Have a (hot?) Halloween!

Buongiorno a tutti!

This Brit is now back from being a curator for the Twitter account @I_am_Italy. What an amazing experience it was to be in touch with and reach out to so many people about what it feels like to live in Italy, and what Italy means to me. I tweeted a lot about the wonderful region where I live, Puglia, and of course, Italian food was a big topic of conversation. No surprises there! :D

But now your blogger has returned. What's new in Italy? I hear you ask. Well, dear readers, it seems as though the Autumn is yet to take my little southern town in its grasp. During the late morning and afternoon, you would be forgiven for thinking that we were still in August, as temperatures have been reaching 30 degrees C. However, everyone here is just waiting for the day where it all changes....from summer to winter in one fell swoop. We will go from wearing a t-shirt to a heavy jacket in the space of 24 hours. So I'm enjoying these last drops of sunshine while I can...

In other news, it is of course Halloween, so I will leave you all with the trailer for the classic 1977 Italian horror film Suspiria by Dario Argento (in both Italian and English).....have a good one!!

I am Italy.

Hello folks!

I hope you're all having a smashing weekend; full of fun and frolics and other non-work related activities!

I'm afraid that this week I shall be temporarily abandoning you. But never fear! As I will be taking part in a very exciting project; namely the I_am_Italy Twitter project (@I_am_Italy, iamitalyontwitter.wordpress.com/about ). For seven days, I have the privilege of curating this fantastic account, and reaching out to over 2000 followers about my views on all things Italian (as well as prompting others to share their views too). So, I hope you will all come and pay me a visit, follow the account and find out more about a little thing called #RotationCuration (nope, I didn't know what it was either!)


Ciao for now!

You can't find THAT in Italy!

Recently I had a conversation with one of my Twitter friends about tea. Yes, see how British we are; even our conversations revolve around our national beverage! Anyway, needless to say, this conversation about tea soon led to a conversation about biscuits (we both bonded over being chocolate digestive fans), which then led to an idea. And then subsequently to True Blood and Alexander Skarsgard's perfect body...but that's another topic entirely. But back to that idea. How about finding out (via some lovely fellow expats on Twitter) about the foods that we really miss while we're in Italy, and then writing a blog about it? Well, here is that blog. Be prepared to get really hungry. And possibly even book that flight back to the UK asap. Yes, we may have incredible gelato, delicious pizza, creamy mozzarella and tomatoes to die for here in Italy, but let's face it...everyone needs a good pork pie every now and then...

Behold, dear readers, the definitive list of food we really miss (in no particular order). Yes we know, you can get substitutes here, or put something together yourself but...well, it's just not the same is it...

• crisps: cracked black pepper and sea salt, roast chicken, prawn cocktail and sweet chili, in particular
• beans on toast
• fish, chips, mushy peas
• Assam tea and Tetley tea
• crumpets (this is also one of my personal choices)
• pork pies
• fish pie
• mint Aero (yes!)
• real bacon with brown sauce (it'd be ketchup for me!)
• steak pie
• saveloys
• English sausages
• cheddar cheese and Wensleydale cheese
• raspberry and white chocolate biscuits
• cinnamon bagels
• jam doughnuts
• Thai curry
• Greg's sausage rolls and Cornish pasties
• Cadbury's chocolate
• Ribena
• Marmite
• Galaxy chocolate
• Irn Bru
• orange Club biscuits
• chocolate hobnobs

Any other expats out there, what foods do you really miss while out of your home country? And here's a tip from us: try Lidl! Sometimes you can find a sneaky packet of cheddar cheese lurking in the fridge section...

I'd like to thank my wonderful Twitter followers for helping me with this *super* important research, in particular the #britpack. Read more about this excellent little group here, over at my friend Ali's blog.

Cilento and friends...

Are you a Twitter user? If the answer to this is yes, then first of all make sure you click the little button over to the left and start following me ;) Secondly, if you do like to use Twitter, then you may well have made the bold and exciting move of actually meeting up in person with a new found online companion. I am proud to say that this weekend I did just that.

After having decided to spend a relaxing couple of days in the beautiful part of Italy that is Cilento, I realised that two of my favourite Twitter people live right in the area. Cue some frantic tweeting and lots of excitement, and our Twitter date was set up! The lovely couple in question are Ali (@cilentoangel) and John (@Cilentoman), who I have had the pleasure of knowing for over half a year now, and have been living in Cilento for almost 3 years. Needless to say, I was thrilled to have the chance to meet them, but also a little bit nervous too!

I really needn't have worried at all, because right from the moment we met, we just clicked! With a big grin, John bounded up to me and introduced himself, before I launched at Ali with a massive cuddle! I introduced my boyfriend who I had brought with me, and we all went for a little drink before heading to a big family run restaurant for some tasty pasta. The men, being typical men, had a big plate of grilled meat of course!

The evening was finished off perfectly with a stroll and a gelato. When it came to saying goodbye, I really didn't want to! But it was lovely to have finally met these two wonderful people, and I absolutely can't wait to meet them again!

Unfortunately, we were having such a good time, that we forgot to take even one photo. So I will leave you with some wonderful views from the place me and my man stayed at in Cilento (http://www.borgoriccio.com/)

Have a great week everyone, and get organising your Twitter meet up asap! :)