You are welcome, even though you are Italian, a descendant of the ancient Romans.’ ‘I am from Sicily. The Romans didn’t consider Sicily part of Italy. In fact, Sicily was a Roman colony, like Judea. We were ruled by a Roman governor like you. You had Pontius Pilate, and we had Verres, who was so brutal that he stripped the Sicilian temples of the golden statues. In my hometown he couldn’t steal the statue of Demeter because it was too big, but he snatched away the statue of Victory which Demeter held in her hand,’ I said.”
“Uncle Salvatore. Don’t you think that still now there are differences and misunderstanding between Sicily and Italy? I have a feeling that they are two different nations. As for me, I consider myself as a Sicilian rather than an Italian. What about you?”
“Benedetto, I am a citizen of the world, as you know. So I don’t feel like being Italian or Sicilian. My country is the world. Garibaldi unified Italy politically, but he couldn’t make one nation with the many small countries that preexisted Italy, because all of them had different history, traditions, and their uniqueness.

This is an excerpt from The Vibrations of Words: second edition by Ettore Grillo
Ettore Grillo author of these books:
– A Hidden Sicilian History
– The Vibrations of Words
-Travels of the Mind
http://www.amazon.com/author/ettoregrillo