Happily ever after

"...That is my home of love: if I have ranged, Like him that travels I return again..."

-William Shakespeare, Sonnet 109

One last look at our apartment.  The middle floor balcony is off our living room; the upper balcony is off the master bedroom.  Yes, that's our last load of laundry flapping in the breeze.

Living room.  We were lucky that our eat-in kitchen was a separate room - that is not always the case in Italy.  Our apartment was quite large by Italian standards.

The foyer.  Doctor's office to the left; our door to the right.  This was a big hangout spot for the townsfolk

Outside FCO Airport, with both passports.  I will use the US one when entering or leaving the US, but will use the Italian one at passport control when leaving (or entering) Italy.

Airport sculpture (as the airport is named after Da Vinci, there are many references to him throughout)

Paolo was a little short for this...

Well, we made it back to the USA, safe and sound.  We spent our last three nights in Fiumicino outside of Rome, since we had to drop off the rental car at the airport, as well as to obtain pre-flight Covid tests, which are still required for flights into the US.  They have a testing center in Terminal 3 of the airport, and as the current rules state that you can get the test done the day before, we opted to do that, so we wouldn't be scrambling at the last minute to make our flight.  We suspected that the wait for the test might be long.  We were able to preregister for the test online (by "preregister," I just mean fill in the required forms, not schedule a specific time).

Waiting in line - about an hour to go from this point

It seems that a lot of people do not plan for this testing ahead of time!  We were shocked by how many people waited until the last minute for their tests - there were several people who claimed they were going to miss their flight if they couldn't jump the queue.  What's that expression about your poor planning not being my emergency?  The gentleman in line ahead of us said he'd already missed his flight while he was waiting - although he seemed to take this pretty calmly; I assume he was able to rebook himself fairly easily.  There was a guy behind us, however, who asked everyone around him multiple times to let him go ahead, as he claimed his flight was departing in 20 minutes.  Super annoying.  It's not that we were being unkind by not wanting to let him go ahead, but rather, we didn't want to start a riot behind us, as there were plenty of other people also waiting who had flights to catch, too.

We stayed at the Hilton right next to the airport again - there is an extremely convenient elevated walkway from the hotel property over to the airport - and took the train into Rome proper twice.  The Monday before we left Italy was Liberation Day - Festa della Liberazione, a public holiday celebrating the Italian Resistance's overthrow of the Fascists and the Nazi powers in Italy in 1945 (in the North, anyway).   We took one last touristy open-top bus tour of Rome, to see the highlights of the city (many of which we've already visited between our 2018 trip and this one).  I took several videos from the bus (I discovered this is easier than trying to snap photos).  Here and here are links to two of my favorites.  This first was taken near the Colosseum and the Forum; the second was taken near the Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II - also known as the "Wedding Cake." Afterward, we took ourselves out for a nice lunch nearby.

The following day, after our Covid tests described above, we went back into Rome, as I wanted to pick up an extra suitcase, as well as a few small, last minute gifts. As we were shopping, Paolo got his pocket picked in the store - right in front of the shopkeeper, who immediately recognized what was happening - it seemed he'd dealt with this particular pickpocket before - and we all chased him down into the next shop and got the phone back, thankfully. Later, we encountered this same asshole again on the street, and he actually has the balls to joke around about it and try to pass it all off as a bit of fun. I let him know it wasn't very funny to us - and he stomped off pretty quickly once I took my phone out and started taking his picture.

Jerky McJerkface, failed pickpocket

Our flight home the next morning was more or less uneventful, except that our flight departed a little earlier than scheduled, and thus landed in Philly earlier, too.  I think that's the first time that's happened for us, so far as I can recall.  I took a short video of our takeoff, to capture a bit of Italy and its western coastline from the air; click here to see it.

Pre-flight champagne.  Not that we were feeling particularly celebratory to be leaving Italy.

The toasted BBQ sandwich served as the "light meal" toward the end of the flight was probably one of the best things I've ever eaten on an airplane.

I believe this is Elba, famous for being Napoleon's first place of exile

We were seated in business class (one of the truly "splurge" bits of this adventure, to be sure), and while I can't speak to the main cabin, I can confirm that in our section, we were two of only three passengers wearing masks.  Some of the crew wore them, and some did not. I understand that the Covid precautions have become more relaxed here in the US.  That will take some getting used to.  Italy is also just now beginning to ease many of its Covid measures, but not as quickly as seems to be happening on this side of the Atlantic.

And here we are, unpacked and (mostly) settled in.  It took me a couple of days to get over the jet lag; Paolo seems to have had an easier time adapting.  It also took me several days to wade through the six months' worth of mail that had accumulated.  For now, I am just working through what I consider to be an adjustment period - trying to assimilate myself back into our American lives (we already miss the fresh bread and excellent produce - the bell peppers are so puny here!).  We are already thinking about how soon (and for how long) we will return to il bel paese...

