Dear you,
While posting a picture on Steepshot and writing the caption/description, I realized how, some places, are dear to my heart for holding the best memories away-from-home that I have made.
London would be the number one, the place where I got the chance to live for an entire year, after high school, and where I made friends for life. There, in between studying English, wild parties, drinking and eating, reading, listening to music, walking, falling asleep in strangers' beds and crying, lots and lots of crying, I made memories that will stay with me forever.
I remember vividly so many things about my first few months in London, and the fact that sometimes I felt sad, depressed and lonely doesn't change for a bit the fact that the rest of the time, I felt free.
I felt like I didn't have a care in the world, besides "does he like me back" - "Should I spend my money for this drink" - "Should I go home or should I stay" - "Which pub should we go to". I felt free for the first time in my life and, coming to a small village in the southern part of Switzerland, I found myself thrown into the cities where dreams come true.
At least that's how I felt. I felt like whatever was going on was the best that could ever happen to me because I was finally there, without anyone to listen to, with my own space, my own ability to choose and I never, ever in my life, felt as happy as I was back then.
I will put Seville as my number two.
Seville was a place where I spend 4 or 5 days with my dad. It was during my first or second year of university, I now can't remember, and I just fell in love.
Holidays with my dad are always nice, and I think I love them more than anything because we rarely do "real" stuff together. I see him every Saturday since he left, but we spend most of our time driving around or watching movies.
Holidays though are something I've always silently cherished. The first time he brought me to Paris, but his girlfriend at the time, and her daughter, joined too, so the trip ended up being pretty stressful and not enjoyable for me (plus, my camera was stolen at the Pompidou, so yeah... awful moment for me).
Seville was the first trip with me and my dad only. Plus I was 18, which meant that dad's typical way of discovering a new place, stopping for beers and tapas every few miles, was now legal for me too.
For those who know me, I am a drinker, I do love my wine, beer, prosecco, cocktail... you name it. But with dad, stopping and having a nice, cold one to escape the Spanish heat, having a tapas to fill our stomachs, all while enjoying the most beautiful view that's ever been presented to me, is priceless.
My memory of Seville is this quiet, relaxed town, surrounded by warm yellowish tones who become a dark mustard yellow under the shadows, and green trees and palm trees all around. I now can't tell if Seville actually has a lot of Palms or not, but I have this memory that fills my heart in mysterious ways. If you know the sound of summer in a warm and not crowded city, you might understand my love for Seville, and how I believe it seems straight out of a dream or movie.
Lastly, my number three would be Rome.
Oh, Rome!
I visited it two years after going back to Switzerland, after London. My best friend Rosa, which I met there, went back to Salerno (close to Naples) a few months before me and I was missing her like crazy. We used to talk every day and at a certain point I decided it was too much, so I bought a ticket from Milan to Naples and I went visit her for a week.
During that week she showed me stunning places, amazing beaches, the clearer sea I've ever swum in and Rome. Oh Rome.
It was a last minute decision but we ended up staying a weekend in the prettiest hotel close to the centere and we wandered around, day and night, enjoying sightseen, drinking in hidden bars and eating.
I had the worse carbonara ever and an unpleasant encounter with, Rosa says, a guy who was probably a mafia-kid. Nonetheless, Rome was fantastic. The city was so beautiful that I can't take it off my mind. All those tiny streets with sanpietrini (the little stones), cats sleeping on the old city ruins, my only regret was not staying for longer and since I came back, two years ago, I can't wait to go back.
I don't know about you, but the places dear to my heart have a reason to be so. I have a very visual memory and also a very creative mind. I am a hopeless romantic and each and every one of these cities I remember in vivid details but with a white shadow all over them, like if every step I take in those places, is a dream that never happened but that I will keep inside me forever. Like a ghost town where I was the only one who was truly alive while seeing and experiencing. And for as much as I know that's not true, I can't help it but feel like I'm the only one who understands those places.
Call me crazy, I've been called worse, but those places I will always love as they were people.
yours,
Anna
