Sitting on the FrecciaBianca train back to Bologna, with seven hours ahead of me, trying to process everything that happened in the last to weeks. It’s not easy. So many things happened, people, places and feelings.

I didn’t know what to expect when I boarded the train in Bologna two weeks ago. Two weeks in Puglia by myself, without a lot of plans apart from learning about food and making this documentary about kindness of strangers, I thought I would have days sitting in a cafe somewhere, writing and working project.

The trip unfolded itself so beautifully. I had no expectations to begin with, but what happened in these two weeks definitely exceeded anything I could have expected for.

Especially all the people met, all those who offered me the Southern hospitality, all the kindness I received was beyond my imagination.

I am overwhelmed, and it is hard to find any words to express my gratitude towards all these people.


Thank you Noemi for the great beginning of this trip, hosting me and spending time with me even though she didn’t feel very well. Her friend Daniela who spent the afternoon with me in Bari, walking around and sharing stories with each other.

Thank you Eleanora, her mother Patrizia and her brother Maximilian, who offered me their hospitality after our short meeting in Bologna. They shared with me the interesting traditions of Pugliese food and we spent some wonderful time doing some food photography together. It’s so nice to spend time with someone like Eleanora, who share the same passion for food and photography with me.

Thank you Viviana and her family for having me and my friend Sara over Easter holiday, showing us the beauty of small towns in the area and cooking delicious food for us. They were so openminded and Viviana was so keen to learn about our cultures as much as we wanted to learn about her. I loved the mixture between traditional and alternative way of living they follow.

Thank you Sara, who once was the ‘stranger’ I became friend with, for being such a good company. I would never for get our excitement as we opened the little package of chocolate like children, or teared open a warm loaf of bread in the train station and stuffed our faces into it, ignoring the weird look people gave us. I cannot think of anyone else to spend these days in Altamura and share the same obsession with these crazy things like her.

Thank you Lorenzo, friend of Viviana and Domenico, with whom we drove through Altamura at night to get some sweets after dinner, got in a car accident together, and drove us to Trani the next morning. The random kindness and encounters I would never forget.

Thank you Miriam for a short stay in Ostuni on the windiest day. She showed me how to make orecchiette con cime di rape and made me feel so Italian it would have been impossible to tell she was German. Despite the bad weather I was glad I stopped by at this white city and got to meet her.

Thank you Andrea for being such a considerate and dedicated host, showing me around Lecce at night and shared with me the wonderful stories of both his town and is life, and a beautiful drive down to the deep South.

And thank you to Manuela and her family, the perfect ending of my trip, for welcoming me to the deep South with a lot of smiles and kisses. I was a part of this family and they showed me not only the beauty of Salento and its culture, but also the generosity, kindness and wonderful hospitality of the deep South. It’s impossible to put my feelings into words.

If someone ask me weather I would come back to Puglia again, I have my answer, without a second thought, on the tip of my tongue…

While Andrea was very careful with his action and gave me a handshake when we first met, Manuela and her family greeted me with kisses on both cheeks. Not only when we first met, but also every morning, every time we left the house, and every night before we went to bed.

Welcome to the deep South, or ‘Il Profondo Sud’ that Manuela referred to.


After speaking English so fluently with Andrea in the past two days, it was time to switch into Italian around the table at lunchtime in Tricase.

I contacted Manuela, or Pocca, the nickname she had while she was studying in Pisa (which was a slang in her hometown meaning yes/sure) like a month in advance. She hadn’t been online for weeks and I didn’t have much expectation, but I sent her a message anyway because she was hosting in a family and she also loved chocolate.

To my surprise, she answered my request and said that her and her family would be happy to host my in Salento.

Not just hosting, but welcoming me to their family.


Apart from working in the IT department at the hospital in town, Antonio, her dad, also maintained a big orchard and kitchen garden, growing almost everything from strawberries to apricots to lemons to bunnies and chickens (for eggs). On the other piece of land they grew almonds, olives and grains to make their own flour for bread and pasta. They also made their wine, had solar panels and collect rainwater for domestic use.

