Nomadic Times, columnist Mel Candea introduced us to the #ConsumelessMed project in her guest article An American in Sicily: A Workation to Remember. During this project Mel interviewed some of her collaborators and over the coming weeks we’re bringing you a series of digital nomad interview with her team members.
Columist: Mel Candea
Christian Cappello is a blogger and a social media manager. He’s got a blog Blog di Viaggi,which is about his travels – mainly about his trip around Italy, on foot. It sounds like it was an amazing journey.
I worked with Chris (as did many others – it really was cross-purposed) on the social media for ConsumelessMed. He was the brains behind the ‘photograph frame’ to use in the social, and there weren’t many times on off-days you didn’t see him carting it around.
His learning curve – for what the project needed – was high and he threw himself into it.
Connect with Christian on Twitter: @BlogDiViaggi_
Briefly describe your digital nomad career:
I travelled the world twice and then I returned back to where I’d started. I’ll never stop learning.
Where do you live now and what do you do?
I live in Bassano del Grappa, a province of Vicenze. It’s a small city in the Veneta region of Northeast Italy. I’m a social media consultant and manager, as well as a travel blogger.
How did you connect with the workation/selection?
A friend of mine saw the ad on Facebook and sent it to me. I investigated it, sent my CV and was selected. I was excited to go to southern Sicily, because I’d only been in the north.
What are your immediate plans (after this)?
Writing a book about my walking trip around the whole of Sicily – it was a total of 78k. I’ll also be working as a social media consultant with a large company part-time while I’m writing it.
Do you have any long-term plans?
No. I never make long-term plans. Because your future can change in an hour – there’s a certain sadness when plans aren’t materialized.
What advice do you have for anyone organizing a workation?
I’d done a workation before, doing a ‘blog tour.’ There were pluses and minuses to each of the workations.
For the blog tour, we were contacted by an agency and treated like royalty on our visit, but the schedule was strict and confined to where they wanted us to see.
On the tour, they don’t tell you how many posts. I had more creative freedom. The tour also gave me freedom of ideas and how I wanted to express myself and I was responsible for the end product for the clients.
With this workation, I was expecting something similar. But I worked harder and the people were much better here. It was freer, with breaks and the beach and no set schedule. But the quality was a lot higher here, it was organized with a strategy. This workation, I was a cog – part of a machine. I sometimes felt more limited by it. It was challenging.
Name your favorite quote (the one you live by):
Follow your heart – don’t listen to people who say you shouldn’t.
What’s your favorite Sicilian dish?
The Fichi d’India, a Sicilian prickly-pear plant that grows in the countryside. It looks like a cactus it has fruit that you eat fresh, with spices.
Describe the highlight of this workation.
Connecting with other people. Everyone can teach you something – and it’s worth learning.
What are you taking away with you from this experience?
It taught me strategy’s a good thing for running my own blog and projects. It also reminded me how much I value my own creativity.
What would you do if you couldn’t be a digital nomad (imagine no WiFi… gasp!):
I’d love to be a farmer. Growing my own food on my own land, being sustainable. Just natural. I’d love it. Really.
In the UK, we had a huge vertical garden on the 3rd floor. There wasn’t much light, it wasn’t great – we even had to use a hydroponic pump to get water. But we grew tomatoes, herbs and spices. So yeah, I’d like to be a farmer.
Meet #DigitalNomad @BlogDiViaggi_, Social Media Manager on the #ConsumelessMed project @westydigitalnom Click To Tweet
Meet the Digital Nomads who collaborated with Mel on the ConsumelessMed project in the following interviews:
- Introductory Article from Mel Candea
- Alberto, Project Manager and Owner of Digitali Nomadi
- Toni Bullo, Graphic/Creative Designer
- Eleonora, Media Manager and Translator
- Armando, Videographer and Animator
- Giulia, Writer and Storyteller (‘Blocal’)
- Carlo, Web Designer: Coming Soon
- Chris, Social Media Manager and Blogger (‘Blog di Viaggi’): Coming Soon
Author Bio for Mel Candea
Mel Candea has been an online writer for 9 years and a digital nomad for 6. She slow travels Europe with her husband in their van. She splits her time between working from the road and exploring the countries and their cultures. Mel is a voracious reader, an avid writer, a partial photographer and a believer in trying to leave places better than how they were found. If at all possible.
You can find her journeys with her Italian husband Armando (filmmaker), their dog Ziggy and their van Mork here:
- Website: http://westfaliadigitalnomads.
com/ - Twitter: @westydigitalnom
- Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/
channel/UCr1_ gqzd2AyefXke58e1fmg - Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/
WestfaliaDigitalNomads/ - Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/
westfalia_digital_nomads/
