After spending time travelling in Italy, I left with the overwhelming feeling that anti-Asian prejudice is far more common than I had expected. From restaurants and daily interactions to museums and churches, I repeatedly experienced situations where I felt I was treated differently because I was Asian.
I’m not claiming that every Italian is racist, nor that every experience in Italy is like this. However, the number of incidents I encountered during my trip made it difficult for me to believe they were all isolated coincidences. Compared with other European countries I visited, Italy was the only place where I consistently felt unwelcome because of my ethnicity.
During our trip to Milan, we decided to have lunch at a well-rated restaurant near the Duomo. It was lunchtime, and the restaurant was busy with many local office workers. There was a long line outside, so we checked in with the host and waited at the end of the queue. We were seated fairly quickly.
The moment we arrived at our table, however, something felt wrong.
The table was still covered with leftovers from the previous customers—dirty plates, used cutlery, unfinished food, and half-empty coffee cups. Because the restaurant was busy, I assumed the staff simply hadn’t had time to clear it yet, so we sat down and waited patiently.
What happened next made it difficult to believe that the issue was simply because they were busy.
Shortly after we were seated, another group of customers arrived and sat at the table next to us. They appeared to be local Italians in business attire and were seated after us. Within moments, a waiter came over, cleared their table immediately, and made sure everything was clean before they settled in.
Our table, however, remained covered with dirty dishes.
The guests next to us were quickly given menus and were able to place their orders, while we continued to sit at a dirty table without anyone acknowledging us or offering us menus.
My boyfriend repeatedly tried to get a waiter’s attention by raising his hand, but we were completely ignored. After about ten minutes, we finally had to walk over to a waiter ourselves to tell him that we still hadn’t received any menus. Instead of bringing us clean menus, he simply handed us menus that had just been collected from another table.
Even after receiving the menus, no one came to take our order. We waited another twenty minutes before once again having to search for a waiter ourselves. Only then did someone come over, appearing visibly annoyed and unwilling to serve us.
When ordering, we didn’t realize that tap water wasn’t complimentary. I politely asked if we could simply have two empty glasses so we could drink the bottled water we had purchased outside. The waiter responded impatiently that glasses were only provided if we ordered the restaurant’s bottled water, implying that if we didn’t buy their water, we wouldn’t receive glasses. We decided not to argue and simply dropped the request.
What made the experience even more frustrating was that by the time the neighboring table—who had arrived after us—had already finished their entire meal, our table still had not been cleared. The dirty dishes from the previous customers remained in front of us for an incredibly long time. Our food didn’t arrive until roughly another thirty minutes later.
Throughout the entire experience, we remained polite and respectful. We never raised our voices or behaved inappropriately. Yet from beginning to end, we were consistently ignored: seated at a dirty table, left waiting without menus, overlooked when trying to get service, forced to chase down staff multiple times, and treated with obvious impatience.
I cannot say with certainty why we were treated this way. However, as two Asian visitors, it was impossible not to notice the stark difference between how we were treated and how the local Italian customers seated beside us were treated. They received prompt, attentive service, while we were repeatedly ignored despite arriving first.
This was the first time during our travels that I genuinely felt we may have been treated differently because of who we were. Whether this was racial discrimination or not, the experience certainly felt that way, and it left us feeling unwelcome and deeply disappointed.
No customer deserves to be treated like this.