I mean, wow, I was impressed.


I was not only lucky to meet and stay with this family, but also to be in Tricase, or Tutino (a small part of Tricase) on this weekend when they had this Christian festival/celebration called Madonna delle Grazie, which always happened a week after Easter. There was a ‘processione’ or a kind of religious parade similar to those found on Easter Friday, and afterwards a stunning fireworks display at a small castle in town. Then on Sunday morning there was a fiera, something like flea market that sold almost everything from panties to homemade cheese. On the last night they had ‘sagra’ where you could try traditional food very cheaply, followed by traditional live folk music and dance from Salento, where I learned the typical dance of this region called Pizzica. Thanks to Manuela for being such a good teacher!


Her aunt and uncle from Lecce also came for a visit that weekend. They had a business which imported goods from Bali and had been visiting Bali every year. It was very interesting to hear their perceptions of Asia, especially when they were from older generations and not the typical backpackers you would normally meet. We had a big lunch together on Sunday, with homemade orecchiette and ragu, rabbit meat, artichokes salad from the garden, ice cream with fresh strawberries that Antonio collected two hours before, ended with some liquor and dark chocolate from the easter egg.

Probably one of the longest lunches I have ever experienced.


When Manuela didn’t have to work, she showed me around Salento. We walked through the pine woods at Porto Selvaggio, visited more towers than I could possibly remember (and she knew the name of almost all of them!), and went to Leuca, the Southernmost part of Puglia where the two oceans (Ionian and Adriatic) met. The evening in Leuca, the sky was clear and it turned pink as the sun set. Unfortunately there was no places to stop the car and enjoy the colours, but she said it was much better in Gallipoli.

So one afternoon after work, she took me there to see the sunset over the sea.


The sky and the water turned pink and as the sun kissed the horizon. Every time I saw the photos from that evening, I could feel the warmth and kindness of Manuela coming out of them.

She gave without expecting anything in return, just to see my happy and she was content too.

I didn’t know how I could possibly thank her enough. I hope she knew how much I enjoyed the time at her place, and how much these 5 days meant to me.

In the past two weeks, I kept asking myself what was the reason that all these ‘strangers’ were so kind to me. That day, I stopped asking. I just turned to Manuela and told her how wonderful she was, hugged and kissed her on the cheek to say thank you.


The last five days with this family marked the end of my trip to Puglia, and it was the best ending I could possibly asked for.

It was the ending that made me decided, with strong will and determination, to come to Puglia again in September (if not before)

Because I knew that someone would be waiting to welcome me back here.

Andrea punctually picked me up from the train station in Lecce, I wasn’t surprise to learn that he lived and worked in Germany before for 5 years.

He was one of the many hosts I contacted in Salento, as well as his girlfriend Manuela who lived in a small town in the deep South of the region. They agreed to host me in Manuela’s house with her family. However, a week before my intended stay, they had to drive to France unexpectedly because her uncle who lived there was ill and went to the hospital. After receiving her message, I thought to myself; ‘Here I go, another uncertainty in life to keep my trip exciting.’ But she said she would be back before I arrived, and if I needed anything I should contact her boyfriend.

After talking to Andrea, he suggested that I should stay in Lecce with him for a few days first before going down to the deep South, and that was what I did.


I didn’t expect him to come and pick me up with his car, but then he explained that here almost everyone drive. First thing here that reminded me of home in Thailand.

He just moved to this apartment around a month or two ago, and said that it wasn’t quite ‘completed’ yet. The other bedroom was still used as a storage and I was sleeping on a sofa bed in the living room. Thought for me, this place was perfect, and so was its host.

Andrea was probably the most considerate host I have met. It was cleared that he had come in contacts with many cultures and seen the big difference between European and Asian cultures. So he was very careful and made it clear from the first day that if I felt uncomfortable with anything just let him know.

