Buongiorno amici,
Wishing you all a belated buon anno or happy new year! We started 2023 in Australia with my family after nearly four years away from home and it was as joyful as you can imagine to be reunited with my loved ones and introduce my partner to everyone.
We got back to Rome this weekend and decided to go for a huge walk from our house to the centre, passing our favourite monuments like the Colosseum, saying ciao to the Spanish Steps and buongiorno to Piazza del Popolo. Rome welcomed us back with blue skies devoid of rain and minimal crowds - winter is such an underrated time to visit, but I think it might be one of my favourite times of year here.
We racked up about 15,000 steps and suddenly we were starving. We passed Castel Sant’Angelo and the Vatican, not wanting to pop in anywhere too touristy for our first meal at a restaurant but finally we were too hungry and tired to care what we ate too much. ‘Let’s try that place down the steps’, I said to Andrea, ‘It looks busy!’
The food gods were looking after us because it was none other than Roscioli Rimessa (arguably one of Rome’s best restaurants) and every table in the house was full….bar one! We sat down to a plate of creamy burrata and anchovies on Roscioli’s delicious fresh bread, a bowl of cacio e pepe and a glass of red wine from Lazio and suddenly we were home.
I’ve thought a lot about the meaning of home over the last month and identity and belonging. What it means to call more than one place home, and how you fit in somewhere when you’re not from the same culture. Have you found yourself in the same boat before? I would love to hear your thoughts on this topic.
Whilst Australia will always be home for me, our trip back made it clear to me that Italy is also home for me too, even if I wasn’t born here or didn’t grow up in an Italian family. I found myself missing life in the piazza, a plate of inexpensive but incredible pasta, the rattle of coffee cups at our local bar, listening to the lyrical sing-song language, the incredible soft Roman light that has to be seen to be believed, chats in the sunshine with our Roman neighbours, and overwhelmingly, the sense of community we have found in just six months in our daily life here.
There’s more to be unpacked here than these few sentences, but for now, I like to think perhaps I can take the best from both of my homes and cultures…
But onto the real reason I’m writing to you from the throes of jetlag! There are a few exciting things happening this week that I didn’t want you to miss out on. Scroll down to find out what’s happening!
WIN an Untold Italy Tour in 2023
This is huge and the competition ends on January 25th - so don’t think, just enter! Simply answer a few questions in our fun Italy quiz and you'll discover the Italian region that best suits you to go in the draw to win. You’ll also receive a travel guide for the region you matched with, so everyone is a runner-up really!
Learn Italian with Intrepid Italian - SALE
You might remember I’ve spoken about my Australian Italian friend Michele from Intrepid Italian before and her amazing online language courses to learn Italian? Well, I wanted to let you know that now’s the time to buy one of her courses because they’re on sale this week for a limited time only.
Any of her courses are on sale for $347 OR take up her special offer of 2 courses and receive another free course, a bonus gift AND a 12-month Mondly subscription for free (language learning app that offers 40+ languages).
Whether you’re learning Italian for travel, or wanting to start from a beginner or intermediate perspective, I can’t recommend Michele’s online courses enough. If you’re planning on traveling to Italy, you’ll get so much out of this!
Visit Italy with me in 2023
Are you planning on living a little la dolce vita this year? We’re offering more Untold Italy tours this year, including some new and exciting regions that weren’t on offer in 2022. Take a peek at what’s in store via the links below:
Umbria in Summer
That’s it for now! Wishing you all a wonderful week and I’ll be back soon with more updates from the Eternal City in 2023.
x Liv
Love getting your newsletter with updates. Thank-you for your knowledge shared and taking us on your journey. Hopefully we can catch up later in the year when I get back up to “my home away from home”