Preparing for Milano

I got an email from the lawyers yesterday. They have decided that the case as is, is not applicable under Italian law. What they want to do is draw up a cause of action stating the link between my mother and I here in California. And then simply have that recognized as valid by an Italian court. This SHOUL’D be fairly straightforward and if all goes well, relatively quick.

We should be receiving the retainer agreement as well shortly. One was sent out right after the initial consultation, but for some reason, we never received it. So step 2 of the process is starting I believe, once they get back the signed retainer.

Keep praying for more work for me. I have been blessed to have gotten some work, but could always use more.

dave

OK, Yesterday I went to see the lawyer that the Consulate recommended in order to start step 2 of the citizenship process. Now that mom is recognized as an Italian citizen, we have to get Italy to acknowledge my heritage even though I was adopted OUT of that family. I have my original birth cert with her name on it, but at that time I am merely known as “unnamed baby boy”. However I also have the adoption certificate which shows the link between my mother and my adoptive parents, relinquishment papers signed by my parents and my amended birth certificate showing my new name and adoptive parents. So…. the lawyer wants to get one document from the court kind of summarizing my link to Anita Anselmo and they think that the Italian Court will simply acknolwedge that without much fuss. However, I was warned that things are never simple with Italy and courts so be prepared. All in all, both lawyers I met with were very nice and seemed like good guys to work with.

I should be getting a retainer in the mail soon to sign and then an estimate on how much all this should initially cost… it won’t be cheap, but I had expected that. This whole step is for me, a giant “put-your-money-where-your-mouth-is” step of faith, since I don’t have the money up front in order to pursue this. However, IF this is really the Lord, then we are praying that he will meet us as we step out. I’ve been getting more work as of late, so that is a good sign, and with the move ahead and some of the simplification we are going through right now, we hope to free up enough to cover all that we need.

On a side note, my bike was stolen a couple of weeks ago, and I just sold my car last friday in order to buy a new bike and basically simplify life. However, I’m not going to Century City on a bike….. so…… I decided to make an adventure out of it and take the public transportation up to meet shelly near her work in Monrovia, and then we would drive from there. I took some pictures along the way as well as at the lawyers office so I’ll give you a little documentary commentary as I go.

So I left the studio and walked 10 minutes to get to the 460 Metro Bus. This is the 460 arriving around 2:05

I rode the 460 for an hour to the metro green line station in norwalk where I caught the green line.

Then I rode the green line over to the Imperial/Wilmington station where the blue line connection is and got onto the blue line, shown arriving below.

The green line runs through the middle of the 105 freeway unimpeded by any traffic and is relatively fast. But the blue line runs through the middle of the city and contends with traffic as well, so it is a bit slower. Anyway I took the blue line from Imperial/Wilmington all the way up to the 7th St. Metro Station in downtown LA, where I caught the red line to Union Station. Here are a few pics of the 7th St. Metro station.

So anyway I took the Red line to Union Station then got on the gold line to Pasadena. Here is the gold line arriving…

This goes all the way to Sierra Madre Villa Blvd a few miles from Shelly’s work in Monrovia. So she met me here and we left from the metro station to drive to Century City. I arrived at the station at 4:30 so the whole trip took almost 2.5 hours… fat wonder more people don’t take the public transportation system… but in all fairness, there probably was a faster way, or at least less convoluted way, but it would have required much more walking. Here is Shelly in the parking structure after picking me up…

We got on the freeway and then hit this common scene in LA…

We actually got there in a reasonable amount of time though once we hit the 10 we were doing alright. We got there early so we went to the Beverly Center, vistited H&M and got something to eat, then headed to the law offices: 9911 Pico in Century City

This is me with Raffaelle DiMartino, the lawyer who will be working here on the case. He has a counterpart in Rome whose name, apart from Roberto, I don’t know, but he will be working on the case from Rome submitting papers and guiding the procedure there.