Little did he know that I was like a lizard that could adapt to its environment within a blink of an eye.

After a nice warm shower, I felt clean like a normal person again and we were ready to went out and explore Lecce at night.


Either because it was a Thursday night or the temperature dropped recently, Leccese people decided to stay home and left the streets pretty empty. But I loved it that way, Baroque architecture illuminated with yellow street lights was so charming. Andrea led me through the old town and told me some stories and history of this Baroque town before we sat down next to an outdoor heater of one of the bars. He ordered some food and wine for both or us (apparently I had no idea what was what.) I sipped a glass of Primitivo, a well-known local wine, and munched on frisellini, burrata, rockets and tomatoes with aromatic Pugliese extra virgin olive oil.



After 15 years of studying in Pisa, working in Germany and travelling through America and East Asia, he decided to come back and started his own business in Lecce. He used to organise Couchsurfing meeting here every week, which was where he met Manuela. Through out conversations over the table, we shared some travel stories and I could feel the mixture of Southern Italian and German in him. It quite a good combination of cultures actually.


The next morning, we went down to a bar under his flat and had a pasticiotto, a typical pastry from Lecce filled with cream, for breakfast. It was surprising good, warm and crispy on the edge, especially considering that this was just a neighbourhood bar and the closest one to us. We found out later that everything there was ‘fatto in casa’ or made at home, even croissant or pastry cream.

Then I understood why that pasticiotto was so good. I would even walk out of the city centre to have some warm pastries at this place if I would find myself in Lecce again.

I stayed in at his place for one more night, and on Saturday morning drove me down to Manuela’s place in the deep South. Manuela also offered to drive all the way up to Lecce just to pick me up and go back to her town, even though there was a train connection between Lecce and Tricase. I understood when I found out that it would take 2 hours on a train, without any delay, while it was only an hour on a car.

Just like in Thailand.


I wasn’t sure if it was the Southern hospitality or I just happened to meet extremely nice people who would love to show me the beauty of their hometown. As we drove along the Adriatic coast to the South, we stopped at the colourful Lago di Bauxite where the water was so blue and deep red rock so bright. Then we walked along the rocky coast for a little bit.


The water here was so blue and so clear. I was smiling to myself and couldn’t believe what was in front of my eyes. If the water wasn’t too cold, I would have jumped into the sea.

I was so happy to be there, in the sunshine in front of the sea where the wind lightly hit my face, looking at the infinite horizon.

And to meet all these lovely people…Andrea had been taking care of me so well, and it was so nice to feel like you were taken care of, especially when you lived so far away from home.

All this kindness I received, I would never forget.

When I contacted Miriam, I didn’t know much about her. only that she was from Germany and studied architecture. She wrote on her profile that she preferred to talk in person if we would meet.

I was a bit hesitant because I wanted to be surrounded by Pugliese people, for this project and for my own interest. I wanted to experience the Italian way of living. But she said she would love to host me, so I thought I would give it a try. Ostuni should be a beautiful town after all.



Little did I know that Ostuni didn’t impress me that much, maybe because of the bad weather and how underdressed I was, but it was worth visiting just to get to know Miriam. Meeting her gave me such a memorable time in Ostuni.

Even though she was quite busy during my short stay, we managed to have both lunch and dinner together, and she showed me how to make orecchiette con cime di rapa, a typical dish from Puglia. Our dinner was one of her friends that night was one of the most Italian dinners I have experienced here, and it was organised by a German girl.

Maybe because Miriam, to much, had a very Italian personality.



She came here two years ago as a wwoofer, and from a planned 1 month stay, it turned into two years. From German to Italian, both friends, language and lifestyle. Now, she bought a house in Ostuni which would be turned into a guesthouse and worked as a production designer in Rome. It’s nice how we just found out once we met that we actually had quite a lot of things in common, being wwoofers and interested in organic farming, cooking and cultures. The olive oil and vegetables she had in the kitchen were given to her by her landlord who had a small farm and made his own olive oil.



