Us Americans have a tendency to think we've got all the good ideas and advanced technology in the world, but my trip to Italy showed me that is not exactly the case. At least not all the time. No, I won't bore you with my travelogue (though if you'd like to see my Pinterest board with our photos, here is the link).
Instead, I collected some examples of cool, useful and intriguing high-tech I saw in action:
Combined rear-view mirror and taxi meter.  Makes perfect sense, right?
Electronic key to your hotel room that you put in a special slot to turn the power on in the room: makes sure that you don't leave anything running while you aren't there.
Our hotel rooms all had motion-sensor technology (in one case underneath the platform bed) so when you get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, the lights automatically come up so you can find your way!
Train and travel information was easy to understand.  All of the trains had high-tech information boards with a full list of stations, telling where you were, what station was next, etc. No more trying to make sense of the public address system (although those worked fine, too)
 Shopping is in for some big changes. At the Milan Expo, we saw the "Supermarket of the Future:" you take an item off the shelf and all of its information is displayed above holographically- its nutritional value, country of origin, price, etc. Kind of hard to see in the picture, but trust me it is very cool.
Leftover currency? At the airport when we were leaving, we saw the international version of Coinstar: put your leftover Euros here and deposit them in your Paypal account. So smart! (we are keeping our Euros for our next trip!) 
And I also want to give honorable mention to all of the apps that made travel so much easier, including GPS (especially helpful in Venice, where it is inevitable you will get lost), my translation app, my currency converter and TripAdvisor, where we made same-night dinner reservations several times.
Okay, I have one complaint. (give me some wine and I might have more...) but mostly this one: why are people so busy taking pictures of themselves that they don't stop to actually experience their trip? Everywhere we went they were selling Selfie Sticks and then hordes of tourists that literally were turning their backs on the art, architecture or landmark so they could take their own picture in front of it. You're missing the point, people!
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