I'll just take a moment here to pay tribute to Paolo, most excellent of travel companions (and husbands), without whose love and support my dual citizenship dream might never have become a reality.  I am not certain whether I'd have had the courage to pack up and move to another country, to live a very different kind of life, where I don't even speak the language, without him.  Thank you, my love ❤️

Passaporto e Permesso

 "Got three passports, couple of visas/You don't even know my real name..."

-Talking Heads, Life During Wartime

Well, I have two passports, not three - and it certainly wasn't no party, and it wasn't no disco, and it definitely wasn't no foolin' around...but I did it!  I finally have my passaporto italiano!  I'm so excited I think I will post another picture of it:

There are some slight differences between the US passport and the Italian one (other than the obvious ones of country and color).  For one thing, the Italian passport lists my town of residence (though not the street address). It also lists my height (in cm, which kind of makes me feel a bit taller) and my eye color.  By the way, according to the clerk at the questura here, there is no such eye color as "hazel," so for Italian purposes, my eyes are listed as grigi (grey).  The Italian passport includes two photos, not just one.  The biggest difference between the two passports is, of course, my name - because Italian women do not have the option to change their surname when they marry, it reflects my maiden name (as do all my other official Italian documents).  

There's an interesting website called Passport Index where you can compare passports of different countries.  As of this writing, Italy is ranked #2 in the world in terms of where you can go; the US is ranked 6th (taking Covid into account).

My passport was actually issued a few weeks ago, but was sent to my service provider's office rather than to my apartment address.  Since Paolo had an appointment to apply for his documentation today, I opted to have our translator bring it with her to give to me when we met for his appointment, rather than trust it to Poste italiane.

Now that I am a citizen, complete with ID and passaporto, I can live here (or anywhere in the EU), and/or come and go as I please.  I don't have to worry about the 90/180 day rules.  As the spouse of an Italian/EU citizen, Paolo has some limited rights as well - as long as he has the proper paperwork.  So today, we headed into Campobasso, the provincial capital, so he could present his documentation at the Immigration office in the questura, in order to receive a permesso di soggiorno per coniuge di cittadino italiano (residence permit for the spouse of an Italian citizen).

The questura opens for business at 9 AM; we were advised to get there by 8:30.  When we arrived at 8:20, there was already a line outside the gatehouse!  I was a little surprised, because I wasn't expecting it to be so busy - after all, Molise is not a very populous region (I think only Valle d'Aosta has fewer people).  But there must have been at least 10 people waiting in line when we arrived, and more showed up after we did.  I use the phrase "waiting in line" very loosely, as according to my personal observations, Italians don't really queue, they just mill about.   Our translator (today it was Saya again) joined us shortly after we arrived; she had all the relevant paperwork with her (we'd coordinated this last week).

At 9 AM the gatehouse opened and there was a rush to the front of the "line;" we did get through relatively quickly (after Saya and I presented our Green Passes for scanning, and Paolo's CDC vaccination card for review).  Paolo was given a little ticket (like you might get at the the deli counter); he was #76 (I couldn't puzzle out how the numbering system worked; there were not actually 75 people ahead of him, but whatever).  We walked around the gatehouse and down the side of the questura building, and entered a little outdoor courtyard to continue our wait.

We waited outside in the cold (low 40sF) until about 10:45, because there was only one person working the immigration counter.  Because Italy.  Once it was finally Paolo's turn, it went smoothly, if a bit slowly.  We handed in copies of the documents they require:  our estratto per riassunto del registro degli atti di matrimonio (extract of our marriage information recorded in my comune); a copy of every page of Paolo's US passport (yes - every single page, including the blank ones); a copy of my Italian ID card; a copy of my lease for the apartment here; some bank statements (to show he can support himself); a Dichiarazione di ospitalità or "hospitality letter," a form I had to sign that confirms that I'm letting him live with me; and a dichiarazione di soggiorno straniero - a foreigner's declaration of stay.  He also had to supply two Italian passport-sized photos, as well as a bollettino postale (it is the form that confirms the fee has been paid - kind of like a receipt that you fill in yourself - in this case, €30,46), and a marca da bollo (€16 tax stamp).  It seems as if everything needs a tax stamp in Italy.

The officer slowly shuffled through the documents and entered information into his computer; then after scanning two fingerprints (one from each hand), he handed us the very flimsy and not-at-all-official-looking-but-they-swear-it-is receipt for the permesso.  The actual permesso document will allegedly be ready...sometime in the next four months.  Because Italy.  There is a number on the receipt that you can enter into the questura's website to check to see whether it is ready to be picked up.  They do not mail them, as they must verify one's identity via fingerprints before releasing the document.  However, the receipt serves as a temporary permesso document; in fact, we were told that lots of people never bother to go back and pick up their actual permesso.  

