In 1997-1998 Internet was catching on in Italy and the provider Tiscali was the first who supplied free connection to the net. I have ever been fond of computers and became a "surfer" devoting lot of hours to the net, attracted by the power of the Web.
First of all I noticed the opportunity to access to several free data banks, known as "white pages" and research engines as the ones you can find today surfing on sites like Yahoo and Hotmail.
Suddenly a spark in my mind: Why don't look for my relatives settled over the Atlantic ocean? My father used to talk me about them from time to time; I remembered that my granfather' sister left Reggio Calabria to White Plains in the 30s or so and she had had 3 or 4 children. Also I remembered 3 names of them: Bruno (#51), Caterina (#52) and Maria (#50). So, I wrote an e-mail to all the Turianos located in those US white pages. My 3rd cousin Thomas #56 replied. He told me he recognized people mentioned in that mail and gave me the e-address of his father Angelo Anthony #53, the 4th child of my granfather' sister, the one I didn't know at all. For more than a year we mailed each other frequently and I discovered his great passion for the family and his hobby for genealogy. I was surprised to notice what a lot of datas about Italian Turianos he knew, even living in America and beeing in Italy just a couple of week, before we met. He sent a first copy of his family tree by air mail, so his hobby became mine.On September 2000 I had the great pleasure to host him in Reggio for a week. Unfortunately, I haven't met him in person since that time, but we keep on mailing weekly (sometimes daily), thanks God.
Angelo Anthony planted the "roots" of our family tree thanks to the infromations owned by his mother and simply talking wuth his relatives. Don't think that genealogy is much more than this! Don't think at expensive researches or thousands of hour spent nighttime in ancient libraries! Just talk with your parents, and oldest relatives that you are no more used to visit. You'll make them and yourself happy to discover things that you might never suppose!