I am unfortunately the only child of only children... So it's just me. And where I live the people keep to themselves.
I miss Italy. Life is quite different here in US. Some places people are friendly, but far too many do not even know their neighbors...
Yes I can imagine that the Italian culture is more family oriented than anywhere in the US right now. And they consider everyone family. Same as here when you get in with the Panamanians or even in the expat community. When we lived in Texas, people weren't too friendly with neighbors - and family was always too busy.
The expats there form a close community?
Yes very. We have spent more time with a lot of our expat friends in the last seven months than we have with a lot of our family members in the last seven years - and we even lived right down the street from one of the members of our family. We see most of our friends at least 3-4 times a week. It is very unusual for us and we really are thankful for it.