Ancora! We have another write-up served fresh!
Well, as I said in my last post, I have been quiet for a while because my family and I have decided to unload the biggest weight off our shoulders.
We sold our investment property that has been in our family for over 45 years, yes you have read that correctly, 45 years. Wogs seem to have this tendency to hold onto the property, sometimes good, and sometimes shit. I guess in our case it was pretty good.
Some of you are probably asking yourselves, “why is this scema writing up about her personal investments”? Well, the reality is this personal investment was a personal struggle, and this business is based on talking about your personal struggles One Panino at a Time.
I want to give you guys some background about this house, yeah it was great from an investment perspective, but the reality was this house has always been a headache for everyone in my family. From my parents having to kick out renters not once but twice, to squatters, to my mother managing this investment on her own. I have seen the struggle my family has gone through just to keep the property.
In 2019 when my mum’s cancer wasn’t aggressive, she decided to take on a whole renovation, kitchen, bathroom, plumbing, painting, and flooring, a whole goddamn revamp! I wasn’t even in the country at the time, I was studying overseas in Switzerland, at the same time my mum was also finding an aged-care home for my Nonna, she was suffering from dementia at this point, so, to put it bluntly, it was a f****n casino in this famiglia.
I got home around September that year, and to my surprise, my mum did this all on her own (now my mum’s not the renovation type of person). After her successful renovation, putting my Nonna in A-grade care, it was back to renting. But what we didn’t know was going to hit us was 2020, and it hit hard. My Nonna passed away, and my mum took time off work to grieve and undergo surgery to reverse her bowels, months passed, and her confidence was coming back, then we received the news that the Cancer returned, and it was stage 4 with only 12 months left to live.
At this point, my mum relied on the rent more than she did on her job, and for me, it was concerning to watch because I saw the stress that this house caused her, all her hard work, I saw the worry in her eyes, my mum couldn’t solely focus on getting better. Being a property Lawyer myself, I knew all landlords in my mother's position were in the same anxiety-riddled boat, landlords for commercial and residential, it was a stressful time for all, I saw it personally and I saw it professionally.
So, when my mum passed on the 18th of February 2021, I knew the absolute shit show that awaited my brothers and I at our doorstep. It has not been fun by no stretch of the imagination; it has not been pleasant, and I have downright not enjoyed inheriting these problems that were served to us on a golden platter. If there is one thing, I’m good at, it’s making out like all the shit that I've been through never happened and I carry on like the rest of society because that’s all I know.
Still, another year of a pandemic being landlords you can only imagine the type of “management” we had to pull off for the last year and a half. We kept the house, but it wasn’t until this year that the house was killing me on a personal level, orchestrating tenants, managing calls, liaising with family members, and making these decisions, not for my clients, but for myself was a lot harder.
Because it was personal, if there is one thing in this career that I try to input into this business and into my personal decision-making, you must take away your emotions and think logically. Is this going to serve you? Can you do this? Do you have the mental capacity for this anymore? The answer was NO. The decisions we had to make TOGETHER were killing us. You’re probably all thinking “well it’s not that hard, you should be used to making decisions together as a family”. Well yes, we are, however, when you make decisions in this capacity as a family and there is a 23-to-11-year age gap, there are different wants and needs in all our lives. But we did decide how we were going to deal with this as a family, One Panino At A Time.
It wasn’t serving us at all, it wasn’t serving me, it was stressing me out, and I failed at One Panino At A Time, the hampers weren’t going well, I sometimes would forget which client I was talking to, and my friends would speak to me and I wasn’t even paying attention, my problems were bigger than everyone else's, I was tired, I would cry myself to sleep, I would get up and repeat, all for the sake of doing the wog thing to retain the property. Because a part of me felt guilty to throw it all away.
I have built this start-up in memory of my parents and taking life One Panino At A Time, and for the last 5 months I have been doing the exact opposite, I have been filling my “golden platter” with responsibilities that did not belong to me in the first place.
So, by 2022, we got to June, the market wasn’t doing well so we decided to take a chance and we agreed if it didn’t do well, we carry on and retain the property like it has been done for the last 45 years, I dreaded it but I knew it was the right thing to do from a business perspective. Normal Jess perspective: I was about to pull my f****n hair out if that was my reality, I had enough at the age of 28, taking care of everyone and everything but myself, but I knew if the price wasn’t right, we would carry that house on our backs for the next few years if we had too. This honestly must be a wog thing, a very toxic trait. Does any other wog do this? Come on, put ya hands up, and don’t be shy?!?
So, we got to July, I had hampers underway and my brothers and I decided to sell, we had to fix up the place, clean, paint, rubbish, hire bins, do electrical work, landscape the whole f***ing nine yards. During that time, I was selling hampers, working full-time, singing and catering, I was working 7 days a week for almost two months, weekends at the investment property, after work, and at the investment property.
