How to plan the future in a relationship just like that through a program that promises to be interesting for you? At any time in life it is easy to feel lost when you have no stable future plans. Having a goal in mind will help us realize an idea and achieve the goal: living together and in peace, cheerfully, without problems, arguing as little as possible, and enjoying life.

So planning for the future is also crucial to maintaining the stability of a future relationship.

Thinking back to when we started dating, perhaps without realizing it, we regularly included each other in our plans. By talking and discussing those future close-ups together, no matter how big or small, a bond was created. There is no reason for this bond to stop developing, and producing plans is a consistent way to maintain a romantic relationship. Planning our future as a couple will have a domino effect on other aspects of our relationship. It would be helpful to discuss our future as a couple and recognize we both want to be together (because that is). In turn, this can provide a sense of trust in the relationship because it would demonstrate we are both committed to being together in the future.

With a feeling of mutual support, we can increase levels of intimacy as we would feel part of a caring and loving team. What quality of life do you want? The first step in planning future is recognizing what each of us individually wants from life. I am looking for a partner capable of making me happy.

Happiness for me is knowing I am not alone, I do not have to face in solitude everything that life puts before me and I can continue to live seeking the best of myself to give it to those who appreciate me as I am.

What aspects of life do you enjoy? What would you like to experience most? Would you like the opportunity to try something new? Visiting the world beyond the borders of Asia?

Life is constantly changing and plans cannot always remain the same. However, keeping each other updated on how you feel and our future wishes increases both of our communication levels. It is this recognition and inclusion that helps maintain a happy relationship.

Starting to organize and prioritize a list of goals will help create an achievable life plan. Will there be compromises must be willing to accept if necessary? I have an idea, I don't know what you are willing to sacrifice to live in harmony. We must also be able to help each other realize our life ambitions, highlight your ideas and mine, and turn any challenges into solutions. But by doing it together, you will uplift each other through the feeling of support and encourage a positive attitude.

A couple who talks and smiles, thinks both short and long term. Discussing larger goals in life is essential. However, the smaller, intermediate plans should not be overlooked. As they say, are the little things that count in life, and much of our happiness comes from these little encounters and fond memories.

Let's talk about important aspects. Living together involves some sacrifices on both sides, not everything works as one would like. Let's start with the essential aspects:

 

What are my priorities?

It might seem difficult but in reality it isn't, or at least not that much. I am 70 years old, my priorities are linked to the desire to live as long as possible, without stress, without particular problems. Unfortunately my past has not always been very fortunate, what I have been able to have I obtained with my work, with a little luck and with some right knowledge.

To work well, a relationship must be based on these characteristics:

1. Health and well-being: Health is true wealth. Without it, nothing else matters.

2. Relationships: I am currently a busy single and I aspire to a relationship with Anna Ly, there is a way to improve this relationship, but it involves sacrifice and availability on her part too.

3. Career: I am quite satisfied with my career, it still needs to be implemented because the environment I find myself in is not as receptive as Europe or North American countries. I am an entrepreneur, planning is a prerequisite for business success.

4. Community: For a long and healthy life it is important to be part of a community. Loneliness is as harmful to your health as smoking.

Being motivated despite life's challenges is not easy, but it is possible. Small daily actions add up to significant changes over time. Planning for my future life can help me continue to put one foot in front of the other until I reach my goals. Hoping they are hers too.

 

Where to live.

The idea is to buy an apartment in District 1, not huge but functional, with maximum 3 bedrooms. Living under the same roof, sometime, implies some choices, one of which, even though we are both free (single), could lead to having to regularize our condition with a marriage. Not mandatory, but useful for both, I consider it an appreciable possibility. A foreigner can buy an apartment and own it for 50 years, I won't live that long, but if you are my wife it could become yours even before the next 50 years. In addition, as my wife, you can gain the Italian passport, a real passe-partout in the whole world, and once acquired it is yours forever, even if we divorce, even if your spouse dies. Think about it. 

To get it you need to know Italian at B1 level (the minimum), try taking the test here: https://www.europassitalian.com/italian-test/b1-level/

 

Work or activity

Of course you have the right to have your own job, activity, time to dedicate, trying to respect the common needs of presence. So you can do the activity you want and not be involved in my activities although you can participate if you want, no constraints or obligations.

