Being Found Out

When I was 9 and on my fourth year of Elementary School I went back to class after 3 days absence due to a cold. My fellow students had learnt how to do long division during those three days.

The teacher ('Maestra Paola') asked one of my friends to explain to me how long division worked , whist she left the class for twenty minutes or so (to do God knows what).

Those were tough times in my class: Paola was going through some sort of family drama, and although we all were far too young to really understand what was going on - we all knew that she was always in an awful mood, and slaps had flown around the class pretty freely in the last few weeks. It got so bad that some of the students had faked illness the week we were being tested on the Italian verbs' structures. I seem to remember that I did too, but I am not totally sure.

That day Maestra Paola left the class and my friend Maria Ignazia started explaining to me how to do long division. I listened to her, silently, thinking that it was not so easy. I also thought that it was strange that the class was so quiet whilst the teacher had left - those really were tough times and we were all scared.

Then suddenly the door opened and Maestra Paola was back, that sour expression still on her face like she had some great worry on her mind.

When she came back the first thing she did was asking me if I had understood it.

' Getting there' I lied. I had in fact understood nothing about long division - I am not sure whether because my fellow 10 year old student had not been an outstanding teacher, or whether I could not get it first time around. Little did I know the price I would pay for giving that answer.

'Ok, let's see' Maestra Paola summoned me immediately to the big blackboard in front of the whole class to test me on long division. When she called my name I almost fainted: my heart started pounding in my chest, I started feeling weak in the knees. I slowly walked to the blackboard as if I was in a dream, took the chalk with shaky hands. I was a small child against a huge black background. I felt exposed and scared.

'Let see' she said ' 1256 divided by 17'.

I wrote 1256 : 17 on the board very slowly. The numbers appeared in front of my eyes like I had written them for the very first time. I underlined the 17 as though I was about to carry out the long division.

Then  I froze. I had no idea of what I was meant to do. I just stood there, my back to the whole class, looking at those numbers in a state of trance, my mind completely blank.  I might as well been in that state for five hours, rather than only a few seconds, for it felt like time had stretched.

I remember very clearly what happened next. Maestra Paola gave me a disgusted little smile. I looked at her, my face apologetic, tears threatening to pour out carried by the humiliation I felt.  I thought she might jump up from her seat and come and slap me. But she stayed put, her face like the face of someone who is experiencing something outrageous.

'Getting there?' she said ' Don't think so'. The whole class was mute. I felt one million eyes looking at me, pitying me. I just could not move. So I just stayed there.

There is very little doubt in my mind that the precise moment laid the foundations of the events that eventually drove me to become a Mathematician. Also, that day was the beginning of me freezing when someone asks me to divide the bill on the spot, or that nagging feeling 'of being found out' when I deliver something at work. I have learnt to manage this over the years once it dawned on me where it all came from.

It is very strange to realize that what we have become in adult age has been greatly influenced by 'Point in Time' experiences that we had had in the past.

Sometimes the big decisions we take or the way we live our lives are driven by desires such as 'proving people wrong'.
Whilst in this particular case the end result has brought ultimate positive change to my life, for many people those 'Point in Time' moments become traps they might not be able to escape for their entire life.

People that have been bullied, or have had some trauma in their childhood, or whatever - might feel the same. Sometimes those events were not even that traumatic, but perhaps back then we were not equipped to see things under the right light. These blocks might be very hard to overcome.

Unless. Unless we recognize them for what they are and find a place for them inside of us. That is why Self Awareness is so important in my mind (as I mentioned several times in this blog). Whilst traumatic or challenging things do happen, and some of them are outside our immediate control, it is very important that we know where we come from and why we are what we are. This is the only way we can gain perspective on why and how past events have affected us, and move on accordingly.

In other words, we cannot allow that 9 year old self (whose reactions and feelings are the feelings of a 9 year old child) to dictate forever how we will be twenty years later. We need to 'make peace' with those events and move on in the most positive way possible.

I read in a book that a good way to do so is to imagine our current self transported to that day the events took place and then imagining having a chat with ourselves from back then, telling them that everything will be ok and not to be so sad. In other words, reinterpreting those events as adults.

Whilst most of my regression fantasies from that day involve kicking Maestra Paola in the ass, I have also managed to stand by that froze and humiliated 9 year old, hold his hand and helping out solving that long division. As cheesy as it sounds - it helped me.

Point in Time events are like crossroads. They might lead us to take a direction we don't like. It is up to us and within our remit to recognize it and rectify, for we are ultimately the ones in the driving seat.

