Il Mercato

Almost every city has at least one, and basically everyone does shopping there - it's the market! The market is a collection of everything you could really ever need to survive. There is also junk that I'm pretty sure never gets sold. Despite some of the bizarre things you may find at the market, there is plenty of useful stuff. For example, you will find food (fruits,vegetables, and meats)The market can run every day except for Sundays in big cities, while it may run 2 times a week in smaller cities. Many of the people that have a place in the market make their living by the money they make in the market. Some of them make their own products (the branch president in Rimini makes belts and sells them at the market.) while others simply get their products for cheap and sell them at a higher prices. Regardless, most of the people will do whatever they need to so that you will buy their products.

video to come

You can try and bargain a price down at the market, though many of the prices are already extremely good. Since each person is the owner of their stuff, they can set whatever price they want and you can try and talk them down. I've noticed that most Italians can't be talked down, but there are also a number of foreigners and they're more easily talked down.

To finish, I just wanted to share a story:
At the market in Torino, we were walking down looking at things and were intrigued by a man doing "magic." What he was really doing was trying to get people to gamble. He had 3 cups upside down and a ball and you would have to guess which cup the ball was under. However, to guess which cup you had to use a 50 euro bill. If you were right you would get your money back and maybe more, but if you were wrong, he took the money or gave it to someone else. We had several people warn us not to join in because the man is sneaky and will rob you.