Author Archive
Love Thursday: Fall in LOVE Park, Philadelphia
I spent a day in Philadelphia on my way “home” to the Coal Region, and of course I had to stop in at LOVE Park. See those gorgeous autumn colors in the background?
I call this “Fall in LOVE Park, Philadelphia”:
I spent many lunch hours and weekend afternoons there many years ago in JFK Plaza, but hadn’t ever taken a photo. So nice to be able to remedy that.
I also had (what I thought was) a fun idea to stand to the side of the statue and put my arms up in the shape of a U to spell out “LOVE U” for Paolo. So I asked my mom to take the photo. She, um, well….
Yes, this was already “straightened” as much as possible in iPhoto.
Eh, it’s the thought that counts.
Happy Love Thursday!
P.S. The photos look much better in Flickr; does anyone know why that is and how I can fix it?
Book Giveaway: 100 Places in Italy Every Woman Should Go
Last post, I tried to explain a bit about why I might possibly want to live in Italy–and by the way, thank you all *so* much for all the wonderful, kind, and supportive comments and insights!
Now as good timing would have it, today we have a guest post from Susan Van Allen, author of 100 Places in Italy Every Woman Should Go, entitled:
Thoughts on Why Women Love Italy…
Before we get to the post, though, a contest just in time for the holidays!
Comment on this post on the blog (NOT on Facebook, Twitter, etc.) before midnight EST on Sunday, December 13, 2009 to be eligible to win one copy of Susan Van Allen’s 100 Places in Italy Every Woman Should Go.
Now, here’s Susan:
I heard a story about a Manhattan shrink that intrigues me. His prescription for female patients who are depressed or suffering from low self esteem is this:
Take one Italian Vacation and call me when you come home…if you come home!
Smart shrink! From my experience, the test results are in: Every woman I’ve ever met (me included) who takes an Italian vacation comes back rejuvenated, strengthened, and often cured of whatever had been plaguing her.
So what is the secret ingredient that Italy has to turn our lives around?
I delved into this question while writing 100 Places In Italy Every Woman Should Go, talking to over a hundred women about their Italian travel experience and remembering my own, that began in 1976. I kept asking: “Why do you love Italy?” Inevitably this answer came: “It feels like Home”.
I understand “It feels like home” coming from someone like me, an Italian-American, who grew up with grandparents, aunts, and uncles who emigrated from southern Italy. I fell in love with Italy at my grandparents’ dining room table in Newark, New Jersey: a loving, abundant, and delicious place. Ever since my first trip there, over 30 years ago, that beautiful childhood feeling from that New Jersey dining room table rushes back at me each time I touch down in Italy.
But what about all those women without a drop of Italian blood who answered, “It feels like home.”
Obviously, we’re talking “Home” in that beautiful sweeping sense—Home meaning “a place that understands us, a place that feeds our soul.”
We feel it as soon as we land in Italy: a deluge of sensual pleasures: We see masterpieces, gorgeous sunsets, fountains, gardens, we smell the ragu, taste the wine and gelato, hear church bells, the lilting Italian language. We feel the Mediterranean sun on our shoulders. It’s such an overload of sensual pleasures, we lose our minds and our hearts melt open.
And then Italy embraces us.
It’s this embrace, I believe, that leads to the answer to my question. Yes, Italy is probably one of the world’s most welcoming country to everyone, but it seems to be especially custom made to welcome women.
Why do Women Love Italy? Because Italy Loves Women.
Women are adored here, from baby principessas to nonnas. And who doesn’t adore being adored?
On the surface, the adoration comes from those handsome Italian men, who in the great tradition of Casanova, have mastered the art of flirting. But in Italy, the adoration of women goes even deeper than that. It’s rooted in this culture that’s worshipped women as divine beings ever since the earth was cooling.
Could this be the secret ingredient? Italy’s long tradition of female worship? You’re surrounded by it everywhere you turn. It comes on most strongly through two deities who reign supreme, side-by-side: Venus, that Vixen Goddess of Love and Beauty, and the Madonna, the Mother of Abundance and Compassion. We come face to face with these females in sculptures and paintings in museums, temples, and churches. Their essence floats in the Italian air, buoying us. Together, Venus and the Madonna embody the complete woman: The Venus side of us that’s the whimsical, adventurous beauty who revels in sensual pleasures and the Madonna side of us—the nurturing, compassionate soul whose generosity is boundless.
Stand back and take a look at an Italian woman striding down the via—she knows those divine Venus-Madonna sparks live inside her. For the rest of us, a trip to Italy fans those sparks. It reawakens us and takes us back to our true divine nature, to our souls. Effortlessly, it takes us home.
So you could spend years on a psychiatrist’s couch. Or, as that Manhattan shrink suggests, you could take a trip to Italy. I say, Go! Buy that ticket. Enjoy every moment. Revel in coming home.
————
LOVE this, Susan. Thanks so much!
Remember to comment for your chance to win a copy of Susan’s book by Sunday at midnight!
Why I Would Want to Live *There*
Last night as my mom, niece, and I were leaving a restaurant (Italian, mind you), my mom stopped to talk with one of her former coworkers who happened to be seated nearby. My mom introduced me and mentioned I live in Italy.
