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So I started this project because I didn't see love,
and I didn't feel love.
I had been working as an independent video
journalist for the American media for several years.
And I would go from one story to the next.
So it would be sex slavery, youth unemployment,
the European crisis.
So it was one sad story to the next.
It was sadness, despair, sadness, despair.
And you have to know that when you work for the news,
the pace is very fast.
So you have to be efficient.
You have to be good.
And you don't-- and I didn't have time to digest, you know,
people's sorrow.
And then, when I would go home, you
know, for comfort, my boyfriend would just look at me and say,
Stefania, you're not doing enough.
So, you know, I didn't feel I was enough.
I just thought, I have to get out of this.
I have to find a way out.
And I thought, you know what, I'm
going to go look for this so-called love.
I'm going to take my car.
And I'm going to go look if love really exists.
And so I just went into my car, and I left on the road.
And I decided to ask people, what is love?
A lot of people think that France is, you know, romantic.
It's ideal.
It's the holy grail.
It's, like, the solution waiting for you
on the other side of the pond.
You know?
And the truth is, that's not true.
People are struggling to make ends meet.
They're struggling to pay their mortgages, just like you.
And, you know, the same thing goes for love.
They're fragile.
They're shy.
They're scared.
They doubt about their ability to be loved and to love.
But they have so much love to give.
You know?
It's just like-- you know, love is not perfect.
Love is joy.
And love is pain.
Love is sadness.
And love is a despair.
You know, for each moment of beauty,
there was a moment of sadness.
And, you know, it would always go hand in hand.
I'll always remember when I had lunch with Lucien Lalanne.
And, you know, it was hard for him
to express exactly what love is.
But for him, really, love was in the mundane.
His wife, Marie-Jeanne, had just died.
And he was telling me, you know, in the evening,
we would watch television.
And we would sit in our respective chairs.
And then we would fall asleep.
And I thought it would last forever.
And it doesn't.
And then he cried.
It was a real deep conversation, deep connection.
And I think, you know, all the people in this book
understand the meaning of this quest.
And I think that's why they were ready to really
have this moment of intimacy.
And that intimacy, I think, and that connection is love.
I'm in love with every single--
I'm in love with every single person I met, really.
It's just, like, every home was so special.
Every person in this book is so special.
It's like, every step, like, every person mended my heart.
They really made me feel that love was there,
that there was hope, you know, in all this disarray, really.
And so I thank them very much, because they're
the ones that made this book.
It's not me.
It's really these people.
Really.
I really think that.
I know.
It's like, I love them so much.
So much.
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