I have a 10 year old boy and 8 year old daughter. I will need to find school information. Primary for my daughter and lower secondary for my son. What kind of options do I have? What kind of authority do I contact to enroll my kids?
Food? I have a wheat allergy, and have heard that Italy is a haven for this illness. Where do I go to find gluten free products?
Housing? I am looking to rent before I buy, and would like good references for property management, or individuals renting out homes.
We are American, will this be a hindrance in making new friends? Where are good places for a family to go to make new friends? I want to provide my kids an easy transition with play mates. Are there custom differences in addressing this?
It all sounds very silly, but I want to make my family's move as easy as possible, and I have had so-so results looking up word searches on Google. So lets try this!
Cheers, and thanks in advance
Update:We are there on a work visas. All paperwork is finished. I just have to iron out the rest of the details.
Verified answer
Novara is a little city in Piemonte Region, North of Italy. It's a calm and industrious city with about 100.000 inhabitants, with a good historic centre and well served about every need of its population (schools, university, commercial centres, hospital and surgeries, banks, public transport system, etc.). Its territory is overall cultivated with rice, but it gets also various industries overall pharmaceutical and electronic products, alimentary industries, publishing trade (the most important of all Italy is from Novara 'de Agostini editrice'), etc. It gets also a very good environment, You can in only one day trip go to the lakes (Maggiore, Orta), to the mountains, to the sea in Liguria Region, it's about one hour far from Milano by train or by car, or from Torino, the chief Region of Piemonte.
All the informations you need, you can ask to 'Comune' (the Comune is a nevralgic centre of all services to the population, I think is like your Council Town). There you can ask not only for schools (they will direct you to the 'principals' of all of them), but even your need to rent or buy an apartment (the most important and national agency in Italy is 'Tecnocasa', you can esaily find in Novara). For your allergy there's no problem, all the commercial centres (supermarkets), quiet all great alimentary shops, get these products from years yet, and if you want some specific ones you can go to the pharmacy shop, by now they get entire areas dedicated to various allergies. I don't know if you are religious or not and what religion you are, but the best way to know people is frequenting the church knowing and introducing yourself and your family to the parish priest, or you can even ask, always in Comune, if there are groups or courses of Italian, traditional cooking, other languages, history, or only to know and frequent other peoples, etc. American people is normally well seen in Italy and generally people is friendly, so you shouldn't get problems. It should have some hindrances about play mates, but that is everywhere in the world and probably only for the first times. Naturally, kids are curious and love everything new, so, after sometime your kids also, can be integrated with the others, first learning the language without forgetting where do they come from.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novara
It must be a full English link, if not you can change language clicking on 'English'
At the start of the link and clickink on the 'listen', you can have a correct spelling of 'Novara'.
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PS - Some advices.
- Remember that in Italy Health System is for free, paying only a very cheap ticket for eventual medical exam or surgical operation. You have only to choose a doctor in a list that will become your family doctor.
- Stores, shops, supermarkets, etc. aren't open at night ... people at night normally sleep. But there's always one pharmacy on duty and a first aid, at the hospital, fully free.
- If your kids are 8 and 10 years old, they'll probably profit of the 'tempo pieno' (full time) at school. So you'll be free until middle afternoon.
- Public television system is a National Monopoly, so you have to pay a tax (near 120 Euros per year).
- Smile is everywhere the key to introduce themselves, but more evident in Italy where it's a real visiting card.
For any other question ask me without problems or even 'Gatta con gli stivali' (Cat (female) with boots), that probably will be your not so far neighbour.
Dear Amanda,
Do not worry, Novara is a nice, small city... You can find whatever you want over there included gluten free products... You just have to ask and be careful when you buy things...
Rent a flat in Italy is NOT cheap unfortunately but apartments in Novara are definitely cheaper than the ones in Milan...
You can enroll you kids in a public or in a privat school. School system in Italy is pretty different to the American one... The majority of kids/teenagers go to public schools and they finish it when they are 18/19 years old (not 17). Normal schools included saturday. There aren't 'English schools' for childrens in Novara so your kids have to attend a normal, Italian school, but to me, this is better... Many American people want their kids to attend an English speaking school but that's wrong, I mean... If your kids have to live in Italy they SHOULD know the local language... You know, kids learn languages very quickly (it wouldn't be a big deal for them) and that's even better for make friends. I think you should contact the school for enroll your kids...
Anyway, making friends is not difficult, you are gonna know new people in Novara as you would in any American city... Italian people are generally friendly.
If you care, Novara is pretty near Milan and some really nice Italian lakes, you can visit those places whenever you want... I live near Lake 'Maggiore' and I can assure you that it's very nice and relaxing: http://www.google.it/search?hl=it&sugexp=frgbld&gs...
If you can get by with Italian, have a look on http://www.mioaffitto.it/appartamenti-affitto-nova... for housing.
You can find also good info for expats in Italy on http://www.expatsinitaly.com/
You say you are American, so i'm just wondering what sort of visa you've managed to get that allows to you to live in Italy. Might be a good idea to sort this out before looking into schools or accommodation.