Resto perchè
Sono Italiana
Amo il mio paese
Vivo in Campagna lontana dalle seccature, quindi sono fortunata
Qui ci sono i miei ricordi più cari
I miei amici più cari
E poi voglio essere qui per continuare a portare la coccarda tricolore e festeggiare l'anno prossimo il 150° anniversario di questa povera "Repubblica"
e poi se andiamo tutti via qui chi ci rimane?
Vorrei andare
Non mi piace questo clima di terrore instaurato dal"Ministero della Paura"
Non sono razzista e non respingo ( le leggi ci sono e basterebbe applicarle)
Odio la corruzione, e tutto le associazioni a delinquere che impediscono lo sviluppo di questo paese
Sono stanca di sentirmi ripetere ( da più di 30 anni) ma come fai a vivere in Italia?
Sono stanca di sentirmi chiedere dagli amici che non sono italiani: ma chi a votato Mr. B. ed essere di conseguenza costreta a fornire lunghe speigazioni sul come, il quando e il perchè.
Tanti auguri per il programma che sono certa sarà belliassimo.
A tutti e due un saluto cordiale.
Annamaria Marcato dalla toscana
Friday 29 October 2010
Wednesday 27 October 2010
My Country: are you thinking of buying a house in Italy? Part one.
I am not a very productive blogger for many reasons:
I will never dream of writing or twitting trying to convince you” how to make money on the internet using Twitter , Facebook or anything else”, if I only knew ,sorry, I would keep it for myself.
I will never write about things I do not know.
Above all I will write when I have something interesting to write about.
Plus I am not a housewife, I am busy and time is precious.
So I just come to the point, that is'
What you should know when you decide to move and buy and house in Italy.
This subject came up few months ago, when by pure chance one of my rental agencies in UK send me an email containing the request of an American gentleman ,who was half through the process to buy a house fairly close to where I live. He was looking for a person who was fluent in English and eventually was willing to be his house manager.
I answered him and well… The Hell broke loose”
Luckily I have been able to help him ( a lawyer , an architect and many other people were involved in the process since the situation was really a messy one) and save him from a very messy situation , but the all process, that by the way, will likely end up in a week from now , made me think .
So after consulting with all the people involved here I am.
Italy is a beautiful Country so I can understand that many people see it as a dreamland where to spend holiday or retire, but if you want to buy a house here , you will find below some useful tips.
If you have already decided where you want to stay, come and live in the area for a while, scout the place, ask for all the information you can think of and please if you do not speak the language (“find yourself an independent translator” I can assure you that she/he will be worth any amount you will pay)
What you need to know, depending on the area:
Where is the nearest village, are there shops, bank, church, all the thing that you expect to find in a civilized place.
Weather How is the weather during the year ( nobody will go to a weather forecaster) but people who live in the area will be able to tell you many things. Lifestyle. Please ask away you will find out that many people will be happy to help you.
Estate Agencies , this is going to be the tricky part, many people who already bought a house here, will wonder why I am saying this. If everything went well : either they found the Perfect estate agent or they have been extremely lucky.
Well the choices can be different : you chose an agency abroad , in this case you must check if they have a subsidiary in Italy, if they know the Italian law about the matter in short if they know what they are doing ( I am sorry many do not ).
You must also be aware that to be an Estate agent in Italy you must have at least a school Diploma( Secondary School Diploma ), be an Italian citizen or if foreigner has to have an Italian regular residency and work permit , also she/he have to take an exam and be registered to the Camera di Commercio ( Chamber of Commerce) of the region in which the agent operate, to be a qualified agent, the person has also to prove that she/he never went bankrupt , that she/he doesn’t have a criminal record and that he/she have never been associated with someone who has a criminal record .. And so on.
To check if your Estate Agency is regular you can go to the web site of the Association that gathers all the regular Estate agents is called F.I.A.I.P (Federazione Italiana Agenti Immobilari Professionali) : http://www.fiaip.it/ ( the web site is in Italian but is user friendly,).
There are many good Foreign agencies who have a subsidiary in Italy care of an Italian Estate agency ,anyway I strongly advice to check their credential before you start any business.
I also stress that there are a lot of people who pretend to be what they are not, also again I stress that should any problem arises, the Italian law recognizes only professional ( this subject only can take hours, but since I do not want to bore you I keep it short) so please keep this in mind.
