dream

 

 

 

Two girls enterprising
 

We are in Italy, in the late '60s and early '70s. In a city of the North, in the student world we feel and breathe some electricity, almost palpable, it will affect almost all thoughts and actions and, as a result, our characters.
Two girls are attending High school, both of them are very good students. Their mindset seems to be made in order to observe and to have excellent results, which is why their parents are proud of them.

 

They spent this time of their lives in a really intense atmosphere. Because we are in the 70s as we said, considering those two cute girls, who used to read newspapers. They were informed on the various social and political events, approving or disapproving them. It is clear that they are protagonists of the time, and living a special moment that can be called historical, participating in various political and social demonstrations, which was characterizing this time. So, among a Beatles’ song and a

 

 

 Bob Dylan’s one. The TV news are all about the Vietnam war, Solidarity for claiming workers' rights, or against the war, student assemblies, self-management, the student revolt and of course their studies were conducted in a very profitable way, the girls spend time intensely studying and participating in street demonstrations, believing it could change the world in better or at least improve it a little.

 

 

It 's interesting that the human being, even if he wants to make improvements in the society, it’s hard to understand that any problems have a single source, selfishness. So considering that selfishness is something bad for everyone (it would be really childish to say that only others are selfish), those who really wants to improve something, should start by improving theirselves, trying to be altruistic (this is the great challenge , the real Jihad). But being altruistic seems not to be as satisfactory as pulling the police with stones from the pavement.

 

 

Girls with many interests

 

The social and political activities, however, were only a marginal part of their occupations. These girls had other interests as well, like foreign languages, they were really good on them, particularly English, it was natural for them to keep one eye to this country, England.  At the time there were football players (especially one) very-performing physically, as well as being British native, he used to attract the female audience. Evolving the concept in this sense, these girls could not limit their Anglo-Saxon passion solely on textbooks, but absolutely had to do something more, it was something that came from though.
After all this, the need to further refine the language comes out. And how? Going and living for some time in England, in order to acquire the perfect pronunciation (in addition trying to contact the famous soccer player, get an autograph and maybe who knows ....) because that language had to be spoken with a perfect prononciation, just like a native speaker of English.

 

 

Equal footing

 

What is difficult to understand is why, when an Englishman is in Italy and, although he cannot speak this Latin language fluently, it does not look bad, instead it seems to give her/him an aura of charm and very particular interest as a foreigner, but especially because his/her English origin. I wonder why is not the same thing for an Italian who goes to England and, because of some little mistakes betrays its Latin origin.
If an Englishman who does not speak a really fluent Italian, looks good in Italy, so it should be the same for an Italian who does not speak a really good English in England, here is a good subject and topic of study for a passionate about sociology or collective psychosis.

 

 

However, the two girls certainly not lost in these thoughts, one day decided to leave their native country. The official motivation was to improve their English, with other personal reasons too. They left for England, placed by an agency that dealt with these things, the study in this country.
The two girls once in England, first contacted the football player and after exhausting expectations (they were not the only fans of the football star) were able to get the autograph. One of the two girls, perhaps the most staid, was deemed satisfied and once that her lessons in England terminated, she went back to Italy by her parents with her little trophy, the autograph of the football player.

 

 

A guy who doesn’t give up

 

For the other girl instead, this  was just the first step, the beginning, she wanted something else from that football player. So for the parents of the girl, started a calvario, as  she didn’t want to come back in Italy as her friend did, even if the project with agency terminated, (his goal was simply to marry player) and continued to stand, along with other girls like her in front of the athlete’s house at all times, even overnight.
Almost every morning, the player used to do some jogging, to training himself. He get used to see these girls who were seeking him, he'll hardly notice them, over time, he realized that more or less were always the same girls. If he was in good mood he was smiling to them, but, instead, his mood wasn’t that great he was easily showing signs of nervousism. 

