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Italian Roots and Genealogy
This podcast is dedicated to Italian Genealogy, finding your Italian Roots and how to navigate through Italian records. Your host has over 12 years of experience and we will have excellent guests that will discuss a variety of genealogy topics. Please subscribe!
Italian Roots and Genealogy
Unveiling Hidden Heritage: A Journey Through Sicilian Roots
Francesca La Torre, a first-generation American with deep Sicilian roots, brings a tapestry of fascinating stories that illuminate the Italian American experience. Raised in Oakland, California, Francesca shares the vibrant contrasts she encountered between her American upbringing and her family's rich Sicilian traditions. From her father's sense of belonging within San Francisco's Italian community to enchanting tales of her parents' whirlwind romance, Francesca offers a heartfelt glimpse into how cultural connections shape identity and belonging.
The episode takes a poignant turn as Francesca reveals a deeply personal family secret involving her father's adoption, uncovered only after his passing. This unexpected revelation led to profound reflections on identity and family roots, sparking a journey to connect with newfound relatives through DNA matches. With passion and emotion, Francesca narrates the complexities of acquiring Italian citizenship and piecing together her father's mysterious past, highlighting the emotional weight of unearthing hidden family histories and the joy of reconnecting with long-lost relatives.
Amidst these personal narratives, Francesca emphasizes the importance of preserving cultural traditions. She recounts her efforts to learn Italian and shares her brother Manuel's dedication to revitalizing a historic Italian club in San Francisco. The episode celebrates the resilience required to maintain cultural heritage across generations and the joy of passing cherished traditions to future family members. Through heartfelt stories of travel, family, and community, listeners are invited to reflect on the enduring bonds that transcend borders and time.
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Hi everyone, this is Bob Sorrentino, from Italian Roots and Genealogy. Be sure to check out our blog and our newsletter and our Facebook page and please subscribe to the channel and check out our great sponsors, italy Rooting Phil Italy and Abiativa Casa. And today I have a great guest, francesca Latore, and she's from California. So thanks for being here, francesca, and getting up early. And getting up early, thank you, no problem whatsoever. So you know, I usually start off with the same question. You know why and when did you start? You know checking into the family and researching them.
Speaker 2:Well, my situation is a little bit different because I'm actually first generation American. So it was my father that came from Sicily as an adult in about 1969. So it's recent was actually the only one of his family of six siblings who left the town that we're from, which is Gela in Sicily, which is a lot of people don't know about Gela, but it does have a lot of ancient Greek artifacts there, but it's not really a tourist town. It's close. It's actually halfway in between, I would say, catania and agrigento, which is more, um, no, well known um. So my father came in 1969, um, so I didn't have to research. Well, let me just say I thought I did not have to research anything. So my grandmother and all of my aunts and uncles and cousins remained in Jela. So I spent my entire life pretty much going back and forth to visit, starting at the age of six when I went with my father, just him, and I, because my grandmother fell down the stairs, broke both her arms and needed assistance.
Speaker 2:So we went. That was my first experience and, coming from California and growing up in Oakland California, which does not Oakland back in the 1900s, the early 1900s did have a larger Italian community that had immigrated there, but when I was growing up in the 70s and 80s, we did not live in an Italian area, so we were the only ones of Italian descent and so it was a very different experience. And so it was a very different experience, my first time going to Sicily in 1977 I think I was six years old, so 1977 so much so that I woke up to the goats coming down the street. You would hear the bell every morning, about 5 in the morning, 530 in the morning, and the goat herder is herding his goats down all the streets selling milk, goat's milk. Door to door you have your own glass bottle. He milks them right there in front of the door. So, coming from an urban area in California, to you know this culture shock of Sicily in the mid 70s, which was very old fashioned compared to what it is today. It's a lot more modern today, but you will still see goat herders today if you're in the country. So big culture shock for me.
Speaker 2:Let me talk a little bit about my father coming in 1969. He was a merchant marine for Italy and had traveled all over the world. He felt when he was a teenager that he really wanted to explore the world. He wanted to see what the rest of the world was like and so he became a merchant marine and after, I think, six years or seven years of traveling around the world, when his boat landed in San Francisco or his ship, he decided he loved it. There was a large and there is still a large Italian community in San Francisco. You can still hear today's Italian being spoken. There's a very large Italian American club called the San Francisco Italian Athletic Association, which it does have a little gym, but it's mostly a social club and they have over a thousand members and my brother is actually the president of the organization today. So when my father came to San Francisco and found all of these Italians, he decided he wanted to stay, so basically he needed to find a wife. He wanted to stay, so basically he needed to find a wife. So he was introduced.
