Top 10 of the most fun cities in Italy, to find ThePlace that suits you best for your work placement abroad. To go to Italy, you need to be ready for two or three things: to take in the sights, to be tactile and to enjoy good food 😀 And if you’re a fan of aperitifs on the terrace: get ready to discover incredible flavours and a whole variety of Spritzs (even with artichokes, and they’re excellent!) Top 10 of the most fun cities in Italy: here we go!
Florence
If you want to visit the heart of Italian culture, Florence is the place to do your internship in Italy. The city is an open-air museum: it’s sublime. And, the word is certainly not strong enough to describe the beauty of the city. Florence is by far the most beautiful city in Europe, unanimously voted by the International Horizons team! Although Prague is very nice too. Florence offers an incredible number of activities, and the city is enough on its own to enjoy for months on end! There’s so much to discover, from the balconies to the cobbled streets, from the Duomo to the David, you really need to stay for at least a fortnight! As well as Florence, you can go as far as Pisa, and in addition to the Leaning Tower of Pisa, you can go to the nearby beach: you’ll be able to swim in the sun with a panoramic view of the mountains and the eternal snows, it’s quite spectacular! I had the chance to go there about ten years ago, and I have some excellent memories of this destination. And wine lovers will be delighted: Tuscany has an internationally renowned wine cellar, including the village of Montepulciano, which is the centre of Vino Nobile! You might even bump into Polichinelle! (And if you don’t know what that is, it’s time to come and share a meal at my granny’s so she can tell you all about it!)
Bologna
Little known in France as a tourist destination, Bologna is nevertheless a large Italian city, and a very beautiful one indeed. The city is very dynamic, like Milan, Rome or Florence, but has all the advantages of a medium-sized town: everything can be done on foot, like Nantes or Bordeaux. It’s one of Italy’s biggest student cities! Young people from the Veneto region often go to study in this city because of the quality of its universities and schools, and because it boasts the oldest university in the West. From memory, the other ‘big’ university town is Udine: I’ve been there, it’s nice for a couple of days, to get to know Northern Italy, or as a stopover on the way to Slovenia – it was on that occasion, by the way, if you want to take a look at the feedback, it was pretty incredible! Bologna is Emilia-Romagna, and above all it’s one of the creative cities in the UNESCO network – it’s a real network, I’m not making things up – because it has an attractive economy and a dynamic cultural policy: the city’s heritage is preserved in around fifty museums!
Roma
The capital! Only Paris is worthy of Rome, only Rome is worthy of Paris”. Like the French capital, Italy is an open-air museum: it’s very beautiful. And, like all Western European capitals, it’s very dynamic; the city has undergone a real transformation over the last twenty years or so, and is adapting to mass tourism. It’s impossible to get bored in Rome, day or night. The only disadvantage of Rome if you’re doing your work placement in Italy is the same as if you were doing your work placement in Malta: there are cranes as far as the eye can see, and everything is under construction. At the same time, with 50% of the world’s heritage classified as UNESCO, Italy is obliged to conserve and renovate it. Rome is very nice.
Palermo
The capital of Sicily! Palermo is one of Italy’s great historical and political cities. Palermo is renowned for its fight against fascism and racism: for the city’s mayor, Palermo belongs to those who love it! The city welcomes many immigrants, and there are no more problems than in the rest of the country (Hi Marine, this one’s for you!). ): it’s still a poor city, still struggling to recover from the internal wars when the cities of the North impoverished the South. Because, yes, while the North often complains that Southern Italy is an economic millstone around its neck, they tend to forget that they did indeed pillage and plunder it during the great Italian wars. Today, moreover, certain areas are tending to be reversed. For example, it’s in the south of Italy that young people are now doing most of their higher education, with a view to reclaiming the economy. Palermo is ideally located: beach, culture, political passion, sun; everything you need for a chill break! Palermo, or Catania, and Sicily in general, is Italy in all its clichés: I feel like it’s my grandmother around every corner.
