Summer dragged on with its slow, sweltering rhythm through those weeks under Trento's scorching sun.
It had been less than two weeks since I had gotten back from Japan, but I already felt the need to give some structure to my days, to stop myself from sinking into endless Fortnite sessions that always ended the same way: sluggish building and red death screens staring back at me.
The Word file I had put together the day after I got home had become my roadmap for the month and a half of summer break ahead of me.
It listed clear goals—realistic but ambitious.
I didn't want the summer to slip away without accomplishing anything. I wanted to improve myself, so I started ticking them off one by one.
The first was learning C++, something that had been buzzing in my head for a year.
I went to a technical school in Italy focused on programming: the Istituto Tecnico Informatico in Trento.
In our first year of high school we had covered Python and Java—Python for its simplicity, clean syntax, and straightforward libraries; Java for object-oriented programming, with abstract classes.
They were useful languages, sure—for quick scripts or enterprise apps—but to me they were just stepping stones to something more powerful.
The programming language I was really interested in was C++, the best one for game development.
I dreamed of making my own video games one day, and C++ was the key to that.
To be honest, I didn't really know what I wanted to do when I grew up.
If I went by process of elimination, crossing off everything that didn't appeal to me, the only thing left was programming.
Sure, I could become a streamer or a pro player—careers I was already starting—but they weren't secure jobs.
After a few years you could find yourself without fans or without the skills to stay at the top level of a game, and that meant having to find something else.
I loved coding: the satisfaction of seeing a program finally run after hours of syntax errors, the power of creating digital worlds from nothing—from a simple "hello world" to a full physics simulator.
But every night the same thought crept in, an endless loop that kept me awake while I stared at the dark ceiling of my room.
"If I want to become a programmer, why am I so set on moving to Japan?" That question tormented me.
Japan had completely enchanted me during the trip: Tokyo's neon lights, the discipline of the people, the 24/7 konbini where you could always find something new to try.
I wanted to live there, to immerse myself in that culture that blended tradition and innovation, maybe stream full-time or keep competing and earning from tournaments.
"Maybe I just want to escape my routine, my house, the expectations everyone has for me?" I would torture myself with that every night before falling asleep.
It was a question I couldn't answer, but deep down I knew I wanted to follow my heart: move to Japan.
To learn C++, I had planned to follow YouTube tutorials, but China offered to be my personal teacher to make the studying more efficient.
On evenings when I wasn't playing Fortnite, I would hop into a Discord call with him.
He had just finished his final year of high school, graduating with high marks in computer science, and he hadn't decided to go to university yet.
"I wanna take a gap year to work on some projects," he had told me once, in his calm, thoughtful voice.
So he had plenty of time to spare for me, and I appreciated it hugely; it was like having my own personal coach.
Since I already had coding experience from school, I didn't have to learn every function and its uses from scratch—just how to structure code in C++.
The sessions started around midnight, when the house was quiet.
I would join the call and open Visual Studio Code while China prepared problems for me to solve as I shared my screen.
I would try to work through them, typing lines of code on my Wooting, but I kept running into memory errors like segmentation faults or undefined behavior from overflows.
He wouldn't say a word until I was done, just watching quietly from his end, sipping energy drinks.
Then he would go over his thoughts on how to optimize the code better or the spots where I had completely screwed up.
His feedback was always precise, stuff like: "Better to use a const reference here—it avoids unnecessary copies" or "Watch out, dangling pointer: switch to a smart pointer, it's faster".
Those were calm evenings, with some low music playing in the background.
The study sessions ran roughly from midnight to three in the morning, with breaks to stretch our fingers or talk about whatever random stuff came up.
Then, until around five, we would jump into a few Fortnite matches, where I kept trying to find any point to building—it stayed completely useless no matter how much I tried.
Those nights with China weren't just lessons; they were moments for thinking.
While the code compiled, my mind drifted back to the doubts: "Am I learning C++ just as a hobby, or is this actually what I want to do with my life?"
Making progress in coding felt good: in just a few weeks I had gotten to the point of writing more complex little programs, like a simple engine for tic-tac-toe.
Smiling to myself, I saved the tic-tac-toe engine file into a folder called "Completed Projects".
That small action gave me the same dopamine hit as leveling up in a game: a real reward for the effort I had put in.
Another goal I had set for myself was getting back into calisthenics—the bodyweight training that had once changed everything for me and that I now felt the urge to pick up again, so my body wouldn't waste away in front of the screen.
As a little kid I had always been overweight, a chubby boy with round cheeks, the result of junk food and hours parked on the couch instead of running around outside playing.
I hated how I looked: the extra fat, the weight that left me winded after two flights of stairs and made me keep my shirt on at the beach all summer.
When I was eleven, scrolling through Instagram reels on the phone I had just gotten—an cheap Oppo A5 smartphone—a video popped up of a guy doing a full workout circuit with no equipment at all.
"Wow," I thought, eyes wide, watching him use nothing but his own body against gravity: push-ups, squats, planks.
The discovery floored me: my whole life I had assumed the only way to get muscular was to join a gym, with weights and pricey memberships I could never afford.
After that video I dug deeper into the discipline, binge-watching YouTube clips.
I learned that calisthenics was accessible, free, and something I could do right at home—no subscription required.
