Whenever someone in my native Ireland asks me where in Italy I live and I answer “Calabria,” I almost always get the same reaction: a vacant nod or a question along the lines of “Is that near…?” I find that if I simply say, ‘The Toe,” people can connect that to the visual representation of ‘The Boot’ for which Italy has become so famous.

That the area has an actual name has mostly interested dedicated geography buffs, intrepid travellers on their way to Sicily and of course, crime aficionados. These days, people are becoming much more familiar with Calabria, and thankfully it’s for all the right reasons.