Tag: spare

‘O sparagno nun è mai guadagno (saving is never gain)

From the German word “sparen” to a famous Neapolitan saying

Naples is one of the cheapest cities in the world. I mean economic from the point of view of food, shopping, public services. If you live in Naples or pass by here you have the opportunity to spend little money and get lots of things. Yet there is a Neapolitan saying that reads like this: “‘O sparagno nun è mai guadagno” (saving is never a profit). This means that no matter how much you try to save, you will never earn a thing of value. Let’s take an example: if you need to buy shoes and buy a pair for a few euros, it is likely that after a few months of purchase these shoes will break and you will be forced to buy new ones. So what did you earn to buy a thing you needed for little money?

When two years ago I was in Berlin I was shopping at a well-known savings supermarket. And I read this writing on the shelves of the store: “Sparen”, which in German means precisely save. The word seemed to me very close to a term used in my city and that is “sparagno“, which means saving.

Even when I lived in Denmark, I bought cheap products that were present under the “Tilbud” sign (which in Danish means “savings”). But in Copenhagen I didn’t feel that home air that I felt when I went shopping in Germany. Every time I went shopping with the “sparen” in Germany, I wondered if I had earned anything from my shopping. Mindful of the fact that in Naples everybody says: “‘O sparagno nun è mai guadagno”, I still wanted to make many attempts to save but of which one has gone bad. In fact, one evening, I was really hungry for Italian food so I bought pasta and “allo sparen” sauce. Back home I cooked what I bought but didn’t have dinner at all. My sparen sauce didn’t stick to pasta allo sparagno. At that moment I remembered the first time I heard the legendary phrase I mentioned before. I was ten and absolutely wanted a colorful swimsuit that was for sale with a famous magazine for young girls. I was on vacation with my grandparents, in Calabria and forced my grandparents to buy me that magazine. Immediately after, I went to the beach to wear that turquoise costume with silver stars. I went into the water but after a couple of dives the upper part of the swimsuit broke and I lost it in the water. I returned in tears under the beach umbrella and hugged my grandmother for comfort, because I realized I had done something foolish. My grandmother scolded me, sweetly telling me: “Did you see? ‘O sparagno nun è mai guadagno”. Immediately afterwards she began to tell me a series of anecdotes about people from Naples that had bad experiences because they had bought some items for savings. Among these there were a bride who had bought a used dress that had broken on her wedding day, a childhood friend who had bought an old car that was immediately damaged due to the dented radiator and other characters from a Naples I have never met in person but that it’s in my memory thanks to the stories of my grandparents.

The saying “‘o sparagno nun è mai guadagno” is not just a play on words to make fun of those people who want to save money. This is above all a warning that the older generations make to younger ones. Saving money and then buying something that will not work well means looking bad in front of others, especially if that object is very important.

In Naples you can be the poorest in the neighborhood where you live, but you never have to save money to not become the laughing stock of your acquaintances.

Making a bad impression in public, in fact, can become the story of a bitter but funny tale that remains etched in the memory of people for so long, maybe even forever.