We thought being handed the receipt indicated we'd reached the end of the appointment - but we thought wrong.  We had to go back outside (brrr!) and wait until called by another officer - this one wearing a lab coat - who scanned fingerprints from all of Paolo's fingers, as well as his palms.  I'm not sure what the lab coat was in aid of, as I can't image you get very dirty just scanning fingerprints all day.

We returned home about 13:00, lunchtime here.  Now that Paolo has proof that his permesso is being processed, we don't have to worry about anyone questioning his right to be here, and/or why he's been here longer than 90 days.  Not that we were too worried about it - except that time we were lollipopped.  Now maybe we will think about doing a little cautious traveling, especially now that Covid numbers are looking a bit better here (*knocks on wood*). 

In other news:  we heard that there is another American couple here in our comune!  They are living around the corner from us.  They only arrived a day or two ago, so we haven't met them yet, but I am sure we will soon.  They are also here for citizenship recognition.  They hail from the Philly region, too.  Small world!

Fiumicino

Last week, we made the decision to extend our stay here in Italy for another few months.  Our original return flight was booked months ago for January 18; since that time, Covid and its side effects - including the airline rescheduling and rerouting our flight such that we would have had a long and very undesirable layover in Hell at Heathrow, among other things - caused us to rethink our plans.  I spent about an hour and a half on the phone one day last week rescheduling our flight (it took an hour just to get through to a human being).  This sounds exasperating, but honestly, I couldn't be annoyed by the wait; those poor airline folks are super understaffed at the moment thanks to everyone being out sick, plus with so many flights being canceled and needing to be rebooked, I'm sure they're overwhelmed). Our apartment is paid through April (the rental had to be for a minimum of six months to meet residency requirements), so no problem there.  The car, however, was a bit of an issue.

Our car was a short-term leased Renault Captur; when we picked it up in October, I was assured the lease could be extended if necessary.  What they didn't tell me (and shame on me for not asking for more details) was that they would only extend for another 80 days - at €55 per day (almost $63) - making the per-day cost of the extension much higher than under the original lease.  No thanks.  So I did a little online comparison shopping (which wasn't easy, because we're limited to automatic cars as Paolo can't drive a manual) and eventually found a better deal with a Hertz rental.  I reached out to the folks at Renault and asked them if they cared to match Hertz's price; they declined.  Whatever.

The Renault needed to be returned in Fiumicino (this is the town where Rome's international airport is located); the Hertz car needs to be picked up at the counter in the airport.  Since with traffic, etc. it was about a 4.5 hour drive from our comune to the leasing office, we decided to book a hotel room overnight and pick up the new car the next day, rather than do all the driving in one day.  Fortunately, there is a Hilton that is literally right across the road from the airport terminal where the car rental offices are located - there is even a covered walkway from the hotel property that takes you right into the airport.

View from our room; the walkway to the airport is below our window, outside the frame of this shot

Although we did run through a bit of fog at one point (high up in the mountains), it was overall a fairly nice day for a drive, weather-wise.  I tried to take some pictures of different areas we drove though, but that's not always easy to do from a moving vehicle.  But here are a few snaps of the countryside I managed to capture:

In one town we drove through (somewhere in Isernia, the other province in Molise), Paolo had to navigate us through a pretty tricky intersection.  The tricky thing about it was that there was only one set of traffic lights, for the (to us) cross traffic.  I don't mean that the other traffic lights one would expect to see at a four point intersection were out - I mean they did not exist!  WTF?  Getting across that intersection was kind of like playing chicken.  Fortunately, we won, I guess.  

I will never understand driving in Italy.

We also sat in traffic for a bit at one point; it turned out that two tractor trailers somehow tangled at a roundabout, completely blocking the normal flow of vehicles - meaning that the carabinieri had to direct everyone around the accident scene.  Traffic traveling in the direction we were headed was forced to go the wrong way through the roundabout to get by.

Our GPS eventually brought us to the A1 Autostrada (she's a bitch like that sometimes).  The autostrade are toll roads for the most part.  This was our first time driving on the A1.  Unfortunately, Paolo entered via a "Telepass" lane, so didn't get a printed entrance ticket (Telepass is the Italian version of EZ Pass).  Without the ticket, we had an issue exiting the A1 - by "issue" I mean we were issued an €83,90 fine which needs to be paid online within 15 days.  Sigh.