Speaker 2:He made friends in the italian community and just by coincidence, my mother worked for an italian immigrant at a. They called them beauty parlors back then, um, which now you know they salons. So she worked in a beauty parlor and the owner of the salon or the beauty parlor was she became very good friends with and she worked for her for many years and she was from Northern Italy I believe it's called Celle Ligure, which is a small town in Northern Italy on the Italian Riviera. So she came to America, became a businesswoman and employed my mother for many years and she had many friends in San Francisco and one of those friends happened to walk into the beauty parlor one day and talk to her to see did she know anyone who would be interested in marrying um, his friend who was new to america? And after he left my mom tells me now that you know this this italian gentleman came in speaking to her, and only Italian, and she couldn't understand Italian because my mom is actually Portuguese from the Azor Islands but her family came in the early 1900s, so they were in that generation where you're going to be American, so you don't speak the language. So she never really connected with her Portuguese culture. But anyway, she was very curious about this conversation because they kept looking at her and after the gentleman left, the owner of the beauty parlor, approached my mother and said you know, would you like to meet this gentleman? Because my mom was a single woman and in her early 20s or mid 20s and she was like this gentleman, you know, he has a friend and he's looking, you know, for someone who possibly could be interested in marriage. And and so my mom, she wanted to meet him. So they met and my mom thought he was very handsome. So they met and my mom thought he was very handsome and she was already enamored of the Italian culture from being best friends with this woman who was the owner of the shop. And so two weeks later, after they met, two weeks later, they went to Reno and got married. Now, the important thing about this is my mother did not speak Italian and my father did not speak English, but somehow they were able to communicate, got married and stayed together for 33 years, until his passing. So it's very interesting.
Speaker 2:And my mom assimilated to the Italian culture and so to this day, my mother can speak Italian and understands Italian quite well. And it's all just because of our upbringing. In the household everything was the Italian way the table was set with the tablecloth and the napkins and the matching set that they were. You know the matching set that you know everyone in Italy has it's. You know we always had Italian bread on the table, fresh Italian bread. My brother, my father, would bring home from the Italian bakery in San Francisco daily, because my father ended up working in an Italian restaurant in San Francisco. Because my father ended up working in an Italian restaurant in San Francisco and all of the other chefs there were Italian. So he really never learned to speak English very, very well. He had a very thick accent. A lot of my friends did not understand what he was saying a lot of the time, but we grew up very Italian, very engulfed in the culture.
Speaker 2:Like I said, the bread on the table it was pasta every night, some type of pasta plus some type of meat, whether it be your chicken cutlet, veal cutlet. You know that was our way of life. We always ate at the same time every day and everyone, all of our friends, were always welcomed at the table and that the table and eating together was a very, very big deal. That's what you did, it was. It wasn't just Sunday dinner for us, it was every night and my friends love to come over and my friends, you, you know, being that we were the only Italians in the in the neighborhood or that, you know, really I never met anyone else in Oakland the whole time I was growing up that was of Italian descent. So they would, everyone would love to come over and it didn't. You know, it never mattered. You know what ethnic background they were. Everyone loved eating at our table and enjoying those different foods that they didn't get anywhere else. Um, so that was my experience growing up.
Speaker 2:It was very important for my father that we, the children, learned Italian. So he basically spoke Italian at home. But you know, being a child and growing up in an area where there's no other Italian kids or no other you don't hear it anywhere else but in your home we were a little embarrassed to speak back in Italian, so, especially if our friends were there. So he would speak to us in Italian, we would answer in English and he understood us and we understood him, but he did. Our parents did make it a priority that we went to Italian school on Saturdays in San Francisco, so when everybody else, all the other kids got to stay home and watch Saturday morning cartoons. That was not our experience. We had to go to Saturday school in San Francisco where we learned proper Italian. Every time I would visit my grandmother in Sicily and all my aunts and uncles and cousins. That was not proper Italian, that was Sicilian, which I still understand today and I still speak a little bit of it, but in the home, with my father, he thought it was very important that we learn proper Italian. So we did go to Italian school for many years in San Francisco and I have made sure that my daughter you know that I'm passing it on to the next generation she's attended Italian classes ever since she was probably eight years old. The first time I took her to Sicily she wasn't even two yet and she's been going, just like myself, to visit all of our relatives every so often. So I've been like 17 times throughout my lifetime and she's already been 11 times. So it's very important that we keep that connection.
Speaker 2:Now the strange thing about this or not even strange, but just interesting is that 10 years after my father passed which he passed early, he was 58, he passed of cancer.
Speaker 2:Ten years after that my family went and myself, my brother, my mother, our kids, we all went because there was a family wedding out there with our cousins and we went to go, you know, celebrate, and in talking with one night, one night we were having dinner at my uncle's house and my uncle speaks straight Sicilian. He doesn't speak any English and he speaks really, really fast, which they tend to do. So in the conversation he's telling us stories about my dad when he was younger and there was something he said that triggered in me a question, said that triggered in me a question, and after that conversation I said to my brother, I think he said Pa was adopted. And he was like I know, I heard that too and we had never in our wildest dreams thought that was possible. So, and my mother was a little bit upset and we didn't know why she wouldn't say, and so we started questioning my aunt the following day and come to find out my father was adopted during world war ii.
