The past, the present.

The table I'm sitting at is actually an old sewing machine, Music from the 80s is playing from the speakers, hung in the corners of stained and scratched walls. Through the windows, high as the ceiling and divided into squares by steel bars, I see double-deckers passing by in the windy and semi-desert street. Here, in the Beyond Retro Café, chairs and tables don't match with each other at all - they all must come from different places and eras. The stained ceiling, the wooden column in the middle of the room covered with naive plastic plants and the squared glasses at the windows covered with smokey panels convey anything but the idea of being in a warm or clean place. But yet, after a first weird and confused impression, I immediately feel at home. Free to sit here, in the middle of the café, sipping a cappuccino and crumbling my croissant all over the table and floor. The vintage clothes shop is just one step from me while I am here, thinking about past and future. I love these kind of places where there isn't one thing that matches with the other. In the café, as in the clothes store, there aren't two items which look the same. But yet I feel a great harmony all around. There are hundreds of dresses and shirts hung up: dotted, striped, flowered ones. If you took them one by one, they probably won't even make any sense. But as I peep through the door from the table I'm sitting at, all the dresses and shoes and shirts and jackets look like there's a perfect harmony among them. 

The Beyond Retro store from the Café.

Vintage is a way to keep the past alive. It's an expensive way to keep on dressing up as our parents used to do in the '70s and '80s. Suddenly, something brings me back to the present: a small blackboard with a colorful chalk writing - "Free WiFi". Here I am, thinking about the past: it seems as if we put all our efforts in trying to leave our past apart. We store up dismissed clothes in boxes or give them away as we are sure they'll never fit us again. Then, after a while, we spend lots of money in vintage stores to set our closets back into the '80s. What's in the while? In the while there's the present. The truthful effort to move on standing on our own feet. We think it's easy to hide the past in some sort of memory boxes and it's done. So confident that we wouldn't need them anymore. What if one day we have to face them all again? Then, the price is higher. If we had kept all these clothes well stored in a proper closet, with patience and care, it would be now costless to wear them again. And so I believe it is the same as with memories. Let them be with us day by day and when we'll realize how precious they are, they'll still be there, unwasted and free. Maybe the most of them won't match which each other, but who cares? The whole soul and mind would feel in harmony - and this, to me, is priceless.

Connections

How much time do we spend in pursuing our virtual identity? How much time do we spend in selecting which picture to use as a profile picture - how to write our status to make it as more attractive as possible to the majority of people? How clever we think we are in using smiles and emoticons to blur the edges of what we would really like to say? I'm afraid sometimes we just hide from truth. Today I had an amazing experience, something that never happened before to me. I decided to join a friend in  a free-hugging event. Yesterday we prepared our papers and today we were ready to join all the Focallocal guys in Trafalgar Square. That's not much a big deal, apparently: you just have to show up there with a paper saying "Free Hugs" and walk among people, move towards them and just...hug. But the actual deal is much more than just that. To me it has meant quite a lot. I don't know if it was because of the gorgeous location - Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery are two of my favorite spots ever all over the World I've seen so far - but suddenly emotions got the upper hand on rationality and I got immediately involved in that thing. I didn't realize what a thing I was about to do until the very first person, a girl, came towards me to get a free hug. I immediately felt tears streaming to my eyes and I had to swallow them back because I didn't want to get too emotional. To hug a person is a very simple thing to do - and yet is one of the most moving, happy things anybody could ever do. No need to hide behind any fake smile in a chat. You're living the moment, one hundred per cent. No way you can get distracted by something else in that very moment - no way you have the time to think how you should put it to get more appreciated by people. You are just...You. And people thank you for that. An elderly woman told me these exact words I'll never forget: "You're doing a great thing today. You're making people smiling". Another man told me: "Thank you. You're connecting the World". The World's not going so bad, though. Most of us may reckon we're getting more and more individualistic and selfish, sharing less and less with people in live interactions. And I might agree with that, but yet when you try to go out of the schemes there's still someone who follows and support you, and that's a good thing. It means people, of course, still feel the need of brotherhood and openness. Once you understand you can be different from what you usually think you are, things can change for better. Apparently effortless actions can get people to think a bit more deeply about connections. And if you believe in connections, you'll start seeing how many of them are just around you. No matter if you're too young or too old - it's never neither too early nor too late. Let Life surprise you. 

Free Hugs with Focallocal, Trafalgar Square. 

