Ciao How nice to think of this anniversary! 150 years doesnot seem like a long time compared to the thousands and thousands of years the Italic civilizations have been recorded on the peninsula or boot as called often in U.S., but officially 1861 we unified all of us Italic brothers and sisters with small kingdoms and became one unified country! Italy may now be unified country, but still hold proud our regions and provinces tribes and regional/dialect roots and the competiveness is still alive and well in the old country who is better, who cooks better, which of us can yell the loudest when speaking but this is common in most countries, but we are die hard competitors, always will be (all in good fun of course! usually) unless playing game "morra" So glad you have such a love for Italia it is certainly a country worthy to fall in love with especially the people and the weather and Figs of course! Ciao.
P.S. Love the photo!