For the common ones, let's forget about the coffee shop project, it's not worth it, there are too many of them in Saigon and not all of them make their owners' dreams come true. But I would also like a business because an Italian friend who is a "chef de cuisine" would be willing to work with me. I thought of a sandwich shop, in HCM there is only one western style sandwich shop (a friend know one of the managers), they have a turnover of around 100 million dong a day, they sell mainly Italian and European style sandwiches (but not only sandwiches), they sell sandwiches to take away, or ordered and delivered to home through Grab. They work well. It can be replicated but thinking of a business clientele, a room with a maximum of 100 m2 of commercial surface, plus kitchen and storage spaces and refrigerators. Mc Donalds style organization (but only as a distribution and payment organization). The Chef friend would obviously take care of the kitchen part, I would take care of the procurement and financial issues of the business and you would be fine as Director, you decide. I would like to give you all the free time you want, no obligations but healthy and shared mutual assistance. Expected investment approximately 6B VND including rent, salaries, equipment, consumables and food.

This is the competitor: https://breadandbutterhcm.com/

 

Means of transport

I would like to buy a car so you can drive it too, that is also useful for my business and work, but also for the family, for getting around the city and going on trips to the seaside or in the mountains.

For the car I would like an eco-friendly one, but at the moment in Vietnam the only electric one sold is the Vinfast, it's cheap. But it is not up to the standard of other foreign models, later can be considered a foreign brand, Tesla started to be sold in Vietnam in 2023.

Before to drive a car you need a driving licence. My driving license expires in June 2025, I will be able to renew it every two years (at my age this is permitted in Italy). It would be useful if you had a driving license, I can do some general driving schooling for you, when the car arrives, just to understand how it works, then a Vietnamese driving school will be necessary to learn the theory and driving rules in Vietnam.

 But if someone as handicapped as my ex-wife has learned to drive, it will be very easy for you, like a walk in the woods.

 

Travel and Adventures

I have seen practically the whole world, there are few countries where I have never been, but the world does not stand still waiting for us, the world turns and changes continuously. And just as the Europe I know is no longer the same as it was 10 years ago, the same can be said of Australia, the United States of America, even Africa and much more. I would like to travel often, to see in a different light all those places that stimulated my life and thirst for adventure when I was younger, and I would like to do it with you. Absolutely not to be missed are Italy, France, Denmark, Spain, Great Britain, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, United States and Canada, and many others, but it will take two annual holidays to see them all. Traveling and discovering is life, it is knowledge, it is the pleasure of meeting other people and interacting with them to improve our lives to enjoy independence and a little reasonable madness.

 

Leisure

Your request scared me a little, because it leads to considering a virtual union and not a real one, in fact maintaining a life status such as to think of depending on someone else. I find a relationship like this very conflicting. I am looking for a person who is capable of living with me most of the time, a free bond but based on mutual honestly, respect and loyalty.

Our union must be based on the joy of living and happiness, if there are problems we discuss them, and the rough edges are resolved, no long faces, no moaning. An open relationship, with full availability to dialogue and resolve problems immediately when they arise.

It may seem strange but paradoxically every human being needs to recover their own spaces, manage and protect them, as well as learn to respect the vital spaces of others, in a word, leave their spaces to their partner. It's not just about physical spaces, closets, rooms or existing spaces in our homes. This is an important psychological space, vital spaces of the couple that must be perceived, protected and respected. I mean everyone's living spaces like these, trying to respect each other's needs. If there is a willingness to accept these, let's talk about it, you will find me agree:

Hobbies, religious beliefs, socialization, family of origin, friends, sport, study. Dedicating a few days a week to your space needs is legitimate, but without exaggerations and limitations, without forgetting the need to be together, united we are stronger.

 

Bonds and mutual assistance

There are written and unwritten rules governing being together for a couple. As mentioned at the beginning of this life plan, we can be a legal couple (married) or not (cohabiting even temporarily) but we decide this jointly, by mutual agreement and on an equal basis, on issues relating to possible marriage, cohabitation, passports and family relationships. The relationship between us must be based on mutual respect, assistance and the fair distribution of responsibilities. In case we will also have the right to independently resolve matters relating to our personal interests. Mutual assistance is taking care of the other person in case of need (illness, accidents, bereavement) and applies to all family members.

 

Kids and Parents

Bo is a priority, this year he should finish primary school (if I remember correctly) and start secondary school, perhaps it would be a good idea to have him attend an international school, where he can better prepare for the future. Vietnamese schools are not excellent, we know this, but to have more chances you must learn English well, otherwise it is difficult. I wish Bo had the best to study, his future is created by attending a better school.

