Audio Transcript:

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mum is from Puglia, the region, and their hometown was Acquaviva delle Fonti

from what I know, it's not too far from Bari, about 45 minutes inland from there and

there's still some family there mum, I think she'd spent like up until like

moving to Australia, had spent her whole life living there

and how old was your mum when she came to Australia?

for a really long time I thought she's 16 I'm pretty sure she was actually 14

so she came to Australia when she was a lot younger

yeah, but she actually spent like quite a lot of her childhood there

yeah, quite a bit

and she was like second oldest, my aunty was like a few years older than her and like my two uncles

and her younger sister, my aunty Rosa, was like the youngest and

- she was like, pretty much like a little toddler before they moved - yeah right

did they come...did your mum come with your grandparents too?

yeah, they all came together the lot of them, all seven of them

wow

what sort of things you feel like you do that affirm that part of your cultural background?

I did live with my grandparents for a bit and you just kinda... you get taught from a young age how to put the coffee on

so the family wouldn't have to get up haha

you know, they could then put it on the kids to like

go put the coffee on it's a good skill to know

it's pretty cliché but like just always talk about food when it comes to Italy and stuff like that and my family but at

the same time like that was like parts of like kind of communicating with that

other culture which was around family time, which was always around food and those kind of things

are there are particular dishes or traditions that are specific to Puglia or to the specific town where your mums from?

I never asked that, like I did think about a little bit when I was telling you about

panzarotti and like kind of realising that not all Italians know about it

and like, well definitely, I don't know... I haven't found other families that's

made it besides mine, like generally if people know about it it's because it's like also

sometimes a festival food

like it's a big deal for my family to make that... not a big deal but like

it's reserved for like more special occasions

there appears to be like a separate Italian Australian cultural identity and it's very different from Italian culture in Italy

do you think that's true?

cause they've kind of like held on to this stuff that's happened and they've held on to what they've thought of that culture

and they haven't kind of like moved past it and stuff, yeah

I'm sure they do lots of stuff just to like kind of remind them of home

and that kind of thing and help themselves build like, their own little like

comfortable wog bubble in regional Victoria

have you been to Italy?

nah, I haven't gone, I'm hoping next year with mum

has um, has she been back to Italy?

no, she hasn't been back it would be a big deal

what was it?

1974 when she moved here, so 40 years? 43

it will be 44 by the time we go

I mean for a really long time in my life I never really had any desire to travel at all, full stop

and I think once I did yeah like the idea of it more...of travelling

I think from that time as well I kind

of felt a stronger connection to that culture too

to Italy?

to Italy, yeah

and I'm not too sure why exactly

in what spaces do you feel like you belong?

I think we get talked about this briefly before as well and I think a lot of migrant communities can kind of relate

on like a lot of levels and they're actually quite similar, especially personality-wise and I just in

and I definitely feel like, in terms of spaces, you feel pretty comfortable with that

I was like in the Lithuanian club months ago and looking at like all the pictures of newly arrived families

who are like hanging out with each other and their doing

their trips um, going to the snow or like you know, in these big halls and that kinda thing

I'm just like, it's just like exactly what my family were doing

yeah, yeah

you know, like they’re people from a fairly different culture but looking at those photos it

felt very familiar and I've definitely felt it like with other friends' families, who like, are from different migrant communities and cultural backgrounds they’re people from a fairly different culture but looking at those photos, it felt very familiar

can you talk about being part of the Shabbab?

I think like being in the Shabbab did kind of help me identify with my family's heritage a lot more

it helped me feel more comfortable with that as well

I guess like Kosta and I are like Greek

Italian and like are probably the most similar out of the bunch

and I guess like in terms of our upbringing and that is more similar, in terms of...cause we were born here

and other different things as well, like I mean like, obviously like all of our cultures are so

...I feel like they’re like, at least everyone in the band like appreciates food heavily

it's been really nice as four separate people to be able to share these like

kind of things with each other too

it's funny like Jad and Shuki, like they've known each other for like years and years now but they're still like 'ah what's

this word in Arabic?' you know, like 'how do you say this in in Hebrew?' and stuff and

like they're still kind of...almost feel like we connect the dots with

each other, in terms of our cultures, which is really... it's fun

so you feel like your connection towards Italian culture has changed over time?

and that you feel like it's strengthened through being part of the Shabbab?

yeah I think like it's always something that

I knew was different about me but for some reason, at some point like I just

kind of got used to that, or just almost forgot about it in a way

this like different part of you?

yeah and in a way just kind of like didn't really embrace it in any kind of way

- as well - yeah that's interesting

yeah I think like meeting those boys has made me want to, kind of like, hold on to that part of me a little

bit more and learn about it more from family as well

growing up I think I was pretty conscious like understanding that my family was different a lot of the

kids I went to school with, and like, I think there was even one point where I didn't really

like, you know, being in an Italian family as well, didn't really like being different

was it like...did you go to school with like predominantly Anglos?

definitely in Primary School there were more Anglos, there were definitely other wog kids around and stuff but yeah, no other Vitos

definitely like the name stuck out heaps there

yeah cause I guess that's a pretty big marker for you

yeah

you can't hide from that

nah, I remember asking my mum why she didn't

call me something like 'Josh'

l went to school with like five Joshs at the time, all like...five Joshs in my year level

I think I like very much wanted to just have the most 'normal' name, yeah I hated it, I really didn't like it...being so different

I always remember never being able to find a key ring with my name on it, being misspelt, mispronounced

yeah I don't know maybe that's also like you can be particularly sensitive when

you're in primary school as well, at least around like being different like I didn't

really want to be different to the other kids

I felt pretty different in other ways outside of my culture as well so

yeah

I didn't really feel like I needed more...