Speaker 2:He was born we think that's what's on his paperwork during World War II, and Jela was where Operation Husky started, where the Allied troops came in and, you know, attacked I guess you would call it his city, his city, because of the beach and everything there. It was a good place to land and so there was a lot of a lot of people that got bombed, a lot of houses that got bombed, a lot of people that perished, and we think his family was part of that. But there's also another part where I didn't know this and through doing research I found out over time that there was a lot of children abandoned or babies abandoned in what's called a foundling wheel wheel where you would deposit your baby in this wheel and turn it and it would go into usually a convent or something like that where they would take the babies and and take care of them. So, world war ii, my grandmother was um, she had just had a baby during that same time and her baby unfortunately passed away, and at that time in Sicily I'm sure it was all of Italy. If you had three children, your husband did not have to go to war and that was her third child and so when the baby passed away, she decided she was going to adopt another child that needed a home. Her father-in-law went with horse and carriage or a cart to where they had the babies, which was somewhere by. It's called Vitoria, which for us might be a 45 minute drive. I'm not sure how long it takes in a horse and cart on roads that aren't paved.
Speaker 2:So she went and she picked out my father and said I want that baby. And so these are stories that we're finding out, you know, 10 years after his passing. No idea, we always knew my father did not look like the rest of his siblings, which were large, dark, and my father was small, very thin and fair, um, light hair, and, but it never dawned on us that we weren't actually blood related. Um, but then now, looking back, it doesn't make sense because he, you know I will show you in the pictures my father next to his brother. So she picked this child out and my father was an infant still, you know, I think he might have been maybe a month or two, maybe even three months old at the time, and her father in law was trying to discourage her from getting my father because he thought he would die as well because he was malnourished, and he just thought it wasn't a good choice and she wanted him. She made a fuss that that was the little boy that she wanted, the little boy that she wanted, and she actually was still lactating and nursed my father to health. So she brought him back to Jela and we never knew how prevalent it was for adoption and people to take other children in that were not their own, and I found out later on how prevalent it was.
Speaker 2:And then, when I thought about it, my uncle has adopted a child, my cousin has adopted two children, and so it you know, it all made sense after the fact. One of the stories that my aunt told me was there was another kid that was adopted one street over and there was a big, what do you call it? There was a big scene that was going on on that street with people yelling and screaming and apparently the child's parents actual parents parents came back and wanted the child and had, and that child had to be given up, and my father came running home and said I don't care, um, if they find my mom, I'm not going, I'm not going. And so that you know that, really, um, it really touched our hearts. But, like I said, we didn't even know any of this until 10 years after he passed and we questioned my mother. She knew, she knew all along. He told her, but when he was passing, right before he passed away, he made her promise not to tell us because he did not want us to lose our connection to Sicily and our family, which was, you know, he didn't have to worry about that, it was already ingrained in us. It was already, you know, solidified. This is our family and we've always been. They've never treated us any different.
Speaker 2:We've been part of the family, you know, since day one, and and actually my grandmother died six months after my father and a lot of the family was saying, you know it was a broken heart, she couldn't handle that.
Speaker 2:That was too devastating for her because he was her favorite and so you know you're not supposed to have favorites, but you know he was and you know it's just been finding that out. We would love to know or meet someone who is actually our blood, not for the sense of replacing the family that we have, because that could never be done, but just to see someone who has his characteristics, you know, may look similar to him and just to know where we'reania area, because we have found through the DNA matches that we do have relatives that are in New York, that their side of the family came in the early 1900s, I believe, and obviously his parents did not leave. So we've traced it back a little bit and know that it's somewhere in that area. But we'd love to find out one day and I know it can be done through genetic genealogy, they can trace it and you know, one day we're going to find out who our actual relatives are and what our actual family name is. That would be very interesting to find out.
Speaker 1:I'm sure, wow, that's, that's, that's some story. Well, and and you know it's interesting because I, you know, I've interviewed a couple of guys that they were adopted. They were born in Italy, adopted in America in the in the 1960s, because Italy wasn't. They I don't know if it was illegal or not, but Italians weren't adopting Italian children. Now a lot of them are being adopted by Americans, but you know, it never dawned on me during world war two that how many children were probably displaced or lost their parents and things like that. And so now so I have to ask you was it, was it like a legal adoption or was it so was?
Speaker 2:So I actually got my Italian citizenship and in getting it, because I was born before my father became an American citizen, so in getting it you have to produce the birth certificate and everything for my father, and it never dawned on me. The paper that came back from the Comune in in Sicily with his, his date of birth, which they listed as January 1st, because they really didn't know his exact date of birth, and it only had my grandmother's name on it because she was the one who did the adopting, because her husband was off to war and when she was able to come back after that, after she did the adoption, but I didn't, you couldn't tell from what was sent to me that there was anything fishy about it. That it that it wasn't an actual birth record, because I have never seen a birth record at that time from you know, from Italy, and it didn't have all the information that you would expect. Now I know that. But I was able to get my citizenship and still did not know that my father was adopted. I didn't find out until, you know, five years later or something like that.
Speaker 2:So yeah, it was. I mean, I can't even. It was very shocking. It was very shocking, but I don't know that it seems a lot more common once I thought about it because, like I said, my, my uncle, adopted a child and and my cousins adopted two children and it just it was a lot. It made sense once I thought about it but at the time, you know, it was very shocking because you know we have our last name and you know who knows what it really really is. Um, I'd love to find out, but I you know and the italians.