We prepared the dinner table while waiting for her friend to arrive. On the table were taralli, olives and almonds for a small aperitif. Then we started the meal with friselle served using ‘sponza frise’ in a traditional way (to let the water drain down) with tomatoes and olive oil, followed by creamy orecchiette which was delicious (and approved by her Pugliese friend as well) At the end, we had some really nice colomba, the Easter bread, which was much nicer than what I expected it to be. It was even better that the one I bought from I famous bakery in Rome last year.



The lengthly dinner ended around midnight.

Miriam was a German which had very little trait of German left in her. It was a shame that we didn’t have much time to spend together. I believed that there would be so much more about Italy, Italian cultures and food I could learn from her.

I’m looking forward to share a conversation over a delicious meal with her again.

Sara wasn’t actually a ‘stranger’, but she used to be. I stayed at her house in York through Couchsurfing two years ago, and we had never met again until I moved to Bologna. We became friends and had lunch together almost every week. She would cook and I would take photos, for our ‘Pranziamo?’ cookbook project.

This time, we went to Puglia together and our main purpose was probably to eat, especially the famous ‘Pane di Altamura’

The reason we got on so well probably wasn’t only because of our love for food, but also our obsession with bread and chocolate.

Finally, on the third day of our stay in Altamura, we got to try the famous bread. Viviana told us to go to a small bakery on via Torino. She said it was a little bit hard to find and we didn’t even know the name of this place. But out will was strong and we managed to find this place.



We entered Ninivaggi, where the smell of freshly baked bread infused into the air, and bought a small loaf of Pane di Altamura and half a focaccia. All for less than three euros. Then we headed to the train station with excitement.

Perhaps more because of the warm bread in the paper bag than going to Matera.

So while we were sitting on a bench, waiting for our train to arrive, the bread-tasting session began.



I took some photographs, as I always did with all the food I ate, and then Sara tear the warm, crusty loaf apart. The yellow-tinted crumb was so soft and the crust so crispy. It was good, so fucking good. We were over the moon as we tried the bread and smiled at each other, then we started laughing.

Everyone in the station who saw us must have thought the we were crazy. But we couldn’t care less. We also tried the focaccia, softer and less oily version of the Barese one, which we agreed we preferred.

It was hard to stop eating bread when it was so warm, and after a while I was breaded-out for the whole day.

Matera wasn’t actually in Puglia, but in the neighbouring region called Basilicata. It was one of the oldest caved cities in the world. We found ourselves there in the afternoon (again), so everything was pretty quiet. Nevertheless it was nice to just stroll on these ancient streets and walked up and down stairs. This was a town like no others and every corner was incredibly unique (and very old) in its own way.



It was such a long city, and we walked on and on forever. Until at some point we thought it was time to go back up to the upper part of the city to get some gelato. Still siesta time and everything was still closed, there wasn’t much to do otherwise and no chocolate shops were open. So we decided it was time to go back to Altamura and have some ‘cioccolatini’ there.

We were lucky to stumbled upon this wonderful Antico Castello Pasticceria when we were craving chocolate so badly, and the had exactly what we were looking for: chocolate pralines filled with pistachio and sea salt!



This was no exaggeration, but we were literally like the happiest 5 year-old children opening their birthday presents, as we went over to a bench opposite with little pralines in hands. They were as good as the best one we found in Bologna, but for half the price.

See? The perfect combination of bread, chocolate, Sara and me. I couldn’t think of anyone else who I would rather visit this place with but her.

When I was in Leeds, people looked at me weirdly when I told them that I went to York, a town half an hour away, and Couchsurfed there. But I glad I did weird things like that out of boredom, because that was where our friendship began, and probably also why I decided to come to Bologna and be here now.

It can be said that Viviana was the beginning of this trip to Puglia.

