This newsletter is coming to you guys from yet another wonderful Italian city. We made our way even further down the boot, right at about ankle height 😅 Any guesses where we are?

We are in Napoli people (aka Naples)!

This city is considered the birthplace of the pizza that we know and love today. And that's the exclusive reason we booked 8 nights here. This will be us for the next week 😎

Jk, jk - there are a bunch of reasons we are here, pizza just happens to be the most important.

We arrived to Napoli yesterday from Rome, where we stayed in a teeny tiny little microstudio. I could lay in bed, make coffee and use the bathroom simultaneously. Not saying that I did. Just that I could.

Thankfully our living conditions have upgraded a bit here in Napoli. Although we totally made the mistake of booking a place without a kitchen - which we never do for longer stays! So yes, it's back to Nescafe 😕 which feels so terribly wrong in Italy...

Anyways, check out our new digs and super local little neighborhood 🙌

We are so excited to experience the chaos of this polarizing city. But also, we are feeling pretty beat up physically and emotionally. But more on our fragile emotional states later in the newsletter.

For now, let’s chat about our week in the Italian town which name we pulled out of a hat and our short but wonderful time in Rome.

Picking places to visit out of a hat!

On Monday we arrived to Florence’s central train station with 10 little pieces of paper, each scribbled with the name of a city or town we had never heard of. We tossed the names in a hat and Aimara reached in to select where fate would take us next.

Then the unthinkable happened. The paper read - wait for it…

Albania!

New subscribers to this newsletter are like wtf is this guy talking about. Don’t worry, I just like to amuse myself with old jokes from time to time.

But seriously, fate brought us to the sleepy Tuscan hill town known as Sinalunga. Ever heard of it???

A few great things happened in Sinalunga:

1. Aimara was in charge of booking our Airbnb - so we ended somewhere a little nicer than usual.
2. We were in town for the Tuesday market and got to experience small town Italy at its best!
3. Our host drove us to Montepulciano, one of Tuscany's most beautiful hill towns that just so happens to be famous for wine. Lucky us!
4. We got some rest! Instead of hustling around and grinding behind our computers, we decided to take it slow, curl up on the couch, and give ourselves some down time. It was lovely ❤️

Something we have to get of our chests...

Disclaimer: the following may sound like an ungrateful venting session.

As much as we love Italy, sometimes making the videos has felt like a struggle. In fact, we are reminded of how we felt in Portugal. Which is a bit confused and insecure about what we are trying to accomplish.

Italy is wonderful, and no doubt one of the best places in the world to go on vacation. But we struggle to feel authentic talking about squares, old buildings and cathedrals. And even though we are experiencing a different culture, it’s not the same as being in places like Sri Lanka, Malaysia or Turkey where all your senses are energized by being somewhere entirely foreign.

We are feeling a bit unsure about whether we’re making videos that we love to make. Maybe we’re just in a funk (we are), and potentially things will change for our last 5 weeks here. But things have just felt like we are trying to advance while being waste deep in mud.

Also you had that Italy is expensive, that we've been staying in pretty uncomfortable places, and our channel/blogs not doing that well lately... you get it. The perfect recipe for a meltdown!

Also, my spoon melted in last night's soup. So that's about where we are right now.

Whenever we find ourselves in unfortunate situations, Aimara always says: we will look back at this and laugh about it one day. And that's what I'm hoping for.

But anyway, how’s your Monday going?

It turns out that we really like Rome!

Rome is just one of those cities. Like Paris, Istanbul, New York or El Tigre, some places just have a vibe that you can’t help fall in love with.

Fun fact: Aimara was born in El Tigre, Venezuela.

We went to town on some seriously phenomenal spaghetti carbonara (twice), enjoyed some afternoon bevvies in Trastevere (a cool little neighborhood we had never explored), and of course filmed some undeniably fantastic content 😂. We need the self pep-talk, so just bare with me...

And this is how you celebrate Halloween in Italy people!

We've now both visited Rome on three separate occasions. And it's one of those places that keeps getting better once you uncover the layers and go beyond the most touristy places. Hopefully life will keep bringing us back :)

This week on Youtube

We haven’t been able to edit new videos :( it’s been hard guys.

We’re terrible at sharing all the downs that happen behind the scenes (sorry, we feel guilty for feeling bad while living this crazy lifestyle) - so we rarely share our struggles but we have them… Betterhelp.com anyone?

Sorry if that was weird. All of this to say that we don’t have a new video. And we don’t know when we will. But you can watch our Verona video in case you missed it :)

And the video comes with a Free Verona PDF!

Or, if you’re getting ready for a Fall trip, check out how we pack everything we actually need into 2 carry on bags and 2 backpacks.​

​Free minimalist-packing list PDF & Aimara’s packing and styling tips for the ladies PDF.

Oh, and our first giveaway is finally happening!

This is just a small way to reward a lucky someone who watches all of our YouTube videos! All you have to do is answer these 3 questions correctly and that’s it! We hope these giveaways will get bigger as we grow 🙏🏼

Enter the giveaway here: https://gleam.io/avhJw/50-amazon-giftcard-october-2023-giveaway​

The answers are in these 3 videos:

1. ​Our two year anniversary video (published on September 6th, 2023)
2. ​Packing Video (published on October 1st, 2023)
3. ​Amsterdam Food Tour (published on October 7th, 2023)

Answer the 3 questions correctly, and don’t forget to follow on Instagram and subscribe to our channel! A winner will be randomly picked on November 15th and we will send the winner a $50 Amazon gift card. It’s really that simple.

We really do appreciate your support! ❤️

What’s next for us?

All of next week will be spent here in Napoli. Yes we are going to eat our weight in pizza. And yes we are gonna to do our best to make some baller videos. And we are also going to visit the town of Pompei, because learning about history is neat!

Plus, we also have some serious work to catch up on.

Buona giornata (have a good day)!

We will see you next Monday ✌🏼

Aimara & Gordon

Other Links:

• ​I'm sharing all my Italy outfits every single day on Reward Style! Basically all the ways to style all the pieces I packed in my little carry-on bag :)
• ​We're on Patreon: Follow the link to check out other ways to support what we do. If you're interested... 😇 We will send you postcards and you'll have access to all the paid PDFs that we will continue to release in the future.
• Interested in a one-time thing instead? Buy us a coffee or leave us a tip here!

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