Coming From

Today I jumped on the 10M red bus on Oxford Street, near Taylor Square - destination Leichhardt, known for being one of the epicenters of the Italian community in Sydney.

It takes a while to get there, and whilst the bus was negotiating its was through the lower end of the CBD and the soulless expanses of Paramatta Road I wondered whether it has been a good idea after all.

However, as the bus stopped in Norton Road I was pleased I had made the 30 minutes journey. This area is lovely, and full of nice Italian cafes and restaurants where one can have some nice Southern European grab whilst people watching. The community here has gone at length to recreate a true Italian feel but somehow managing avoiding being tacky. This area includes an Italian Bilingual School for children and an Italian Forum: a Mall-like complex built around a courtyard where the architecture and everything else resemble Northern Italian towns. Gelaterias, Pizzerias and all the other -rias you can think of can be found in the area.  Another thing that I noticed was the travel agent showing a massive 'Alitalia' logo - perhaps people here are the last on Earth that opt for the disgraced airline! :-)

The Norton Road itself is buzzing with a relaxed European feel to it and I must say the locals really look Italian. The soft May light only added to the feeling of serenity.

I sat down at the charming Belli Bar and read my book in the autumnal sun, whilst sipping a velvety cappuccino and eating a lovely panino (roast chicken, tomatoes and spicy caramelized onions). Bliss. There I also started thinking about immigrant communities.

One interesting thing I've noticed when I moved over here (but that also applies to other emigrants' communities elsewhere) is how strong the identity of the different communities/social groups that have established themselves here is. Italian seem to be more Italian than people that currently live in Italy, The Chinese community in Chinatown is very strong, Christians seem to be more Christian, sports fans more macho fanatic, etc etc.

Starting from scratch in a place far way from where we come from can accentuate that longing for belonging that people feel. This must have been even more so when the significant waves of immigration started after WWII, bringing numerous hopefuls who endured a arduous journey to start a new life here. Back then 'being Italian' was probably one of the most important points of reference and certainties they had, and it opened up doors and networks upon arrival. In a way, those people represent a snapshot of Italy from the day they left the country.

The question of identity is something that has always fascinated me. When I went to boarding school it felt like any Italian patriotism was zapped out of me and replaced with what we called International Understanding. This is the simple and banal discovery that it doesn't matter where we come from: people are just people and more or less we all have the same basic needs and the same aspirations.  These needs and these aspirations are then shaped by the environment that we live in.We all eat, all work, all love, all hate, go to the toilet. We all desire happiness.

I always thought that the story of Babel's tower always exemplified how men are similar, and that the biggest walls between them is communication. .This issue has become over the years less of a determinant, thanks to the introduction of lengua franca such as English, Spanish and no doubt Mandarin.

When I was 16 at school it was like I stopped being Italian and I just become someone who had lived in Italy and had been shaped to that date by that environment. If you add to that 11 years in the UK and a couple of years travelling the world the end result is a man that does not feel like he is from anywhere in particular but that shares and buys into a lot of elements from the different cultures he was exposed to. To this day I never fail to feel anachronistic when I go back home. The strange thing is that back home people regard me almost as a stranger, whilst abroad people think of me as an Italian - I tend not to identify with either judgement.

I am obviously not unique in this: as we live in a world when people live everywhere and have simple access to knowledge, strong displays of identity and traditions (whether religious, cultural etc) become more and more misaligned with the overall melting One World trends.

Some people regard globalization as the negative process through which we are losing ourselves - however history seems to suggest that this is just the next stage of a process that has been going on forever. An example I can think of is the way the Roman Empire merged together so many different traditions (geographical, religious, cultural, etc) and then went on to dissipate (including the total death of its language: Latin). We have lost so many traditions, languages and religions through history and the underlying reason behind this is people and cultures melting together (albeit forcefully in many cases). Technology and modern life have only accelerated this process to the point that we can see it unfolding within the same generation rather than across several decades.

It's funny though as how we 'melt together' and become closer, we also become more lonely. Simplistically put, an Italian that emigrates now won't probably go to Little Italy as the first point of call - he or she will be able to access the resources they need anyway. They will also be able to communicate and overall they might find that things generally work the same way than back home, if not better. However, as their options expand they also shrink because they do not have any longer access to the comforting reassurance of belonging to a specific community. Their story is not of much interest and it probably resembles the story of so many people before them.

Whilst the lack of traditions does not bother me that much, from another side it does feel like I am missing something - Identity is after all a great place to hide when you don't want to define yourself by yourself. Perhaps that is all it is : a place to hide - a fancy dress to wear for a party where other people in similar fancy dresses are going. The easy option.

