Jacopo, nice to meet you!

Hi! As you read from the title, my name is Jacopo and I’m really happy to meet you.

Introducing and talking about yourself is always super hard, at least for me. I could write article after article about any topic, after getting the right information, but if I have to write about myself, here comes the block.

I’ll still try to be comprehensive enough, without running into boring AA style presentations.

As I write this it’s October 2021, I’m 24 years old and I’ve been living in Malta for six months, after living in England for 8 months. The one in the UK was my first experience abroad: dreamed of for years, I will never forget it.

Why did I decide to move abroad?

On the surface, I had no reason to leave Italy. I had a loving family, fantastic childhood friends, a wonderful, if a bit of a pain in the ass girlfriend (Beatrice, the other half of this blog), and a secure and “well paid” job.

I deliberately put the “well paid” in quotes: don’t worry, I’ll explain why in a later article.

Coming back to me, although I had everything that, according to many, is enough to be happy, I wasn’t entirely happy. Let’s be clear, despite the fact apparently I had everything, I felt that something was missing.

I’ve always been a curious boy and eager to discover, know and learn. Since I was a teenager, therefore, I had a lot of fun, but something in me always wondered if there was something else outside my country, my habits and my culture.

The answer was not long in coming: there was much more outside my little world.

When I was 15/16 years old, realizing how big the world was made a sort of anger grow in me that almost turned into an apathy towards my everyday life. I reacted badly, but who could blame me?

Fortunately, I was able to turn that anger into positive energy. I rolled up my sleeves, took courage (my family didn’t really agree with my desire to experience abroad), and once I graduated, I started working (literally and figuratively) to make my dream come true.

I planned to leave in March 2020 – bad choice, as we all know.

If I want something, however, not even a global pandemic can stop me, so in July 2020 I packed up and moved to England, specifically to Chichester, a small English town just over an hour south of London.

Obviously, like most people who want to move to the UK, I dreamed of living in the capital. The dynamics of life, always unpredictable, especially in times like these, led me to Chichester and, to be honest, maybe it worked out even better for me. I’ll tell you about that too in another article.

That said, I’ve been living abroad for almost a year and a half now, I still have a loving family (who has now completely accepted this need of mine to see the world), wonderful childhood friends, a wonderful girlfriend and a very good job.

Finally, I feel like I’m not missing anything. But I have not lost my desire to discover, explore, grow, learn and improve: this blog is a perfect example.

I’ve gone on too long. Remember, at the beginning of the article, when I told you that I usually freeze up if it comes to talking about myself? Apparently, this time the words just came to me.

Nice to meet you again, and whether you’re here because you want to change your life, have a little experience abroad, consider all the possibilities, or just out of curiosity, I thank you for reading this far and hope to see you in our next articles as well.

Cheers, mate!