I’ve just read my 42nd book in Italian right in time for my 42nd birthday – Anna Maria Ortese’s collection of short stories and essays Il mare non bagna Napoli. This isn’t a big number since I’ve been keeping this list of books since 2009, so that means 42 books in Italian in 12 years. But it’s still pretty neat and it’s making me think about birthdays, milestones and reading in Italian. As I’m looking…
This past Monday, I fulfilled the biggest dream of my life and became an Italian citizen. As some of you may already know, I applied online for citizenship back in December 2016 when we were still living in London. (You can read more about the process here and about the most recent update that shortened the wait times back to two years here. ) I’ll give you a brief time line, so you can get…
Life has been pretty heavy these past few months, things that have nothing to do with covid and I’ve taken a break from writing on here. But I’m slowly emerging from my cocoon and I missed being here. It’s been a year since the very first lockdown and we’re back in another lockdown as we’re facing a third wave. Unfortunately, vaccinations have been in short supply and there has been a delay. That and the…
I’ve got a few Italian citizenship updates to share with you. As of today, there is a new website to check on the status of your citizenship applications. Go to the ALI Ministero dell’Interno website If you had checked your website the past few weeks, there was a notification that they were updating the website and details. This was due to a nationwide system over-hall to make government websites more secure and up-to-date, part of…
For the past 6 months, my mind has been dominated by sickness, surgery, doctor appointments, tests, and a world-wide pandemic. And I’ve been grasping for something that feels familiar, an everyday action and that has turned out to be coffee. I’m not a coffee drinker, I don’t really like the taste and often times I don’t even like the way it makes me feel. But during all of this uncertainty and upheaval, I’ve been drawn…
Woo-hoo! Today is the first day of phase 2 in Italy – meaning that the lockdown is being slowly, gradually, cautiously lifted. We are finally allowed to leave our house to go for a solitary walk and to visit our family members. Up until this point, I had only left the house 3 times in 56 days – twice to walk into town to get money out of the cash point and once to the…
