The matriarch is the oldest living Italian immigrant in the Queen City, according to her family. Her husband and brothers founded Regina’s G. Marconi Canadian Italian Club.
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For Italian immigrant Matilde Fusco, turning 100 years old is bittersweet.
“I don’t feel like I’m 100. I feel young, but my body’s not young. My brain’s here, but not my body,” she said a few days ahead of her milestone birthday on Sunday.
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The matriarch — who stills bakes and cooks, and has never broken a bone or needed an operation — is the oldest living Italian immigrant in Regina, according to her family.
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But with such a title comes a degree of isolation. With no one her age to talk to, Fusco is lonely, she lamented.
Between the photos of family members on her walls, the crocheted blankets on the couch, and the homemade biscotti in the refrigerator, it’s clear she has spent much of the past century as a loving wife, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother.
Born in Cepagatti — a commune and town in the province of Pescara — on March 24, 1924, Fusco spent her formative years on a farm.
“When you think of a farm, you think of a Canadian farm. A farm over there is just two or three lots,” her son-in-law Edward Batalha explained.
Fast forward to 1957, when two of Fusco’s brothers, Bartolomeo and Lorenzo, decided to move to Canada to work on the railway after serving in the army. Another brother, Giuseppe, followed shortly after.
Those moves were the first in a series of events that led the soon-to-be centenarian to the Canadian Prairies. Once the trio of brothers had been settled in Regina for a few years, Bartolomeo sponsored Matilde, her husband Raf, nine-year-old son Giovanni and 11-year-old daughter Rosanna to come to Canada.
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The family took a boat from Napoli to Halifax in March 1963, spent a night in Montreal and then took a train to the Queen City.
“It was not a better life in Italy so I said I want a change and I came here,” Fusco said.
She was surprised by the size of the small house their family moved into when they first arrived in Regina, but added that she likes the flatness of Saskatchewan.
When they moved to Regina, the city was a lot smaller with nothing east of Fleet Street, a now-grown Giovanni recalled.
Fusco didn’t understand much English when she first arrived in Canada and found it difficult to learn the language. After getting work as a short-order cook at a bus depot restaurant, a waitress there would try to teach her English by telling her the names of different items like cup and spoon.
“She was driving me crazy,” Fusco recalled with a little laugh.
She worked there for 10 years and, after quitting, spent a lot of time crocheting blankets, knitting clothing, and sewing. She created traditional Italian blankets and table cloths for both of her children when they got married.
As she worked hard for her family, in turn her family worked hard for the Italian community that called Regina home.
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In 1970, Fusco’s brothers and husband founded the G. Marconi Canadian Italian Club, born from an idea to collect $100 — which is worth about $800 today — from every Italian household in order to create a place where they could hold functions. It now hosts thousands of visitors every year, according to its website.
“My brother said we want to build a club just for us … and we built a club,” Fusco reminisced.
Her husband, who worked a lot and spent a great deal of time at the club, passed away in 1994.
While Fusco and her family embraced life on the Prairies, she never lost sight of where she came from. She returned to Italy — where she still has some family members — about five times after she immigrated with her family. Her last trip was 10 years ago at age 90.
On Sunday, approximately 100 friends and family members from across Canada plan to gather in celebration of her birthday, including her six grandchildren who live in Montreal, Calgary, Vancouver and Saskatoon, and her 12 great-grandchildren.
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