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In 2012, I traveled to Italy. Like most visitors, I had a limited agenda but made the most of it. My best example is right out of the gate. We started in Rome, had rented a car, a little Nissan Juke (which I was ecstatic was a manual transmission), and off we went.

Our first stop was supposed to be the Vatican. We had ample time to arrive. My travel mate had committed nearly a ream of paper to printing out directions to everywhere we would be visiting, complete with Google Maps’ infant Street View option added for each directional.

The streets of Rome do have driving lanes–with lines, arrows, and words–but unless cars are lining up at a traffic signal, no one follows them. So instead of touring the Vatican, I found myself in a real-life game of Pole Position (if you remember 80s arcade games) or Mario Kart (if you do not).

Somehow we made it to our hotel with no scratches, dings, or dents. I felt like this was a better tour of Rome’s culture than I ever could have received at the Vatican.

Although this chaotic driving style was not the norm in Pompeii, which only has one real main street; or in Florence, whose streets are driven carefully and within speed limits; in Venice, the driving was the same as in Rome. . .but in water. Gondolas filled with tourists seemed to mill around the canals like cattle haphazardly trying to enter a chute; private water taxis sped around them, bolstered by a motor and a certain destination. Despite the chaos, the gondoliers and taxi drivers managed just fine.