Changes

Yesterday I had a taste of three of the main drinks in the UK: cider, tea and Pimm's. When you wake up on a Sunday morning with no idea of what could happen during the day, then it's gonna be a nice day for sure! I was sitting in the tube, heading to Cutty Sark station in Greenwich and I was thinking about how fast things can change. And how easy it is for human beings to adapt to changes. I think it's part of our evolutionary skills, that we have to face changes in the best ways in order not to be overcome by them. You meet new people and your life get twirled upside down, but yet it's not such a harm as it may sound. I feel pretty confortable in these shoes. So as I said, we were heading to Greenwich. I had only been there once, three years ago, and I couldn't help some memories to come back to my mind. The wind, a shy sun that was hiding behind fast clouds, the smells and tastes of Greenwich Market. But then, here I am, another period, another go, another life. Walking through the Naval College Gardens, you feel a sense of inner peace: large meadows, high buildings with white columns, people laying on the grass and a feeling of being in a quiet place where anything could happen to you. There, surrounded bu young men in their uniforms, you feel as if anything could hurt you - apart from memories, as they come from the inside. 

Naval College Gardens and the Royal Naval College, Greenwich.

We stopped for a drink at a pub called The Gipsy Moth, where I had half a pint of cider - and it soon got to my head! There we go with the first taste of Britain! As soon as you feel confortable, sitting at the table and start having a conversation in the fluency that alcohol gives to your English, suddenly it starts raining, so that we decided to head off to the National Maritime Museum, and spend half an hour there waiting for our tea-room reservation time. Changes in the weather here are so quick because clouds fly over so fast, adaptation is a way of life and there is not so much wonder about it, but I still feel confused sometimes when I go out in the morning and it's sunny and warm, then after a couple of hours it gets chilly and damned windy that you can't almost stand on your feet. That's a clear message: I have to get used to any sort of changes. Starting with the weather ones could be a good point.

The tea room has been a very British experience, too! Now I know for sure how all my dolls must have felt when I used to place them around the table in their best outfits, with lot of cups, teapots, plates full of scones, cakes, brownies and glasses with cream and jam. It is a very "Victorian age" experience, with fresco painted walls and mirrored doors that double the actual room size. Unfortunately there wasn't much light through the windows because of the clouds, but the atmosphere was delicate and warm. I tried to imagine how women from the high London society could sit there and spend many words about the people they knew, and how London aristocratic dynamics were manipulated from those apparently harmless round, nice and well-dressed tables, covered by the tinkling of pots and spoons. There we were, four girls talking about our holidays and travels, nothing compared to those powerful women, but yet we enjoyed the stay very much. Changes happen, but tea is always tea.

Tea room in the Fan Museum, Greenwich.

A second start

Friday. I spent the whole day at home. Watching tv series, doing the laundry, cooking, drinking tea, studying phrasal verbs and cooking again. Apparently, I should have nothing to say about today, as I only stepped in the garden to hang out my laundry and nothing more. I am here, sitting on my bed, twisted and turned into layers of sweaters and blankett as the weather is terribly cold - especially considering that a month ago I was enjoying the hot sun in Florida, dipping my feet in the Ocean. And I suddenly realized it's not true that I spent all the day at home: today, after almost one week of rushing all around the City to see rooms and houses that could potentially become "home" to me, my head  and body needed some rest. I can still feel the rain pouring on my hair and on my face, the desolation of that bus stop in the cold evening, my tears streaming down and mixing with raindrops. Today, all I needed was the calm and the warmth that you feel only when you are at home - and in some ways, I was able to find them even if I'm everywhere but home at the moment. I didn't actually spend all the day here: today, my thoughts have reached the furthest corners on Earth, from New Zealand, to Germany, to Switzerland and Argentina, and so on. I had this strong feeling of connection with other Friends who are trying to make their ways somewhere in the World. What if, in our lives, we could be gifted with a second start? What if we were given a second chance to start our lives over? Once you're stucked in your routine, in your own Country, it's almost the same places and faces you've always seen for ages, the same daily habits. For ages. You start wondering how would it be to have a second chance, until  you start gathering all your strength and energies and you decide to leave. And then? Trying to make a comparison between the two situations would be both silly and useless, as I would need ages before starting to have a daily routine here. At the moment, each little moment of joy is a bliss, and each obstacle on my way is a curse. Today I realized that even though a little bit of courage is enough to leave your Country, then only patience makes the difference and gives you the answers. That's why today I've decided to stop making questions - as it's not the right time to find answers yet. 

Yesterday

Yesterday has been a very hard day. The sky was grey and the weather was windy and cold. I was in Aldgate East tube station waiting for my train to approach: people all around me were silent in their coats, wind was blowing so cold through the galleries and the train kept me waiting for ten minutes in this unreal place. As the appointment I had previously arranged for the afternoon has been anticipated, I didn't even had the time to get a shower or prepare myself properly to see another house. Yet, tired since the night before, my mood wasn't exactly the right one to start another hectic day in London. I didn't even enjoy the journey on the double-decker, and that's obviously a sign that something was wrong with me. 

Aldgate East tube station.