Speaker 1:They don't do dna, so right, right, that makes it.
Speaker 2:I mean because I was going to ask you.
Speaker 1:I was going to ask you if you found somebody in the States, and you, obviously you did.
Speaker 2:But it's distant though.
Speaker 2:It's distant, the ones you know, because that part of the family left in the early 1900s. It might be, you know, our common ancestor could be a great great grandparent. It's not further back than that great-great-grandparent. It's not further back than that, but either great or great-great-grandparent. That is where it probably split off. But yeah, they're very distant and they don't, it seems like, because I was looking about their history so I couldn't find out through them. It would have to be. I'd have to pay for a genetic genealogist. I've looked into it a little bit and at some point I do plan on doing it, just because I am very curious now. But it could never replace the family that I have there. Like I said, I never felt anything but love and part of the family.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I can understand that. I mean, you know, my, my kids are adopted. So you know, I can understand that you have a couple of things that you mentioned earlier, which is, which is, which is, you know, funny, um, when you mentioned the, the, uh, the, the goats and the milking the goats my, um, my great-grandfather, in torito he was.
Speaker 1:He had a cow and he used to walk through the streets and milk the cow right and and um, and my aunt, uh, I, my family, comes from corona queens, which was at the time probably all italian, not this, I don't think there's any left now but she owned a beauty parlor and it was funny when you mentioned beauty parlor because that's what they were called and and uh, and, uh.
Speaker 1:jeez, I think all the girls that that worked there were Italian. My mom worked there for a while, but I was probably I was probably the first unisex client or customer because my mother worked there. And so on Fridays when my father would pick her up, I would get my hair cut by my cousin and sit under the big dryer. You know Right.
Speaker 2:Of course yes.
Speaker 1:I know it well.
Speaker 2:I know it well. I used to go to the beauty parlor when I was probably about 10, 11 years old and I'd work, I'd sweep up all the hair, I'd wash all the brushes and combs. So, yeah, I would get a little, you know make a couple of dollars doing that, and was, you know, happy to do it? Um, so yeah, beauty parlors still are very important in the Italian culture. In Italy, um, in Sicily, people they they go to get their hair done and and the hair is always immaculate. You know the. You don't go outside with wet hair, which I would get yelled at all the time when I was there in the summer and I was like I'm not blow drying my hair in this heat.
Speaker 2:As soon as I'm outside I'm going to be sweating because it's so humid there. So, but everybody, immaculate always. You know, hair done, dress nice. You know it's, it's part of the culture.
Speaker 1:I know we, we said that when we were there, especially the last time we walked around the streets. You know, you don't notice it as much, probably in like Naples because there's so many tourists there, but we were in.
Speaker 1:Toronto and just, you know, just walking around and people, they don't dress like us, they dress like we used to dress, but you know it's, it's, you know it's sad in some ways that we, we kind of lost that kind of thing and and I'm, you know, so jealous that you would send to Italian school, we would, I was talking with that, with somebody. We didn't have that here. I probably would have hated it. When, when.
Speaker 1:I was a kid to go, uh, but I wish I I'm going to, I'm going to Italian, uh, I'm going to Italian classes now at the Italian club we started last week, so eventually I'll catch on. I hope you know I'm getting.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, my brain isn't a sponge anymore, you know everything just leaves.
Speaker 2:It may take a little longer, but you'll still. You'll still catch on. You know, a lot of my friends growing up had no idea that I was even bilingual, didn't find out until my adult years, because then I embraced it a lot more before I kind of tried to hide it. My father would you know back in the day when you'd be playing outside, you know when it's time to come in for dinner, my father would be on the porch and he'd call me, you know, in Italian, for me to go in and come eat and my friends would, uh, they'd make fun of me and you know. So I I did hide the fact I was bilingual for a long time, um, but once I became an adult, and especially after my father's passing, it ignited a drive in me to be more connected. Um, because the majority of the times the trips that I had going to Italy were my childhood, because my parents paid for that ticket. So once I became an adult and had to pay for myself, there was a 10-year gap where I didn't go. So I lost a lot of the language, especially the Sicilian, because that was only spoken when I was there. But then, you know, in recent years I have made a push, well, the last 10 years, a push with family, and you know record things because it's going to be lost pretty soon. And so I'm trying to, you know, accumulate a lot of what's going on there in our family so that my daughter can then pass it on to her children whenever she decides to have a family. So, and especially my brother, my brother Manuel, has it's been the same thing with him as far as it ignited once my father passed and we didn't have that connection anymore anymore. We were starting to get lost, and he has been instrumental in San Francisco in growing the organization that he's now the president of, and I think he's the only the second Sicilian president in the entire history of that club, which is over 100 years old. So he's really made a push himself to get connected with our roots, because we started to realize that it was getting lost. And I know that that happens a lot when you're, you know, for our children, for second generation and third generation Italian Americans, you lose the language, you lose the culture, and we don't want that to happen, because that is instrumental in what shaped us to be the person, the persons that we are today. So we've really made a push ourselves in in continuing that on to the next generation, in continuing that on to the next generation.
