Author: Nick Scialpi

A STORY BY BIANCA SCIALPI

This story is one that explores many different ranges of emotions over many years of life. My Nonna, or as others call her, Bianca, has so far lived a life that has involved adventure, triumph, despair and eternal happiness, which included a remarkable decision in the early stages of 1954. This incredible woman has lived nothing short of a remarkable life and it is my privilege to be able to share her story.

Bianca Scialpi was born in Trieste, Italy on September 29, 1935 to mother Genia and father who will remain unnamed. Her mother was only married a month before she was born, and her father only remained in the picture for a very short amount of time.

He left when Bianca was three years of age.

“I was three, and I remember the night where my mother and father had a big fight.

“It was a summer night, and my grandfather got inbetween them trying to seperate. My uncle took me into the kitchen to get me away from the fight, and the next thing I remember was seeing my Dad filling his suitcase with all of his belongings.

“That was the last time I saw him as a child. We never heard from him during the war, even though he lived in the same city. We had bombings, but never heard from him once. I could never forgive him for that, he never even came around to see if we were alive, if we needed anything, if we had enough to eat.

“But I was lucky because my Mother and extended family were living with me at the time, and even during the Nazi occupaton of Trieste they would leave the house in the middle of the night to search for food in exchange for cigarettes, so I never went hungry.”

As a child, Bianca struggled to grasp the concept of her own Father never appearing in her life. Unfortunately, this is a common occurance in this day and age as it was back in the 1930’s. Growing up without a Father is something I can only imagine would feel like a gaping hole in your life, however it moulded my Nonna into the strong, fierceless woman that she is today.

“Growing up, I was very upset with my father. I never knew him until I was 17, that was the first time I met him since he left, he had asked my Aunty to ask me to meet him at the bank. I thought to myself ‘What for?’

“He wanted to meet with me because all of his life, he had told the bank that he was married with a daughter. And at the time, the government gave him an extra amount of money each month. All through those years where he had left, he cashed the money every month.”

Bianca’s father had spent his entire life living a lie – telling the bank and the government that he was living and supporting his wife and daughter whilst being nothing but a ghost for Bianca’s entire life.

After many years – the bank had caught up with him and told him to show them proof that he had been supporting his daughter for the last 14 years of his life.

He then had the nerve to ask Bianca to inform the bank that he had been there for her and supported her through her childhood, all so he could continue to cash in at the end of every month.

So after dissappearing for 14 years – he then showed his face to his daughter for the sole purpose of financially benefitting from her.

Bianca reacted to this by telling the bank the truth, therefore ending her Father’s illegal funding.

For all the years following that, there was very little contact between Bianca and her father.

After a health scare in 1989, Bianca decided to make a trip back home to Trieste with her husband, Luciano, where he convinced her to make a visit to her father.

“I was very ill in 1989 and almost passed. When I was healthy, myself and my husband Luciano decided to make a trip back home to Trieste to see the rest of the family.

“My husband was very family orientated. He hated drama, hated not being in contact with family, so he suggested to me to go and see my Father.

“I was very skeptical, I did not want to see him, but I was convinced, so I reached out to him and knock on his door.

“So I met him, we had a chat, but I didn’t feel anything. He was a stranger to me. It was nothing.

That was the last time Bianca saw her father. He did try and reach out to her time and again through letters, but she had no interest.

He sent his final one in 1997, telling Bianca that he was very sick and did not have long left to live.

He eventually passed, and when Nonna returned to Trieste in 2001, she searched for his grave as at the end of the day, even if she did feel nothing, he was still her Father.

“He was not the father I deserved or the husband my mother deserved.

“I asked my mother so many times: ‘Why did you marry this man if you never got along with him’? to which she replied ‘I didn’t want you to not have a father’s name on your birth certificate. I didn’t want you to have an unknown father.’

“I told her it wouldn’t make any difference to me!”

Her mother’s sacrifice to live with a man as horrible as her father just so her daughter could have a father’s name on her birth certificate is a testimant to the woman that she was.

Being able to not live in complete happiness and commit to sacrifice for the benefit of your child shows tremendous strength and character, something that is seen less and less in today’s society.

Whilst I personally did not have the pleasure of knowing my bis-nonna, from the way my Nonna spoke about her I can tell how much of a courageous, brave and outstanding woman she was.

Fast-forwarding a few years now, in February 1955 my Nonna and Nonno made the brave yet exciting decision to migrate to Australia.

“The decision to come to Australia was really sudden.

“We were in a position where we couldn’t get married because my partner Luciano was taking his paypack home to his mum until the week before we got married, so no chance of getting married.

