Sometimes, the most beautiful stories are born by chance. And this is the story of Giulia Piras, 19 years old, a diploma as a surveyor in her pocket and a heart divided between two lands: Emilia, where she was born and raised, and Sardinia, her favorite Island.

And it is precisely with that determination that flows in the veins of the Sardinians that Giulia has done something extraordinary: she has saved the newsstand of Farneta, a tiny hamlet nestled in the mountains of Modena, which was at risk of closing forever . Without that small space of just 18 square meters, the town would have lost a point of reference, a place of meeting, of exchange, of stories.

"I had been looking for a job that I really liked for months, then my mother told me that the newsstand was about to close. I thought: why not?", says Giulia with the smile of someone who loves a challenge. "It wasn't in my plans, but I've always dreamed of having my own business. So I decided to give it a try."

So, just before Christmas, he raised the shutters for the first time. The newspapers arrived only last week, but in the meantime that newsstand had already returned to being a meeting point in Farneta, a piece of home for those who stop by every morning to pick up the newspaper, to exchange a few words, to feel part of something.

Giulia has strong roots. Her father Andrea is from Samassi, her mother Sabrina Canargiu from San Gavino Monreale. "My parents left the island when they were twenty, but I feel deeply connected to my homeland. The sea, the scent of the earth, my family, I love everything about those places and I too suffer from Sardinian nostalgia."

She hasn't been back for two years, but she has a promise to herself: as soon as she can, she will come to embrace her second home. "In the village there are my paternal grandparents, many relatives and also several friends that I have known since I was a child."

In the meantime, however, he chose to stay, to build something, to give Farneta what it risked losing. "Of course, if I could, as much as I love it, I would move to Sardinia even tomorrow, but I can't leave everything here. Today I realize how important this newsstand was for the town. When the old owner announced the closure, people were worried, but now I see their faces smile every morning and this is the greatest satisfaction."

And who knows if one day the call of Sardinia will be too strong to resist. But for now, every morning, between the pages of the newspapers that she distributes with passion, Giulia has brought new energy to a country that was at risk of losing a small but precious piece of its identity.

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