away from my grandma until I found a tray full of sunglasses shoved in my face. I politely told him no several times, being as timid as I am.
It was around the fifth or sixth time the woman beside me aggressively told him no. At this point I noticed there were about three or four men now grouped around me telling me how nice and funny my grandma was. I would quietly tell them no whenever they would shove a “Gucci” bag or “African” bracelet in my face. They then began complimenting me in an attempt to get me to buy something. It started out innocently enough, complimenting my eyes, my hair… Then they began making remarks on my figure and my breasts.
I already being as uncomfortable as I was before hand was now absolutely terrified. Here I was a fifteen year old girl, in a foreign country, and the only two people I actually knew were holding off the other four or so vendors from everybody else. The woman beside me had started another conversation with a friend of hers who had just appeared. So when they began to call me “sexy” I was on the verge of tears and attempting to get closer to my grandparents.
I eventually stalled halfway to them and curled up on the ground. My grandpa thankfully heard the harassers and swooped in and rescued me. Shortly afterwards the shuttle arrived. When we got on the shuttle to take us back to our bus I sat as far as possible from the doors knowing since not everybody had shown up yet we would be there for a while and they would still be attempting to sell their merchandise. Apparently one of them had given bracelets to my grandma for being so nice to them. He wanted her to give them to my grandpa and me. My grandma heard what had happened and was cracking jokes about how they had “complimented” me. It was then that I actually started to cry. She immediately began to comfort me apologizing for the joke. My grandpa on the other hand insisted that I at least wear the bracelet until I got back to the bus to be polite. As soon as we got back I threw it away. I didn’t want to look at it and just be ashamed of that entire experience.
– April
Location: Pisa, Italy
