For many of those who knew her as a radiant and kind-hearted looker in the 1980s and 1990s as secretary of the Luigi Broglio Space Centre, she is still Annamaria; for all the others, from the peers and friends of previous years, to the diplomats of the Italian Embassy, artists and staff members who have worked at the Italian Cultural Institute in Nairobi for almost thirty years, she is simply the wonderful Annie.
A great, good, positive, calming presence, impossible to forget.
Annie Petrozzi, the eternal Italian girl born in Kenya, is officially retiring today, after having been one of the most usual and pleasant faces to meet at dozens of events at the Institute, first at the historic Westlands location, where so many activities were organised and Annie was a pillar, following initiatives, taking an active part in the setting up of theatre shows and days for children, as well as for the events of the Embassy itself.
An eternal blonde lady, the kind that is difficult to think of as 'old', Annie disguises her Friulian origins with a British accent and stylish aplomb, the result of a happy childhood in Kenya at the end of the British empire and a sparkling, formative adolescence in the newly independent country, where her father Rinaldo, who came from Friuli and was a former Udinese footballer, built houses and provided for her and her brother Roberto, a highly-regarded doctor who died a few years ago, as well as his wife Rina, also from Friuli.
Of the land of her parents, Annie has retained the frankness, the pleasure of company and a good drink with friends. For those of us who had the pleasure of sharing a few moments of work and too few occasions for recreation with her, a very sweet and affectionate memory remains of her, and the wish that we will spend much more time together, and that it will be quality time.
Because feelings, sympathy and the lightness of life never retire.