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Oct 16, 2022Liked by Iona Italia

Good Morning Iona,

I’m sorry to hear you have come down with Covid and that it’s been a rough bit for you. Thanks for the repost it showed up this am right next to a new post from Mitra Martin who is a tango aquaintance,Iranian and also posting on sub stack. You might enjoy her work if you’ve got energy to read.

I hope you feel better soon!

G

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Thanks, Gretchen! x

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I can really relate to your story, mia cara signora. I was born in the US, but I am Tatar and Scottish, mostly. I moved around a lot, from the far North near the Canadian border, to Colorado, to South Carolina where I was briefly in the service, to Northern, Southern and the desert of California, and now at my permanent residence, Las Vegas, Nevada. My aunt, who lives next door, is from Colombia. I speak Spanish fairly fluently, and so I decided to learn Italian because it's fairly close to Spanish. I am also learning Japanese because I love the culture and the people (but not anime), Polish because I'm 1/8 Slav, and Russian, so I can help my brothers and sisters in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Crimea learn English, as they all want to learn Russian first. I have a friend in Bangladesh, so I've been dabbling in Bangla as well. It can be a small, closely connected and loving world if we want it to be...

"Donna, se' tanto grande e tanto vali,

che qual vuol grazia e a te non ricorre

sua disianza vuol volar senz'ali." <3 <3 <3

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I don't speak Italian, but I can get the gist of that: thank you! (I'm not Italian. Ita-walla = Mason, a common Parsi surname). Sounds like a fascinating mixture of languages and cultures.

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I thought you might be Italian too! ☺️

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If you're asking me, I'm Italian in spirit :) I'm actually Crimean Tatar, mostly

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It shows how arbitrary it all is, doesn't it?

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नमस्कार It's a quote from Dante's Paradiso. I think it applies to many situations. Paradiso is an incredibly insightful and hopeful missive. People always focus on and quote from Inferno, not realizing that Purgatorio and Paradiso complete the Divine Comedy. If you are interested, Mark Musa's dual English-Italian translation is the best I've found so far. You are a donna, a beautiful lady. I wish you well लवकर बरे व्हा

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Oh no, I'm so very sorry that you've fallen ill. And I wish you a speedy and thorough recovery. Con i migliori auguri, Bi'aru

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Thank you!

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