Dear Italy,

This is

Though my letters to you continue to be unanswered, I thought I ought to let you know about this one little thing that we Americans know that perhaps you don’t:

Toast is bread that has been toasted.

(For a full explanation of the process of heating a slice of bread until its color and taste change due to a process known as the Maillard reaction, see this Wikipedia page.)

Now, growing up in America I toasted bread. My mom toasted bread. My dad toasted bread. My brothers and sister and friends and relatives, we all toasted bread. I am, you might say, a veteran of toast. A knowledgeble, capable, experienced toaster.

So I bought a toaster. In Italy. In a store.

Throughout my whole life, every toaster had a handle you press down to make the bread go down into the toaster. So imagine my surprise, dear Italy, when I found that pressing the down lever on my new toaster didn’t make anything go down. The following video will clarify:

Plus, see those metal prongs on the top of the toaster?

They appear to be modeled after these:

They are kinda clumsy to push in there, and when you pull them out, well, here’s another safety feature of the normal toaster: You don’t ever have to touch the hot metal! (I discovered this the hard way.)

One final thing: In bars and grocery stores all over Tuscany, regular soft normal bread is sold as toast. But it’s not toasted! It’s called “toast” but it’s not toasted. What the hell is going on?

OK. Don’t tell me to calm down. I’m calm. I just … it’s taken me time to get used to it. I’m an immigrant. Things are different here. I get that. It’s just … not always easy to adjust.

To be frank, the whole thing strikes me as insane. Not that there’s anything wrong with insane. Lord knows, if you want insane, visit America.

To recap, I merely wish to say to thou, Dear Italy, country of my residence, country that I love [though my many letters offering advice and occasional complaint regarding food, traffic laws, etc., remain unanswered] I must now again informest thou — that is, in the formal, per informarvi, of the following fact:

Toast is bread that has been toasted.

As to that push-down handle on the toaster: It should be for pushing the toast down. If it doesn’t push the toast down, its presence is, in my humble opinion, absurd.

Thank you for your attention to this matter. As always—somewhat, I must admit, with growing despondency—I humbly await your reply.

Cary Tennis, Castiglion Fiorentino