“Even renting was out of the question and he couldn’t live with me because I already lived with my uncle and my mum and my aunty and his house was full because there were seven kids.

“So we decide to try – Australia was looking for people with particular skills and Luciano was a tool maker.”

My Nonno (Luciano) then decided to apply for the job, however little did he know that they wanted him and only him – he was told that he could not bring anyone to Australia – however there was one exception; marriage.

He told the interviewer that he was not going unless he could bring his fiance, but they would not budge. So Luciano said to them ‘Fine. I’ll just marry her.’

“At the time, we were together only six months. I was 19 and a half years old.

“That was on February 10, so we went to the church the next day to ask about getting married right away.

“Of course, when you got married back then you had to put your marriage declarations in two weeks previous to the marriage, but anyway, they said you don’t have to worry about that, you can just get married two days later!

“But that was on a Sunday and I said, no, I don’t want to get married on a Sunday, because Sunday, the church will be full of people! I wasn’t prepared for a wedding and I didn’t have a wedding dress, so we got married on Monday, February 14 1955 on Valentines Day and it was five degree below zero in the middle of winter!”

So within the space of a few days, my Nonna and Nonno’s lives changed forever, and on February 26, they set sail for Australia from Trieste.

A month long trip across the ocean may sounds appealing to some, but back in those days there was bound to be an issue of some sort.

“The trip was meant to be less than 30 days, but the ship had problems between Fremantle and Melbourne so we spent a period of time going very slowly.

“In the meantime, I was in a cabin separate to Luciano. It was not like a honeymoon, we were separated often on the ship.

“I got mumps on the ship, so I spent a week in hospital which was horrible! I was quarantined away from my new husband and it was a very difficult time.

“After we docked in Melbourne, we were put on a train to the Bonegilla camp, which is about on the border of NSW near Albury. It used to be a camp for the war, but at that time it was a migrant camp.

“Because I was in hospital on the ship, I had to be quarantined at Bonegilla for a week, then after that week I was finally re-united with my husband.

“We spent a month there, then Luciano got an interview for a job in Melbourne working on railways and he was shortly offered a job later. 

“We moved from Bonegilla to Melbourne at the beginning of April, we rented a nice two bedroom apartment in Brighton. We had a very small kitchen and the toilet and laundry were both outside!”

The way my Nonna was explaining her unique situation was said with such enthusiasm and happiness, which brought a tear to my eye.

But with so much constant movement – from Trieste, to Bonegilla, to Brighton, you would think there would be a bit of struggle in amongst it all.

But my Nonna always has a positive outlook on things. She makes the most out of any situation and that is exactly what she did in this time as well.

“There weren’t many struggles either when we first moved to Brighton. We entered the country with no money at all, we got off the ship and the Australian government gave us 30 pounds!

“I was a fussy eater, and the food was a lot different to what we were used to in Italy. We lived off baked beans, sausages and mutton. So we spent the 30 pound very quickly on canned fruit and a small bottle of olive oil – which was very rare to find at the time – to use with vegetables.

“We moved to Melbourne with nothing but a couple of suitcases and some olive oil, but we were lucky that we had a friend that lived close to us in Brighton and he looked after us and helped us with accommodation before we purchased our apartment – he even generously lent us some money.

“One of our first days in Brighton, this man – I cannot remember his name – took a day off work and took us to Burke St. to a furniture shop, he lent me 30 pounds so that I could put a deposit on a mattress, pillows and blankets. 

“It took a few months to pay back the 30 pounds that was owed – it doesn’t sound like a lot now but it was a lot in those days!

“We lived in Brighton for eight and a half years, until we bought a block of land here in Cheltenham in 1962, which we then built a house in 1963 that I still live in today!

“We could have built a slightly bigger house, but the amount of money that the bank lent us was only enough to build this one, we would have had to get a second mortgage to build a bigger one and that was not feasible.”

As I sat there listening to my Nonna speak about how proud she was of her home, I took a moment to look around at what she was so proud of.

She has lived in this home for over 60 years, and minus the few renovations, it has rarely ever changed and is always in imacculate condition.

Nonna takes great pride in her home, especially her garden out in the backyard that is better than 99% of gardens in the country – very impressive for an 89 year old!

It reminded me how special she was and how every moment matters.

“The entire time we lived here, Luciano was always a tool maker in Moorabbin, they used to make big washing machines for dry cleaners. He worked there for over 26 years, where he started off as a tool maker, before being in charge of all the tools.

“He was loved by everybody.