Despite some very heavy traffic in certain areas, congestion around Rome in particular (think rush hour I-95 around Philly, my personal nightmare), and some confusion on the part of our GPS going around the roundabouts near the airport (damn her), we eventually made it to the Renault leasing office in Fiumicino (the town, not the airport) about 1/2 hour before our scheduled drop-off time.  There was no one at the desk when we walked in to the office, so we sat down to wait until someone showed up.  The guy arrived within about 10 minutes or so; he'd had another drop-off scheduled right before ours.  He took care of that client, then dealt with us.

Admittedly, I was a little worried about what they might say (or charge us) relating to the scratches on the car from our little misadventure in Larino; in the end, I don't think the guy even looked at the car.  He had me sign a form to return the car to them, and there was a section on the paperwork where they are supposed to indicate any damage...and that was left blank.  Whew!  On the other hand, the way Italians drive and park, I'm guessing vehicles are rarely returned wholly intact.  Once the paperwork was complete, we hopped in a van (along with his other client) and he dropped us at our respective hotels. 

So here we are ensconced in our comfy room at the Hilton; tomorrow we will cross over to the airport via the walkway, pick up our new car, and head home.  Hopefully the new GPS will know to avoid the A1, and also be better at navigating roundabouts.  I'll end this with a couple of pictures from dinner, and one of Leonardo da Vinci, for whom the airport is named (the actual full name of the airport is Aeroporto Internazionale di Roma–Fiumicino "Leonardo da Vinci"):

Paolo is looking grumpy because I wouldn't let him have the rolls with seeds that he is not supposed to eat

Paolo looking happier because he got pasta with octopus, which is one of his favorites

Leo.  I can't figure out whether his hands are actually bigger than his head, or if it's an optical illusion.

Odds and Ends

It's Monday, and as I am writing this, the streets are still relatively holiday-quiet; I think the official "holiday" season here doesn't really end until Epiphany, January 6th, which is a public holiday here.  I do hear the vegetable seller driving around in his truck calling out his wares over his loudspeaker, though.  And, when I was hanging out laundry earlier today, I looked down from the balcony to see someone standing in the street waiting for the doctor's office to open.

Speaking of the doctor's office - she (one of our landlords) still hasn't entirely moved to her new offices.  When we first moved in, we were told she'd be moving out in a week or so.  I mentioned it in passing last time I spoke with Nicoletta, and she said that they're still working on getting the new place ready!  Because Italy.  I don't really mind, except that I'm not thrilled about a bunch of germy sick people hanging out around our front door several days a week; I'm kind of a germaphobe.  But they all do wear their masks, so that's something, anyway.  The doctor's office placed a sign on the door - that is, on the door to OUR apartment - stating that patients must wear masks in the building.

Speaking of masks, and Covid, and so on - in my last post I talked a little bit about the currently mandated Covid mitigation strategies, and how people generally comply with the rules, and we don't see a lot of evidence of any anti-(Covid, mask, vaccine) people around - I just wanted to clarify that I was talking about our personal experience, here where we are, in our region (and also in Lecce where we were for Christmas, for that matter, which is to our south).  Of course there are anti- (Covid, mask, vaccine) people in Italy - I don't want to give anyone the wrong impression that we're living in some kind of Covid-free paradise.  There are areas of Italy - quite a few - where Covid is currently surging.  While certain regions are back in the yellow zone, Molise is not one of them, thankfully; it is still in the lowest-risk white zone.  I think this is in part because it is so rural; Puglia, where we spent Christmas, is also a white zone.  Interestingly, we read that while Omicron is here, Delta is still the dominant strain in Italy - for now.  

One more personal Covid bummer is that the Marche region currently has a high number of cases.  That is the region where my great grandfather's hometown, Corinaldo, is located.  I was hoping we would be able to take a drive up there sometime soon-ish; but I think it would be best to wait on that for now.

And then there are these people living in Bolzano who think they're protected from illness by all the fresh Alpine air, and who sincerely believe that if they do happen to get sick, they can simply treat it with "onion compresses, body cream[s] of thyme and myrtle, and drink[ing] a lot of tea."  Bolzano, which - surprise! - has one of the highest Covid infection rates in Italy, is pretty far to the north of us.  Aside from Covid and the weird healthcare beliefs of a majority of its population, Bolzano otherwise sounds like an interesting place to visit, but we won't be going there anytime soon.

We don't really have anything interesting planned to do for this week; my next citizenship-related appointment, for the purpose of applying for my Italian passport, is scheduled for Tuesday of next week, 1/11 (or, as we write here, 11/01 - something I always have to stop and think about when filling in or reading forms).  This morning I took care of some basic household chores - vacuuming and then mopping the tile floors, as well as laundry - I'm on load #2 as I'm writing this.  

