[Culturechat] Non smoking areas in Europe

[L B]

We came back from Italy about a week ago, and we found
most restaurants to be as smoke-filled as usual
(doesn't take much: one puffing customer can "stink
up" the whole place in no time). But there were some
notable exceptions, among which a working-class
trattoria in Florence, where smoking was simply
verbotten in the *entire* restaurant. Every smoking
customer (i.e. virtually everyone in the restaurant
except for us) went outside for a smoke and came back
when he/she was done (often, several times during
dinner). And remember, this was mid-December, and
outside temperatures were pretty chilly. 

I'm quite used to smokers in European restaurants, so
I was shocked to find a non-smoking restaurant in
Italy, of all places. I thought that, perhaps, this
particular restaurant used engine fuel or something
equally combustible to cook meals--short of that, I
couldn't find a reasonable explanation for this
strange behavior. Thanks to Anton's explanation, now I
can safely to blame it on the Italian government.

A note on the non-smoking cars in trains: I personally
found that the no-smoking policy is usually
observed and enforced on most trains in most European
countries. In my experience only once, on a local
train in Germany, a man lit up--and was immediately
shamed by his fellow passengers. Of course, on
long-haul journeys, one can't always count on getting
a no-smoking seat assignment--I once traveled all the
way from Cologne to Paris in a smoking car, not an
experience I would recommend (in a smoking car,
everyone smokes ALL the time).

LB

--- anton47@juno.com wrote:
> I read that the Italian Government is trying to
> something about no
> smoking areas in restaurants.
> It comes somewhat as a culture shock to many to find
> lots of second hand
> smoke in public places in Europe. Even smoke free
> hotel rooms are hard to
> find.
> Are there other governments working on the smoking
> problem? Trains are
> segregated but it is not too well enforced.
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