Monster.com Contributor Rebecca Falkoff, on the streets of Florence, Italy.

Italy: Venice's canalled mazes; the Amalfi coast's breathtaking ravines; Rome's grand Coliseum. It is the land of roaring Vespas, quiet strolls, fine foods, superb wines and rich gelato. If you hope to live and work in Italy, I can see what draws you there. But beyond this travel brochure description is a work environment rife with contradictions.

Italy has an unemployment rate of roughly 9.5 percent -- among the highest in Europe. But don't take that stat at face value. Most of the unemployment is concentrated in Southern Italy, where it is not at all unusual to be unemployed and living off your parents' pension. Highly industrialized areas of Northern Italy hold a great demand for both skilled and wage laborers.

Online Resources Quick Hits If you're deciding whether or not to head to Italy, let us help. Check out our cheat sheet of the pros and cons for going Roman here. Kata Web Lavoro Kata Web, one of Italy's major portal sites, recently launched kwlavoro, which deals with career opportunities. Among the site's features is a salary calculator for calculating the salary differences in cities and towns throughout Italy's 20 regions and how much you make after taxes. In Italian. Job Italy A career site that features job listings and articles and you can enter your cv into the database. In Italian. CESOP Recruitment and Career Opportunities CESOP offers job listings and allows you to create an online cv. The organization also conducts campus recruiting sessions. In Italian with an abridged English mirror site. Lavoro Oggi This is a career portal site. It is rich on content, featuring articles about various fields of work and study, although the job listings are not as thorough as those on Kata Web Lavoro and JobItaly. In Italian. No Profit Italia This site features information about non-profit and volunteer positions throughout Italy. In English and Italian. Oro e Colore This school offers intensive programs in gilding and wood carving and the restoration of gilded works of art, paintings and wooden supports. Their 600- and 900-hour classes are officially recognized by the Region of Tuscany. Courses are taught entirely in Italian; Web site is in Italian and English. Books Living and Working in Italy: Staying in Italy-- All You Need to Know by Amanda Hinton -Buy it! Living, Studying and Working in Italy: Everything You Need to Know to Fulfill Your Dreams of Living Abroad by Travis Neighbor and Monica Larner -Buy it!

Italy's work environment becomes even more complicated with respect to foreign workers. In the last 10 to 15 years, Italy has experienced an unprecedented deluge of immigration, primarily from Eastern Europe and Northern Africa. This abundance of immigrants has led to a certain amount of hostility toward foreigners working in Italy. However, Italy's own past as an emigrant nation and the European Community's borderless ideals help to alleviate the hostility.

Irene Demartini of LavoroPiù, a temporary job placement service in Rome, contests that anyone hoping to find work in Italy, whether Italian or foreign, should have proficient knowledge of the English language and computer basics. Most American college grads already have these skills and may be well on their way to landing jobs. But Americans may not be prepared for how specific prospective employers get about the employers they seek - in terms of gender, age and appearance. It is common to see Help Wanted signs in shop windows that read: "We are looking for a girl between the ages of 18 and 28 with a beautiful presence and a good knowledge of languages."

But don't let this deter you from finding your dream job in Italy. You should definitely consider these issues long and hard before committing to move to Italy, because they are elements of the culture you probably can't change. If you do choose to live and work in Italy, there is currently an abundance of work available for technology specialists and language teachers. Other opportunities include careers in tourism, art restoration and fashion design.

TECHNOLOGY
According to Giovanni Sangiorgi, director of marketing at JobItaly, a career Web site, most of the Italy's job opportunities are concentrated in technology fields. "Anything related to the New Economy," he explains. "Clearly, though, while there may be demand for a chef, baker, pharmacist or newspaper vendor, the jobs you find online are for people who have strong tech skills."

Sangiorgi asserts that the most difficult thing an American faces when deciding to work in technology in Italy is not the language but the salary. "Language is relative. The universal language of technology is infused with cognates and borrowed English words," He says/ "But as a programmer in Italy, you simply won't make the same kind of money you can make in America." The average gross salary for a programmer with about two years of experience is L 2.5 million a month or approximately $1,200. "You have to take into consideration that everything in Italy is cheaper, with the exception of gasoline and Coca Cola. You can live quite well on L 2.5 million a month."

TEACHING ENGLISH
Everyone in Italy seems to want to learn English. At certain times of year, the advertisements on the metropolitana are all for either English language or weight loss programs, and it is a lot easier to find work teaching English in Italy than it is to lose weight.

Currently, private schools, which are profitable enterprises in Italy, have the most openings. However, teachers there are often required to use a systematic methodology which may counter their own teaching styles. But more and more positions will likely become available in public schools as well. A recent study revealed that an embarrassingly high percentage of public school language instructors failed proficiency tests in the languages they instruct, so the Ministry of Education is working to recruit more mother tongue teachers.

Neither private nor public schools are likely to hire a potential teacher without an in-person meeting first. If you're considering teaching, plan on doing the bulk of your job search upon arriving in Italy.

TOURISM
Tourism is one of Italy's largest industries, and English speakers are always needed. Several cultural associations in larger cities hire dynamic individuals to give tours of major attractions. Luke Massengill, 24, was backpacking through Europe when he came to Rome and started working as a tour group leader for Walks of Rome Cultural Association. He enjoyed his work and found it rewarding. "It was great to be able to study the culture while living here," he says.

DEFINE YOUR GOALS AND BE PERSISTENT
Art restoration and fashion design are two other booming job markets in Italy. Art restoration is a highly specialized craft, but if you are willing to make the commitment, you can find excellent training programs, such as Oro e Colore, to help get you started. As for fashion, Milan professes to be the fashion capital of the world. So if you want to embark on a career in fashion design, you may want to make that your first networking stop.

There are many other opportunities beyond technology, teaching, tourism and art restoration waiting to be discovered. As a first step, identify your interests and see how they may fit into the present job market.

*Interviews with Irene Demartini and Giovanni Sangiorgi were conducted in Italian and translated by Rebecca Falkoff.