So now you have found your Estate agent and unless you are in a big town, or in a specific area when people can reasonably expect to speak English , you will need a translator ( if the estate agency is a well equipped one, they should be able to provide one)
Looking for the right place
I am sure that when you eventually start looking for the house of your dreams, you must at least have set a list of your priorities :
Where it should be and what it should have… notwithstanding I recommend you:
Try not to fall in love at first sight
as the old Burt Bacharach song says when you fall in love …..
” A guy with a pin to burst your bubble
That's what you get for all your trouble..
Absolutely true…
to be continued
I will never dream of writing or twitting trying to convince you” how to make money on the internet using Twitter , Facebook or anything else”, if I only knew ,sorry, I would keep it for myself.
I will never write about things I do not know.
Above all I will write when I have something interesting to write about.
So I just come to the point, that is'
What you should know when you decide to move and buy and house in Italy.
This subject came up few months ago, when by pure chance one of my rental agencies in UK send me an email containing the request of an American gentleman ,who was half through the process to buy a house fairly close to where I live. He was looking for a person who was fluent in English and eventually was willing to be his house manager.
I answered him and well… The Hell broke loose”
Luckily I have been able to help him ( a lawyer , an architect and many other people were involved in the process since the situation was really a messy one) and save him from a very messy situation , but the all process, that by the way, will likely end up in a week from now , made me think .
So after consulting with all the people involved here I am.
Italy is a beautiful Country so I can understand that many people see it as a dreamland where to spend holiday or retire, but if you want to buy a house here , you will find below some useful tips.
If you have already decided where you want to stay, come and live in the area for a while, scout the place, ask for all the information you can think of and please if you do not speak the language (“find yourself an independent translator” I can assure you that she/he will be worth any amount you will pay)
What you need to know, depending on the area:
Where is the nearest village, are there shops, bank, church, all the thing that you expect to find in a civilized place.
Weather How is the weather during the year ( nobody will go to a weather forecaster) but people who live in the area will be able to tell you many things. Lifestyle. Please ask away you will find out that many people will be happy to help you.
Estate Agencies , this is going to be the tricky part, many people who already bought a house here, will wonder why I am saying this. If everything went well : either they found the Perfect estate agent or they have been extremely lucky.
Well the choices can be different : you chose an agency abroad , in this case you must check if they have a subsidiary in Italy, if they know the Italian law about the matter in short if they know what they are doing ( I am sorry many do not ).
You must also be aware that to be an Estate agent in Italy you must have at least a school Diploma( Secondary School Diploma ), be an Italian citizen or if foreigner has to have an Italian regular residency and work permit , also she/he have to take an exam and be registered to the Camera di Commercio ( Chamber of Commerce) of the region in which the agent operate, to be a qualified agent, the person has also to prove that she/he never went bankrupt , that she/he doesn’t have a criminal record and that he/she have never been associated with someone who has a criminal record .. And so on.
To check if your Estate Agency is regular you can go to the web site of the Association that gathers all the regular Estate agents is called F.I.A.I.P (Federazione Italiana Agenti Immobilari Professionali) : http://www.fiaip.it/ ( the web site is in Italian but is user friendly,).
There are many good Foreign agencies who have a subsidiary in Italy care of an Italian Estate agency ,anyway I strongly advice to check their credential before you start any business.
I also stress that there are a lot of people who pretend to be what they are not, also again I stress that should any problem arises, the Italian law recognizes only professional ( this subject only can take hours, but since I do not want to bore you I keep it short) so please keep this in mind.
Looking for the right place
I am sure that when you eventually start looking for the house of your dreams, you must at least have set a list of your priorities :
Where it should be and what it should have… notwithstanding I recommend you:
Try not to fall in love at first sight
as the old Burt Bacharach song says when you fall in love …..
” A guy with a pin to burst your bubble
That's what you get for all your trouble..
Absolutely true…
to be continued
Friday 15 October 2010
About my Country and countryfolks....
Since, I slowly started writing, I have been searching the web and reading many other blogs on Italy , I found out that the majority of them are written by foreigners or expatriates who love Italy ( its culture , its food ) very much ( forgiving us, our many faults and accepting our good qualities).
Yesterday I really laugh when I read about the travelling tips a lady gave, about our trains and railways ( at the moments not functioning properly at all), about toilets, and many other things.
(By the way I laughed since I did not want to get mad , not with the nice lady, but with the train company and many other things not functioning at all in this moment).