When I got up at 5:30 or 6 AM this morning to use the facilities, I turned on load #1 before going back to bed; that way the load was done by the time I woke up for real around 9 AM.  It really does take about two hours to do one load of wash; that just seems to be the norm here.  I'm really not sure why European washing machines have such long cycles.  The machines tend to be smaller capacity, too, according to my observations.  I've tried running the machine on both the regular and the "eco" cycle, but that didn't make any difference in the amount of time it took to complete a load.  Frankly, I'm not even sure what the "eco" button does on my machine.  The weather has been very nice lately, in that it hasn't been raining and/or super windy; it looks like it will be sunny and mid- to upper-50s F for at least half of this week - in other words, good clothes drying weather.

I forgot to mention that when I went in to sign the registers at the town hall last week, I was also - finally! - given a copy of the trash and recycling schedule! Up until now, we've put out trash and recycling based on our guesses as to what our surrounding neighbors were placing outside for pickup.  At last we have confirmation as to what specific items to put out for pickup on a given day, and on which holidays trash/recycling is not collected.  I was also informed that the schedule will be changing in the beginning of the year, and I should be getting a copy of the new schedule in the mail (who knows when? because Italy).  The funny thing is that last week, someone - presumably one of our landlords - taped a note on our door about what containers to put out on each day.  The note was written in English, so someone must have helped them, or else they used a translation app.  

Monday:  "organico" (food trash/compostables)

Tuesday:  "secco residuo" (non-recyclables, trash that doesn't fit into the other categories)

Wednesday:  "plastica e metalli" (plastics and metal)

Thursday:  "organico" (again)

Friday:  alternates between "vetro" (glass) and "carta e cartone" (paper and cardboard)

Saturday:  "pannolini e pannoloni" (baby diapers and adult incontinence products)

There is a restaurant in Termoli we'd like to try, maybe this week, for lunch - a time of day we suspect there wouldn't be many other people in the restaurant - called Yoshi Fusion Sushi.  It's very near the Carrefour (supermarket) and the Happy Casa (home goods).  Whenever we drive by it, it looks pretty empty.  It's only open 12-3 during the afternoons, then opens again at supper time form 7 PM - 11PM (very common hours here).  We're curious to see how the Asian food is here.  We have to go out to Happy Casa at some point soon anyway, as Paolo has been on a kind of glass-breaking rampage...OK, perhaps "rampage" is a little strong; but he did manage to somehow break both a wine glass and a water glass in separate incidents today.

We have been watching TV shows in Italian with English subtitles - or rather, shows available via our Amazon Firestick.  I mentioned previously that we watched the Italian version of Nero Wolfe on MHz Choice, which was really quite good. The downside of watching things on MHz Choice is that you can't change the streaming settings, so shows we watch through that subscription (which are almost all HD) use up more data per episode than I would like.  Netflix is much better as far as that goes; if you adjust down to SD, you use much, much less data.  We watched all three seasons of Suburra:  Blood on Rome, which was excellent, I thought.  Apparently it's based on a movie (that we have not seen).  It has organized crime, gypsies, and corrupt Vatican officials - what could be better?  It's also pretty violent, so definitely not a show for the kiddies.  I personally enjoyed this show much more than I did The Sopranos, actually.  We also just wrapped up a two-season documentary series called Rotten, which is about food production, and really made us think about some of the foods we consume and the effect our consumption has on other people around the world, as well as the environment.  I don't know that watching TV shows in Italian is really helping us learn the language all that much, but it can't hurt, anyway.

One food-related item:  peanut butter!  Another item found on the "international" shelves at the big supermarket (we have not seen any peanut butter at any of the little mercati here in town).  They had two kinds - a "crunchy" and a "creamy," each made by a different producer.  I couldn't resist and chose the creamy one, as that's what I would eat at home.  It was, by the way, close to €4 for a jar (in other words, a little pricey).  I finally got around to tasting it yesterday...and do you know, it was pretty close to American, non-organic peanut butter (frankly I don't care for the organic kind because I don't like the way the oil separates out of it).  I would say it was a bit less salty, and less sweet than the brand I normally buy in the US, but had just about the same creamy texture and peanuty flavor.  Interestingly, the company listed on the label - Nick the Easy Rider - seems to be German.  Nick appears to be an importer of some sort...the website, in both German and Italian, seems to lose something in translation...

And now, time for a little pranzo; I think there's a tuna melt calling my name...

12/31/2021: Happy New Year's Eve

We returned from Lecce last Monday via train; we wore our FFP2 masks as required and also had our temperatures checked at the station prior to boarding.  And there was no mold on the apartment walls when we returned, yay!

During the last month, Italy has tightened up their Covid protocols several times to include, among things,  1) wearing masks outdoors; 2) requiring the use of FFP2 masks on all public transportation and in most venues (theaters, stadiums, and so on); and requiring the "Super" Green Pass for indoor dining, museums, sporting events, going to the gym, and for just about anything else taking place indoors.

