sebastiano's activity

it's curious that Adriatica brought this up today because i have just been called by the police,the reason being two british people stayed with us but they claimed the only documents they had with them were British driving licences because they had left their passports in Faenza.As there was no choice itook the licence details and filled in the rest of the form as always The next day the  questura a called to tell me off more than sternly that we may NOT take ANY guests who are not in possession of either a valid passport or a valid identity card DRIVING LICENCES including Italian ones are not acceptable as proof of identity in that the issuing authority in italy the !motorizzazione in uk DVLA do not have the "juridic capacity to establish identity"

yes, you're right too!! ,i was probably preaching well etc as we had no parameters at all..! survived and surviving.i guess it was for those people who had no particular idea of where they were actually going.Those who 8 months down the line complain of the lack of services,adsl,thai restaurants (sorry no thai's),marmite and so on or even that the"investment" can reveal itself "flawed"because the eventual return on an eventual sale may not even be equivalent to the total investment.As far as "moving on " is concerned sometimes thats easier said ...it can be very tough and wrenching leaving a place where one has friends, feels affection and is used to being.As one gets older this gets even harder personally i'd find it hard to move to say Lazio or even Abruzzo and rea dapting to a whole new series of life "codes"even though they are only neihbouring regions..Actually i think Penny has an important point,the question of income and work.Because if one doesn't have really significant funds or a more than golden pension this is an expensive country.

actually a more interesting question than it might seem (with no offence intended of course)IF one is simply looking for a place for some kind of holiday home then almost anywhere is fine if you like it.However if the intention is to relocate and live and or retire to some place then it's more complex.Personally as i don't care for the area i came from i would never choose to live there (simply for questions of origin or family presence).Of course,and i certainly FEEL this that there are places which grab one,a sort of visceral attachment in other words a place one really likes MAY be a good enough reason.if one is changing country then a lot of other issues come into the arguement.It could be a good idea to construct some kind of check list which takes in as many parameters as one wants.things like connections to the rest of the country/world ie.motorways,airports,roads.Town or country is as big a question as it would be in the UK there's a big difference between a market town in the south of england and a remote location in central wales for example.services may be an issue,like are there any /some or good if one is going to get older it's useful to know that there is an excellent hospital at least within 100km of the place.climate is more of an issue than many believe...everywhere's nice in August but many parts of Italy enjoy(or suffer) from long very cold almost continental (as opposed to mediteranean)kinds of winter with few people around snow heavy rain and high heating bills!northern toscana for example certainly gets plenty of winter rains.things like cuisine and landscape can be good or great in almost any italian region but try and find out what if any development programmes there may be for any chosen area you might not want to find yourself in a dream location with an out of the box shopping mall next door ten years down the line,most of all as you say you're a couple it might be better if you are BOTH convinced of your eventual choice as life can be difficult at times.anyway good luck it was just a few thoughts on the question.

it's suprising how many wild animals eat fruit.Foxes love cherries also grapes,figs and apparently cachi.when we had a small vinyard the bottom grapoli were regularly cleaned by foxes and badgers.last year i placed a line of cachi on top of the thermic cover to our iacuzzi to mature sheltered from birds/hornets and so on, after a few days i saw there were only a couple left ,initially i presumed my neighbour had taken some for his wife ...no problem i thought..then the next day there were none when i went close up there was a "neat "fox shit  left on the  cover ...must have thought it was christmas!..

yes,they're wonderful aren't they.i got bitten once after saving it from the mouth of our cat...but i'm still  here.. they eat a lot of unpleasant insects..they are getting more rare as they are easily victims of intensive agriculture and pollution but fortunately there are quite a lot around still in the marche.if you watch them you can notice that differently from the wall lizards these have articulated limbs and walk rather than slither..As ignorance is always free and abundant our builders used to kill them asserting they were dangerous/venomous etc but they are totally harmless.

yes,it's true.whilst many have less time during the spring/summer months i suspect that some people have gravitated into facebook.Personally i don't "like" facebook which ifind invasive whereas here one can just come in read or comment and it's not thrown in your face like these "social network sites" apart from these i haven't found many/any really good sites as an alternative..

yes, despite illeagal hunting there are plenty of Roebuck around they're the small brown "deer" with white bums.The istrici which the regional government brought in to repopulate them seem to prosper on our and neighbouring cultivations to the point that i know quite a few people who have shot and eaten them.... it's too early for fire flies and certainly too cold at the moment they are usually found in june with the ripening grain but die off after the harvest there are a lot of migratory birds around at the moment like the pairs of little tortorelle (they look like tiny pigeons) and like to fuff around in the middle of quiet roads, the "lupopa" is also back a strange cockatoo looking bird with a crest on it's head. two years ago the regional government helicoptered here baskets of vipers (for repopulation!?) i hope they threw a few into their Ancona gardens too!

is what has already been said but if you live here on a more or less permanent basis and more importantly if you work (generate your income here) then you have to become resident.current tax rates are higher than the uk,on top of which you will have nat social contributions to pay and other incumbancies.if you are not living here at least the amount of time that consitutes living somewhere and you don't work here then you're better off where you are.

yes, it's not only a story of inertia.it appears that with the new instruments at the disposal of the agenzia del territorio ( ex catasto) now available to the comuni ( who are of course anxious to raise any possible new funding) they have revised their rubbish taxation.An example our cleaning lady's family have been regularly paying their annual rubbish tax to date.Now they have received too a demand for 2004 but this is extra to what they already paid.it seems that aerial photographs have "spotted" what is in fact 4 poles with an undulated tin roof and this is added to their main house increasing it's value/size and hence their rubbish tax, now they say they're going to pull it down but the photo/tax demand remains anyway...basically it's a lose-lose situation...ours hasn't come thru yet but we're waiting for the suprise....so every time you see those low flying copters and planes you can be pretty sure they're spying on your henious crimes...sheds..outbuildings...lean to's and various..!..how do you stand for sheds and pergolas's capo?

As some info only now is available on what went on over the last ten days.it turns out that ENEL had to bring into parts of the prov. of fermo and ascoli 45 big 100kw generators.until yesterday our supply which returned only last saturday has been coming from one of these whilst the lines were repaired.it turns out that "our" generator was consuming 4.5 quintali of diesel a day (450kg.) so no wonder they were in a hurry to repair the lines.However other problems have started to emerge.Whilst they have managed to clear the two landslips blocking two of our access roads large potentially dangerous cracks have started to appear on these roads of which a part has collapsed and whilst movement continues could close a number of roads in the area.this just at a moment in which local authorities (comuni/provincie) don't have the resources to face these big jobs.one of my neighbours 84 yrs it appears will have to leave his house which could be swept away shortly if this big landslide continues to form this would mean that the S.P.239 -FERMO-AMANDOLA could be closed presumably for several months (just above the turn off for Monte San Martino)will inform later on developments as it also means we'll hardly be able to get out either.....