#Did I add many extra little bits that are inspired by Japanese streets? Yes

[bluebelliedrolling]

Hello there joel smallishbeans fans…would you like to see my loosely inspired by joel smallishbeans’ base joel smallishbeans base? Say yes please

[kayejwrotes]

Half-Italian Iwaizumi headcanons

These were inspired by lovely @aira–elenabarilliart and @latestphase that fueled my secret love for half- “insert not Japanese nationality” Iwa.

- His mom comes from Lombardia, land of incredibly good food and contradictions. She was an Oriental Studies university student that ended up falling in love with the Very Handsome and Exotic™ exchange student, namely Iwa’s dad. They fell in love and, in the end, she decided to follow him back to Japan, where Hajime was born.

- She’s from Milan, but of Bolognese descents. Not the pasta, but as in part of her family comes from Bologna, a city Dante named “la grassa, la dotta, la rossa” (the fat, the savant, the red) for very precise reasons, but what it’s interesting to us it’s the first name, “la grassa”. Why? Because Emilian cooking is rich, hearty, and very very tasty. Of course, Mama Iwaizumi taught his son everything she knows about it. And she knows a lot.

- Since Hajime was a kid, she made sure to have him around whenever she cooked. She started to involve him in the cooking process bit by bit, teaching him how to do pasta, how to do risotto, mixing with him traditional Japanese dishes with typical Italian techniques. Sometimes the results were good, sometimes were not, but they always had fun together. Cooking in time became one of their things.

- Surprisingly, Italian and Japanese culture share a fair amount of similar traits. Respect your elders, value family and work, respect your parents and be grateful for them, so there were never educational conflicts in the Iwaizumi’s household. 

- Also, if not for his slightly darker complexion, Hajime doesn’t look in the slightest like his mom. He’s the younger version of his father for which his mom is really grateful for mainly two reasons: her husband is really really handsome, and her son never had to face any form of discrimination through school. 

- They moved next to the Oikawas soon after Hajime was born, when Oikawa’s mom was in the last stages of her pregnancy. The two mothers soon became friends and bonded over the journey through their maternity, so Hajime and Tooru have known each other since the very first moment.

- Tooru loves Mama Iwaizumi. She made sure to always give him extras to take home with him, whenever she cooked something Italian. Let’s just say Tooru made sure to ask Hajime every day about what his mom was making for dinner.

- Despite what one could expect, Hajime’s favourite dish his Oikawa’s mom agedashi tofu. Mama Iwaizumi still doesn’t know how his son came out like that. Unbelievable.

- Obviously, Hajime had the best bentos while growing up. Sometimes they were very traditional (rice, vegetables, chicken), but other times - other glorious times, Makki would add once in high-school while seeing Iwa’s lunch -  it was full Italian leftovers power. His mom would tell him to take his “schiscetta” (literally, lunch made of leftovers in dialect). Lasagna, pasta al ragù, risotto allo zafferano, torte salate, whatever was left from the previous dinner was his. 

- Once, he took all the leftovers at school and shared with Oikawa, Makki and Mattsun. Mattsun brushed away a tear of happiness at the sight of tutto quel bendiddio. (Yes, Hajime taught them some Italian expression like this one).

This is becoming really long, so I decided to put a “read more” and let you enjoy the rest like this.

- Hajime speaks a bit of Italian because his mom made sure to talk to him also in her own language, but he isn’t that good at it. He can hold simple conversations in it, but he usually gets genders, numbers, and verbs wrong, since many of those he can’t associate them to Japanese grammar.

- Despite not knowing that much of Italian, he made sure to learn one or two things that he knew would come useful in time.

- “Pirla”. It’s one of those typical Milanese words that could have thousands of shades, depending on which tone they are pronounced. If your mom says “pirla” to you, while laughing or smiling really soft, you probably did something stupid, bit she has already forgiven you and kinda finds you amusing. If she shouts it at the top of her lungs while driving right after a car cut her street, she is probably insulting the other driver really badly. Funnily enough, the real meaning of this word means “to go around without purpose”.

- He tried “pirla” a few times against Tooru, whenever he did something stupid, but after a few tries, he found out “cacchetta” worked better. That’s where the famous “shittykawa” was born.

- But he made sure to learn other words too. He went only once to Italy, during the summer of his ten years, but he stayed there for one whole month, visiting the country up and down with his grandparents, uncles and cousins.  Talking was difficult but he found a special understanding with his nonna over the right way to make tagliatelle. During their cooking sessions, the classical “ Ma la fidanzatina?” (”What about girlfrends?”) came out, and Hajime didn’t answer at first, but after a while he asked how could he tell someone he liked that he loved them. She stared a him and then answered saying that if he really wanted to tell something like that to a special person, he had to be sure they were “The One”. In Italian we don’t have gender neutral terms to refer to someone, so she first told him “a person” but after that she asked him to let her know, when he “glielo dirà”. “Lo” refers to a male object of the sentence.

- Hajime had come to terms with the fact that he was in love with his best friend around the age of 13. He still called Oikawa “cacchetta” but you could almost feel the fond but exhasperated tone whenever he told him. 

- The first time he let the word “amore” slip through it was their last day before high school graduation. He had wanted to try it with Tooru near, but without making him notice what he was doing. He had waited until his friend had fallen asleep on the couch, or so he thought, and muttered the word in the silence. Nothing happened, but he felt a sudden rush of embarrassment at the thought that yes, he had just called “love” his best friend, because he was in love with him, even though the other didn’t suspect anything about it. He wanted to say it another time, just to get that feeling of “righteousness” again, but Tooru had shot up on the couch before he could say anything and Hajime had to cover up the sudden closeness with an excuse. 

- In the end, Oikawa had heard everything that night, but since  Hajime didn’t seem ready to have any talk about it, he just let things go on like that.

- It was in the end of their third year of university that Oikawa crumbled and left a very dumbfounded Hajime alone for spring break and went home straight to talk with Mama Iwa about her “coniglio” of a son that preferred to go on as if nothing had changed between them instead of facing his feelings.

- When he went home after some days, his plan was put into action. “Hajime’s a very proud and strong boy. He faces everything head on, except when it comes to feelings” she had told him “You have to trick him, Tooru caro.” He had two possibilities here: be sneaky and subtle, and have him crumbling until he confessed his feelings for him ( a very italian thing Mama Iwa had told him. No one ever wanted to confess first), or face him right away as soon as he put his feet inside their door. Luckily for them, Tooru was a very Japanese man. Or probably, just very Tooru.

- One of the first trips they took after getting together, was to Italy. Hajime was literally brimming with exctiment at the idea of Tooru meeting his Italian family.  He couldn’t stop telling him of that one uncle who once took him to the horse races when  he was there that summer, or how he and his nonno had gone around for the Emilian country stealing ripe fruit from the trees of his neighbours when he was ten. He remembered everything about them from the frequent calls on skype. He also remembered what his nonna had told him all those years ago.

- When he presented Tooru at his nonna she just asked him “E’ lui?” and Hajime told her “Sì, è lui, nonna”.  Tooru caught bits and pieces of their words, the heavy accent of the old woman too difficult to understand for him, but he believed he understood something when the little woman’s arms closed around his torso in a bone crushing hug, kissing him on both cheeks. “Benvenuto in famiglia!”