It must be devastating thinking you’re Italian and turning out to be something else.
Let’s face it, they have it all. The history, the fashion, the good looks, smoking on the toilet. Life is covered for your average Giuseppe.
My friend and esteemed colleague Joe Baiamonte is of Sicilian stock, despite looking and sounding like a German Jason Manford. The type of guy who lives, breathes and sh*ts Christopher Moltisanti. Not a day passes by where society’s littlest occurrences fail to draw similarities with Goodfellas, a 90s Serie A midfielder or lasagne.
Should the day ever come that he discovers he isn’t actually Italian and indeed just a bloke from Burnley whose grandfather decided to change his surname to Baiamonte after seeing La Dolce Vita, there’ll be serious hell to pay. Each and every one of us would be whacked and promptly dumped in a Queens trash compactor*. Bada bing bada boom!
This horror became a reality for one dad who had gone his whole life believing he was more Bella Italia than Burger King.
‘My uncle on my Italian side got one of the DNA tests done and it turns out they’re not Italian and everyone in my family is having a mental breakdown,’ Twitter user @queenozymandias wrote. ‘My dad is yelling at his brother “WHY DID YOU DO THIS”.
She added:
Dad is currently yelling in an excessively Italian accent at his brother and my stepmom that life has been ruined.
Currently looking at a map to try to figure out if we could be from like the Italian part of Switzerland, a thing that my father now is convinced exists.
My uncle Andy is now yodelling in the kitchen and my dad is yelling at him to shut up…
This all came up bc [sic] I had to explain to my step brother what “Joey bag a donuts” meant and it all came up.
She later updated:
My nana is mad at my uncle and eventually just stopped talking to him and started talking about her family’s history in New Jersey, and this morning told my brother to “shut it” when he brought it up again. I’m getting my dad Swiss chocolate for Christmas. He remains devastated.
That’s how it plays out in real life, guys. Messy, hilarious, gutting.
The tweet received 418k favourites and 52k retweets. Surely must have struck a chord. Are there other middle aged people out there who suddenly learnt they weren’t who they thought they were?
Tbh, when I went on a school trip to a Synagogue back in Year 3, my mum told me beforehand that my name was Jewish and as a result I walked around the entire place assuming I was just that.
No one has yet convinced me I’m not come to think of it. Mazel tov!
*I do not believe all Italians are mob members and neither should you.
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