Tuesday July 1 we are going to Century City to meet with the lawyer about the case and see if we can get the ball rolling. We will be meeting at about 7, so if any of you happen to remember to pray for us, that would be much appreciated. It feels nice to once again be moving forward on this.

 dave

Ok step 2 of my citizenship drive is to “proceed in Italy with a request in a law court of acknolwedgement of parenthood so that [I] can be granted Italian citizenship”.

So I have just sent off an email to the lawyer the Consulate suggested to see about starting this process. I don’t have any money, so this is all kind of probing right now to see what I might be able to accomplish or how much we may be able to start with, well, nothing.

I’ll keep the blog updated with the progress of the whole thing as we go.

dave

Well, my mom received her AIRE registration in the mail today, meaning she is officially an Italian citizen. AIRE is an acronym for Anagrafe degli Italiani Residenti all’Estero…. or in english, the Registry of Italians Residing Abroad….

What that means is that she is an acknowledged Italian citizen, which would enable her to file a court case in Italy to have me recognized as her legitimate son, even though I am adopted out. That is what we will have to do next, though I will need to pay for it… and I don’t have the moolah right now.

On a positive note, I’m receiving some more work offers…. and on a negative note, my bike got stolen from my garage so I’m back to driving my beater to work…..

 well, keep praying for us.

 dave

well, there will be some period of waiting before much gets done … probably a couple of years for the entire process of getting italian citizenship. What happens now is that I wait for a few months before moms notice of citizenship is official. Once that is done, I will need to contact a lawyer that the Consulate suggested and proceed with a court petition to get my adoption recognized. Even though I will be paying for it, it will need to happen in moms name, so her citizenship being completed is necessary. So … probably another couple of months without too much word. In the meantime, I thought I’d post a few pics from the last time we were down in San Diego, and you can see Shelly and I with my mom and my nonna.

And …… on a further note, since this next step will be expensive …  and even more so with the dollar plummeting against the euro … I could use some prayer for more work. My work has dried up over the last few months leaving us in a pretty scarce situation. There is simply no extra money right now and especially not for expensive court cases.

Got back from the consulate a few hours ago and everything was pretty anticlimactic. The documents were taken, perused to make sure all was in order and we were told, “that’s it, thanks”. Mom should receive something in a few months stating she is an italian citizen. Then we can get on with step 2.

Traffic was typical LA: I left the house at 7:30 for a 9:30 appointment and didn’t get there till nearly 10:00, but all in all, it feels good to have gotten through this first step.

I took a few pictures for the blog so here you go.

OK, I received a call from the Italian Consulate yesterday and my appointment will be 3 March, at 9:30 am. I already have everything I need for my appointment except maybe a few extra copies of the documents, but that is just a matter of printing them out at this point. So if all goes well, and I expect no problems for this stage, Mom should become an Italian citizen in a few more weeks. Then we start planning for step 2.

well, 2008 is here … and in supposedly just a few months, march to be exact, I should get a call from the Italian Consulate giving me details on when my appointment will be exactly. This upcoming appointment will be to submit my mom’s citizenship papers, which … unlike mine …  should be a relatively straightforward process. Once her citizenship is ackowledged, then we can start with the expensive portion: getting my adoption recognized. She has to file the paperwork though in order to get that rolling because it has to be an italian citizen to file for the case.

I still have a few more details to wrap up… i need to get a passport size photo from my mom and then make copies of everything for the consulate. But other than that, things are pretty much in order. I’ll let everyone know what the interview date is when I know.

dave

Want to wish everyone a happy new year.

In a few months, i’ll be going to the consulate to apply for mom’s citizenship. Assuming that goes without a hitch, once she is recognized as an Italian citizen, we can proceed with getting the adoption recognized in Italy.

On the spiritual side of things, God has been doing a work in me to drive out things that will need to be removed when we are in Italy. So I’m thankful for the trials and the things that are happening, and the renewed fervor for seeking God and knowing him more. I’m also just a few days away from having finished my first reading of the entire bible in Italian. kinda stoked about that. I’m going to start over with another italian version when i’m done.

Well, God bless and keep us in prayer for this new year.

dave