As I arrived in Whitechapel, I almost got lost and I had to ask to a Pakistani shopkeeper for informations, as I still don't have a proper map. I arrived late on my appointment - everything seemed to say "It's not your day", and maybe it would have been better for me to remain in my bed, as I didn't really enjoy what was about to happen. I entered the small apartment in a sort of University Block of Flats called Paymal House. On my left, a door led through the kitchen: a tiny room, so dirty that I almost had to hold my breath. The sink was full of dirty stuff, the shelves looked sticky, all the households were -for unknown reasons- lying on the sticky floor, in a jungle of cables and dust. A creepy staircase lead upstairs, where I have been shown the most squalid bedroom EVER. The bed consisted in nothing but a stained mattress, with no linen, stuffed with a mass of unidentified objects and clothes. The only thing I was able to spot was a laptop, the only sign of a person actually living there. Between the bed and the small window, there were a tiny wardrobe and a chest of drawers, turned upside down. In the small space between me and the wall, there was another mattress which I've been told could have been used for "my overnight guests": I think not even a rat or a homeless dog would have slept on this dusty, mouldy, stained, horrible...thing. Without even checking the toilets, I said thank you to the guy who showed me the room - who was, in the while, begging me to let him know as soon as possible if I intended to rent his room, as he was going to be kicked out in two days since he can't afford to pay the rent. I run back to the bus stop, so tired and depressed by what I had just seen and by the fact that I actually wasted my morning for nothing. But then, on my way back home,  I received a very good news: on Saturday, I can move to the place in Dollis Hill. It will be temporary, but yet it's a good news, isn't it? I immediately started seing things more positively, and I enjoyed the way back on the double-decker much more than the previous morning. I also noticed that, passing through Stamford Hill quartier, the streets were crowded of people wearing unusual clothes and big black hats: a large community of Ortodox Jewish lives there and they keep their traditional clothes and hairstyle, with typical side curls. 

An Ortodox Jewish in Stamford Hill.

As I came back home, I still had a feeling of dirty and sticky and the images of that awful place were still so clear in my mind, that first of all I had a massive carbohydrates lunch to restore my spirit and then I had to wash myself, my room, the shower, the kitchen, and then myself again, in order to take this bad feelings away from me and finally enjoy what remained of the day. 

A thousand faces.

Today I've seen something like a million faces. In the tube, in the streets, in the shops, faces everywhere. Young, old, Black, White, Indian, Chinese. People sleeping, reading, listening to music, talking, texting, going nuts. People everywhere. People wearing sporty, poshy, and a lot - A LOT - just wearing... AWFULLY. Sometimes I find myself wondering if they even have mirrors at home. Among all these thousands of people you can easily spot tourists: they are the ones who stop in the middle of the sidewalk or on the zebra crossing because they absolutely need to take a picture beside a double-decker bus; tourists are everywhere, in the corner of the streets, loaded with shopping bags and Starbucks glasses. They are slow: when they're walking, and even when they're about to get a sit on the tube. I noticed that only few of them manage to do so at the first try, because there's always someone faster than them at catching the free seat. London tube is like a monster and you have to fight against it for survival. You have to fight against endless corridors, where the walls are decorated with mosaics made of tiny square-shaped tiles that literally hypnotize you after the first ten steps. You have to keep on walking even when talented buskers are playing beautiful songs and you'd like to stop and listen to them: if you stop, the crowd will just step on you and pull you on the escalators anyway. After spending one hour of my life in such a nuthouse, I arrived in Dollis Hill. It's a very nice neighborhood in the North West of London. As I was early for my appointment, I decided to have a look around and after walking a little bit without any destinations, I found a very peaceful place: Gladstone Park. It's a huge green area on the top of a hill, with walking paths, football pitches and endless green meadows. I was too tired to climb the hill so I stopped on a bench, reading a book. 

Gladstone Park in Dollis Hill.

I was sitting there, with fresh air smoothing my cheeks and this green natural carpet in front of my eyes and I couldn't think about anything else but how life is beautiful and full of surprises: when you're tired of people and noise, she gifts you with a peaceful place where your eyes and ears could finally get some rest.

In the place it has to be.

The sky il almost completely dark blue, only a shade of light peers out on the horizon, a plane flying over my head leaves two white lines behind it. It's a warm springtime evening in London, I step out in the garden to take my laundry inside, but the atmosphere is too moving to be ignored. Today I had a very busy day. I went to Woolwich Arsenal to see a room I might rent for the summer - the journey took me an hour by tube and almost half an hour walking on a rise, in a foreign neighborhood, feeling the highest anxiety EVER as it was the very first time for me to go and see a room I might rent, so it might become my home for few months. After the visit, I decided to come back by bus even if it would have taken me longer. I was there, sitting upstairs in the front line of the double-decker, glued to the mirror, joyful as a child the first time you take him to see an aquarium. I don't feel like a stranger in these foreign streets, corner after corner I'm greed to see new places, new colors and faces. Maybe I won't ever see any of them again, but in that very moment everything is just in the place it has to be. And then, after an hour of sharp turns, trees scratching the top of the bus and children yelling silly songs behind me, here I am: my favorite place in the World. I cannot explain what happens to me when I see it. I just feel so full of life, until the bottom of the deepest hole of my heart, everything inside me is full of this place. Only here, I can breathe peace, harmony and balance. 

