I am 39 years old lady from Kuala Lumpur Malaysia and I was in Italy for almost 3 months since August 2016, met my boyfriend there and frankly speaking, I really love the experience being there. As now I am back to Kuala Lumpur, here is my story.
I was enrol 12 classes in Italian while i was in Kuala Lumpur, so at least i can communicate, not much, but some basic is there. Not too bad.
One must know how to communicate with the locals as just few percentage can speaks English. But if you are in Rome or Milan, people who speaks English are more.