“For myself at that time, I had no skill whatsoever! But I found work in a sewing factory in Moorabbin, so I had to learn how to use a sewing machine, which I had never done before! The factory specialised in making foundation garments – at least that’s what they called it at the time. 

“I stayed at that factory for years and ended up being in charge of creating sample garments for the company! Unfortunately the company was bulldozed around 30-40 years ago.

“I worked there until I had my second-born, Adrian, in 1967 and I stopped working to take care of him and my daughter Laura.

“Eventually I went back to work part time cleaning offices and working at takeaway stores, but that was enough for me for a few years whilst I was taking care of the kids.

“Unfortunately, I was very sick in around 1988, so I gave up work altogether, but by this time, my firstborn Laura was married to my son-in-law Hrad, and Adrian was a young man working.

“But I was happy. I moved to this home in 1963 and 62 years later, I’m still here and talking to my grandson about my life.”

Nonna’s positive outlook on everything to do with her life is infectious – an attitude I wish I grasped earlier on in my life.

Even though she has sufferred tremendous loss on multiple occassions, she will look back on those she has lost with nothing but fond memories.

The biggest loss of all – her husband Luciano in 2001.

“Unfortunately, I lost my husband in 2001 due to cancer after being with him for over 46 years.

“In 1998 he started to feel unwell, at the time he was only 70 and had been retired for about five years. So over that time we travelled back to Italy and other places around Australia, to Uluru, Queensland, Great Barrier Reef, etc.

“But it was a very short period of time where we were able to do what we were planning, because he got very sick.

“When he got sick, the doctors said it was non-hodgkin lymphoma. He was treated for that for 6 months, before diagnosing him with something else that was not curable.

“We saw another doctor that told us it was not a lymphoma, it was amyloidosis, which we had no idea what it even was at the time. The doctor then told us that Luciano had a maximum of a year and a half to live, and will end up in a wheelchair being unable to walk.

“There was no cure. Nothing. We just had to wait. 

“The disease took a toll on him, it attacks your vital organs. So Luciano had a lot of trouble with his kidneys, and his body was struggling a lot.

“It was lucky that he had six or seven months more than he was supposed to, so he was able to see you (Nick) being born and come to your christening, before passing away in May 2001.

“It was a struggle to be on my own, lucky I had my children, my grandchildren, and now my great-grandchildren.

“I’m a lucky Nonna, a lucky Bis-Nonna. I’m 90 and still living in my own home by myself, and I’m very healthy for my age.”

As my Nonna touched on just there – I do not have any recollection of my Nonno which is saddening.

But the way my Nonna spoke about him was so touching, and everytime she mentioned him it was like I could see a sparkle in her eye.

Losing your significant other to a disease would be the most heartbreaking of things to go through.

But my incredible Nonna considers herself lucky. Lucky that she got to live her life with her true love, even if his life was cruelly cut short.

My Nonna turns 90 this year – and for an almost 90 year old, she could not be more healthy if she tried, it is incredible to see.

And while her outlook on the last 89 years of her life is a beautiful and positive one, her outlook on the remaining years of her life was a tough conversation to hear.

“My main concern is that one day I won’t be able to look after myself. Maybe I will be gone before that, but you never know.

“I don’t want anyone to look after me. I have already said to both of my children, if anything were to ever happen to me – just let me go. I don’t want to end up in a nursing home for years without being able to move or understand anything.

“If I collapse one day – just let me go.

“But right now I’m here and I’m happy.

“It’s 2025 and maybe I will get to see 2026 or 2027. I hope to see you get married – I don’t know if I will. 

“But it is what it is, we have to take everything one day at a time and be happy with what we have.

“I’m just glad that if I need something, everyone is only a phone call away and they will all do their best to make me happy, but at the moment I am fine on my own.

“I’ve never been one for chatting and going out. I used to do that with my husband a lot back in the day, that was the greatest enjoyment that I have ever had. We used to go to dinner dances and dance the night away. 

“I can’t do that anymore, but that doesn’t matter. I have plenty of nice memories and I am happy.”

Whilst I understand where my Nonna is coming from, if anything was to ever happen to her, there is so many people in my Family that would do anything to keep her around for as long as possible.

It’s a controversial topic to say the least, going out on your own terms vs going out when you physically have nothing left to give.

But I’m not here to give my opinion on that topic – I’m here to share my beautiful Nonna’s story, and that is her point of view.

If you’ve read this story, I hope you’ve enjoyed it. If you found it through my socials, you’ll know that this is the only story I’m posting on this website. This was not an academic piece of writing by any stretch of the imagination, but a testament to the beautiful woman that is my Nonna.

I love you Nonna.