Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Boomerang. I always have my boomerang with me.
Sometimes it comes back, sometimes it doesn’t.
So guys… Music is life!
Dreaming Australia. Italians on the other side of the world.
These are my mom and dad.
This was taken in 1963 at my sister’s Christening party.
This is a family group, “Sixties” style. Here’s come Sasha.
We were Italian children, our look was important to us as a representation of Italian culture.
It was unusual for Australians, they probably found us weird.
As a little girl from Southern Italy, I already wore earrings.
My mother is from Calabria, my father from Sicily.
I was eight or 9 years old, I was wearing my school uniform.
I used to take to school my Panini with mortadella as my mid-morning snack while my class mates used to have Vegemite sandwiches.
I was raised in an Italian family, still Australian culture gave me a free and open mind.
She was 45 when she came to Australia after her son Franco, together with my granpa Luigi.
She couldn’t speak a word of English, it was not necessary to her.
She would say “Hello, how are you?” with her thick Italian accent.
We used to have Sunday lunches with her hand-made tagliatelle and Sicilian torrone.
My career started off in Italy thank to many valuable friends who believed in me.
My first spot was for Coca Cola. This was my very first theme song in the Eighties.
After that, I sang theme songs for other brands like Nescafé, Nutella,
including “I feel good” for Coppa Del Nonno, which got very famous at that time.
Let’s talk about English spoken by Italian immigrants in Australia.
My family ran a home furniture store.
My mother would talk to the delivery truck driver asking…
“Did you park the truck?”
English was contaminated by Italian.
Grocery stores are Italian, restaurants and bars in Lygon Street are Italian…
Italian is the second language most spoken in Australian.
After 50 years of Italian culture it is also taught in school.
My mother received the picture of an Italian guy, who looked ok.
She said “Ok, I will marry him.”
This is how things used to work, you would have a cousin who knew a family back with a son
who wanted to get married with an Italian girl, so you would exchange letters and photos.
My mother didn’t like the guy when she met him in person, and said...
It took her 2 years to return the money he paid to have her travel to Italy.
She travelled by plane. My father, instead, got to Australia after a 40-day journey by ship.
They met at an Italian party (Italians used to throw parties to keep in touch and get to know each other).
My father was a natural born salesman, he found his way as a door-to-door salesman.
My father brought made-in-Italy furniture design in Australia.
He was the only Italian hosting a commercial in Italian on an Australian tv channel.
The police man says “This is gold!” He just had is tv commercial performed live by my father!
Parents have to entrust their children, give them the chance to go abroad.
I always tell my son: “If you want to make experiences abroad, go.”
My father asks me “Are you sure about that? You will miss your son!”
and I say “Yes Dad, I will miss him, but you and Mom gave me this chance as well.”
We would live a parallel life.
We lived in Australia, but our way of life at home was Italian.
I would go to school, English was my mother tongue, but Italian-Australians were a community bound by Italian culture.
Italians brought something valuable to Australia, culture, style…
The Made-in-Italy is a sign of Australian international openness.