by Janice Nigro This week, well, I believe we are into week 4 of lockdown in California and about to enter into week 5. I'm writing this at 72 hours without leaving my apartment. It starts to be a real test of the stretch of your imagination on what you can do and what there... Continue Reading →
The Lockdown Diaries: Enlightenment
by Janice Nigro I’ve been doing my part during the lockdown. Staying indoors for most of my days. Fooling myself that I am doing some exercise in 500 square feet of space. Working on my projects. It’s kind of business as usual for me. Marketing, writing, and editing. Although it's harder for me to remember... Continue Reading →
The Lockdown Diaries: Another perspective
by Janice Nigro I’m not sick and I hope the dreaded coronavirus (or any other disease) is not currently taking up residence inside your body. I’m not enjoying this particular period of time in American history for many reasons. But there’s another way to look at all of this. It’s as if the whole world... Continue Reading →
Discovering the meaning of dim sum in Seattle
by Janice Nigro Being a nomad is great. Until you realize that your closest friends live nowhere close. So when the last minute opportunity came up a few weekends ago to travel to Seattle to see some friends from the USA who I met in Norway and now live in Tasmania, I took it (yes,... Continue Reading →
“Slow” connecting
by Janice Nigro Anyone who knows me, knows I love the subtleties of language. I can spend hours, even years, focusing on a word that seems well, funny to me. Many come from the misuse of words that my international friends will make. It’s not meant to make fun, or funny (as they will say),... Continue Reading →
Falling in love with Napoli in a pastry shop
You can often recall the precise moment you fall in love. Sometimes the match looks good on paper and the connection is immediate. And sometimes it comes out of nowhere and hits you like a ton of bricks. There are no birds singing or harps playing, but your basic chemistry changes from a blip for... Continue Reading →
The bonus you get from living overseas
by Janice Nigro The idea of living overseas always captivated me. I imagined myself speaking a second language fluently and sharing my life with a man with an accent. I derived this cliché of a fantasy from some combination of movies, National Geographic, my Sicilian background, and Spanish class in 5th grade. I blew an... Continue Reading →
Please humor me while I try to learn your language
I didn’t think too hard when the taxi driver in Sorrento (Italy) asked me what I had for dinner. The words just rolled off my tongue. “Pasta ai frutti di mare.” I don’t remember how my travel companions responded. All I remember is what Bartolo the taxi driver said next. “Buon italiano!” “Good Italian!” I... Continue Reading →
Home is where my pasta machine is
by Janice Nigro A plane is that modern vehicle of irony, speeding you through the air at times to areas of the Earth that might still be in the stone age. Or at least into another apparent universe where we don’t understand the language, we don’t look like anyone else, and we don't have the... Continue Reading →
Confessions of a lazy traveler
by Janice Nigro What is the craziest excuse you have ever used for traveling somewhere? I am guessing it wasn’t to play in a rematch for eisstockschiessen. Yes, it was a rematch for eisstockschiessen (an ice game but not curling) that compelled me to travel to Germany in potentially the worst part of winter, for... Continue Reading →