A memoir: the perfect gift
“A memoir is a unique present. I wished I had known more about my nanna, but it is too late now. The costs would not have been a problem. If all my siblings had put in a hundred dollars, we would have had her story to be kept for generations to come.”
The untold story of Uncle Jan and Aunty Nel
I am thinking about my Uncle Jan and Aunty Nel. They lived in a very modest home and had a very humble life. We visited them regularly because they had no other relatives. For their birthdays we would give them something luxurious, usually Chanel perfume or a Davidov aftershave. When uncle Jan started “When I was young…” and the shoebox with photos was put on the table, it was time to go home. So boring. Now I regret that I never paid any attention to their life story. After they passed, my brother looked after their possessions and finances. He found out they had more than half a million euros in the bank. Cleaning up their house, we found dozens of Chanel perfumes and Davidov aftershave. They were unwrapped. I believe they would have been very willing and proud to have their story told and captured in a memoir. It would have been more valuable than all the luxuries in the world.
My Italian Family
The following excerpt is 586 words
“If I could just help one person, make a difference in the life of that one person, I would be so grateful,” Silva says with a determined voice, her bright eyes wide open. “I’ve been through a lot, but I have learned to deal with it. I really love my life, love myself and love where I am. But that took a lot of work.” Because Silva is petite, these bold words have an even bigger impact. Here is a power lady, a healer, a coach. A woman shaped by a difficult history but transformed to be a confident leader.
Silva and her twin sister are the middle of an Italian family. Two elder brothers and two younger brothers complete the Ratno family. Father Vito Ratno and mother Roza Ratno migrated to Australia in 1951 because of the poor situation Italy was in after the second world war. Australia was a land of promise, space, opportunity. “My parents came to Australia and basically knew nothing. Especially my dad wanted a better life for us. We never had that conversation, but we just went. My dad was a clever man. He looked around and said, ‘Wow, we’ve got all this, all this land, the beauty of the beaches, the rain forests, the fertile soil to grow vegetables.’ To him that was freedom.”
Many Italian migrants found work in the sugar cane fields, others in tobacco farms. The Italians were initially seen as non-white: Not black, but not white either. It took until the seventies before Italians were fully integrated and Italian names were found in business, politics and society, and words as spaghetti, pasta, zucchini, pizza, gelato, cappuccino, and vino were part of the everyday experience of the Queenslanders. Most of the Italians settled in Queensland, just like the Ratno family. “We settled in Mareeba, in Northern Queensland and two aunties and uncles with their children joined our family. Mareeba was known for its tobacco farming and that was what we did.” No-one in the family spoke English. Italian was the language spoken at home, with family and friends. “I only
learned English when I went to primary school, at the age of five,” Silva says, “But at home, we still spoke Italian. Even when I talk to my mum these days, Italian is the language we use.”
Working on the tobacco farm was not seasonal. “It was not that we only worked when it was time to harvest. There was work all year around. And the whole family was involved.” It was estimated that it took 450 hours of human labour to grow, harvest and process one acre of tobacco plants to be ready for the market. Tobacco seedlings were first planted in seed beds late winter. Ninety days after, they were transplanted to land with better soil, ploughed by a mule or horse. The tobacco seedlings were then planted by hand, one at the time and the beds were kept free from weeds. Silva, as young as she was, also worked on the tobacco farm. “In July or early August, the hottest time of the year, the harvest began. Can you imagine? The hot, humid weather? And us working in a barn?” In the barn the leaves were strung onto sticks for curing. The leaves were tied on to long sticks by hand with cotton twine, with about a hundred leaves per stick. “Mind you,” Silva says, “The sticks were placed so high that I had to stand on a height to be able to reach the stick. I had to work with my arms up high. It was rough. But you did just what you had to do.”
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Our travels around Australia
(excerpt of 1,300 words)
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