Because I’m not such a big fan of uncertainty, and to buy train tickets to somewhere for so long without have a place to sleep is a bit too risky for me. Luckily, I came across Viviana’s profile on Workaway. At that time, I didn’t even know where Altamura was, or that it had a famous DOP bread, and UNESCO town like Matera was only half an hour away. I only knew that Viviana loved cooking and wanted to homeschool her 2 year-old son. Plus she would welcome me to join her family even over the Easter holiday. I saw that she was also on Couchsurfing and somehow I just ended up Couchsurfing her place…with Sara, my friend from Bologna whom I met through Couchsurfing 2 years ago.



I have to say that Sara, Viviana and I was quite a good combination, especially when in Altamura.

She was a young, beautiful and open-minded mum. A real full-time housewife who knew a l lot about tradition food and culture from her hometown but also had a keen interest in learning about other cultures around the world. I loved the way she wanted to raise Vito Matteo, her cupid-like son.

When she knew that I was a food writer, she wrote down what she wanted to cook for me to try.

And the food here was great, from the taste, quality, love and care that was put into everything.

It could be because Domenico’s parents had a ‘masserie’, a sort of farmhouse in an old, restored buildingin the countryside where they had vineyard, orchards, olive grove, almond trees, grew vegetables, raised chickens for eggs, pigs for salami and also had sheep. They would start making their own cheese next year.

Oh, and they also had a swimming pool.

I mean…I was lost of words. They should start hosting wwoofers and I might be the first one who request to stay there for a long term and ask if I could join their family.

On Pasquetta or Easter Monday, the day that everyone would usually go for a picnic or barbecue with friends, they said we could join them and asked where we wanted to go. The first place that came to my mind was Val d’Itria, the area in Puglia with lots of trulli, the traditional ‘cottage’ built with white stones.



So on Monday morning, after I made pancakes for breakfast, we en routed to Alberobello. The historical centre of this cute little town was filled with trulli, and I felt like we were in another version, a much brighter one, of Hobbit. Though the town was packed due to Pasquetta. Locorotondo, on the other hand, was so quiet and peaceful. We strolled around the small alleys and I had to stop and take photos at every turn. Each corner was so lovely in its own simple way.



That evening, Viviana made sourdough piadina (Italian flatbread from Emilia-Romagna) for dinner. The next day, it was my turn to share with them the cuisine from Thailand. They invited Lorenzo, their crazy friend, to join us for dinner.

They liked the food (*relief sigh*) After dinner, Lorenzo asked Sara and I if we wanted to go with him.

‘Andiamo?’

‘Si!’

I didn’t know where to, but I just say yes to everything. We got on his car and he drove us into town to buy some sweets from a pasticceria, at around 11pm.

This is the land of ‘la dolce vita’.

Sitting at the back seat, on my lap was a big box of sweets, including the tits (Tette delle Monache), a typical sweet from here, light and fluffy dough filled with whipped cream and ricotta. Legend has it that, because nuns can’t have babies their tits are going straight up like the shape of this sweet.

But then something unexpected happened, and the next thing I knew, the right side of my face hit the back of the passenger seat.

A car crash.

Well, Lorenzo’s driving can be a bit jerky sometimes, but the other was driving on the opposite direction on a one-way street. It was quite clear who was guilty in this case.

So the evening didn’t end as well as we thought it would be, but at least we got back home safely and could still enjoy the sweets.

And the tits were actually really yummy.



Next morning, Lorenzo offered to drive us around for a bit. We headed to Castel del Monte, the famous abandoned castle on the 5-cent coin. Almost an hour later (with a short stop at the bakery, buying warm bread and focaccia which infused the smell of the car), we arrived at the castle, but then he said there was nothing inside and suggested that we go further to Trani, a small seaside town.

So we followed.



Trani was a cute little town in the North of Bari. It’s a shame that the main church by the sea was closed for renovation, and we went there in the afternoon so the whole town was dead quiet.

Oh well.



After a delicious lunch of riso, patate e cozze and calzone cipolla prepared by Viviana, we packed our bags and she drove us to the train station.

