Her Facebook page has nearly 300,000 followers from all over the world; her videos on Youtube are widely clicked: she is known as the web’s best ever Nonna. She’s a little over a metre tall and 80 years old but her smile and charisma are explosive. So is her attitude to certain things; tattoos is one, she hates them.

Like Penelope Green in the famous novel "When in Rome", Michelle Di Pietro leaves everything, career, home, family and friends to chase the infamous Italian dream and finally live the "dolce vita". (Photo Courtesy of Michelle Di Pietro)

How two "paesani" from a little town in Basilicata happened to meet unexpectedly for the first time in a Queensland holiday suburb

Finally, after one year and a half of living my dream in Australia, I decided it was time to go back home to see my family and friends, and to enjoy the Italian summer in my hometown Stigliano, Basilicata!