Personal

“Boh!?”… And Other Perfect Italian Words & Phrases That Don’t Translate Well

1 year ago

by Michael in Culture, language, Personal, Things that make me scratch my head

TweetWhen you split your life between two cultures with two languages, it is quite easy to get trapped in the wrong language from time to time. I sometimes find myself speaking one language, then suddenly a word or phrase pops out from the other. I don’t realize it until the person I am [...]

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In Search of the Perfect Espresso

1 year ago

by Michael in Coffee, Cooking, Culinary, Personal, Recipes, Travel Tips

TweetLike a fine wine or a great cigar, those who know their coffee are extremely discriminating. I count myself among them. Coffee is something I take very seriously.Technorati: VA2TJVJYZX67 Depending on the style of coffee, completely different factors come into play when determining [...]

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The FAMILY feeling of our vacations explained

2 years ago

by Michael in Cooking, Culinary, Culture, Food, Personal, Tours, Travel Tips, Tuscany

TweetOur future guests often ask me what our tours are going to be like, and I try to explain the feeling of ‘family’, and how it is so different than anything else out there. Oddly, it is a difficult thing to explain, especially since our future guests are little more than strangers on a [...]

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The Blindfolded Chef – Ceci Soup Challenge

3 years ago

by Michael in Cooking, Culinary, Food, Personal

Tweet Last week Paola wanted to teach Alyssa, our 18 year old daughter, how to make Ceci Soup. She was saying it was so easy that she could do it blindfolded. As we laughed at her, she insisted that she could, so I ended up betting her $100 that she couldn’t. What started out as a stupid [...]

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Italian… So lost in translation

3 years ago

by Michael in Let Me Vent, Personal

Tweet“My daughter speaks perfect English. After all, she spent a month in England with a native family”. That was the quote that caused me to simply give up, and it speaks volumes about Italian culture and the denial so many of them live in. It happened this past October. I was in a local [...]

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Florida Italophiles Unite!

4 years ago

by Michael in Culinary, Culture, Food, Personal, Wine

Tweet Wow… I’ve been away from Italy now for a total of 3 and a half months. That is the longest stretch in more than 2 years. When I am in the states, I’m not immersed in the wonders of Italian culture, so material for the blog is hard to come by. Anyhow, the other day Paola and I had [...]

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The hidden ruins of a 13th century Olive Mill in Italy

4 years ago

by Michael in Culture, Lazio, Personal, Tours, Travel Tips, Umbria

TweetAsk around Soriano about ‘Fosso Mulino’ (River Mill) and you will get mostly blank stares. So it is no surprise that after all of these years I had no idea that it existed. Very few people do. One day I was out with my friend (and our contractor) Andrea D’Alessio. He asked me if I [...]

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Finding Italy through London Fog this XMas

5 years ago

by Michael in Let Me Vent, Personal, Travel Tips

TweetOn Tuesday, December 19th at around 4:30 PM we sat at the departure gate in Los Angeles waiting to board our flight. It had already been a very long day for us, and we were looking forward to a 10 hour flight to London with a connection that would take us to Rome. It was me, Paola, [...]