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Last year, after working in the same place for eight years, I decided to quit my job and travel to Europe to follow the love of my life and my dream of writing. My last day at work, I packed the last things left in my office and less than five hours later I was in a plane to Paris… Little did I know a new home was waiting for me, but not where I’d thought. A scheduled layover in Paris got extended to four days. I’d been in love with the city since I’d visited the first time, thirteen years before, and I’d been there three times; the first one for four weeks (spread out over almost two months), the second one for a couple of days, and the third one for about twelve hours. My visits seemed to be getting shorter and shorter, but every time it managed to take my breath away. But this time was different. I wasn’t looking for a surprise rendez-vous around the corner, my life-changing, just-like-in-films lovestory had already begun. It wasn’t only that, for the first time in almost a decade, I was free, with no strings attached, no work to come back to, no set time to return. The thought of staying in the “City of light” crossed my mind several times, as many Latin American writers had done, but the adventure was just starting. After four days of museums and galleries, more than a dozen crepes, strolling along Paris’ touristic (and not so touristic) spots, and one of the most stressing rides to the airport, we headed to Florence, where we would live for the next six weeks… more than enough to change my life conception. I had been so convinced that if I could choose any city to live in Europe it would be Paris, but Florence just stole me away. My travel (and life) partner had a thousand surprises in store, almost as if she was trying to “sell” me the city. I believe she accomplished this in the first couple of nights: an apartment directly overlooking the Duomo, gelato, delicious pizza and wine, and night serenades from street artists. I’d been to Florence once before, but I don’t think I’d actually “lived” it. The next weeks only surpassed the welcoming moments. After enjoying the popular tourist spots, we started to enjoy the little, familiar things. We lived in three apartments during our stay in Florence, and all of them felt like home, because the city in itself did. Not too big, not too small, this was like the city Goldilocks would choose if she was looking for a new place to live. We walked to most places, got to know the streets quite well, we started trying out different places every day and understanding the little hues of the city that are only evident when you pass the tourist “trial run”, as knowing how to tell good pizza places or finding the secret, really local flea markets. I was expecting to find in Florence a dream city… I didn’t expect to find my new reality. If I could choose one scene to sum all the experience up, it wouldn’t be looking out the balcony directly into the Duomo, or walking around the Uffizi galleries; it would either be looking over the city from the Piazzale Michelangelo when the sun is setting, or even more intimate, sitting down in our favorite café, a small charming place filled with locals, where you payed much less for cappuccinos and pistachio pastries and got the real Firenze experience. Paris may have taken my breath away, but Florence made me sigh in relief for finding a home far from home.