(Mar. 29) – “I’ve been living in the United States for almost eleven years and I was really fine since the very beginning. Being completely out of your environment can be tough but then you get used to it, and you begin to appreciate all the positive aspects, until one day you feel part of it.” Lorenzo Barcellone is a 33 years old Italin from La Spezia. He has worked in Arizona for years as a specialist in urban planning. “I work for a company that deals with sustainable development in Phoenix, the largest and most populous city in the State of Arizona,” says Lorenzo, enthusiastic about the choice he made. “I arrived in the United States in May 2001 to continue my university studies. I graduated in December 2004 in Urban Sciences at the University of Utah, in Salt Lake City. During my university years I worked as part-time planner in Bountiful, a town a few miles from Salt Lake.” “In 2005 – continues Barcellone – I found a better place in Arizona and I moved to Phoenix. In January, two years ago, I earned a master degree in business administration (MBA), which I completed in December 2011. During that master I studied in Prague for a few months.” Lorenzo occasionally returns to Italy to visit his family and admits that “when homesickness gets stronger, the desire is obviously higher,” but he assures he won’t come back to work in Italy: “In Arizona the salaries are much higher than in Italy.” Like him, many other young people decide to make a career abroad. A tough but unavoidable choice: “I think that many young Italians have realized they can find more opportunities abroad than in Italy. I know some other Italians who came here for the same reason I did. Everybody loves Italy and I am proud to be Italian, and love grows stronger when you live abroad. But I suppose a lot of Italians know that Italy’s problems can not be solved in short time.” At the beginning of his experience in the United States there has been some difficulties: “The biggest challenge was to adapt to the American mentality. The way of thinking is very different. I felt like one who lived inside a bubble of glass in a muffled world and for the first time has faced the real world.” (Gil/Peg)