Matthia doesn't want to return to Vietnam, he will follow his path in France, but if he decides differently, there will always be a place for him. I don't know your father, I've only seen him in some of your photographs, I don't know how he feels since he was left alone after your mom passed away. There will always be a place for him. But it depends on you and him.

Funds and Budget

The life of a couple, real or virtual, must be based mainly on sincerity and honesty.

Giving is connected to having and both will be reciprocal, I didn't go into the details of possible coexistence, I didn't talk about needs because for the majority of people who share large spaces and common visions, both of them already know how to organize their lives.

But life isn't just about sharing time. We will certainly open a bank account in a foreign bank in Vietnam in common (HSBC or SCB), because the management of resources must be common, but it is my intention to dedicate funds to you, which will be yours and you can use them as you wish and this regardless of any funds from your work or business for which you decide how to use them.

I don't indicate a precise figure, I had thought something around 100 million per month, but it is only an indicative figure, everything is connected to the availability and the exchange between partners.

The budget is certainly linked to work. In short, there are many opportunities available.

The spending budget is amply covered.

 

The final Chapter

There is still a lot left to say. Naturally it is a challenge and from this arises the need to know your expectations. Because otherwise it will always be too little or not enough if you still don't intend to accept my proposal.

I'm sincere, this is what I can offer you. I already know you and I know that I can trust you, in the end everything will be yours too, and no one takes away from themselves what they already have even if it comes from their partner.

I don't like paying a salary, it sounds like a sugar daddy, the ex didn't take a salary, she took what she needed for her own needs day by day, she had her own debit/credit card in the joint bank account which she used as best she could she believed, had and still has, because the other joint bank account was closed, her own bank account where only she could access, with a credit card and without too many limits, the limit was decency and the awareness of not putting the family is in crisis with crazy and useless expenses.

In a couple, love is not everything. Respect and trust are essential to find and maintain the balance between the couple's needs and personal goals for a long time. These two values are the basis of good relationships, even as a couple, and they make the difference. Like love, trust must be built and cultivated over time. When trust is lacking, in fact, whatever the other person does or thinks, doubt will always be before our eyes, clouding our vision. To build it, you start by sharing values as a couple, learning to avoid attitudes or gestures that could hurt the other. It takes a little time, a lot of attention and listening to your partner's needs and vice versa, to test compatibility, find a balance and maintain it in the various life circumstances that we will experience together. Trust, sometimes, is lost due to some negative experience, in which case it is very important to be honest and address the topic without making it too steep and impossible to overcome. When trust is lacking, is not shared or is not strong enough, it will take very little to have doubts or not to believe the words or gestures of the person we have at our side. Anything, even minimal, will destroy that stability and tranquility necessary for the well-being of a couple.

 

Fundamentals

Finally, if we really wanted to identify the components of a healthy relationship, I would say that the following characteristics are essential for building a balanced, satisfying and long-lasting relationship:

1)    Respect. Each person must be welcomed as they are, appreciated in their entirety and uniqueness;

2)   Trust. A couple in which there is trust is balanced, knows no control mechanisms and has complete freedom with rules established by mutual agreement;

3)   Honesty. It is a fundamental pillar towards ourselves and our partner;

4)   Sincerity understood as the self-critical ability to respect one's own desires, aspirations and needs without damaging the needs of the partner;

5)   Support. A couple is almost a team in which they support each other and encourage mutual personal growth;

6)   Equity. In every couple there is balance, respect, mutual exchange and sharing of joys and burdens;

7)   Recognition of individuality. The partner, just as we are, is an individual with his own personality and uniqueness, characteristics to be protected and recognized;

8)   Communication. It will never be enough, I want to underline the fundamental role of good communication and constructive dialogue within a couple. Suffice it to say that in his absence, there is no relationship that can last.

I chose you as my partner 14 months ago, you represent added value to my life and our journey. I wish you and I can stay together to share a long journey as a couple, I hope for the next 30 years.

 

Sergio, Wednesday, January 3, 2024

 

Thoughts of love dedicated to an Angel

I don't love you as if you were a salt rose, a topaz or an arrow of carnations that spread fire, I love you as certain dark things are loved, secretly, between the shadow and the soul. 