Speaker 2:And so when my brother started in that club, just becoming a member who my father was also a member of, that club would go play cards there and my brother would go with him sometimes when he was playing cards and earn money doing little odd, like going to get them something to drink, or he would earn money doing little odd like going to get them something to drink, or, you know, he would earn money doing little things for the guys there. And so, um, he eventually became a member, but that was after my father's passing, because when we were teenagers and young adults we weren't interested. We weren't interested anymore. Um, but then we did. We realized as we got older how important it was and we came back.
Speaker 2:And so when he started with that club and became a member, the average age of the people that were members also was in the 60s, like 65 or something like that. So it was older and if you don't start getting the younger generation involved, it dies out. So in the course of him being a member there, they have really recruited and now the average age is around 40, 40, 45. So they've really made a push to get the next generation to be a part of this and to continue the Italian culture. So they've been successful and, you know, it really makes me happy, although I cannot be a member, because it is a fraternal organization for men that's like mine, us too, yeah you know, I'm a little salty about it, but it's okay, it's okay.
Speaker 2:Because I still participate in everything that they have going on.
Speaker 2:They have one of the oldest foot races in the country, the Statuto race, which there's pictures of and you can find pictures of the some of the first races that happened, but it's it's in it's 105th year or something like that, and it happens every year on the first Sunday in June in San Francisco and I participate in that. Every year I'm going up there for Columbus day. They have a parade and they you know all the restaurants set out tables along the parade path and it's really a fun activity to do with your family, and also it just coincides with Fleet Week in San Francisco, so the Blue Angels fly across after the parade. So right over the head of where this is located, in the middle of North Beach, which is the Italian center of San Francisco, so it's right in front of the, it goes right in front of the club. The Blue Angels go right over, and you know. So I participate in a lot of the activities that they have going on, even though I can't be a member myself.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I didn't, you know, I didn't know, I wish I had joined years ago, but I was busy and my brother joined the club in Florida and that's why I got involved. But when I got there I didn't realize, when I first was going there, that it was the same thing and somebody had asked and he said oh, you know, we started to try and have women members like a while ago, but they couldn't take it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, it's, it's, it's the truth. Someone proposed during one of their meetings for them to open it up to women. But that was when the club's membership was kind of dwindling. And you know, one of the old Italians stood up and was very upset and he said I come here to get away from my wife.
Speaker 1:I mean, obviously it's a joke, but it you know, things like that it's funny it's funny, um, and you know, and they do, and you know, of course they do similar things uh, where they do it, but it's the same thing with our club, uh, it's, uh, I think the average age is 72, but they are starting to get younger members. We have, like, I think, about 420 members, so it's not a bad size.
Speaker 2:No, that's not a bad size. Theirs is close to a thousand.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's fantastic, that's great. And especially that they're getting the young, the young people, and I think, I think there's, there's starting to be a resurgence, you know.
Speaker 2:I think so because we we can't my brother and myself can't be the only ones that are feeling this way that you know want to get back to our roots, get back to our culture. Get back, you know we can. There is a resurgence and people can be proud of their Italian heritage and start to want to go back and learn. And you know, if you've never been, it is a culture shock, depending on where you go. If you go to a non-tourist area, it's going to be a different way of life. For sure, one thing I did find out my grandfather was a goat herder. Because I never knew what my grandfather did for a living because he was deceased before I was born. So I never knew, never met him, um, before I was born. So I never knew, never met him, um. I only had my, my Nona, who I'm named after Um and I. We everybody calls her as a nickname. I guess when you get older, if your name is Francesca, then you become Chichina, and so that's my Nona, chichina. And my daughter was able to meet her and spend time with her at least four or five times before she passed away. So that was a great experience for her. She still remembers. But finding out my father was a, my grandfather was a goat herder was very interesting, because that's something that you would think somebody would do in the 1800s or something you know. Be a goat herder, but this was, you know, in the 1940s, 50s, even. I think he died sometime in the 60s. So even up till then.
Speaker 2:And a lot of families will have what's called they call it Campania, which is your country home or your country where you have things planted, and my grandma, I always grew up going to my grandmother's Campania, which had grapevines and olive trees and fig trees and you know all of that.
Speaker 2:And my grandmother used to make her own wine. So she had the large casks of wine, the super large casks, in her house. And when I was six years old, the first time I went besides the goats coming down the street, my grandmother sold wine. So people would come to the door with their empty glass bottle and would pay and, you know, would get it filled from the large cask of her wine. And because she had both of her arms broke and was from falling down the stairs and was in a cask in both arms, she could no longer do that. So I had the biggest kick out of the people would come to the door and I had the responsibility of filling the glass bottles with the wine and putting the money in her pocket, and so that was a wonderful memory, and my uncle in Sicily still makes wine today and my daughter, you know.
Speaker 2:She just gets a kick out of going over there and filling up her. Well, we do it in plastic bottles now because we transport it home. I still have some wine in my fridge. But now my brother has also started the tradition and he has grape vines and this is his first year where he's making wine. And next year we're going to start a family tradition where all the family in the US gets together and helps him harvest the grapes, because he did it by himself this year and it was a lot of work, but we've decided we're going to make that an annual thing where we're going to help him to harvest all of the grapes and get the wine started all of the grapes and and get the wine started.