I really loved this easy-going family, and how genuinely curious and interested they are about other cultures and the world. It would be lovely to see how Vito Matteo would be raised and educated in this alternative way.

Both of us wanted to come back in September, and I think we would.

Eleonora wasn’t a Couchsurfer, but she was another ‘stranger’ who welcomed me to her home, Maison Lizia.

In fact, it was back in Bologna when we first met. I came across this food-related event on Facebook. A cookbook writer, food blogger and sommelier Patrizia would come to the bar/bookshop (which I found out later was a Pugliese bar) to present her new book, followed by some samplings of typical food from the region. I knew I was going to Puglia and I couldn’t miss it.

I arrived there on time, but I probably forgot that everyone involved tonight was from the South, and the concept of being punctual wasn’t very popular there. So I sat in the courtyard with my journal, spent an hour there filling in the pages with words.

Then they started talking, in Italian obviously. It was a combination of lateness and tiredness that took my attention away and I couldn’t be bothered to try to understand, wasn’t even sure if I would understand if I tried. So I just flipped through the cookbook and looked at the photos.

Bored, I thought to myself that at least I would get to try something delicious afterwards.

Somehow I paid a bit more attention at the end, and understood that the girl with a camera who was taking photos around that night, was not only the food photographer for this cookbook, but also Patrizia’s daughter, Eleonora.

So I approached her and we started talking.

I was so impressed that she took all these photographs for the cookbook, and she was only eighteen.

It turned out that they lived right next to Altamura in Puglia, the only place I knew I would be staying for sure in April because my Workaway host lived there.

We exchanged our contacts, and three weeks later, they picked me up from a bus station in Santeramo and welcomed me to their home, where we spent two days taking photos, cooking and eating together.



Ele planned an eventful itinerary for me, from going to Polignano for an amazing gelato at 10pm, trying out panzerotto, visiting Bari and showed me some fishermen traditions like how they prepared the ‘polpo’ or octopus, and going to Matera with her mum who knew the town incredibly well.



The highlight couldn’t be anything else but all the food stories I learned from them, especially when her granny came over and made oreccheitte con grano arso with us. Grano arso, or burnt wheat, had a story behind it. Because people in the past were really poor, some of them would go around burnt wheat field and collected the toasted wheat grain to make flour. It had a darker colour, some grey and some brown, and tasted a little toasty. After a while of taking photos, I also stuck my hands in the dough and learned how to make this tiny ear-shaped, as well as cavatelli and strascinati. Four hours after we entered the kitchen, we finally a delicious homemade lunch consisted of friselle topped with tomatoes, cavatelli with roasted vegetables and little baked aubergine cup filled with ricotta, roasted tomato sauce and something else very sophisticated.


Sophisticatedly mouth-watering.



Apart from eating a lot of yummy food (which was always the case in Puglia anyway), I also learned something about my creative practice. I had done quite a bit of food photography before, but nothing serious and definitely not with another food photographer. It was a whole new experience for me. Through working with Ele and her mum, wandering around the kitchen, up and down the steps, pointing cameras at everything and being asked if they should pause their actions for me to take photos, I understood the beauty of collaboration. It was so nice to share these specific interests with someone. Same passion yet coming from different backgrounds, we learned from each other and that generated the conversations.

Through our love for food and photography we shared and bound.

Back in February when I planned to go to Bari, I contacted Noemi but she replied quite late and I changed my plan. This time, I contacted her again. Even though she replied a bit late (again) she said I could stay with her for a couple of nights in Bari, the first stop of my unplanned trip around Puglia.

And the reason I contacted her in the first place? Probably because she said she liked breakfast!

I boarded the train in Bologna on Tuesday morning, worked a little bit on my Macbook and turned on 3G to checked my Whatsapp and saw the message Noemi sent me.

‘…I just woke up with fever…in case I’ll be very bad I will ask my friends if they can host you…let’s see…’

Great, something to get excited about even before I arrive in Puglia.

