Where I Live

I just got back from a weekend in Rome where I celebrated my 30^th birthday with some very special friends. It was the best birthday of my life simply because I was laughing, eating, walking and chatting with people that I love dearly. They flew to Rome from London to be with me, knowing that I had just moved to a new city and may not have had anyone to really celebrate with! Aren’t they wonderful? I was also able to catch up with some local Italian friends ‘a cui voglio tanto bene’ :) It was fantastic!

I departed from Termini Station this morning, Verona-bound. As I stepped onto the train, my heart pumped out a strange and wonderful sensation that coursed through my arteries and gave me that tingly feeling in the guts that makes you smile. I can only describe it as a mixture of satisfaction, excitement and relief in one deep-seated hit.  It was something I recognised but had not experienced for a very long time… I felt like I was going home.

I’ve been travelling for two-and-a-half years now and during all that time, I have not stayed put anywhere longer than six months. I have lived in places for two, three, four months and then moved to another job, another flat, another city. However, as I got on that train to head back to Verona, I felt like I finally had a place to call home. A place where I could unpack my winter AND summer wardrobe because I’d be staying for more than one season; a place where I could put books on the shelves and own more than one suitcase-full of stuff.

Verona is gorgeous. It is an ancient city that has been dominated and developed by a myriad of people. You’ll see ruins and constructions still standing from the Roman to Austrian Empires. 

Every day I cross over the river at Ponte della Vittoria, and even if I have been wondering what on Earth I’m doing in Italy, I glance over to Castelvecchio on my right and the dome of San Giorgio in Braida on my left, and I know that I’ve made the right decision. It’s just so beautiful! Then in the evenings I walk along the Adige River listening to him rush by the soft yellow lights of San Zeno and I sigh contentedly… I live here.  

Farewell London

After a year-and-a-half of uninspired living in London, I have moved to Verona, Italy. There are many great things about Britain, but the constant grey and depressing weather eventually took their toll on me. The brown-brick buildings; the ever-insufficient footpaths replete with fast-moving pedestrians; the black stuff on your tissue when you blow your nose on the tube; the cold; the rain; the wind that renders your umbrella useless; and a lifestyle overflowing with all the things I would prefer to keep in my ‘seldom practiced’ basket (winter clothes in “summer”, the ever-present potato and thick-sliced bacon, and being the only sober person at the party, for example) finally turned me into a veritable malcontent. God bless you England, but I needed to get out!

I have to bring balance to the above by stating that I did love the parks, the politeness, the existence of the queue (Italy is yet to understand this concept), the Southbank, and mostly the free museums and galleries. When someone asked me what I would miss about London, I said, “My friends, and the National Gallery!” Some amazing pieces are there, and I could go and see them free of charge, as many times as I wanted. If I was meeting someone at Trafalgar Square, I’d often wander in for ten minutes to have a peek at my favourites… The Tailor by Moroni, The Boulevard Montmartre at Night by Pissarro, and everything by Canaletto!

In July I finished up my job as an Occupational Therapist at a swish private hospital in Harley Street and kissed my career and London goodbye. I went home to Melbourne for six weeks where there was more sun and blue sky (in winter) than I’d seen all summer in England! It was so refreshing to be home in the city that I still love the most.

I went to all my favourite coffee houses and laneways, visited my old regular haunts and walked along our Southbank. It doesn’t have the iconic landmarks that London’s Southbank is littered with, but it’s a really wonderful area of Melbourne. As I walked along the Yarra River, soaking in all the things I love about my hometown – every familiar building and every new development that I had never seen before – it was like someone had pulled out the defibrillator and stunned my heart back into action. I gazed down the river towards Flinders Street Station, inhaled deeply, emotionally, emphatically, and realised... I could breathe again.