Loneliness might be the ultimate price to pay for togetherness.

As I sipped my cappuccino in Norton Road in Sydney and once again I failed to feel at home among the Italian community I let these thoughts bounce around in the autumnal sunshine, as though wishing for some clarity that was not to come.

Theory of Reinvention

In one of my previous entries (http://365daysoflondon.blogspot.com/2009/11/transitions.html) I explored the way people's lives change by moving through possible 'fates' that are defined by our own potential. Potential is meant as the collection of all the things that we can do or become, whether we fulfill those opportunities or not.

For instance, if we are very good at cooking (or we have a cooking qualification) it might be feasible for us to become chefs - i.e. we have got the potential of becoming a chef. This does not mean that we will, but still we could. The sum of all these potential is our destiny.
In a way, I argued that destiny is more or less a board game -like process, where the cells on the board represent the range of opportunities and potential that each of us have.

In the last few days I have been thinking about the process that we follow to move from one cell to the next in this board game. We can call this process transitioning.


It is obvious that moving from one state to the next does not happen within a second. Itself is a process through which we leave behind what we were and kick off our new phase.

If we were to distill the key elements that form this transition process we might be able to aide and accelerate it, in turn helping us moving forward more efficiently in life.

I thought about it in my own context: as we have moved from London to Sydney it has taken  us a few months to fully implement the change, i.e. leave our previous board game cell (life in London) and  fully start our new cell (new life in Sydney). These months were all about setting ourselves up for the future, but also closing a few chapters with the past.

The way people react to change that has been imposed on them has been largely documented in business literature through a 7 phase process.

However, here I am interested in how does one adapt to a voluntary radical change, and are there any ways someone can facilitate and speed up the process?

The first thing I have noticed about transition periods is that we do not know that we are experiencing one until it is over. I am obviously generalizing this to my own experience - but it seems natural that we don't know we are transitioning because we haven't yet experienced what the 'end of the tunnel' looks like or feels like, and hence only when we get there do we see what we have been driving towards. In a way, when we are transitioning we are buying lots of ingredients for a recipe that comes to life only at the very end.

In my own example, David and I have spent quite a lot of time opening bank accounts, finding a flat, figuring out jobs etc etc. Bizarrely, during our first few months here we did not dedicate a great deal of time partying or light heartedly go out there and explore - it almost felt like the time was not quite right yet until we were completely set up. Now that we are set up, I marvel about how little in many ways we have done during our transition period, waiting for the eggs containing our new life to hatch. We have recently done a lot of exploring as a result of having family guests staying on holiday, and it was interesting to see how many things we were doing for the first time ourselves.

You might have a similar feeling after you come out at the other side of life changing times, for instance whilst you try to change jobs,on your way back from a gap year, whilst you are training for a marathon, or dealing with the loss of a loved one.

The other thing about transitions is that it is very easy to lose the long term perspective of things. In my example, you might get overly frustrated about minutia like opening a new bank account. However, it is important to remind ourselves what really matters and what the end goal is. What will you remember of these days in 20 years time: surely not the frustrations in sorting out your electricity bills. Sometimes I find it useful to think how I will be telling this story in 20 years time - what are the things that will matter to me then? Probably the excitement of starting a new life with my dear Patata, of travelling through regions that I do not know very well, making new mates for life etc etc., rather than how upsetting and incompetent Sydney taxi drivers are!

Overall, I realized that often people put off positive changes they crave for because they are afraid or too focussed on that required transition phase, rather than the resulting new state that awaits us at the end of that process. We might become so focussed on the transition that we might lose track of where that transition is taking us - to the point that the transitioning and the end result might become the same thing in our mind. We call it losing weight, moving cities, changing jobs, saving money, etc. We need to remind ourselves that what really matters is a healthier life, enjoying a new city, feeling great about our new job, buying a new house, etc. that comes at the end of the process. So perhaps the most important thing in implementing positive change is having vision - i.e. taking time to fully understand where we are directed and why we want to get there, before putting our heads down and do what it takes to make it happen.

City Personalities

One thing that I have soon come to realise is how the different areas of Sydney have got their own personalities. These personalities are made of the specific lifestyle, type of people, environments, landscapes that each of these areas presents.

Whilst this is probably true for all major cities (London for instance is definitely divided along its N-S-E-W boundaries) in Sydney this is even more striking, and sometimes you feel like you are not just moving between different cities but more like different countries as you explore the different areas.