“Why would you want to live there?” she responded.
I was beyond taken aback by the question. I know not everyone feels the desire to live and experience other cultures, but really? Why would I want to live in Italy? REALLY?
Completely baffled, I blanked but quickly blurted out, “Because I love it!” It wasn’t until later that I sat and thought about it. Of course I have lots of practical reasons I choose to live in Italy, including but not limited to the following:
- Paolo and all my fur babies
- Fresh delicious food (much of it from our own garden)
- The laidback lifestyle where I’m not pressured to have the latest gadget, iFillintheblank, etc.
- Living minutes from the sea and mountains
- Being surrounded by amazing history, culture, and beauty
- Pretty nice weather year-round
- How much healthier I feel since living there
But you know what? “Because I love it!” really sums it up best after all. It’s difficult to put my happiness and overwhelming sense of feeling I’m in the right place at the right time into words, spoken or written, but I know I feel it, and that is what’s important.
And as it turns out, that random, unexpected question really came at an interesting point during my first trip to America in nearly six years; I’m about two weeks in with another four to go, and I can honestly say I *know* I love (and miss) my life in Italy. There’s still a lot to process about this trip, but I’m grateful that I was pushed to explore at least some of that while I’m still living it.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m certainly enjoying my visit in the U.S. — this crazy Coal Region will always be home — but I have a new home I love now too.
And that’s reason enough for me to live there.
P.S. Buon compleanno to my amore (31) and to Bleeding Espresso (3)!
Tina Tangos: On Being Authentic
Please welcome the lovely Tina of Tina Tangos for her thoughts on being authentic:
This is my fourth time being an “expat,” and my second time living in Italy. My first time living abroad, I was an au pair in Switzerland. I was 24 at the time, and I did it not only because I had always wanted to live abroad and wanted a different experience, but I also did it because I envisioned myself at dinner parties as a “grown-up” later in life, smugly saying, “When I lived in Europe…”
During my time in Switzerland, I had the chance to visit Italy several times. I fell in love with the streets, the architecture, the food. What fascinated me the most was the way people dressed and carried themselves when they walked, and the fact that their daily lives took place on this very soil. I wanted to live in Italy and I wanted to be one of those people.
Upon my return to the United States, I wore interesting scarves and pointy-toed high-heeled shoes and never left the house without my sunglasses. I would play Italian pop music on my Discman (yes, those were the pre-iPod days) and strut down the street as though I were in Rome and not Seattle.
Finally, in 2006, I got a student visa and went off to Perugia. On one hand, I flourished in a lot of ways and my Italian went through the roof. I felt free and whole. On the other hand, I was so impatient to mold the experience into how I had fantasized it would be, that I made a bit of a fool of myself, and it even affected some personal relationships.
Due to a matter of the heart, I ran away to Argentina. Living in Buenos Aires is what finally did it. It’s a tough, huge city where people have their own problems to worry about and aren’t concerned with you. I learned a lot about just doing what I needed to do, and I fell into Argentina’s daily life.
That’s when my Italian citizenship was finally processed. It’s also when my life fell apart in Argentina. My heart broke. Everything broke (even my bedroom door – it just fell off!) It’s also when a relative offered to buy me a one-way ticket to Rome. It seemed like all the signs were pointing me back to Italy. So, I went with the current, and here I am, in Perugia again.
I’ve been here almost two months, as an Italian. I realized the other day that it’s already the best and most authentic living-abroad experience I’ve had yet. And not just for the obvious reason of being able to legally stay here forever (which does help).
Why then? Because I didn’t force it to happen – it happened for me when I stopped swimming upstream. Not only that, after all that living, and after my Argentinean experience, I simply couldn’t care less about fitting in. I am who I am, and I’m proud of my experiences. My Italian has changed – I have developed a strange accent, I accidentally say Spanish words, and I forget to use “lei” instead of “tu” in appropriate situations – and people still embrace me.
It’s great to assimilate into a culture, and I highly recommend that you do – but I’ve learned that it’s also important to just be who you are, even if it isn’t the “norm” in your adopted country. The more authentic you are, the more your new home will embrace you.
Tina Ferrari is a translator, tango dancer and part-time writer based in Perugia, Italy. She writes at AffordableCallingCards.net, where you can buy affordable calling cards to Italy, as well as on her own blog, Tina Tangos. Comments are always welcome!
Love Thursday: Acorns of Love
The Mystical World Wide Web says:
The Acorn has also been associated with couples and love divination.
Dropping two Acorns into the same bowl of water will provide the inquirers with news.
Should the Acorns float together then the couple will marry, the reverse being true if the Acorns drift apart.
So what does it mean when you’re out walking with your beloved, as P and I were about a month ago, and you stumble upon this–two acorns physically merged together?
Well today it means I’m missing my P big time.
Happy Love Thursday everyone and
Happy Thanksgiving to my fellow Americans!
Michelle Kaminsky is an American attorney-turned-freelance writer who lived in her family's ancestral village in Calabria, Italy for 15 years. This blog is now archived.
Calabria Guidebook
Recipes