 

We must even understand that when a person is bothered almost daily, though for friendship reasons, it can be very stressful and annoying. Even if this girl was really good on her studies, she had some problems with mathematics, especially in the probability, that’s why she didn’t take into consideration the chance to be refused.
For the player side, things were seen from another point of view, this girl for him was only a fan, as many others. From the human point of view the footballer, was a man like everyone else, but from the social point of view, he couldn’t care a lot about them, because he was surrounded by those pretty girls, there were so many of them that even if she was very beautiful and attractive. This girl had neither a chance over a million to contact the athlete, and start a friendly relationship, the athlete had already his girlfriend.

 

 

To him she was just one like many other girls waiting for him in the morning. In the morning during his daily training, when he was in good mood used to say “hi” to the girl. The pain for the parents and the girl began as she started gradually feeling a great frustration because she failed with the athlete, but she did not give up. Her parents, however, beginning to be worried for their only daughter. She did not even gave them her address as once completed her studies, in order to continue to live in England, was forced to find a job as a bartender in London and to rent a shared house with other girls that wasn’t a 5 star residence. She used to change her place quite often but not always her parent were informed about that, she used to tell them that “everything is fine here, I’ll come back soon”.

 

 

It seemed to be a nightmare ending but ...

 

So this girl with a bright future ahead, with a really good family, loved by her parents, esteemed by everyone, surrounded by boys, found herself almost begging for some smile from the player, who found himself invariably if anywhere, leaving home, the gym etc.. while her life was a huge struggle, hard work, little pay and really unpleasant jobs, just to be able to stay in England and chase her dream.
Parents in one of those rare times that phoned her, managed to convince the daughter to go back to Italy. They hardly believed it!
They went to pick her up at the airport with great excitement, and finally the adventure, lasted too much for them, ended. But the happy moment lasted only a couple of minutes, as the girl, cuddled by her parents started to cry as she couldn’t understand why she was back, crying she said “what am I doing here? I want to go back in England, there’s where I want to live”.

 

 

The burden on her father was too much and trying not to listen her daughter, slowly reached a taxi.
Unfortunately, after few days, the girl decided to go back in England as her main purpose was to follow her dream. Once left, after a couple of weeks, the father get a seriously illness.
The girl, on the other hand, after different adventures working just to make ends meet, she gave up, as she understood that her dream was nearly impossible to be reached. But even if she couldn’t have a bright future with this football player she decided to stay and to keep working in UK as there everything was “better” than in Italy.

The father, in fact, increasingly desperate for her daughter, knowing her bad situation and her sad life abroad despite her promising future as a student was getting worst . The daughter instead was spending her time working in small pubs or fast food just to get the money for the rent (always shared with others girl)...

 

 

The right man at the right time

 

That's about to end, she knew a guy, of course English. She started liking him and after many talks she felt something more than a friendship.  The boy, after knowing that the girl had Italian origins, his interest for the girl increased a lot. This boy couldn’t believe that he was going out with an Italian girl, coming from the country of the sun, with the best cooking ever (with respect for the French, Chinese or American ones).
A country recognized as the kingdom of the beautiful singing, the typical Neapolitan songs, with its history and tradition, the festival of San Remo and so on.. In past the good sing was recognized as something purely Italian, so that was a natural for any musicians, Italian or foreign, to write the titles of their songs in Italian, as well as the signs of expression, adagio, forte, allegro, pianissimo, etc.., a bit as today with computers where everything is written in English.

 

 

Finally, this Englishman, started talking about marriage with the Italian girlfriend, but the first thing he made clear, was that once married, he would come to live permanently in Italy (for the parents the struggle, lasted about six years, could reach the end). Just fed up to go out with the umbrella at all time, as well as raincoat. They were bored of all the burgers, fries, fast food, pasta looking like “glue” with gray sky and sea.; For the English guy started a new life: sun, spaghetti tomato sauce or Bolognese, or even matriciana, or carbonara, tagliatelle, perhaps home-made ravioli and lasagna and pizza “four seasons”, as “mari e monti” and fine wines. The sea and the sky were always blue, and, with a bright sun together with a colourful, noisy and chaotic mess, with the usual misunderstandings and bureaucratic bottlenecks, typically Latin. Currently this couple teaches in school, they are two esteemed professors of English, they are happy to live in Italia......

 

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