I mean like in terms of like where my family stood

financially... by the time I was around, they were pretty comfortable

I think maybe my mum struggled the most being a single parent

but she was pretty good at making it work

like that was never something I was embarrassed

about, I don't think either, like when I live with my grandparents for a bit that

was embarrassing, I didn't want to have friends around my grandparents... like having a friend

coming around after school

more like, just my grandmother treated me like I was like 3

years old like that up into my twenties you know, like before she passed away like

having a mate around, while my grandmother was like kind of babying me

would have been like pretty embarro

I think when I was living there I had a

friend around maybe like once or twice or something like the whole two years I lived there

yeah

I definitely notice my family don't draw the similarities

between them and other cultures, which is probably why they like hung out so

strongly with mostly other Italians

other migrant cultures, you mean?

yeah

yep, like they don't see similarities that maybe like our generation would?

yeah, I don't think they do at all

I know they don't

yep

I know they don't, maybe they did at one point, I'm not too sure maybe they could identify with like, identify more with cultures that moved here around a similar time

mmhm

or were probably moving here to Australia around the same time, like the 70s

yeah I don't think definitely they understand like race and migration happening right now

a part of me thinks like, I don't know if it's exactly right, cause I haven't really talked to my family that much about

you know, if they came across like any kind of racism when they first moved here

but part of me thinks that I don't think they really did, because they did have that bubble

that they were all kind of like able to jump into umm

just because of the sheer number of Italians here?

yeah, in Shepparton especially

umm

so there's a big Italian community in Shepparton?

mmm, quite a bit

see the agriculture industry is quite big there, around the time that they moved

lots of work in farms and fields and sheds and factories and stuff

yeah I think they were kind of like, able to kind of like cope pretty well, umm not having to

interact with too many Australians every day

maybe also by the 70s they had gotten a bit more

used to like Mediterranean people moving over over

I think all of them, when they moved here, like they all had to

start from the bottom and work their way up that's for sure

my mum works as a

clerk in Radiology at the hospital but when she started off the hospital she was the janitor

and was the janitor there for quite a while and when I come around...or was about to kind of come around

she was thinking 'oh well I'm going to have to be making more money if I'm having a kid

and started learning how to like use computers and stuff like that so she could get a job

like I honestly, honestly think that Nick Giannopoulos ruined it haha

I was going to ask you, what do you think of 'Wog Boy' and all those send ups and stuff?

yeah, those movies were pretty empowering like for a lot of migrant communities and stuff, they were great

yeah I think they were really good for those communities, but like that movie was so popular, like it was everywhere

and you know, Nick Giannopoulos' character is like so proud of being a wog, you know

and he starts calling himself 'the wog boy' and people start referring to him as that and people from like...Australians

looking at that movie they're probably like 'it's fine' and I don't know...

this thing of like, who is laughing at that?

yeah

and like, you know saying that, I'm sure like heaps of people from Mediterranean backgrounds are okay with

Australians using the word 'wog', I don't know, I also feel like it's okay for me to feel uncomfortable with that

I think anyone who comes so far to come to Australia, I mean

everywhere is far away from Australia, it's a fuckin' struggle to get here

yeah

it's hard and even if your family helps you

I had other family who were here a little bit beforehand who sponsored them to come over

which wouldn't have been cheap

and then, you know, my grandfather being the only person working in the

family, you know, feeding five kids and a wife and paying for everyone's flights over and the sponsorship or their permanent visas

over here it would have been...

where do you think that our generation fits in within the current social political sphere in Australia?

like I always felt positively about people seeking asylum in Australia and migrating to Australia

but I think when I started to align with my family's culture a lot more, it kinda connected the dots a bit more for me

and like I understood, for me

why I felt strongly

you can see that your family have had these opportunities to migrate here and why shouldn't anybody else?

yeah exactly

yeah and I think there are people out there with stronger voices who are doing a better

job of it than I am for example, shoot what's Kon's last name, from the ASRC?

Karapanagiotidis?

yeah I think you're right, yeah yeah

and he talks a lot about people seeking asylum or immigrating to Australia that, you know, if it wasn't

allowed you know back when our families were doing it, wouldn't be here

yeah, exactly

imagine how different this country would be if it wasn't for immigration?

yeah

at the same time, I don't know if...well I know my family don't understand or like I was saying

other immigrants now but also like they definitely...they don't understand how, you know, they're occupying stolen land right now

yeah, they don't get it

um is there anything else you want to say?

I think that's kind of everything I wanted to ask

ummm...

I don't still wish I was called Josh