Some time before I left for Italy, my relatives took their time to warn me about Italian men. “Be careful,” they would say, their voices brimming with trepidation. “All they do is say ‘Ciao Bella’ and do that backward hand wave gesture! You must be on your guard!” As a woman who takes pride in her street smarts, I packed my mammoth backpack and flew over the Atlantic, adamant on avoiding any man with slick dark hair who uses the word “bellissima” more than once in a sentence.

However, upon my arrival I soon discovered that the stereotypes found in old “Saturday Night Live” skits and romantic comedies are a far cry from the truth. Based on everything I heard, I half-expected there to be a herd of hecklers awaiting all the female tourists as soon as we left the airport. This was not so.

In Florence, I was sketching a sculpture known as “The Rape of the Sabine Women” in the Piazza della Signoria, when a man interrupted me. At first I was annoyed by the interruption, and then I was surprised by an invitation to coffee after a few introductory sentences. But what surprised me more was that I accepted the invitation.

Hours later, this man and I were dissecting the differences between Americans and Italians in regards to romance. Americans, according to him, are obsessed about the future when it comes to relationships, while Italians live in the present. But Italians, I contended, are too whimsical, while Americans are grounded and realistic. The conversation lasted until the sun came up. Americans are too puritan. Italians are too aggressive. Americans don’t appreciate beauty. Italians don’t appreciate hard work.

As the cafes began to stir again, we decided to enjoy one last espresso before calling it a night, or, in this case, morning. It was then that I realized that this man didn’t touch me once. He didn’t try to grab me or handle me. He didn’t try to kiss me. And he didn’t call me beautiful. Even though our interaction was rife with generalizations about each other’s cultures, in actuality, this interaction dispelled most of the stereotypes we were arguing about.

Intercultural communications teaches us that what we perceive about people outside our cultural realm really tells us what we think about ourselves. Drawing on this, I remember “The Rape of the Sabine Women.” The statue portrays a voluptuous woman reaching for the sky as she sprawls across the shoulders of a muscular man and his compatriot. Now, to me the woman appears to be a victim. But what does that say about my perception of men and women? Is vocalizing appreciation for beauty the same as being aggressive? Or is it how I perceive that vocalization? My experience with this man from Florence taught me that I must take my biases into account when looking at another culture, and try to sift through the stereotypes to see the truth.