Finding a Place to Call Home in Italy

For most of my adult life, my world has moved between London and Dubai.
Two cities that don’t slow down,
two places that shape you in very specific ways.

London taught me how to keep up.
Dubai taught me how to aim higher.

And for a long time,
that rhythm felt natural.
Necessary, even.

I wasn’t built in either of those places.

I was born in South Bohemia.
Imagine a landscape of fairytale châteaux,
thousands of fishponds reflecting the sky,
and deep forests filled with wild blueberries and mushrooms,
where deer move freely through the silence.

A place where space isn’t something you search for,
it simply exists.

Where mornings begin quietly,
and silence is just part of the day.

If you’ve ever known such a place,
close to nature,
where life unfolds a little more quietly,
you’ll recognise the feeling.

It stays with you,
long after you think you’ve moved beyond it.

I left in my late twenties,
without overthinking it,
simply following where life was taking me at the time.

More than twenty years passed in motion;
studying, working,
building a life across cities that reward speed.

London became home for over a decade,
and there was a time when standing in Trafalgar Square
felt like standing at the centre of everything.
Energy, movement, possibility
layered on top of itself.

And I loved that feeling.
Until I didn’t.

So I moved again.

Dubai made sense in a different way.
Sharper, more defined,
built on ambition and clarity.

And for a while, it worked.

But after years of living in places designed around constant movement,
I started to notice what was missing;
not in theory,
but in the everyday.

Nature.
Real nature.

Open space that doesn’t end at the edge of a road.
Green that isn’t designed.
Silence that doesn’t need to be searched for.

The kind of simplicity
where you can step outside barefoot without thinking,
and feel at home without thinking about it.

City life gives you a lot;
opportunities, people, direction.

But it doesn’t always give you
that kind of quiet freedom.

And that absence stayed with me.

Over time, the question shifted.

It became less about where to go next,
and more about how I actually want to live.

I’ve been an expat for most of my adult life,
moving, adapting, starting again.

It becomes second nature.

But recently, movement has started to feel different.

Less about chasing something new,
and more about choosing
where I might want to stay,
somewhere that feels closer to my roots.

But this time,
I wasn’t looking for another city.

I started looking for something else entirely.

Not just a temporary place,
somewhere to live.

I started looking at places differently.

Not as destinations,
but as something more permanent.

Homes.
Land.
Possibility.

Not just as investments,
but places that shape
how your life actually feels.

That’s what brought me back to Italy.

Not for the first time
but for the first time
with a different perspective.

And somehow,
it led me to Puglia.

There’s no simple reason why.

Italy isn’t the easiest option.
It’s less polished,
less predictable.

Things don’t always work
the way you expect them to.

But that’s part of it.

It feels lived-in.
Layered.
Real in a way
that’s hard to replicate.

And then there’s the pace,
not forced,
not curated,
just naturally slower.

A rhythm where not everything needs to be optimised,
where time isn’t always something to manage.

And somewhere within that,
I found myself looking for something of my own.

Not perfect,
not idealised,
but a place that feels grounded,

somewhere among olive trees
where days unfold more quietly,
and life doesn’t feel rushed.

I’m not trying to step away from the life I’ve built.

I’m simply rethinking
what the next part of it could look like.

Less noise,
more space,
less rushing,
more presence.

This is where I’ll share that process.

The places,
the houses,
the reality of it.

Not just the highlights,
but everything in between.

Because finding a place
isn’t just about location.

It’s about recognising something
before you can fully explain it.

I don’t have a final answer yet.

But I know I’m asking the right questions.

And for now,
that feels like a good place to start.