My favorite place in the World.

I stepped out of the bus just before crossing Westminster Bridge and I turned left, walking on the riverside until Lambeth Bridge and then decided to stop here to do one of the most beautiful things I ever did in my life. I entered a red phone box, inserted the coins, dialed the number and hold on. "Hello?" The voice of my grandmother on the other side of the receiver sounded at the same time so far away and so close to me. We spoke for few minutes, the line was not very clear and for some reason the phone rejected the coins I tried to put into it. In the overall excitement, I was talking so fast and both of us were talking so loud that I couldn't help ending the phone call with a laugh. I kept this smile with me all day long and I look forward to do this again. 

The red phone box. 

Up and down

Life is made of up and down. From getting up in the morning to laying down at night, your perspectives are about to change hundred times a day. I am sitting on the train, fascinated by the English countryside running in front of my eyes out of the train window, thinking about life. Questions and uncertainties for the future have apparently gone for the moment, replaced by a deep feeling of joy and hope. A minute after, I start feeling my heartbeat in my ears and tears streaming down my face: all of a sudden, I'm able to feel only melancholy and despair. Up and down. To me, travelling on my own has always meant freedom and pride; I don't miss talking to people and I don't really feel alone. I don't even feel disoriented or puzzled in the airports, where thousands of people come and go around you, and maybe you don't know which direction to take because you've never been there before, The excitement of finding the way step by step, following directions, pulling the suitcase through corridors made of glass and then on the escalators. Up and down. Following directions step by step makes me feel I'm going the right way, no doubts and no regrets. That's why I've chosen to live day by day. From today. 

Today, I've been in a place never seen before. Even if I've already been in London several times and even for long, and seen many places around, I've never been to Little Venice before. You get there after a very long walk alongside Regent's Canal. From the second hand bookshop in Camden Market - one of my favorite places in the world, where I can't help buying something anytime I go there - you just follow the canal and cross Edgware Road, and you'll reach Little Venice. Regent's Canal walkway is a very relaxing path for a Sunday afternoon stroll in London. Many people are walking or riding along the river and many others are passing by on riverboats. 

Walking along the Canal.

As you pass by, you'll find yourself crossing London Zoo and you can see tropical birds, whartogs and hyenas just over your head. There are amazing villas on the riverside, with high columns as if they were Greek temples. The funniest part of the walkway is a dock where many boats are moored: they are like houses on the water, with people seriously living there. Each boat is decorated, depending on the owner's taste, but many of them are definitely kitch! In front of each boat there is a small garden, with trees hanging Christmas balls or lights, barbecues, colorful dwarfs and chairs. Then, the last part of the Canal was full of other boats with people having parties, eating and drinking - and apparently they didn't mind if tourists took pictures of them having fun. 

People having party on the boat.

An example of kitsch decorations.

After this long walk, we finally got to Little Venice, where Bank Holiday Canalway Cavalcade was taking place. There, the Canal is larger forming a sort of a lake, where many boats have gathered to celebrate a traditional reunion which sees more than one hundred boats. The atmosphere is joyful: colorful flags from all over the world wave on the boats, the air is invaded with scents of food from all over, people are laying on the lawn having picnics or just relaxing, children are playing around - even if it implies looking like hamsters in their balls (you'll understand why...). 

Canalway Cavalcade.

Relax time on holiday.

I wanted to try it!

Before.

Before is always tricky. You have to be careful with expectations: yours and others'. Other people's expectations usually consist of an endless list of questions, from "where are you going to live?" to "you already have a job there, don't you?", or "how long are you planning to stay?". For sure I have no answer, to none of them. But that's the point. Before, I never answer questions. Mainly because I have no idea of what to say, so that anything could be a lie, but also because I'd like people to put less pressure on me. Here they are, my best friends right now - silent, patient, quiet and useful: a scale and a suitcase. 

No questions about my future, about my whys and hows. I know it will be hard in the beginning. These days are passing by like liquid moments, as if panic and desire could stop the time. Especially during the night, the noise of the clock is more like the sound of a bomb about to explode beside my bed. I'm awake but yet unable to think clearly about ..all the things I should think of. I should clean my room, set a list of priorities, check anything I casually dropped in the suitcase, check if I forgot anything important, call my grandmother like four or five times a day to make sure she's not getting mad for me and my future. But then I feel glued to my bed and I'm unable to think or do anything. So here I am. Glued to my bed. Any advices on how to get up and react to all this more lively?