Sometimes moving abroad can feel like a gamble.
For 36-year-old New Yorker Caroline Chilicella, the move to the quiet corner of Central Italy was more than a fleeing. It means building a family, buying affordable homes, and creating a new life.
Tired of the costs and pace of New York City, Chirichella moved to Guardia Sanframondi, a little-known village near Naples in 2014.
Today, married to an Italian man, married to a mom and two children, she lives a perfect life in town, so even many Italians say they have a hard time placing it.
This movement was a coincidence. One evening, the TV property show House Hunters International attracted Chirichella’s attention. Especially Guardia Sanframondi, the location of the episode.
“My mother and I had already planned a trip to Italy, but my mother suggested adding it to our itinerary because it looked so beautiful,” she tells CNN. “When I first came here in October 2014, everything just clicked and I knew this was the place I wanted to live.”
She saw herself as a “proud New York City girl,” but while running her own business, she didn’t pay rent in her parents’ apartment, but says she was already tired of living in the Big Apple.
“I didn’t have time for real connections with people. The city was so obsessed with my taste that I managed to run my own private catering business, but I didn’t have much flexibility to fully experience life,” she says.
“I was living my life, but I didn’t feel like I was going through it. I wanted a place where I could live my life to the fullest and become part of my community. I wanted a complete change in pace and scenery.”
Chirichella, a community of just 5,000 people located in the Campania region of Italy, said she was quickly won.
“On my first visit, I knew this was a special place,” she says. “I felt it in my mind. It felt like I was back home. Guardia has a sense of community that comes from New York and feels like it’s lacking.”
Taking advantage of the cheap property prices you can find in many rural Italian communities, Chirichella has found a three-storey home with a terrace offering views of the valley and mountains. She paid just $50,000, but says she could afford it without a mortgage.
It was also my first encounter with Vito Pace, an artist who was on display at the art show. They met while walking past each other in the square.
“I went back to New York a month later and he sent me a friend request on Facebook. We started talking every day until we returned to Guardia six months later.”
The two enjoyed the first proper date on Chilichela’s return. They then had a long distance relationship before they decided to make their transition to Italy permanent in 2016.
In New York, Kilicella once had ambitions to become an opera singer, but the city’s enthusiastic pace worn her down and stripped her of her dreams, she says. Guardia was quite far from the tourist trail and offered her the opposition of New York. It also gave her another dream.
“Guardia is living slowly, La Dolce Vita is at her best,” she says. “I met a lot of great people, foreigners and locals, everyone is looking for each other, and that’s exactly what I wanted when it was time to raise a family.
Chirichella’s relationship with Pace quickly moved after living in Guardia. A further six months later, they lived together, engaged within a year, and then married a month later. They have now been married for over seven years and have two children. Two children, 7 years old, Nicola, 2.
“I wanted to find a way to live in my own words. I knew being a mother was always on the card, so I wanted time to have fun with my family.”
Chirichella is currently working hard to run a child-rearing public relations company.
“Living at Guardia was the best decision I’ve ever made because it gave me my future. My husband, my children and my own business.”
Just outside the historic centre of Guardia, the Chilichela home was undergoing many renovations and upgrades as the family grew, and most of the work was handled at a pace. They eventually surpassed that and moved to the second four-bedroom property, which put it on the market earlier this year and bought just $80,000.
When she doesn’t run an agency, Kirichela spends her days with friends, taking long walks in the countryside, taking children to the park, eating and drinking “great food” and enjoying the pace of Italian cheerful life.
At a pace she explores the area enjoying day trips to surrounding towns. Immering in the town also helped her learn Italian.
Her movements also reconnected her with her family roots. As an Italian-American dual citizen, she is linked to the Campania region through her great grandfather from Sarah Consolina, near Salerno, south of Naples.
And now, her New York family – 72-year-old Mama Elvira and 73-year-old Dad Bob – have decided to move to Guardia, wanting to follow in Chilichela’s footsteps, approach her grandchildren and share the peaceful life of her new home.
“My parents also live in town and we often meet for dinner,” she says. “They make up a large part of our lives. They babysit the kids, I can work, and my husband and I can sometimes spend the night alone.”
Even if children are added, the costs are lower. The family spends around $3,500 a month, covering utility, groceries, car insurance, and even eating three times a week.
“This doesn’t include traveling, going to movies, or taking kids to the amusement park,” she explains. “But if we live in New York with our two children, what we live here won’t even cover our rent.”
She works for herself, she adds, giving her the flexibility she has long imagined.
Chirichella says it’s not always easy to adapt to the habit of living in Italy. For example, punctuality is not usually a national character, she says. “If you’re expecting someone to deliver or work from home, I always know that they’re at least 20 minutes behind the time they give them.
When she decided to buy a house, she noticed that her timeline tends to grow, but quickly agreed to the fact that it was part of how things work in Italy.
“Working with Italians is very different to working with Americans. That’s fine. If they wanted them to work the same way as America, they should have stayed there.”
Even basics like electricity and water can be cut off without warning. However, other surprises have been more welcome. She began to love improvisational encounters, which are part of small town life.
“It adds color that day,” she says. “The small random interactions have become my favorite part of life here.”
Nearly a decade at Guardia, Chirichella says she can’t imagine returning to New York. “When I was young, I was on the subway, on school, and seeing so many people who looked miserable, I never wanted it to be me,” she says. “I found a way to create my version of happiness.”