That same night, while the whole house slept, I started trying push-ups in my bedroom.
I got into plank position, hands on the wooden floor, and lowered myself, breathing in deep.
Huff… flop!
I couldn't push back up, collapsing face-first, breathless, heart hammering like I had just lost a boss fight.
Even that half-rep left me gasping as if I had run a marathon, sweat beading on my forehead, a mix of defeat and stubborn resolve.
I started worrying I would wake my brother, who slept in the same room—our beds separated only by a cabinet that doubled as a divider, with open shelves on one side and closed compartments on the other.
Back then I didn't have a PC yet, so he wasn't used to the constant background clicking or Discord chats that went until dawn, noises he would eventually get accustomed to over the years.
The next day I tried again, more determined than the night before.
I had looked up exercises online to learn proper push-ups and found there were harder variations—diamond push-ups, one-arm—and easier ones, like knee push-ups.
That night I did push-ups on my knees: they were simpler because less weight had to be lifted, shifting the center of effort.
I felt the burn in my arms and chest, a pain that only made me want to keep going.
In a week I had started to get how the different exercises worked—proper form, breathing, core engagement.
I began doing workout circuits I had found on Instagram, until I settled on one I liked enough to make my routine: 3 sets of 5 push-up reps, squats for legs, 30-second planks, and sit-ups for cardio.
The hardest part was controlling my breathing.
If I breathed too loud I risked sounding like an asthmatic, and my brother would definitely wake up, rolling over in bed with a sleepy "What're you doing?"
At the same time, if I didn't breathe right I would start coughing, making even more noise.
I had to find a balance—breathing slow and controlled, inhaling through my nose and exhaling silently through my mouth.
I kept training for a year and a half, turning my bedroom into an improvised gym every night, even though I didn't have a single piece of equipment.
I went from knee push-ups to full push-ups with perfect form, from 5 reps to 20, feeling my body change bit by bit: the fat melting away like fading pixels, muscles emerging under the skin, a new energy that made me feel invincible.
I got lean, with some muscle—abs you could just make out and broader shoulders.
Back then, though, having muscle wasn't really the point: what mattered was losing weight, shedding the pounds that weighed me down physically and mentally.
And I could say I had done it: for the first time I could look in the mirror with pride.
My strongest exercise had always been push-ups: before I quit I had gotten to 50 with perfect execution—elbows tucked close to my body, chest brushing the floor, back straight—and that had made me really proud of myself.
In the end I stopped because I wanted to focus hard on Valorant, where I was getting good—climbing ranks with Frois—and on streaming, where I wanted to grow.
Time was limited, and the nighttime calisthenics kept getting skipped for gaming practice, leaving me wiped out.
Now the muscles I had built over time were gone because of how sedentary I had become.
If I kept going like that I risked starting to put weight back on, with that belly fat slowly building up around my waist, making me feel less confident.
That wasn't okay with me—not after seeing how much I could improve and how good it felt to be in shape.
So I started training again, but this time with a different approach: more mature and sustainable, working it into my day.
I decided to go to the little park right below my building, a green space in the residential neighborhood of Trento.
The park had gravel paths, wooden benches under chestnut trees that gave shade, and playground equipment for kids—swings and colorful slides.
Fortunately, there was also a proper calisthenics area the city had installed a couple of years earlier.
That opened up my workout options hugely, letting me try exercises I had never been able to do for lack of equipment.
At home I could only do the classic bodyweight moves like push-ups and squats, but here I could explore pull-ups for my lats, dips for chest and triceps, and leg raises for abs.
I started with a simple routine to ease back in gradually and avoid injury: warm-up with jumping jacks for light cardio, then 3 sets of push-ups starting at 10 reps, squats, and planks.
The park was lively and full of energy: kids running around yelling, dogs barking happily on leashes with their early-rising owners, grandparents chatting on benches while sipping coffee from thermoses, and the smell of freshly cut grass.
I would go there early in the morning, around nine, right after waking up and having breakfast—a protein bar.
I always brought a one-liter thermal bottle and my wireless earbuds, which gave me an extra boost: a Spotify playlist of rap or synthwave pumping rhythm straight into my veins.
The first sessions were tough—a brutal reminder of how out of shape I was: rusty muscles protesting after just a few reps, short breath leaving me gasping.
But it felt familiar, a good burn that motivated me to get back not just to where I had been, but to an even better version.
In a week I was already feeling the first progress: smoother push-ups with full range of motion and a post-workout energy that lasted all day.
I expanded the routine, adding dips for triceps and leg raises for abs.
Even though I was improving on every exercise, there was one I just couldn't do: pull-ups.
I would grab the bar, pull with everything I had, but nothing—my body wouldn't lift, and the frustration built with every try.
Each attempt ended in the same frustration, and I felt a stubborn determination growing inside me not to give up.
Even if I couldn't complete the pull-ups, the training stayed therapeutic: a way to vent the frustration from the useless building in Fortnite and the doubts about my future.
Every rep made me feel stronger—not just physically, but mentally—like a daily reset that cleared my head.
I would think during the sets: "If I did it once, I can do it again."
And as the strength came back to my muscles, I knew I still had to face the toughest challenge of that sweltering summer: moving to Japan.