When we arrived to Sydney one of the first things we had to do was deciding where we would live. It was a pretty important decision (a) because we wanted our new life to give us stuff we could not get in London (b) because the area where you live really defines your lifestyle.

On a macro level, Sydney is divided between Western and Eastern burbs. The Eastern suburbs are the ones where it all happens - this is the area where young professionals, wealthy families, hedonists or simply urban chic lovers tend to live.

Within the Eastern burbs there are a number of neighborhoods ranging from the sea resort village feel of Bondi, to the cafe' culture paradise of Darlinghurst, to the soulless CBD, the chic and trendy Potts Point, the beach wealth families paradises of Double and Rose Bay, and more.

We ended up opting for Rushcutter Bay. This is a lovely en-cove of the meandering Sydney Harbour, characteristic for its lush park (alive with people playing rugby or having picnics) and a buzzing yacht club. It is located minutes from the chic restaurants and cafes in Potts Point and only a 45 minutes or less walk to the CBD where we both work. That walk is great for clearing your mind before work or processing the day just left behind.
It is also walking distance from the night life of Surrey Hills and Darlingurst, and the closest beach (with shark nets) is Redlef Pool, a mere 25 minutes walk towards Rose bay. Rushcutters Bay is lovely, and as many lovely things it does come with an inflated price tag. However, we have found this the perfect place to set up our new life in Sydney, for its 'personality' seems to match ours just fine.

Whether you live here or not, whether you are only visiting Sydney I advise to explore this area.

For tips on bars and restaurants in this area check out my TripAdvisor contributions at: http://www.tripadvisor.com/members-reviews/youngprofessionalUK

Builders

'We are all just like builders'.

 I told myself the other day, the winter sun at the same time framing me and annulling my contours in my balcony window. You know what I mean - when the sun is so brilliant and warm and the sky so blue that things seem almost to blur together. I closed my eyes and let the feeling take over. Rushcutters Bay was shimmering in the sunlight in what could have been a Montale's miraculous moment. Montale was an early XX century Italian poet I truly adore. He was a good mate of TS Elliott as well. He wrote cryptic verses to a hypothetical yet very real female listener.

The core of what he said is that we are all trapped in this reality of limits and boundaries. However, when the sun shines really hard, or when a day to day object manages to be charged with the magnetic strength of fate and things around it become almost ethereal, then the fabric that makes our prison might tear a bit- just a bit - and we might be able to jump out to a reality of inner peace and strength.

When I let the sunlight annul me on my balcony the other day I felt the clarity that I imagine might come in a moment of Montalian trans pass.
David and I have been in Sydney for about 5 months now, after a few weeks travelling through South America. It has taken a long time to start setting up our new life in this new city. The shadow of London was very real at the beginning, that lingering feeling that reminded us that we had a very well set up show there - whilst here it was all back to casting.

I missed the city that knew me, missed my friends and at times I doubted whether I had already spent my quota of adaptability in my 20s. However it has become apparent that whilst I had wanted the journey of my new life to start on a 'sit-com-style' high, journeys like these are journey's of self discovery. And by definition, in order to discover you need to negotiate your way through unknown equations, which are often not easy.

However, whilst the starting point might have been in some shady valley, the path was to take me all the way up to a sunny balcony.
We spent the first couple of months trying building an elusive routine made of basics: a place to stay, new jobs, meeting new people, discovering a new city and a new society. Day by day the pieces came together in terms of understanding where things where and how the different 'bits' of Sydney (starting from Potts Point, Bondi and the CBD) formed the overall picture. In many ways we naturally re-invented ourselves - evolving to the next stage as individuals and as a couple.

We made a point of building a life that could not be compared to what we had in London - a life made of stuff that only Sydney could offer: sea views for breakfast, walking to work, hours spent in sunny cafe's reading the paper, healthier bodies, walking to the beach. Suddenly that first phase had finished and we were happy and had a new show going on.

'We are like builders' I told myself the other day.  It's true. It seems to me that we spend our life building lives. Now the dilemma is that we are often really bad at predicting what will make us happy in the future. In our 20's we might think that a cabin by the lake by the age of 40 might be what will make us happy - so we might spend years saving for that cabin - but then when we turn 40 we might be totally different people and despise boring weekends by the lake.

So I was thinking that the trick might be making always sure that we focus on something that our 60 year old self would not regret having done (whether because of the resulting joy or the lesson learnt). The other day when the sunlight was engulfing me and Sydney was shining and everything in my life made sense, I thought that the 60 year old me will look at these days and smile.