Bella Figura

Bella Figura PDF Author: Kamin Mohammadi
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0385354002
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 287

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Book Description
“My ideal type of armchair travel: immersive, insightful, seductive. In Bella Figura, Kamin Mohammadi takes us to the year in Florence that changed her life, and gives us the tools to bring the grace of the Italian lifestyle to our own lives.” —National Bestselling Author Stephanie Danler “She walks down the street with a swing in her step and a lift to her head. She radiates allure as if followed by a personal spotlight. She may be tall or short, slim or pneumatically curvaceous, dressed discreetly or ostentatiously—it matters not. Her gait, her composure, the very tilt of her head is an ode to grace and self-possession that makes her beautiful whatever her actual features reveal.” This is the bella figura, the Italian concept of making every aspect of life as beautiful as it can be, that Kamin Mohammadi discovered when she escaped the London corporate media world for a year in Italy. Following the lead of her new neighbors, she soon found a happier, healthier, and more beautiful way of living. The bella figura knows: • That the food that you eat should give you pleasure while eating it. Pause for meals, and set a place, even if you are eating alone. • To seize any opportunity to get moving—be it taking the stairs, doing a coffee run at work, or dancing with abandon. • To drink a spoonful of excellent-quality extra-virgin olive oil four times a day. • To seek out nature, be it a city park, a tree on your street, or some wild place. • And to love yourself. The bella figura—occupies her space, emotionally and physically, with style and entitlement.

Bella Figura

Bella Figura PDF Author: Kamin Mohammadi
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0385354002
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 287

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Book Description
“My ideal type of armchair travel: immersive, insightful, seductive. In Bella Figura, Kamin Mohammadi takes us to the year in Florence that changed her life, and gives us the tools to bring the grace of the Italian lifestyle to our own lives.” —National Bestselling Author Stephanie Danler “She walks down the street with a swing in her step and a lift to her head. She radiates allure as if followed by a personal spotlight. She may be tall or short, slim or pneumatically curvaceous, dressed discreetly or ostentatiously—it matters not. Her gait, her composure, the very tilt of her head is an ode to grace and self-possession that makes her beautiful whatever her actual features reveal.” This is the bella figura, the Italian concept of making every aspect of life as beautiful as it can be, that Kamin Mohammadi discovered when she escaped the London corporate media world for a year in Italy. Following the lead of her new neighbors, she soon found a happier, healthier, and more beautiful way of living. The bella figura knows: • That the food that you eat should give you pleasure while eating it. Pause for meals, and set a place, even if you are eating alone. • To seize any opportunity to get moving—be it taking the stairs, doing a coffee run at work, or dancing with abandon. • To drink a spoonful of excellent-quality extra-virgin olive oil four times a day. • To seek out nature, be it a city park, a tree on your street, or some wild place. • And to love yourself. The bella figura—occupies her space, emotionally and physically, with style and entitlement.

La Bella Figura

La Bella Figura PDF Author: Beppe Severgnini
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0307486877
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
Join the bestselling author of Ciao, America! on a lively tour of modern Italy that takes you behind the seductive face it puts on for visitors—la bella figura—and highlights its maddening, paradoxical true self You won’t need luggage for this hypothetical and hilarious trip into the hearts and minds of Beppe Severgnini’s fellow Italians. In fact, Beppe would prefer if you left behind the baggage his crafty and elegant countrymen have smuggled into your subconscious. To get to his Italia, you’ll need to forget about your idealized notions of Italy. Although La Bella Figura will take you to legendary cities and scenic regions, your real destinations are the places where Italians are at their best, worst, and most authentic: The highway: in America, a red light has only one possible interpretation—Stop! An Italian red light doesn’t warn or order you as much as provide an invitation for reflection. The airport: where Italians prove that one of their virtues (an appreciation for beauty) is really a vice. Who cares if the beautiful girls hawking cell phones in airport kiosks stick you with an outdated model? That’s the price of gazing upon perfection. The small town: which demonstrates the Italian genius for pleasant living: “a congenial barber . . . a well-stocked newsstand . . . professionally made coffee and a proper pizza; bell towers we can recognize in the distance, and people with a kind word and a smile for everyone.” The chaos of the roads, the anarchy of the office, the theatrical spirit of the hypermarkets, and garrulous train journeys; the sensory reassurance of a church and the importance of the beach; the solitude of the soccer stadium and the crowded Italian bedroom; the vertical fixations of the apartment building and the horizontal democracy of the eat-in kitchen. As you venture to these and many other locations rooted in the Italian psyche, you realize that Beppe has become your Dante and shown you a country that “has too much style to be hell” but is “too disorderly to be heaven.” Ten days, thirty places. From north to south. From food to politics. From saintliness to sexuality. This ironic, methodical, and sentimental examination will help you understand why Italy—as Beppe says—“can have you fuming and then purring in the space of a hundred meters or ten minutes.”

Che Bella Figura!

Che Bella Figura! PDF Author: Gloria Nardini
Publisher: SUNY Press
ISBN: 9780791440919
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 180

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Book Description
A colorful ethnography of an Italian ladies' club, this book explores the historical and linguistic importance of the women's language and behavior.

