What you should avoid in Rome (and in Italy)

Surely Italy is the "Bel Paese" (the beautiful country), however as it occurs in every country there are a few things that you should avoid, to spare being frustrated and to dodge problems.

(1) Need and internet connection (Internet Service Provider)? Avoid Telecom Italia Network - TIN.

You should avoid Telecom Italia Network (aka as "TIN). Starting an account is very time consuming and complicated. The speed of the normal internet connection is helplessly slow. Broad band (ADSL) is even more complicated to install, and it is frequently down. Support is ill-disposing: instead of trying to solve the problem they will drag you with countless questions until you get tired (what is your Operative System? What is your user ID? etc. etc.). If there is a technical problem with the line, they might take many days to fix the problem.
The reason is that they have monopoly on telephone connections and they are the biggest ISP. You will be forced to deal with them to have a phone line, however try to avoid them as ISP. The other Italian ISPs are not really good either, however they are friendlier and to some extent better.

(2) Taking a train in high season without a reservation.

You might end up travelling all the time possibly standing, without air conditioning, in a crowded corridor. Eurostar class trains, and also IC Intercities will not allow standing passengers, so you might not be able to travel at all. If your travel agent is not available to get reservations from your country, many travel agencies in every Italian town offer a train reservation service (generally presented outside as "Biglietteria FS" where FS stands for Ferrovie dello Stato, i.e. State Railways). It is even better reserving and purchasing your ticket in any box office of every regular Italian train station. Prices in travel agencies are the same as in the box offices of train stations. The consequence is that travel agencies make a very minimal profit, they just do it to offer a more complete service to their clients. So don't be demanding or don't think that they will have to pamper you: actually, try to make the procedure as smooth as possible.

(3) Don't rely on surface public transport on Sundays.

While subways are on time and work regularly (they are less crowded actually on holidays), buses slow down, and you might wait a long long time before the bus appears. At least try to wear a hat in summer! A possible exception is if you catch the bus in an area served by many lines, as there are more chances that one will pass.

(4) Going to a restaurant that you don't know well on Sunday and holidays.

It might be crowded, and you could wait a long time to be served. The food is generally not at its best. Naturally, you should also reserve your place, or you might end up standing a long time even before you sit! This will solve some problems, but not all.

(5) Don't use AOL as your e-mail provider to communicate by e-mail with Italians. It carelessly does not include previous dialogues automatically when you hit the "reply to" button, so every time you write to a service provider in Italy (or elsewhere) they have to make a  tedious search among all the
messages received and sent every day to find yours.

AOL has other defects: it blocks normal and valid incoming e-mail capriciously. AOL is the perfect e-mail provider to experience all sort of misunderstandings, and to get stranded in your holidays abroad (e-mail incoming delivery failures can happen any time unpredictably, with arrival information, reply to some questions of yours etc.).

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