This is Joe’s Story…
Joe always thought he had family in Italy. Real cousins, not just random genes floating around in some stranger
‘s system. His father was from Italy, as were all of his grandparents. So, it stands to reason that there should be some people around that were related, but where?
Growing up, Joe had heard of a small village called Agordo. Nestled at the bottom of the Dolomites, Agordo is in the Belluno region on the eastern side of Italy. He had heard that his grandfather, Federico, was from this village. Joe had traveled to Italy before, but had not been as close to this area as he was in the fall of 2006. Joe and his wife were traveling alone through Italy and were staying in Venice. They’d been traveling by train all along, so Joe stopped a taxi driver to ask if he knew of Agordo.
The driver did and said it would be €900 for the trip there and back – because it was so far from Venice, the driver convinced Joe he would not have enough time to even search for more than an hour or two before it was time to return. Disappointed, Joe asked if he had a phone book of that area…surprisingly, he did! The driver laughed when Joe told him he wanted to write everyone in that village that had the same last name as his grandfather, but gave him the page anyway. There were only 3 names.
When Joe returned from Italy, he painstakingly made 3 copies of a letter he wrote in Italian. He photocopied photographs of his grandfather and his grandfather’s brother and showed the letters to his son, Bob, who had studied in Italy. Bob proofread the letter, but suggested he add his email address at the bottom. Joe did and the letters were sent.
Weeks passed and there was no word from anyone in Italy and Joe was very sad. At Christmastime, Joe mentioned how there must not really have been any family in that area and how sad he was about not finding them. Just on a lark, someone decided Joe should check his email (because he didn’t do so very often) and there was a note from Italy…”Yes, we are your family!” was all it said and all it had to say! Joe had found the family he always knew he had!