I want to help you to understand Italy a little better, mind I am not an a teacher and I do not want to give any lesson to anybody, I simply want to help people who want to understand us better ( again don’t forget I am Italian)
Few points.
Point one
Italy is a relatively new country : it became a united country only in 1861, and next year we are celebrating our 150° anniversary.
Before 1861 , what we called Italy was divided in many small states ( there are millions of books and articles about this subject).
Italy in 1494
What I always found interesting is this sentence, allegedly written by one of our founding fathers
The most interesting ones are written by these people.
So I have chosen the ones I like more and I am following, finding them most of the time very amusing and above all caring.
(By the way I laughed since I did not want to get mad , not with the nice lady, but with the train company and many other things not functioning at all in this moment).
I want to help you to understand Italy a little better, mind I am not an a teacher and I do not want to give any lesson to anybody, I simply want to help people who want to understand us better ( again don’t forget I am Italian)
Few points.
Point one
Italy is a relatively new country : it became a united country only in 1861, and next year we are celebrating our 150° anniversary.
Before 1861 , what we called Italy was divided in many small states ( there are millions of books and articles about this subject).
Italy in 1494
What I always found interesting is this sentence, allegedly written by one of our founding fathers“ Fatta l’Italia bisogna fare gli Italiani” that means literally “Now that we have made Italy we must make the Italian citizen).
After 150 years this most impossible task has not been achieved.
Point two
Well, I can assure you , that as a category “Italians citizens “ do not exist but on the paper.
Very few time, and very few people when introducing themselves to you will say I am Italian …they will say I am from Torino, Alba, Venezia, Bologna….. Rome , Naples and so on.
There are many reasons for this behavior , but again I do not want to give any lesson, I just want to point out, that the "Italians" differences are not only dialects, characters, food, culture but are buried deep in every people whatever part of Italy they live..
Maybe that is the reason why up to now we haven’t been able to have a stable government and are so unruly.
I assure you I am not making this up.
Try to envision the difference between people who live in Milan and in Venice ( I have already gone through both experiences quite a few years ago)
Generalizing to the extreme : people in Milan are always work and business even having fun is becoming a work.
In Venice people are compelled by the nature of their city and land to move slowly , to take their time and eventually life is more slow.
Point three
Italians by nature cannot stand rules, sometime I think we were anarchist even before the term was invented.
Try to write down a rule of any kind and unless you force it down to our throat and make it respect with heavy and expensive fine , nobody will abide it, since we all things rules are made for others not for us.( well there are very few exceptions)
Examples: it is quite a few years since they apply a new Street code with speed limits ( different from normal roads and highways), I paid my due at the beginning than I decided that I did not want to lose my driving license and I did not want to give away money without reason , so now I am a very sedate driver, I respect the speed limit everywhere.
Result : Now I feel like an Idiot , other drivers blow their horns, blink their lights like I was the one doing wrong.
Point four
Italy is populated by about 60milions of independent individuals and I stress the word independent .
I think this is enough to help you to understand that even if you try to generalize it is impossible, we are unique in bad and in good deeds.
Point five.
There is no Country such as ours ( actually there is one but I do not want to mention it) where religion is so intertwined with politics and culture and this is a big drawback.
Well I made only few points but I thing that those are the most important ones to understand who we are.
Most commons places
Italians are loud ( it can be true somewhere and somehow) , but try to go and visit Piedmont that is by the way a very fascinating Italian region, there people speak slowly and softly, using their hands very little.
Italians do not work ( ahahahahaha) we have to and we must, at the moment we have event to invent works, since thank you to the situation ( but I refuse to talk about politic) there is very little work.
Italians are all “ cuore , amore, mamma” come on… some …but the times of” Oh Sole mio” are long gone by.
Italians love arts, this is such a big issue that I will reserve it for another post.
Italians are always trying to cheat tourists : some of them, it is true, but the same happens in all Big European touristic cities ( I could write quite a few funny stories about it)
Italians are all nice and funny..please since when?
Do you know that I even found a web site about all the common places about Italians?
I could go on for hours, but I spare you for now, I found some new one quite funny, and I report in the next few days.
At this point , the few who are so nice to read what I am writing would probably wonder why, I consider my life here a long vacation.
Easy I do not think that there is another place in the world where I would like to live… while , I want to be able to criticize with good reason all the things I do not like at all.
Beside I am lucky , I can make comparison and I truly live in a small paradise.
…….