Pretty much everyone wears either an FFP2 or a surgical-type mask (the change to requiring the FFP2's in many circumstances is really recent).  Personally, I like the FFP2 masks better anyway - I feel like they fit my face better, and the ones I purchase have a metal piece with foam cushioning that you can bend to fit across your nose, meaning eyeglasses don't fog up.  They're a little pricey - about €1 a pop - and I buy them in boxes of 10.  I recently read an article stating that the government is mandating that the price drop to €0,50 per mask.  You see very few people without masks anywhere (yes, of course there are Covid-deniers, anti-vaxxers, and anti-maskers here in Italy, as there are everywhere...but there doesn't seem to be as many of them, they don't seem as vocal or at least they don't get as much press as in the US, and we really haven't knowingly encountered any here - that is, we haven't seen any protesters or people blatantly disregarding the rules).

Green Pass (confirms you're either fully vaccinated, or have proof of recovery from Covid, or have tested negative for Covid within the last 48 hours) vs Super Green Pass (confirms you're either fully vaccinated or have proof of having recovered from Covid) hasn't been an issue for us.  Neither one of us has one, of course, as we are not on the national health scheme, and we haven't yet figured out whether we - or at least I - can use our CDC vaccination cards to have a Super Green Pass generated (there's a lot of conflicting info floating around the internet about this).  Note that these "passes" are QR codes, not paper passes like those issued in the US.  But we have not had any trouble with showing our CDC cards + US passports when asked for a Green Pass - Italy says that these are acceptable for Americans to present.  We've had to show our CDC proof of vaccinations cards any time we've dined indoors, gone to a museum, checked into a hotel, and taken the train.  

As far as we're concerned, this is all to the good!  Nothing is 100% of course, but we do feel reasonably safe with all these measures in place.  Here in our comune, it's not such an issue as we're not exactly in the midst of a bustling metropolis; there are no big crowds to worry about when we do go out.  We mostly cook at home, occasionally getting take-out pizza from the place down the street, but when we were in Rome and in Lecce, we did eat outdoors as often as possible.

I wrote all of the above not for the purpose of agitating anyone who might disagree with certain Covid measures, or to make some kind of political statement, or whatever; but simply to describe what the rules are currently like here.

Moving on...

As I said, we returned home on Monday; on Tuesday 12/28, I had to go to the town hall to sign off on my birth and marriage information, as the entry of same into the town's official records is now complete.  Note that birth, marriage, and death records are maintained at the comune level (unlike, say, in PA where birth and death records are filed at the state level, while marriage records are filed with the county offices).  As well as having computerized records, the information is also entered into actual, physical books:  the Registro degli Atti di Nascita (Register of Births) and the Registro degli Atti di Matrimonio (Register of Marriages).  There is also a Registro degli Atti di Morte, but "I'm not dead yet...I don't want to go in the cart...I feel fine!"*

Registro degli Atti di Nascita

Registro degli Atti di Matrimonio

Unfortunately, I was told that they won't give you a copy of your entries in the books unless you have some kind of pressing need (often court-related).  The modern-day entries into these seemingly old-fashioned books are typed.  I happen to have copies of some of my ancestor's entries from their respective comuni that were hand written.  As an example, here is my great grandfather's birth record entry (top of left-hand page):

I did, however, get a copy of my estratto per riassunto del registro degli atti di nascita, as well as a copy of our estratto per riassunto del registro degli atti di matrimonio - basically, extracts of the information in the birth and marriage record books, respectively.

The marriage record is particularly important, as now Paolo finally has an appointment to obtain his permesso to allow him to remain in Italy as my non-EU citizen spouse.  Nicoletta has been trying to get this appointment for some time, knowing that since he is not an EU/Schengen area citizen, he has to abide by the 90/180 day travel rules:  he can only stay within the Schengen Area for 90 out of every 180 days.  I think his 90th day is January 24th.  Because Italian bureaucracy is what it is, the first available appointment for him is February 8th.  Yes, that is outside the 90 days, but with a receipt from the questura showing he has an "appointment," plus our marriage record, he has the right to remain beyond the 90 days for now (because he has proof of a pending appointment and he can prove he is married to an Italian citizen, should any official question it in the meantime).

I have "appointment" in quotes above because there is no set time - basically, we have to show up on the day and wait until we're called in.  Because Italy, I guess. 

I should mention that we do have tickets for a flight to the US for 1/19.  I booked these back when I booked our incoming flight to Italy, and made sure they were flexible and could be changed without penalty, not knowing how long the citizenship process would take, what Covid would look like, and so on.  The airline has already changed our flight on us - I'm not sure why (I'm guessing Covid-related), but I've been notified that the flight out of Rome is now departing much earlier in the day (something ridiculous like 6 AM) and we also now are scheduled to have a 4+ hour layover at Heathrow.  No thank you!  As of now, chances are quite high that we will be changing these tickets and not returning to the US in January, and will keep Paolo's appointment at the questura.  There are some other things we need to consider regarding just how long we will actually remain in Italy, so stay tuned for updates on that.