La Bella Figura

La Bella Figura PDF Author: Kristi Belle
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781540649478
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 100

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Book Description
La Bella Figura is a lifestyle guide for the woman who aspires to live a European-style life filled with simple pleasures and wants to look good while she does it. It is about making your life richer with less, not more, just like European women do. Who Should Read This Book: * Do you feel overwhelmed and yearn for a life where you spend the majority of your time, money and energy toward what you think really matters? * Have you ever looked in your closet and felt overwhelmed by the sheer number of clothing items you own and yet still feel as if you have nothing to wear? * Do you want to elevate everything in your world to an art form -- from the way you dress to how you eat and spend your leisure time? La Bella Figura shows how you can bring all the simple pleasures of a European lifestyle into your home and life no matter what your budget or where you live.

Che Bella Figura!

Che Bella Figura! PDF Author: Gloria Nardini
Publisher: SUNY Press
ISBN: 9780791440926
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 180

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Book Description
A colorful ethnography of an Italian ladies' club, this book explores the historical and linguistic importance of the women's language and behavior.

The Cypress Tree

The Cypress Tree PDF Author: Kamin Mohammadi
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 1408822334
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
Kamin Mohammadi was nine years old when her family fled Iran during the 1979 Revolution. Bewildered by the seismic changes in her homeland, she turned her back on the past and spent her teenage years trying to fit in with British attitudes to family, food and freedom. She was twenty-seven before she returned to Iran, drawn inexorably back by memories of her grandmother's house in Abadan, with its traditional inner courtyard, its noisy gatherings and its very wallssteeped in history.The Cypress Tree is Kamin's account of her journey home, to rediscover her Iranian self and to discover for the first time the story of her family: a sprawling clan that sprang from humble roots to bloom during the affluent, Biba-clad 1960s, only to be shaken by the horrors of the Iran-Iraq War and the heartbreak of exile, and toughened by the struggle for democracy that continues today.This moving and passionate memoir is a love letter both to Kamin's extraordinary family and toIran itself, an ancient country which has survived so much modern tumult but where joy and resilience will always triumph over despair.

Ciao, America!

Ciao, America! PDF Author: Beppe Severgnini
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0767912365
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
In the wry but affectionate tradition of Bill Bryson, Ciao, America! is a delightful look at America through the eyes of a fiercely funny guest—one of Italy’s favorite authors who spent a year in Washington, D.C. When Beppe Severgnini and his wife rented a creaky house in Georgetown they were determined to see if they could adapt to a full four seasons in a country obsessed with ice cubes, air-conditioning, recliner chairs, and, of all things, after-dinner cappuccinos. From their first encounters with cryptic rental listings to their back-to-Europe yard sale twelve months later, Beppe explores this foreign land with the self-described patience of a mildly inappropriate beachcomber, holding up a mirror to America’s signature manners and mores. Succumbing to his surroundings day by day, he and his wife find themselves developing a taste for Klondike bars and Samuel Adams beer, and even that most peculiar of American institutions—the pancake house. The realtor who waves a perfect bye-bye, the overzealous mattress salesman who bounces from bed to bed, and the plumber named Marx who deals in illegally powerful showerheads are just a few of the better-than-fiction characters the Severgninis encounter while foraging for clues to the real America. A trip to the computer store proves just as revealing as D.C.’s Fourth of July celebration, as do boisterous waiters angling for tips and no-parking signs crammed with a dozen lines of fine print. By the end of his visit, Severgnini has come to grips with life in these United States—and written a charming, laugh-out-loud tribute.

La Bella Figura

La Bella Figura PDF Author: Dawn Mattera
Publisher: Xlibris Corporation
ISBN: 149315155X
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 108

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Book Description
Do you want to be happy, healthy and hot? La bella figura has a figurative and literal translation. In these pages, we will reveal Italian secrets for both: looking, feeling and being your best. We’ll journey through the calendar with each month highlighting a unique aspect of the Italian culture and how we can apply it to our lives. Each chapter also has a recipe or two of Italian favorites with the fat and calories slashed. You’ll also see some twists on traditional dishes. This book holds the spark to ignite your life!

Italian Ways: On and Off the Rails from Milan to Palermo

Italian Ways: On and Off the Rails from Milan to Palermo PDF Author: Tim Parks
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393348822
Category : Transportation
Languages : en
Pages : 283

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Book Description
An Italian travelogue describes the trains that traverse the country, from the architecture of old train stations to the new high-speed railways, and portrays the author's memorable encounters along the way.

Italian Days

Italian Days PDF Author: Barbara Grizzuti Harrison
Publisher: Open Road + Grove/Atlantic
ISBN: 0802190294
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 483

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Book Description
A “contagiously exuberant” celebration of Italian food, culture, and history that “will be the companion of visitors for years to come” (The Washington Post Book World). In an absorbing journey down the Italian peninsula, essayist, journalist, and fiction writer Barbara Grizzuti Harrison, offers a fascinating mixture of history, politics, folklore, food, architecture, arts, and literature, studded with local anecdotes and personal reflections. From fashionable Milan to historic Rome and primitive, brooding Calabria, Harrison reveals her country of origin in all its beauty, peculiarity, and glory. Italian Days is the story of a return home; of friends, family, and faith; and of the search for the good life that propels all of us on our journeys wherever we are. “Harrison’s wonderful journal will make you update your passport and dream of subletting your job, home, etc. . . . With Harrison, you never know with whom you’ll be lunching, or climbing down a ruin. You just know you want to be there.” —Glamour