Bari
In the South too! Bari’s main advantage is its geographical location: a large Italian city by the sea, opposite the Balkan countries! During your work placement in Italy in Bari, you’ll be able to sail as far as Albania, and discover the Balkan countries: Montenegro, Bosnia, Serbia, Macedonia, etc! Bari is a relatively chilled-out and accessible city, and the people are very friendly and welcoming. From Bari, you can travel to almost all of Puglia by train, and it’s absolutely magnificent. I was there in the summer of 2022, so if you’d like a little feedback, check out our blog post about it. As well as the old town of Bari, which is very lively at nightfall, you can take the opportunity to visit Monopoli, Polignano a Mare, Taranto… a pleasure for the eyes, and the taste buds too. I knew that Italy was a culinary slaughterhouse, but then Puglia is a delight: fresh produce, worked fish, vegetables full of oil and sunshine… Just writing to you makes me want to go back! And by the way, check out our blog for feedback!
Venise
The must-see Italian museum! Fewer and fewer tourists are accepted: cruise ships have been banned from the city centre for several years now, and confinement has given Venice back to the Italians. Drastic measures will be taken to reduce the number of tourists, who were making a visit to the city a nightmare. Apart from this point, Venice remains more than pleasant to live in: atypical, the city offers an unlimited number of activities. Beware that prices are higher than in the rest of Italy, as they are boosted by mass tourism. And just between you and me: it’s a bit overcrowded. It’s full of people, all the time, and you can’t see much (and yet I’m not far from 2 metres tall!). It’s a shame, because the city is really beautiful, but it’s getting quite oppressive; I’d strongly advise against it if you don’t like crowds. On the other hand, for an internship in tourism, an internship in Venice makes a lot of sense. I think that in a few years’ time, this situation will have changed: the COVID has passed, and when the dolphins returned to the canals, because it became calm and clean, the locals thought it was time to do something. The city of Venice is using more and more means to soften tourism and implement green policies.
Milano
Kiki the Dictator makes it a personal affair to defend Milan, personally I’m not a big fan: it’s beautiful, it’s big. But for me, Milan is more of a big European city than an Italian one; you don’t get the usual Italian chill vibe. The people in Milan are nice, but it’s colder than the rest of Italy, less affordable and less friendly. Clearly, if you want to avoid ‘touchy-feely’ Italy, this is the place to go! In spite of everything, Milan remains a beautiful and very dynamic city: ideal for an internship in Italy, especially if you want to work in fashion or industry, as Milan is the city of industry in Italy. What’s more, there are regular flights and they’re really very cheap; from Nantes, for example, we have regular flights, and they cost around fifty euros return. If you live in a major French city, you can even do your work placement there and come back from time to time at the weekend if you feel too far away from your family! Milan is also very well served by train, so if you want to visit the rest of Italy at low cost, it’s relatively convenient.
Udine
A small town in northern Italy, close to the Slovenian border, Udine is very charming and ideally located; well, after that you have to like the small-town atmosphere. As a Parisian by birth and from Nantes at heart, I have to admit that for me, Pero is too small. But from Udine, you can easily visit the Italian Alps and the Dolomites – and if you like hiking, it’s really worth the diversions, it’s so beautiful! – Venice, Bologna, Trieste or even a 3-hour drive to the Slovenian capital or Koper: it’s great!
Gene
The perfect city for those who want to work in import-export or logistics! COUCOU the B.T.S. C.I.! Genoa is one of Europe’s major ports; it’s pretty and dynamic. We really like the town, which, like Lorient in France, offers a relatively quiet lifestyle compared with the rest of the country: probably because it’s so close to the sea. By the way, this is the place to look for BTS CI courses for your work placement in Italy.
Naples
Naples! The city is relatively poor but sublime! Unfortunately, like Paris, or Nantes, the city has some problems of insecurity related to drug trafficking; but past this concern, Naples is THE Italian city that gathers all the clichés we have about the country. The people are very welcoming, it’s chill & family!
And Belluno is the 11th city!
Just because we like it so much! Always obliged to place it to please Diego ?
For your work placement in Italy, don’t hesitate to contact Team International Horizons. We can talk to you for hours about the country, and above all find the work placement that’s just right for you!
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