Then we styled it. I finished up catering, I finished up the hampers and I went to Noosa, the campaign started, and the feedback we were getting was amazing. However, in the last three weeks of the property campaign, it wasn’t looking good, interest rates were and still are getting worse, the property market is dropping, and I was stressing out because I thought we were making a mistake and most of all I thought I was disappointing my parents after all the hard work they’ve put in. I then went to Bali two weeks later, as you can see, I have a slight pattern of skipping town when it gets a little hard (we all have our vices this is mine, stop judging).
It got to the last 5 days before the auction and things weren’t looking great, but someone put in an offer. As you all know and some of you may not, I lost both parents on the 18th, the clock on my logo represents the number 18 if you look closely at the hands. It’s a representation of their passing and the birth of One Panino At A Time. So, if you know where I’m going with this, on the 18th of October 2022, someone came in with an offer we couldn’t refuse.
I left my phone on my desk at work, I came back to my phone an hour later with 3 missed calls from the agent, my brother sending me screenshots of the offer, my sister-in-law was jumping up and down and my other brother was calling me like a stage-5 clinger. So, I knew on the 18th of October 2022 that it wasn’t the market that was doing this for us, it was my parents. I am not the superstitious type, but I do believe the departed watch over us, and I do believe they saw the weight this house was carrying on our shoulders, and after 45 years, it was finished, the home served its purpose and it no longer needed to serve us. So, thank you, Mum & Dad.
My Nonno was a little bit of a property mogul in his own right who passed properties down to his only daughter and in turn, got passed down to us. But the funny thing is with these wogs, they like to pass things down, properties, heirlooms and at times businesses. Which is how I met a girl by the name of Alana Sabbadini from Bar Carlo.
Successful owner of Bar Carlo, her Nonno Carlo Sabbadini started The Waiters’ Club back in the 70s and it was one of the first Italian restaurants in Melbourne. It was a place for Italian waiters, and late-night workers would come from across the city to play cards and enjoy a simple Italian meal over a glass of wine. Carlo sadly passed away in 1989 and his son took over, with such success in the family, downstairs of the famous Italian restaurant Meyers Place Bar, founded Melbourne's laneway bar scene in the early 1990s. In 2017 it then turned into the famous Bar Carlo, inheriting family history.
This bar is your typical northern-Italy one-stop shop for an apretivo! They have little plates of traditional olives, served with some patatine (real Italian style) and a famous wall of Leone. This is the most famous alcoholic beverage in Bassano del Grappa thanks to the skills and passion of Mr Leone Miotti. The value of Leone is enclosed in its traditional composition that offers an elaborate mix of selected natural ingredients. Leone possesses the typical unique Freshness of Juniper Extract (Aromatic Flavor Tasting) and has digestive properties.
Bar Carlo has based their vibe around the North of Italy, with Italian cocktails shaken around the clock and your freshest panini it is hard to shy away from this place.
So, I decided to celebrate my success by having the freshest Panino this bar could offer. I ordered:
The Mortadella:
- Fresh Bread
- Mortadella
- Olives
- Mozarella
Cazzo! This was so fresh and so traditional, there was no bullshit with this panino, the mortadella was cut finely, the mozzarella was fresh, thick, and juicy from That's Amorè Cheese and the Sicilian olives were wedged between the mozzarella and mortadella. It was simple, crisp, and straight to the point, not to mention the fresh bread from North St. Bakery that compacts all the condiments.
These guys make your typical panino served fresh on a plate, it tasted like home, and it was just simple, they hit it right with the mozzarella. I combined my panino with an excellent Negroni that tasted like I was sitting in Firenzè.
Whilst I was eating, I could hear conversations in the background from customers saying that this place reminds them of Florence, how you can just walk on in order some Cicchetti, have some apretivi and talk for hours.
Alana Sabbadini has done an excellent job of preserving the northern-Italian lifestyle and bringing it to the streets of Melbourne CBD. This woman is a powerhouse, being pregnant at the same time as running her business nothing is going to stop her from making Bar Carlo the only Bar in Australia that preserves the most famous alcohol in Italy.
That’s right, Bar Carlo is the only bar that stocks Leone and she is proud of it. So proud that Bar Carlo & One Panino At A Time have decided to team up for Christmas and serve you guys the freshest Panino hampers you have ever seen!
We will be taking orders in the next couple of weeks and the hampers will feature panini made fresh at Bar Carlo with a make-your-own drinks package included.
Be sure to find these guys at 20 Meyers Pl, Melbourne or check out their Instagram: @barcarlomelbourne.