But I wasn’t that worried, I was already on the train anyway so whatever would happen I could find a solution once I arrived.

Once in Bari, I went to her flat and she greeted me with a wide smile, even when didn’t feel 100% well. I could stay at her place but on the sofa and not in her bedroom (which would have been more than what I expected for) I left after a while and let her rest while I went out to explore the city.


Bari was so charming. The buildings might not be very particular or beautiful, but I could feel the liveliness here. Maybe it was because I got to talk and meet a lot of people from here, bloggers, grandmas who let me in to their kitchen and showed me how to make orecchiette and without trying to sell anything to me like others, and Daniela, Noemi’s friend from Trento who just arrived back in Bari that morning.

The first time I saw her, she was exactly like I imagined my documentary to look like, light blond hair, bright blue eyes and playful red lips, the colour scheme of my documentary.

I had to tell her about my documentary, and asked if I could film her little bit. Of course she didn’t object, just not while she was enjoying her focaccia Barese.



After a short while, I found out that we have some things in common. Daniela left Bari to go to university 6 years ago, she also went to Porto, Portugal, for her Erasmus semester and spent two months in Australia with AFS, with which she was also a volunteer in Trento.



We strolled around bari, kept chatting away and eating the delicious focaccia until we reached the train station and each of us went home for dinner. Then we met again at a bar on the other side of the train station, where they spent their teenage years hanging out. Every Tuesday night there was a live Salento folk music and people would dance and jumped around with this traditional dance called Pizzica. I learned to mimic them and joined the crowd for a bit.

And I fell in love, right then, with the liveliness of this place, the atmosphere and the energy, the happiness in the air.



Being by the sea, I wanted to eat fresh seafood. So before I left Bari, Noemi organised a small seafood lunch for us, starting from two, by the time the pasta was ready we were seven.

I loved how this lengthly lunch with lovely friends started from me say to Noemi that I wanted to eat seafood.



Sergio, Noemi’s boyfriend, was the chef for today and he cooked cavatelli con frutti di mari, or a typical pasta with seafood. Started from some snacked and white wine, we then enjoyed the delicious pasta topped with chopped fresh parsley and lemon zest from Noemi’s garden along with some music from Italy, Portugal and Thailand. The meal ended with a few shorts of homemade limoncello and other citrusy liquor. By the time we all left, it was 4 in the afternoon.

It was time for me, too, to say goodbye to Noemi, her lovely friends and Bari.

My trip in Puglia began with smiles, laughters and memorable moments. I was already in love, it that was just the beginning.

I had always wanted to visit Puglia. Before I went to Naples in February, my initial plan was to go to Bari but things didn’t work out with accommodations and flights got way too expensive.

This time, I had almost 3 weeks of Easter holiday (partly official, the rest I entitles myself for it) so I decided to bought a train ticket to Puglia and stay for a couple of weeks, without much plan but one mission to make a documentary for a film module at university.

A documentary about the kindness of strangers.



Something I had always wanted to express and share with others, yet it wasn’t easy to just go out and shoot videos of people you just met. But it was about time, and this time I forced myself to do it because otherwise I would fail this module.

I had also told almost everyone I met that I was gonna make a documentary about Couchsurfing, just to put a little more pressure on myself.

I hated it when people force me to do things. The only way that worked for me was to force myself to do it.



I had been using Couchsurfing since before I turned eighteen and had to lie my age to register myself on the website. I had made so many friends on this platform. The reason I found myself in Bologna, spending my semester abroad here, was also because of Couchsurfing.

Every time I left for an adventure, meeting ‘strangers’ who welcomed me to their homes, their families, accommodated me, cooked for me, shared with me their time, knowledge and stories, showed me around their beloved towns or introduced me to their friends, all those things made me believe in the generosity and kindness of people. I wished we would trust each other a little bit more.

And that was the beginning of this project, In Puglia: The Kindness of Strangers.