I love you like a plant that does not flower and carries within itself, hidden, the light of those flowers, and thanks to your love the dense aroma that rises from the earth lives darkly in my body. 

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where, I love you directly without problems or pride, I love you like this because 

I don't know how to love otherwise than in this way in which I am not and you are not, so close that your hand on my chest is mine, so close that your eyes close with my sleep.

LET IT GO

Don't go back to where you were happy one day, it's a trap of melancholy, everything will have changed and nothing will be the same as before, not even you.


Don't look for the same landscapes, nor the same people, time plays dirty and will have taken care of destroying everything that once made you happy.


Don't go back to the place where you were happy one day, always keep it in your memory, as it was, but don't go back.


Life goes on and there are new roads to travel… new places to visit and other people waiting for you. ❤️

ANNA

I wanted Anna like I've never wanted anyone before. I wanted Anna against all common sense, against all pride, against all reticence, hesitation, preconception, second thoughts, lucidity. I wanted her so much, too much, I wanted her more than she wanted me, and maybe she never wanted me, but she was there and continued to buzz around me, of course - I wanted her even more, to fill this obvious distance between us. I wanted her and I still want Anna, that's the problem. I want her even though she treated me like a "weird" because deep down I know I was strange.

Predictable. Grantor. Conniving.

I want her even though she's gone from my life, even though there's no longer a future together and maybe it wasn't even there before, but it might seem, even though she's dating others, even though everyone else — potential boyfriends, potential men who will win at the roulette wheel life and they will be able to make her fall in love like I was unable to do in thirteen months by giving her everything, even the benefit of the doubt which in reality was already a certainty; certainty of having become entangled in a sterile, counterproductive, burnt-out story.

I want her so much that I learned to tell myself: to clarify, to vent, to calm myself, I learned to tell about us, about her, therefore about myself, a new me that I discovered day after day and hour after hour, re- building me after her mere presence - but even more so her absence - had shattered me, approaching me in an indifferent, superficial or rather, weird way - a word she likes a lot.

There is no future, I know it. We will never be a couple (but always never say never is the mantra). Yet I would trust her. She will never fall in love with me because, as a wise man said with that brutal honesty that only those familiar with life have: you have given yourself too much, she already knows you, she has lost interest. To paraphrase, I'm trite. The truth is that she doesn't know me at all, I would like to point that out. But she didn't want to do it, I would like to clarify this too. I, on the other hand, had to get to know myself again. I had to introduce myself again, new, unpublished, unknown, like a distant relative who you have never seen before but to whom you are linked by sharing a surname, blood, family trees.

I had to present myself with this baggage, these new experiences: hello, I'm the new you who only retains appearance and generality of the old you; I bring you new doubts, I bring you old wounds with new pain, I bring you your insecurities - the usual ones, did you by any chance think you had overcome them? — and the conflicts, the conflicts against the usual you and the new unknown — you will not win, so you better make him a friend, this unknown enemy of yourself that you cannot defeat, you better learn to live with this unknown troublemaker who chases an unrequited love and throws himself into the void against all common sense.

She was my void. In everything. The leap into the void. The emptiness in my stomach. The void of substance and content and feelings and perspectives and investments. She gave me a little that seemed like a lot, and with that much that was in fact little I was reassured that I had achieved peace of mind and it would be an understatement to talk about giving or donating. She gave me so little that sometimes I think I even dreamed it. She gave me, for my perspective, for the nothing I had given up until that time - that, in the evident imbalance of the relationship, I remained anchored to my scale while she, in the lightness of hers, was already flying towards new destinations, other stories, new interests, more tantalizing pleasures.

And then, let's face it, she's not the one who's strange. She is the representation that most conforms to the average Vietnamese woman - interested, shrewd, straight forwarded, perhaps apparently superficially and falsely modern but internally linked to the values of the traditional family, but only in words, then in reality I didn't know or perhaps I deliberately ignored, unable to invent scenarios reliable ones that could justify my way of thinking about her. Was it me who was stupid? Am I the one who believed her words, who saw sincerity in them, who fondled her when perhaps she should have been slapped to make her see reason and recognize our relationship? I should have helped her to be found when we had to get lost, to be there when I had to leave. Love is an ironic twist of fate. And a sarcastic joke about life. I thought she was the one after our first pseudo phone conversation with Zalo? It was there, in those hours condensed in a pleasant conversation with an almost stranger whose photographic features I remembered well but not the look, not the look because we had not yet looked intensely into each other's eyes, that I understood, I hoped, I believed that finally after so much wandering in vain, finally after so much waiting, I had finally been rewarded: finally I said, her. And I felt it was mine from the first time we went out, I felt it was part of my life, like a phantom limb: it wasn't there, but I felt it. It was there, we had already met in another time and another space, it was destiny that had told us, inspiration from the oriental idea of love, perhaps perfect or imperfect but it suited both of us perfectly: we just had to meet, it was just that the effort and once made, here we are.

