June 2004

Being Bilingual is Good for Your Brain

June 20, 2004

There is a deep-rooted superstition among some Italian doctors and teachers that raising a child bilingual causes the child problems, such as slower overall language development, and academic problems later in school. Fortunately, I never fell for that line, as I had done my homework about bilingualism while still pregnant (above). And it doesn’t stand [...]

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Shotgun Wedding 1: Tanzania Surprise

June 20, 2004

In January Enrico and I had one of our 15th anniversaries. May 28th was our other anniversary, the one we more often celebrate. Confused yet? Let me explain. As I recounted in that earlier story, in the spring of 1988 we had decided that we should get married. We didn’t actually tell anybody about this [...]

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Shotgun Wedding 4: Justice of the Peace

June 20, 2004

I took a charter flight to Rome, full of Italians who had been on safari vacations in Tanzania and Kenya. I loved flying over Africa, looking down on the Sahara, a vast expanse of sand with some mysterious geographical features that I couldn’t identify. Then we flew over the Mediterranean. The Kenyan crew spoke no [...]

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The Historic Villas of Bergamo

June 10, 2004

^ courtyard of Palazzo Terzi Italy, like England, has its share of stately homes, and of owners who can’t afford to maintain them. So some clever person came up with the idea to open to the public some of the historic villas of Bergamo, for a limited time. None of these places is so amazing [...]

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School “Mortality” in Italy

June 5, 2004

Today is the last day of school (in Lombardia). Making the local headlines yesterday was a 14-year-old girl who threw herself off a bridge, because she knew she would fail her first year of high school. Her reaction is both extreme and unusual, because failing one or more years of high school – any high [...]

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The Family That Eats Together

June 2, 2004

The other night I attended a party of Americans, with their Italian significant others and families. One American remarked that the kids present were amazingly polite, well-spoken, and self-possessed, compared with American kids of the same ages. He was right, but I hadn’t particularly noticed, because it’s what I’ve grown to expect. I have written [...]

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Freakin’ at The Freakers’ Ball

June 2, 2004

San Francisco’s Folsom Street Fair A few years ago, a friend took me to San Francisco’s Folsom Street Fair, “the world’s largest leather event.” No, they’re not selling purses. The Fair is the culmination of Leather Week, “a seven-day celebration of all things leather and kink! Each year, the week before Folsom Street Fair is filled [...]

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Macho Animals …with Artificial Testicles

June 2, 2004

My friend Sara runs the Prevent a Litter Coalition, an American charity promoting spaying and neutering of pets, to prevent unwanted litters of puppies and kittens being born and (often) abandoned, abused, or euthanized because shelters cannot find good homes for them. From Sara I learned about Neuticles, fake testicles for neutered pets – so [...]

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