My own appointment at the questura to apply for my Italian passport is scheduled for January 11.  

Speaking of official documents and the like:  yesterday afternoon, our landlord knocked on the door to deliver a piece of mail that somehow was delivered to...some address other than ours...and subsequently somehow made its way to him, to give to me (gotta love small town life!).  In the envelope was my official codice fiscale card - I didn't know it would be so official and plastic (unlike a paper US social security card).  The front of it looks like this (with my tax number blacked out):

The EE for "Provincia" (province) just indicates that I'm foreign-born.  Every province has an accepted two-letter abbreviation; for example, the province in which we live, Campobasso, is abbreviated as CB.

We have no plans for New Year's Eve tonight.  Back in the US we don't usually do anything for NYE other than watch Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen get tipsy and ring in the new year on CNN.  We do have a bottle of Prosecco, so there's that, anyway.  I think most of the usual big, crowded celebrations are canceled here in Italy anyway, as large crowds and so forth are not really allowed at present.  

Buon anno a tutti!  🥂🍾 🥳

*for those who missed the reference, click here. 

Buon Giorno del Ringraziamento dall’Italia

Happy Thanksgiving from Italy!  After a long afternoon/evening of train travel followed by several drinks at the bar next door to our hotel, we slept in this morning and thus missed breakfast at the hotel.  Fortunately, there is a coffee bar just a couple of doors down, so we sat outside people watching while sipping espressos until lunchtime.  We decided to eat (outside) at Ristorante Il Lampadario (The Chandelier in English) right around the corner - and realized, mid-meal, that we’d had dinner there on our previous trip to Rome in 2018.  

We treated ourselves to a nice leisurely pizza lunch, then took the Metro (there’s an A Line stop right by our hotel) over to Barberini to visit the Museum and Crypt of the Capuchins as well as the Chiesa di Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccini.  

Passed this on the way to the museum

The church & museum/crypts

They do not allow photography inside either the museum/crypt or in the church, but if you check out the links above, or do a Google search, you will get a good idea of what we saw.  You might expect it to be somewhat creepy; but we found the arrangements of the bones in their crypts to be strangely beautiful.  At the very least, it’s certainly an interesting reminder of one’s own mortality.  Also, the museum of the history of the Capuchin order was pretty informative as well.

We came back to the hotel for a little rest before heading out for a (somewhat early by Italian standards) dinner at nearby Ristorante La Sorgente, which is an Asian restaurant, because that’s how we roll on Thanksgiving.  Actually, we chose a nearby place because of the rain (it rained off and on all day, of course), but as we were under cover, we were still able to eat outside (the temps here really haven’t been too bad; they did turn on an outdoor heater for us though).  I thought the misspellings in the menu, in Italian and English, were amusing - for example, you could order “dumblings.”  Paolo did in fact get some dumblings; they were quite tasty.

Also amusing were the fortune cookies, which were a German brand, though the fortunes were printed in Italian and Spanish.

More rain expected for tomorrow.  We’re thinking of possibly visiting Centrale Montemartini, which could be a very interesting museum.  We’ll see how the day goes!
 

Sono Italiana! 💚🤍💓

…I am a citizen of the planet; from simple roots through high vision…

Alanis Morrissette, Citizen of the Planet

Today was the day!  Just as I did on the day of my first appointment, I saw another rainbow outside the window (albeit much fainter than the first one):

We were scheduled to meet at 5 PM at the town hall.  So this morning we hit the shops, to pick up a couple of bottles of Prosecco at the grocery store, as well as an assortment of goodies from Nerone’s - the bake shop where we like to get our bread.  I wish I had taken a picture of the three different things I chose but in my excitement, I forgot.  Basically, they were a variety of different cookies, one of which was a delicious chocolate-covered square that I was told is a regional favorite.  There was also a cherry-flavored, powdered-sugar covered oval-shaped cookie, as well as an anisette-flavored variety.  I also stopped and bought a bouquet of flowers for Nicoletta at one of the flower shops.

I had been looking for thank you cards to give to Mayor Mimmo and the two clerks, but could not find any in the stores, so I settled for plain blue cards (similar to index cards but without lines) and matching envelopes.  With the help of Google translate, I wrote brief messages expressing my gratitude to each.  I had hoped that the Phillies hats I ordered on Amazon might arrive today, but that did not work out (I discovered later that delivery was attempted while we were at the town hall).  I’ll be seeing the guys again soon enough, so no big deal.

