HI EVERYONE, MY NAME IS SARAH THOMPSON
Hi everyone, my name is Sarah! I’m an American that lives along the Amalfi Coast in Italy, and I’m going to tell you how I got here.
So lets take it back to the year 2003.
I was the ripe age of 10 years old, where I was absolutely obsessed with Lizzie Mcguire! I can officially, unofficially, claim the spot as the biggest fan of Hilary Duff...I loved her energy, I just loved her and felt like I could always relate (besides the fact she was a teenage pop-star lol). Being her biggest fan, of course I also fell in love with Lizzie Mcguire The Movie, but not for the reasons you may think!
Yeah of course, Paolo was a really cool addition, but my favorite part of the movie was the begining montage. The movie starts as Lizzie is going through Rome in the evening and she sees the Colosseum, and the Pantheon, just driving by and experiencing the city for the first time (I can still hear the opening song playing: do they take them for espresso...di di di....on an evening in Roma”).
Rome just seemed like the most magical place...ever! I knew wherever I wanted to go to university, I’d be studying abroad in Italy. So when I applied to colleges, I looked at Boston University, Arcadia, and also Temple University. My major was originally acting...as I loved musical theater in high school. And I pursued that my freshman year, if I had the confidence now back then...it could have been a different story!
So, I decided on Temple University based on the programs, but I knew that my junior year, spring semester, no matter what, or where I was, I’d be studying abroad in Italy, no exceptions!
So finally, it comes to the year 2014, and I am studying abroad at Temple University’s Rome Campus!
I arrived in January 2014, and I absolutely fell in love. Rome was everything I expected it to be and more! I went with one of my best friends, Ashley, but we decided to go our separate ways to have new experiences and meet new people and eventually bring together a group.
It worked wonders. We had an amazing friend group, and traveled all over. We spent every single weekend traveling around Italy, just exploring. On the weekends we weren’t in italy we were in Amsterdam, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, etc. We went to so many amazing places, but no matter where we were I always missed Italy. Ashley and I ended up loving Italy so much, we said, you know what, we have one summer left before we need to find a real job, lets see if we can extend this year in Italy.
But first things first, we needed to find jobs. Every single day, I kid you not, we bothered our program leader Gianni, to see if he’s ever heard of anyone who needs two American girls to either intern or work, or do whatever during the summer, just as long as they offer us a place to stay.
We continued bothering Gianni, everyday, “Hey! Have you heard anything, have you heard anything yet?!” We got to the point where there was about a month left in the program and we still haven’t found jobs. Ashley and I are literally having the conversation walking back from the piazza, and low and behold, outside the University was Gianni! So there we go again, “GIANNI, GIANNI, Have you heard anything?!” He’s like, I’m sorry girls but I haven’t anything.”
At this point we’ve accepted defeat, and we turned to walked away. As we were turning around, we hear Gianni go “WAIT!” We immediately turned around, “WHAT!?” He says the words, “Have you heard of Sorrento?” Side note: I’m not kidding you when I say the timing could not have been more perfect...we were going to Sorrento THAT weekend!
It was a Tuesday, and that day we booked a bus to Sorrento. Gianni told us that he had a friend who owns a barns rental and needs two girls to work there. So of course we said, “HELL YEAH, when can we meet this guy and solidify our summer in Italy?” We couldn’t believe it, we were there at the right time at the right place, it was destiny.
So we got to Sorrento, and stayed at this little hostel, and had an amazing time exploring the Amalfi Coast. It was our first time seeing the Amalfi Coast and we fell even more in love with Italy. I couldn’t believe real people lived, and just experienced life in such a beautiful place. So we make our way to the bar Gianni told us about and meet the bar owner for an interview.
The interview kind of went like this:
Bar Owner: “You speak English?”
Ashley and I: “Yes!”
Bar Owner: “You wanna stay here?”
Ashley and I: “Yes!”
Bar Owner: “When do you wanna start?”
Ashely and I: “...that’s it...we’re hired?! I guess we’ll start the day after our program ends”
Bar Owner: “Great.”
It was amazing, we got a place to stay, and we helped around the bar, and it was just fantastic! So the weekend comes to an end, and we head back up to Rome. The whole way up we couldn’t believe that we were going to spend our summer in the Amalfi Coast...It was going to be the best summer ever!
Finally the semester comes to an end and we go down to Sorrento. We start working at this bar and there was this boy who was also working there, his name was Luigi. We had so much fun together. Another side note: I did have a little Paolo moment in Rome with another boy, but it didn’t work out because it felt like a Paolo moment...if you know, you know. But anyways, we had an amazing summer, doing so many amazing things. However, without visas we could only stay three months, our summer was cut short. When I tell you I’ve never cried so much or so hard in my entire life... We knew we would be back, we just needed one year to graduate!
I went back to America, still dreaming of Italy, but what really sealed the deal, is when Luigi came with his friends to America that November-December for his birthday. That time we spent together was amazing, we traveled throughout the US, to Miami, New York, Philly to see my family, and then out to the West Coast with his friends. I kept wondering how will we see each other again, I just need to finish the last semester in the US, and then I’m free to live and work wherever I want.
One day, Luigi surprised me with a plane ticket to visit him for about a week or so in Italy for my birthday that February! I spent that week with him and then I flew back to the US to graduate college in May 2015. Unfortunately Luigi couldn’t come to my graduation, but I dedicated my little cap to him saying, “Ciao Amo!”
One week after I graduated, as a graduation present, I bought a one way plane ticket to Italy...and I’ve been here ever since! Luigi and I got married in 2019, we had our daughter in 2019, and then COVID hit...and I started documenting my life on TikTok and Instagram.
Soon after that, I opened up my own travel agency, LUXAMA.
Luxama is a luxury vacation agency specializing in creating tailored, high-touch vacations for my clients along the Amalfi Coast, Italy, and now other European destinations.
I absolutely love doing these luxury bespoke vacations. I get to customize the intineraries of my clients, and watch them experience what I first experienced in Rome. From that Lizzie Mcguire movie, to reality, and actually seeing it in person is just...indescribable!
In 2022, we had our son, Sergio James. So now Luigi and I are raising our family here and it’s such a beautiful thing! It’s a learning experience but I just know from here on out, it’s growing. If not for all the small decisions I made up until this point (ie watching the Lizzie Mcguire movie in 2003), I wouldn’t be here today! So thank you Lizzie Mcguire, thank you Hilary Duff, and thank you to me and my best friend Ashley for being confident and crazy enough to live in Italy that summer, and my biggest thank you is to Gianni; because without Gianni, because if it wasn’t for him, I definitely wouldn’t be here today!
Sometimes I still can’t believe all of these butterfly effect moments, and little decisions that I’ve made that actually, completely change my life and led me here. So let this be a sign, go out there and make your dreams come true!