Revenge
Driving from my village( Laterina ) to Arezzo through a road called ” Sette ponti” that together with HighwayA1 and another state road Called “Vecchia Aretina or State road 69” connect us to Arezzo, I was driving behind a truck- since in that part of the road is forbidden to overcome any car in front of you- suddenly a car behind me darted past me ,past the truck , past another car in front of the truck and … it was stopped by the police immediately after .
I restrain to blow my horn since is forbidden.
I would be more than happy to receive any comments from someone out there
Monday 27 September 2010
Anna's Tuscany,my life long vacation in Italy: How I became a country gal
Anna's Tuscany,my life long vacation in Italy: How I became a country gal: "Life is very funny and the saying'never say never' in my case is absolutely true. I was born in Bologna, lived almost 25 years of my life in..."
How I became a country gal
Life is very funny and the saying"never say never" in my case is absolutely true.
I was born in Bologna, lived almost 25 years of my life in Padova and I always loved the sea, winter summer it never made any difference for me, as soon I smell salty air and I hear the sound of the waves crashing against rock or beaches , I felt happy, lively and in a fantastic mood. So what am I doing here in the center of Tuscany, surrounded by hills, with the nearest beach is 153 kilometers away?
Simply, I fell in love with this place. I remembered the first time I saw it , I suddenly imagined a life of peace and quiet: I saw myself making home made jams and tomato sauce like real old "mama", I liked the idea and the only thing I had to do was to convince my husband., well after all it was quite easy and now after seven years I do not regret my choice and I enjoy every minute of my life in the countryside.I don't want to make you believe that here everything is easy, on the contrary there are some draws backs: such as:
I have to go to Florence every time I want to buy a book ( you can say why do not order via Internet) well when I want a book I want it immediately , also there is nothing I like more than perusing among the well supplied bookstore shelves.
Idem if I want to go to theater or attend to a concert.
Car, here is a must if you want to go shopping, but everything is really close, It is also a good excuse to go exploring the surroundings.
People here tend to work slower that up north, so if you need an artisan , you have to prepare yourself to a log wait, since when he tells you "I am coming on Monday" ,you do not know for sure which Monday and in what month he will be arriving at your door steps.
On the other side, living close to a village helps, here everybody is very friendly, I am sure they know more about me, than I know about them but when I need something there is always somebody ready to help.
I will tell you more about living close to the village in the future.
Anyway i love every single minute of my life in this place, by the way the name of the place is Santa maria in Valle on the left bank or the Arno river.
I will be happy to read your comment, if you have any.ù
A presto!!
Simply, I fell in love with this place. I remembered the first time I saw it , I suddenly imagined a life of peace and quiet: I saw myself making home made jams and tomato sauce like real old "mama", I liked the idea and the only thing I had to do was to convince my husband., well after all it was quite easy and now after seven years I do not regret my choice and I enjoy every minute of my life in the countryside.I don't want to make you believe that here everything is easy, on the contrary there are some draws backs: such as:
I have to go to Florence every time I want to buy a book ( you can say why do not order via Internet) well when I want a book I want it immediately , also there is nothing I like more than perusing among the well supplied bookstore shelves.
Idem if I want to go to theater or attend to a concert.
Car, here is a must if you want to go shopping, but everything is really close, It is also a good excuse to go exploring the surroundings.
People here tend to work slower that up north, so if you need an artisan , you have to prepare yourself to a log wait, since when he tells you "I am coming on Monday" ,you do not know for sure which Monday and in what month he will be arriving at your door steps.
On the other side, living close to a village helps, here everybody is very friendly, I am sure they know more about me, than I know about them but when I need something there is always somebody ready to help.
I will tell you more about living close to the village in the future.
Anyway i love every single minute of my life in this place, by the way the name of the place is Santa maria in Valle on the left bank or the Arno river.
I will be happy to read your comment, if you have any.ù
A presto!!
Thursday 23 September 2010
Something about myself...
This morning when I woke up I was ready to write my first post.It took me some time to decide how I wanted to present myself, then I got it: very simply, I will be myself!
Even if I am a true italian, do not expect to read here only edulcorated things about Italy and my italian life. I will put down my point of view and what I believe to be the truth.
An american friend of mine had recently told me that I have strong opinions about many things. She was being sincere. So, you will get to know who I am and what I think. Some of you will like me, some not...well ,I do not expect to be liked by everybody. Now get ready , I am coming out and write about everything I want. Let's have fun together.
PS.I only ask you to be patient if my English will not always be perfect... after all "Sono Italiana!
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