Ciao from Rome! Here we are with another month, another editorial, another wonderful magazine about Italy, from your friends at We the Italians!
Representing We the Italians, I recently had the honor to attend a special presentation about the new Italian Strategic Plan for Tourism 2017-2022. This is a very important document that brings a brand new concept and design to the Italian offer towards tourists all around the world. During the presentation We the Italians learnt several interesting facts about Italy. Three brief pills: 2 millions visas are granted every year by the Italian Ministry for Foreign Affairs to enter Italy; Italy is the #1 country on Instagram with 54 millions of photos; the 24% of the tourists that visit Italy come from outside Europe, 11,7 millions of them are Americans. We can do way better, and We the Italians is working on it … stay tuned. For now, you can download reprint and share the Plan from here (in English).
On July 3rd a great Italian actor has died. Paolo Villaggio has been perfectly describing through the decades a very important part of our country, with its flaws and its big heart. His main character, Ugo Fantozzi, was a bittersweet interpretation of several topics the Italians have been struggling with through the years: it did not describe the whole country (no character could) but it meant very much to the Italians. In the October of 2015, our Italian Cinema column on our online magazine told the Italians who live in the US a little bit about this wonderful character, played by an exceptional artist. You can read the article from October 2015 here. Thanks Paolo for the hundreds of bitter laughs you gave us.
A day after Paolo Villaggio's death, July 4th, was not always the 241st anniversary of the United States of America, that We the Italians celebrated with a little American party here in Rome. July 4th 2017 was also Fiat 500 60th anniversary. This is another icon of the Italian culture of the last decades, a car that almost any Italian family has had at least once in its history: I remember my mother driving me to school on ours! Please take a look at this beautiful video celebrating this important anniversary, starring the Oscar winner Adrian Brody and the beautiful Italian actress Anna Manuelli.
Last but not least, please let me present you a very important project regarding Columbus. We the Italians has been asked by the very committed Italian Americans, who are behind this project, great people we have the honor to call friends, to spread the word as much as we can about it through the Italian American community. This is their message: "Across the United States, many cities and states no longer celebrate Columbus Day. It’s simple to help preserve this important day with Emojitalia, a brand new keyboard and emoji app that lets users across the country have their voice heard. Go to www.emojitalia.com now to download!" Please, don't forget to do that. Let's defend Columbus as much as we can.
Just a reminder about our new book. At the beginning of every year we will publish a yearbook about the year before, and so this is the We the Italians 2016 yearbook: with all the interviews done, both in English and Italian. It is a useful tool to know more about Italy and the US and also to learn or refresh the knowledge of our wonderful Italian language. It can be bought and/or donated here.
We encourage you to join us in our social media presence: Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube!
That’s all for now. So stay tuned, fasten your seat belt and enjoy the ride. The future’s so bright, we gotta wear shades!