Speaker 2:So you know, I know that my family, I send them pictures and videos all the time.
Speaker 2:Whatsapp was a great invention, um, because that's how we communicate and they, uh, they, they eat it up every time they see us doing things, making things like for christmas we made arancini and you know we always have lasagna at Christmas.
Speaker 2:That's like a Christmas dish, but this year we last year we also had arancini and my family in Sicily loves seeing the videos of us doing those things, because it makes them proud that we're continuing to do the things that they relate to and we're not forgetting them and we're not losing contact with them. You know, before, when we were children, on Sundays, my father would call Sicily and we'd have to get on the phone and speak to my grandmother, and none of us wanted to do it. We tried to pretend like we were asleep. We didn't want to talk on the phone, you know, to Italy, because what are we going to say? Hi, how are you? I love you. You know, and that was it. Now I call almost daily and talk to someone, one of my cousins, just just to keep it, just to keep the connection alive, and I'm constantly sending pictures and videos to them. And it's, you know, family. The family is strong.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you know, I wish I had known years ago, especially the first trip we made to Italy 25 years ago. I didn't know that I had so many cousins from my father's family there, because my grandmother and her aunt were the only two who came. Everybody else stayed there, the only ones that I mean. Now, in the last, like I don't know, 10 years or something like that, I have two cousins that they now live in San Diego. But and when we went there the first time I mean, had I known I would have met these people nobody ever said anything, and it was only just a couple of years ago that I found out that. You know, my dad's first cousins are still alive. They're in their 90s. So so you know, and I think that's a message for everybody, you know, find them. They want to know who we are.
Speaker 2:I think more than we want to know who we are.
Speaker 1:I think more than we want to know who they are.
Speaker 2:Right? No, they do, and they will welcome you with open arms. 90% of the time I, you know, I can't, I can't even, I don't know when, especially if you're in, you're from a small town or a town where you know there's not a lot of tourists, they think it's wonderful. Here come the Americans. You're kind of like a celebrity in the town and I think a lot of people would be surprised how welcoming they would be once they're found, how much they want to see and know. Family is very important there.
Speaker 2:I think we've lost that in America. Family isn't as close anymore like they used to be. On my mom's side of the family I remember when we were kids growing up, because all we had was my mom's side, when we were growing up here, because all my father's side was there. I remember doing family picnics and playing, you know, softball and volleyball and you know all these things and it doesn't seem like that and it wasn't a family reunion. These are just things we did on, you know, during the summer, on like a monthly basis or something. You know it. Just it doesn't seem like those things happen anymore with your cousin.
Speaker 1:You're not as close to your cousins as you used to be and they are if you are I think a lot of that's because you know people you know uh have drifted apart geographically more than anything else, I mean when I was growing up when I growing up, you know, three of my cousins lived in the same town.
Speaker 1:I mean two of my, two of my two of my uncles lived in the same town as us and my cousin's cousin lived next door. So we used to, you know, I used to see my cousin Denise, or she's my cousin's cousin, but to hang out with her every single day, you know. And, and even my other cousins, they lived, you know, a bus ride away or something like that, and to your point, every Sunday if you went to my grandmother's house, somebody was there, maybe not everybody all the time, but there was always somebody there. So so yeah, and I think, but but like I said, I I think the good thing is there's been a resurgence.
Speaker 2:I mean, you know some of the some of the kids in their 20s and 30s, they're naming their kids with the Italian names now, right, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's, there's pride in that and you know I feel sorry for a lot of the immigrants that came that either changed their names willingly or by accident through Ellis Island and things like that. Their names got changed and their names got Americanized and because of the discrimination that they faced, you know they didn't teach their kids Italian. You know they wanted them to be American so they wanted them to speak English. I feel sorry for them because you know it pushes you further away from that connection to your roots and I do appreciate the fact that I didn't go through that, that there was always a push on my father's side to connect to you know, make sure that it was passed on to you know, make sure that it was passed on. And so you know, like I said, we grew up in an area we weren't lucky enough, not in our city where we actually lived, to be exposed to other Italians or things like that, but going to San Francisco a lot. You know that's where they had the Italian bakery where we got Italian, fresh Italian bread every day, or the Italian deli where we got our you know our salami and you know our mortadella and all of those things that you know and that's what we grew up on.
Speaker 2:It was funny because I went to a celebration of my Catholic school that I went to in Oakland where we were the only Italian family in the entire school and one of my friends that I went to school with first through eighth grade pretty much she one of her memories of was of me bringing salami sandwiches to lunch every day, on Italian bread, you know so. No one else had that and back then Nutella was not, you know, worldwide. So they would look at me weird. You know I'm eating a chocolate sandwich. They have no idea what I'm doing. You know, but you know that's, that's what I grew up on.
Speaker 1:Well, we went to the beach. We went to the beach and had eggplant Parmesan sandwiches and sausage and pepper sandwiches.