We arrived on time and waited out front - only to eventually discover that Nicoletta and everyone else were already in the building, which we didn’t realize until she texted me to let me know.  We went upstairs, but had to wait a bit longer while they were getting ready.  

Me, with bags full of goodies

We were led into what appeared to be the main council meeting chamber - it had several long tables with chairs, plus audience seating, the town flag with its coat of arms, and so on.  I set up the Prosecco and snacks on one of the long tables.  In addition to ourselves, the mayor, the two clerks, and Nicoletta and Antonio (her maybe/maybe not boyfriend whose name I finally remembered!), there were a few municipal workers (or possibly members of the town council - it wasn’t clear to me), and two other town residents - a woman who is originally from England who has lived here for several years, whose name I unfortunately did not catch, and Francesco, an older gentleman who was born here, but lived in England for many years before returning home for good.  

They had a nice little ceremony where the mayor - wearing his official (and spiffy) green, white, and red sash - read out the attestation document reciting my lineage and confirming that according to Italian law, I have been an Italian citizen since birth.  He then signed the document.  It’s possible a few tears of happiness leaked out during this.  It really was a pretty special ceremony, if somewhat brief.  

Unfortunately, my technologically-challenged husband Paolo failed to work the iPhone correctly, so I have three very short, choppy clips instead of the complete video of the entire ceremony I’d wanted.  Sigh.   We did get some nice pictures, though:

Apparently Mayor Mimmo and Paolo are now best buds.

Afterward, Paolo and I stopped in at our usual place for a celebratory glass of wine.  Our landlord was there, and I showed him my piece of paper confirming my citizenship.  He had a friend with him who was trying to communicate with us, so the sweet girl who works in the pizza place down the street and who speaks some English kindly translated for us all.   According to her interpretation, he was asking if, when we go back to America, could he come along with us, as he wants to find himself a young American wife like Paolo's! 

So:  now my Italian citizenship is recognized.  I just have to wait for the documents to be transcribed in the town records  (all those birth, marriage, death, and divorce records for my line), then I can request my Italian ID, and after that, my passport.  We really don’t know how long the transcription will take - it may take longer than the previous processes (after all, there’s just the two clerks, it’s olive harvest time, and whatnot).  So in the meantime, we will continue living here in my new comune while exploring the region.

And also, I think Paolo owes me a trip to Rome.  

Breaking News!

 “ Well surprise, surprise, surprise…” 

- Bruce Springsteen, Surprise, Surprise

This morning I received a very unexpected phone call from my service provider, telling me that the Philadelphia Consulate already responded to the comune’s request for a non rinuncia check!!! This is HUGE! We were not expecting them to respond anywhere nearly as quickly as they did - we were thinking it would be at least several weeks, at the earliest. This means I am cleared for recognition of my Italian citizenship!

I was told that Mayor Mimmo is planning on having some kind of citizenship recognition ceremony for me at the town hall this Thursday! I’m just waiting for Nicoletta to let me know what time.  My service provider (that is, Nicoletta’s boss) and Nicoletta were debating whether or not to tell me, or whether they should just inform me I had another appointment this week and let it be a surprise. In the end, he opted to call and tell me “in case you wanted to get dressed up for it.”  They were as shocked as I am that this all happened so fast; he says it may be a new record for one of his clients to receive their recognition so soon. 

I was advised I should bring a bottle of Prosecco with me to the ceremony.

After all the work of gathering documents, having documents amended, getting a court order to correct my grandfather’s birth certificate, getting them all Apostilled, and after all the preparation and planning for this journey, it seems very unreal that it’s finally happening. But it is!! Wow. I’m still in shock.

Unfortunately, the weather is not reflective of my current happy mood, as it’s been quite dreary and rainy for a large part of the day, so we didn’t go out anywhere to celebrate. We did, however, have these delicious taralli zuccherati for dessert:

To be sure, the ceremony will not exactly mark the end of the process.  Once I am recognized, I will need to have my all my documents transcribed into the records of the comune.  Once that has been completed, I can then request my Italian birth certificate and my Italian ID card.  After obtaining my ID card, I can schedule my passport appointment.  When our marriage record has been transcribed, we can then request a permesso di soggiorno for Paolo which will allow him to remain in Italy as the spouse of an Italian citizen, meaning we won’t need to worry about the 90/180 day rule for him - at least while we are resident in Italy.

Funny thing:  last evening, we were discussing the possibility of taking a trip via train to Rome at the end of this week for a few days, just for fun.  We’d considered leaving on Thursday and coming back either Saturday or Sunday; it looked as if the weather would be nice for walking around, dining outdoors, and so on.  We decided to think it over and talk about it again today.  We're really glad now that we didn’t book it immediately!  I guess Rome can wait another week or two :)