From Toronto to teaching english in beautiful and historical Rome. My first trip ever to Europe was to Italy. We decided to spend 10 days in the country and started in Rome. A city filled with history and charm. Clarice is a Canadian who decided to move to this beautiful country. Here is her story:
What’s your name and where are you from?
My name’s Clarice and I’m from Toronto ??
Where in the world do you currently live? Why did you choose that city?
I live in Rome ?? and fell in love with the people & culture.
What do you do for a living? and what did you do before moving?
I work as an English teacher but my side hustle is working as a content creator and blogger.
What has been your biggest challenge?
That’s a hard one to answer because my initial reason for coming to Rome was for personal growth. I wanted to live and experience life in a different way than I had gotten accustomed to in Toronto, I wanted to learn a language, get to know myself better and not really have a career or job path in mind (just something easy, slower paced and not have a lot of responsibility). So, in the beginning my biggest challenge was blending in with the new family while working as an au pair and overcoming the cultural differences. However, after meeting my then boyfriend (now husband) I had bigger challenges to consider and overcome, such as personal identity, career, lifestyle and potentially living away from my family and friends indefinitely.
What was your best outcome?
This December marks five years that I’ve been living in Rome. So much has happened and at the same time not necessarily a lot of growth, confusing? I know. I’ve learned that everything has on it’s own time and hardly anything happens when you want it to. Being patient and flexible are really important mindsets to keep when you’re living in a foreign country. My best outcome is that I’ve evolved and grown personally. I truly feel like I’m living my best life and found the right person to spend it with, but I’m still waiting for the career aspect of my life to catch up.
Would you move back?
No.
What’s your best advice for people considering moving countries?
If you’ve been thinking about it for a while, go for it! You’ll figure everything out once you get there. You only live once and worst case scenario you move abroad for a month or so and you can always move back.