Speaker 2:Oh yes, oh yes. You know, my family would go to the beach when we were in Sicily and, kid you not, they would bring pasta al ferno, lasagna, a whole watermelon, and they bury the watermelon deep in the sand because it would stay cool that way, because ice is not the biggest deal out there, especially back then Ice people don't use ice, so they didn't have the coolers with the ice and all that, and the lasagna would stay warm because it's hot.
Speaker 2:You know they would cook it right before you get there, and we would. We would be on the beach all day long, because jela is, it's a beach town, um, but not a lot of tourists, um, so we would have these full-on meals at the beach with you know these. You know pasta dishes and and all kinds of fruit and nuts, and you know I spent my childhood doing that. At the age of 12, I started going by myself, without my family. They would send me and I would go and spend summers with my grandmother and sometimes I would ask to go um, and they would. You know I would go and spend the summer there and it was basically the life consisted of pretty much in the summertime the beach every day every day, so you used to make that trip from California all the way there by yourself.
Speaker 1:Yes, people wouldn't do that anymore. They'd be terrified to do that.
Speaker 2:They'd be terrified, yeah but you know, I come from the generation that you walked to school I was on the bus at age 10, catching the bus different places, you know, to a friend's house, down to the beauty parlor where my mother worked, um, you know. So I was. You know public transportation was what I was.
Speaker 1:You know what I grew up on I used to go to new york city at 12 years old on the train by myself, by me and my friend. And then you didn't think twice about it.
Speaker 2:Right. So my first time that I went by myself, I was 12 and I was fine. I went from San Francisco to New York because they didn't have direct flights to Rome back then. So San Francisco to New York. Then I changed planes and got on the plane from New York to Rome, but in Rome I didn't realize that I needed to get out of the international terminal and go to the domestic terminal.
Speaker 1:So I kept walking around in a circle and couldn't figure it out.
Speaker 2:Finally, I went to the Alitalia desk and said, okay, I have a flight here, I can't find it, I don't know how to get there. And they escorted me at that point. And then, once I landed in Catania, my grandmother and my cousins were there and they were asking me are you sure this is your grandmother? Yes, that is my grandmother. I know my grandmother. I know my grandmother, um, but after that, um, I was fine going by myself. I knew what to do, um, but yeah, at 12 years old was the first time I went by myself.
Speaker 1:so, yeah, it's crazy and it's you know, it's a different world I used I was. I guess maybe I lived from my school because I went to a Catholic school. Maybe I lived I don't know a quarter of a mile, a third of a mile or something like that. I used to walk second grade. I was walking the school by myself.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I have memories of kindergarten, the first few months, you know, someone would walk with me, but after that it was a group of kids that would walk there together and walk home together. So yeah, I have memories of doing that in kindergarten. In first grade I was walking to a different school because kindergarten was a public school. And then, first grade, I started at the Catholic school.
Speaker 1:And now, if it's, they have air conditioning, and if it's too hot, you can't go to school. You can't go in a car, you can't do this. We used to go in the snow and the rain and you know, like you, we didn't have air conditioning in the school.
Speaker 2:Right, no, I remember it being so hot and humid in Sicily in the summertime that we would just sleep on the marble floor in my grandmother's house, because that was the coolest place to be. Um. Sleeping in the bed wasn't as comfortable, but but sleeping on the marble floor, um yeah, that was the coolest place to be. So, yeah, a lot of memories that's yeah, that's, that's well.
Speaker 1:That's like a dog when it's real hot, he sleeps on the floor. He doesn't go in a bed because it's cooler but obviously it's cooler on on the wood you know, oh yes but yeah, like I said, I, I just, I, just I. I think if if I had known what I know now, you know, 20 or 25 years ago, I wouldn't say we'd be living there, but I definitely would have had a house there.
Speaker 1:I would have had a place there somewhere, um, just just um, because it it is the thing that that I find is it's a slower lifestyle style, a happy lifestyle. Yes, uh, and like you said, you know, when I met my dad's cousins, as soon as I walked through that door, they treated me like they knew me ever since I was born. Oh yes, you can't explain it.
Speaker 2:You can't explain it yeah, I was the first time I went, when I was six, when my uncle picked us up from the airport, and when we got to my grandmother's house it was total confusion. There were so many, that place was so packed with so many people that it scared me. I started crying and then after a while I got used to it, because all these people just rushing at you, wanting to pick me up, wanting to kiss me, and I have no idea who they are or what they're talking about, because they were all speaking in Sicilian and my father had raised me on Italian and it's a very different language. It's not a dialect, it's an actual language. You know there's a lot of words that have a Arabic background and so you know the sound of it is totally different from Italian and you know. So the confusion of that scared me. There was only one telephone at that time on the whole block on both sides of the street, on my grandmother's street. She didn't have it. It was a second cousin down at the end of the block and if you wanted to call America or someone wanted to callzza, where you could go to a place and pay to use the telephone to call the US, and that's what we used to do. It was very different, very different back then.
