I thought it would have been easy

I left more than one year ago thinking I could shut all my Italian life in one bag and forget about it.

I left after making peace with those unchangeable vices with which my country is filled, but it was that kind of temporary break one allows to somebody they don't want anything more to do with.

I left filled with prejudices on my people, already looking forward to that land I filled with good things and dreams to fulfill.

Then I arrived overseas, in that land which used to offer a bunch of opportunities and which now hates immigrants because they steal jobs to Canadians.

I arrived in that land where not only the weather is cold, but the people as well, as long as you don't know them.

I went to see Bon Jovi's concerts and the very first thing I was told was “Who says you can't go home?”

I went to see NBA matches, but then I would suffer while following the web report of Reyer's matches, my hometown team, while my girlfriends showed me our little stadium via Skype.

I went out for dinner with the Italian community, only to be told how jealous Canadians are of that bond that keeps us Italians connected to our home country, no matter what.

I celebrated Italy's Birthday preparing a well-known speech and listening a thousand times to "Buonanotte all'Italia" (“Goodnight Italia”) while crying for rage for that little country that could not manage to wake up.

I came back shutting my ears at the nonsense of the know-it-all's, fed up with the ignorance of those usual Italians standing at the bus stop.

Then I went back in person to our stadium, realizing that we're the only people in the world to clap while singing the national anthem, as if we were at a street festival or something.

And maybe the only modern country to accept dictatorships for a while, to then wake up from time to time.

A country that maybe is finding the guts to express its own opinion, even if it's not what everybody would expect.

A country where -contrary to what prejudices say- many things work as well as, if not better than, in the rest of the world. A country that will maybe be able to keep the “shift” pressed and call itself a Country.

I thought it would have been easy to break that bond and forget I'm Italian. Instead now I want to be one of those Italians who stay and fight. Because “even if in Italy there's not much, you can always find something to do!”