But we weren't here. Or rather she was there, there, everywhere, with the gift of transmutation of those who do not anchor themselves to any shore. It wasn't mine, it was hers, of herself, of her past, of her limits, of her preconceptions, of her present of which I was part to a minimal extent - an ephemeral, unrealistic, surmountable, set aside extent - of her future of which I would not have done but part, I just didn't know. It was hers, of herself and of the interest she never had in me or maybe she did but she never told me openly, of the superficiality with which she treated me, apparent love, of the lies she foisted on me, and I reconstructed with unfailing sagacity, the fruit of my eidetic memory, which was once called photographic, of the apparent respect it has granted me, of the lack of education with which it moves in the world and with which I have allowed it to move in mine and with which I myself have downgraded, degraded, devalued to an incredible and smoky lover like a reflection for his luminous image, the result of skilful exercises in creativity.

She belongs to herself and it is right, very right, sacrosanct that she is, she belongs to herself. I just wanted her to share with me part of her belonging, of her existence: this is what I wanted. The truth is that someone who wants to leave and travel and discover cannot be forced to love and stay - even if that departure then becomes a return, even if the journey then becomes the road home: even if she returns, she doesn't stay - she leaves she will go again, and she has done so countless times, she has done so now too, the last one, in which she ideally turned to the web, almost running away, she smiled at me aware that we would never see each other again.

Maybe we won't see each other again but I don't know this yet, and neither does she, because perhaps I will no longer have the courage to flay my soul to discover her heart. I will no longer have the courage to believe in a future that doesn't exist and to delude myself into what doesn't exist and what I thought was. I don't want to give her the time needed to understand if he is the right one for her. And if not him another? One without a face, without a name for me, but with a precise physiognomy for her: the money as a defined and constant presence who will be able to live with it in a way I can't, not because money causes distance, of course, but and above all emotional distance. I won't have the courage to deal with a bastard but true reality: she doesn't want me and I don't want to allow myself the luxury of falling apart when she tells me that someone else has reached the finish line? I won't survive today's, I won't even survive tomorrow's, and then how many others?

I will no longer have courage because everything was exhausted when I persisted in continuing on viscous, slippery ground, on which I fell and got up and fell again: when, aware of defeat, I went to the bottom of the abyss, to the bottom of the the ocean, to touch the lowest point of my existence with my own hands in order to possibly go back up.

I still love you very much Anna, I know I wanted to take care of you: of your wounds, of your good eyes, of your insecurities, and also on your secutrities, of your ambition. I wanted to undermine your superficial frankness only with words. I wanted, I wanted, I wanted and then I had to unhinge my wanted because you didn't want.

I hope you find your serenity one day. May you learn to look inside yourself and make your insecurities your strengths, fears and courage. I hope that one day, far, far away, you'll find that a person capable of making you mature, grow, understand, know. And I hope that person is myself. I truly loved you, Anna, more than you loved me and this, unfortunately, is a bill that only I can pay.

Anna forever

Anna you left a mark on my mind I can never erase. 

You took a piece from my heart that no one can ever replace. 

No one could replace you. 

You're the eye in the storm, you're the piece I'm trying to find. 

When I'm sad, when I think, when I work, when I walk all alone through the sunny streets of Saigon or in the shopping malls, you're the only one on my mind. 

I will search for you until I find you again. 

I know you know it. I don't know what else to do. 

I lost the chance to love you, you are the one who rejects me, you have eliminated me from your mind as well as from your life. 

I have been alone in my dreams, but I have always looked for you, I need love in this place, you are the only one I knew, the only one who is capable of repairing my loneliness. 

I let myself be carried away by the wind, I hope it carries me into your arms. 

The only place where I am safe, only you can heal my scars

The only one to save me I'm walking on the deep blue sea

I will look for your lighthouse to lead me. 

I don't want to lose my love for you.