Speaker 2:Another memory I have is realizing how different we were from where I was raised, because my father, he, actually didn't drive. He wasn't a good driver, and you can tell how the way if you've ever been to Rome or any city. Really, in Italy, they drive crazy. I did actually learn how to drive as a teenager in Sicily. Um, I, I did actually learn how to drive as a teenager in sicily, um, so, um, that helped me out. I can drive there now, but they drive crazy. So when my father came to the us, you know it, we my family decided it wasn't a good idea for him to drive, so he actually would catch public transportation to work every day in san francisco, um, but I remember him coming home because he would walk home at the same time every day from the bus stop and you know the way he dressed. He still dressed like he was in Italy and I remember playing on the street and some of the older kids who were teenagers at the time were talking about oh, your father's in the mafia, your father's in the mafia, and I had no idea what the mafia was. I had not seen the godfather, I didn't know. And I remember running in the house crying because I knew they made it sound derogatory. So I ran in the house crying, saying they're saying Paz and the Mafia, and my mother was just like no, he's not. And that's when I learned what it was sort of A child's view of it, if you will, and I think a lot of people have that stereotype, especially Sicily.
Speaker 2:In the 80s, in Gela, where my family is from, there was a lot of mafia things going on, not within my family, but a lot of things happening, and I think it got a bad rap, especially the city where I'm from. And if you read a lot of travel books that were written in the 80s, like, well, there's a guy on PBS I can't think of his name right now, but he's always going to Europe and visiting different places. Anyway, he wrote, put out a travel book about Sicily and he said to avoid Gela, which is where my family's from. And I'm like why we have a nice beach, beautiful beach. You know we have, you know, archaeology so many, so many ancient artifacts from when the greek, from the greek occupation, have been found in in that city, but no one knows. We have a beautiful museum of all these artifacts, but nobody knows, because of that stigma of the mafia and it's so not like that, like you can go there now, today, even when I was a child. I have a best friend that I grew up with across the street.
Speaker 2:Her family grew up across the street from my grandmother and every time I go, we would, you know, hang out together and have fun and go to the beach and, you know, go to the piazza and go to the discotheque and you know all these things. And it just there's so many things that were great, like we would be out at night as 12 year olds 13, 14, 15, and be able to, just, you know, go wherever we wanted and not have to worry about kidnapping and things like that. You know, whereas in the US you would never let your kids out, you know, late at night, without worrying about something happening to something's going to happen. You know, it's a different, it's a different lifestyle, and I was there in May and was having dinner with my best friend and her husband and we were talking about it and talking about the differences between there, because her kids were out and it was like a Friday night. In her she had a 12 year old and a 14 year old.
Speaker 2:And they were out with their friends at the hangout spot by the beach and at another friend's house, and you know it was late at night, midnight, and you know they weren't concerned or worried at all and I said you can't do that in America. America sounds great to them, it sounds wonderful, it's the best thing since sliced bread, which they still don't have. But you know there's a lot of, there's a lot of you know things you have to be careful for here which they have no idea. When I told them that you know kids can't go out like that because there is a definite risk of kidnapping and human trafficking, because there is a definite risk of kidnapping and human trafficking, and my friend thought the kidnapping was for ransom and she was like kidnapping and they were like, oh, to pay ransom. I was like no Kidnapping and you'll never see them again because they've been killed or they've been trafficked.
Speaker 1:You know it was totally foreign to them, totally foreign and you know, yeah, her daughter's 27, she's a nurse in tampa when she works night sometimes and we, even we worry about her oh yes being in the car alone going to yeah and I still yes, I worry it's, it's a totally different lifestyle there.
Speaker 2:And you know it's a slower life. You enjoy your time more. I actually am going to be retiring there within the next seven years, my husband and I, who and he's not Italian he's been twice with me and he doesn't speak Italian, but he loves it and we're going to be moving because you know once we are retired and living on, you know, retirement we can afford the life there, whereas here it's going to be a little more difficult.
Speaker 2:But people have to get used to. You know a lot of people think about doing it, but you should make some trips first and really see what it's like well, you know saying about the the air conditioning.
Speaker 2:um, people in my town, none of my family, has air conditioning, but if you go to like a Airbnb, a bed and breakfast or a hotel, of course they have it and some families do have it now. But that's one major thing that I think a lot of my friends from the US would have a problem with, with the heat and not having access to air conditioning.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm sure, and you know, we were in Bari last year and even there it's, you know, along the waterfront and everything, there were people of all ages, very respectful. You didn't feel threatened, you didn't. You know there were a couple of policemen hanging around but you know, you didn't really feel that you had to worry, you know at least we didn't, you know.
Speaker 2:No't though you don't maybe in a more tourist area. You know a large city, a very large city. I'm sure it's going to be the same.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, naples, you have to be careful, palermo, you have to be careful, but you know, coming from new york, we were always looking around anyway, so you probably feel the same way.
Speaker 2:Oh, yes, oh, yes so.
Speaker 1:I'm sorry to worry that much. We didn't worry that much. Well, Francesca, I could go on for another three hours. You know I appreciate you being on and taking the time, especially, you know, getting up early and doing all of that. Thanks, Thanks again.
Speaker 2:Sure Sure. I love to talk about my experiences.
Speaker 1:Yeah, me too.
