My life in Abu Dabhi, the center of the world where Italians are loved

Giuseppe Cuscunà is a 28-year-old from Castiglione Olona, and a few years ago he left the province of Varese to move to Abu Dahbi, where he works as head of marketing for an airline and lives with his wife Greta, who is from Varese as well. The couple share an Instagram account where they publish the pictures of their travelling experiences.

Giuseppe left for the Emirates graduating in languages and getting a master’s degree in economy.

“Abu Dahbi,” he says, “is a city that masterfully combines its traditional nature with the constant looking forward to the future. However, other than the highest skyscrapers in the world, the automatic dispensers for gold ingots, enormous shopping malls and hawks in the desert, you can find something much deeper”.

He too chose to share his experience of “varesino” abroad, telling us about the reality he found during this new experience:

“Here many legends and myths about Muslim people are debunked by the friendly and modern residents. If London is considered a melting pot of nationalities, the Emirates are too, but for religions.

The impact was definitely drastic. I moved to the capital of the Emirates in July, in the middle of the Summer, so this only meant one thing: atrociously boiling hot weather! I had never seen my glasses getting blurred because of the hot weather, or staff on the beaches giving away ice in order to cool oneself down.

After the scorching season, living here means forgetting about the cold and the freezing weather of the last days of January and the nice snowfalls of Varese which, this will shock you, I miss! Although wearing flip-flops 365 days a year is surely a great advantage.

I’ve been living here for three years now and I’m sure that this country has a lot to offer to people from all ages looking for a lifetime experience. I know entire Italian families that relocated here and shortly adapted to the rhythms of this country of the middle east.

These are the three main questions that people asked me during these years:

1) Have you learned Arabic?

Absolutely not. I found out that Arabs have the same difficulty both to write it and to speak it. I learned to say “thank you”, which is always useful.

2) Have you ever felt uncomfortable with residents?

Never. They love Italians, our traditions and our good taste for beauty.

3) What do you do in your free time?

I take very long walks on the corniche, the seashore, I visit the nearby chaotic Dubai and I travel, of course.

Living in Abu Dahbi means being at the center of the world, this allows you to reach the main African and Asian destinations in just a couple of hours of flight.

Together with my wife Greta, I created an Instagram profile where we daily share our travelling experiences.

You can follow us on: @italiantravelcouple

In a recent article we wrote how more than 53 thousand people from Varese moved abroad. Just like with Giuseppe Cuscunà, we would like to tell, as much as possible, who they are, what do they do and where are they, out in the world. If you live abroad and would like to get in touch with us, you can fill in this module, we will soon contact you.