Asklemmy

47100 readers

2382 users here now

A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions

Search asklemmy 🔍

If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!

Open-ended question
Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
An actual topic of discussion

Looking for support?

Looking for a community?

Lemmyverse: community search
sub.rehab: maps old subreddits to fediverse options, marks official as such
!lemmy411@lemmy.ca: a community for finding communities

~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de~

founded 6 years ago

MODERATORS

101

Thinking of immigrating to Italy - am I insane? (lemmy.world)

submitted 5 days ago by AHamSandwich@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

111 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Hi all! This is an alt for anonymity. Please be gentle, this is a hard topic for me to discuss.

I'm a progressive United States citizen who is looking to get out. I'm of Italian descent so I'm working on getting Italian citizenship through jure sanguinis, but it's going to take some time, if it works at all (gotta substantiate some relations) and won't extend to my husband until he completes a citizenship test, which he can do after living in Italy for two years.

Here's my big question: is moving to Italy even a good idea?

I know there's a significant element of fascism there, but that seems to be the case to varying extents throughout Europe. I've visited a few times as a tourist and everyone was very kind. I also have a US cousin that lives there as a permanent resident near Napoli and she is very encouraging, saying people will be welcoming. We don't want much, just to make a living and maybe have a kid.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] AHamSandwich@lemmy.world 6 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Thank you so much for a very helpful and detailed response. We're both planning on working remotely and we'd actually prefer to live outside of the cities. I'm good at learning languages and my husband is bilingual and excellent with accents, so we will work at being fluent in the language of wherever we settle.

In your opinion, can we ever be fully accepted by any Italian community or will we always be "that (hopefully) nice American couple". I worry because we're missing all the cultural touchstones gained from growing up in Italy. We've been advised to be persistently nice with neighbors and that bigger cities will have English speaking immigrants we can meet up with, but we really want to integrate, acknowledging it'll take time and effort. Do you think that is possible?

[–] Damage@feddit.it 4 points 4 days ago (1 children)

We’re both planning on working remotely and we’d actually prefer to live outside of the cities.

Meaning you already have jobs lined up for this? Remote work in Italy is not uncommon but not super common either, and usually it's not full remote. Be aware that many areas of Italy have poor connection speeds.

can we ever be fully accepted by any Italian community

I don't see why not. Maybe focus on being yourselves rather than what you want to be seen as! Of course making new friends as adults always presents challenges, anywhere, but Italians are known to be friendly and outgoing.

[–] AHamSandwich@lemmy.world 3 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Meaning you already have jobs lined up for this?

Yeah, we already work remotely. My employer is fine with my working anywhere in the world. My husband's employer isn't, but he's working on new employment. We can survive on my income alone.

Maybe focus on being yourselves rather than what you want to be seen as!

Thanks, that's the plan! We're both friendly and outgoing, I think more than most Americans, so I'm hoping that helps.

Thanks again for the info and your encouragement. We experienced a lot of xenophobia when we previously asked on Reddit, so this has been really refreshing.

[–] Damage@feddit.it 3 points 3 days ago

If you need anything else let me know! Godspeed.