𝟑:𝟎𝟎| 𝙽𝚒𝚌𝚘𝚕𝚊 𝚉𝚊𝚕𝚎𝚠𝚜𝚔𝚒 𝚡 𝙾𝙲

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟏: 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐩𝐚'𝐬 𝐟𝐚𝐦𝐨𝐮𝐬

Nepotism baby, shortened to nepo baby, is a term referring to the children of celebrities who have succeeded in careers, usually the same, or adjacent, career to their celebrity parents. The implication is that these children are only successful because they have inside access because of their parents due to nepotism.

Well, that's complete bullshit. Just because you get a famous relative/ parent, doesn't mean you will be as successful as them. I am the living proof of that. I am a nepo baby.

My name is Valentina Santos. I am 21 years old college student with business and marketing major and I am the granddaughter of the one and only José Mário dos Santos Mourinho Félix. Also known as 'I am Josè Mourinho' on Tiktok and one of the most, if not the best football coaches and midfielders ever.

My grandpa is known for coaching 10 teams since 2000 to current day. He was a coach for teams like Chelsea, Real Madrid, Inter Milan and many more and I can't even name. My granddad is the best, there's no doubt every football fan in the world knows his name. He really has accomplished a lot on his life.

If you type my grandfather's name on the internet and you open Wikipedia, you can see much how much of an impact did he had over the years. It's insane to me how this person is related to me.

And over the years my family's success has been a blessing, yes. But it was also a curse, cause no matter what I did, I was always in the spotlights expected to be just like my grandpa, if not even better. And thanks to my grandpa's career, I made a lot of good friendships and I met a lot of famous footballers that most people would dream to meet.

I met a lot of friends my age in the football community and most of them didn't even know I was related to José until they saw a picture of me and my sister on his profile on Instagram. Yes, my grandfather has a instagram account.

Anyway, my point was...being a nepo baby doesn't mean you get your success on a silver plate just because you have a famous family member-no. In fact, we have it way harder, because it's expected from us to fulfil this criteria out for us, because we have a famous relative.

When I first got into college and my professors learned my full name and realised who I was related to, all the comments that I expected from them started.

'Oh, I bet you're as hardworking as your grandpa is'.

'I'm not a fan of him, I think he sucks'.

'Here we don't give special treatment, so if you want good grades you gotta work twice as hard, miss Santos'.

And this is only the light comments. I used to get bullied in school, when a team that my grandpa coached lost a game, because I quote: 'it was your grandfather's fault for not coaching better'. This bullying became so intense at some point that I had to be homeschooled for the rest of my school years.

Thank God that my sister Clara had it much, much better than me. No one knew, or at least some people knew, who she was related to and even if they knew-they didn't bother her. So while I was at home studying with my Portuguese mother yelling at me, my sister has the best teenage years she could ask for.

I'm happy for her. As an older sister all I want for my baby Clara is to have the best in life and if not even more. But at the same time I have to admit I was a little jealous of her. Most of the friends I made weren't even in my country, so I was hardly going out on the weekends. And in my city all the kids already knew me and they didn't like me much.

Before I turned 18 my grandpa refused to take me to trips or when he was moving around for work, so I spent most of my days at home. Now I miss these days, in which I could've been free and go out, have fun and enjoy my life. Still, I'm not complaining. I managed to get a high diploma and enroll into a good college.

Plus, now that I'm 21 I travel more, I see more of my friends whenever I please and when they have matches they always make sure to come and see me. So my life is getting better.

A lot of changes are coming.

Like two months ago a team from Rome, Italy called A.S Roma has took my grandfather's interest for some reason. I couldn't understand why he would be interested in this club, when he had the chance to manage Real Madrid again, but who cares? And now, that I'm 21 years old and I have choices..he spoke to me.

"Valentina", grandpa sat me down one night, when he came up to my parents house and he pushed the papers of his transfer to me, "eu quero te oferecer algo". (I want to offer you something).

"O que é isso vovô". (What's that, granddad".

I took the papers in my hands and when I saw all these offers that he got from the club I now understood why he was so interested in this club. My dream has always been to live in Italy, since I was a little child and my grandfather knows this. So when I saw an offer for two big apartments and a place for me at the business college in Milan, my heart dropped.

"não tem como... você está brincando comigo", (no way...are you kidding me?), I looked at my grandfather with disbelief and my eyes got wide open, "vovô você quer mesmo que eu vá a Milão com você?", (granddad, do you really want me to come to Milan with you?).

"Esta é a única razão pela qual escolhi ser o treinador deste clube", (this is the only reason why I choose to be a coach of this club), he gave me a soft smile, like he always does.

"sem chance...." (no way), I stood up and I threw myself on my grandfather hugging him as tight I could, "obrigado, obrigado, obrigado", (thank you).

I AM GOING TO ITALY, I screamed mentally as I started jumping up and down like a mad person. My sister Clara was staring at me like I was crazy, but I got used to her looking at me like that lately.

"That's not fair", she said, "I wanna go to Italy too. Why is only Vale going?".

"Cause you're still in school and you can't start your last year in new school...in a new country, for which you don't know the language", I explained to her and looked at her with only one eyebrow raised up.

"But you can?", she smirked at me.

"I know Italian", I crossed my arms.

"No, you don't. You're bullshitting me".

"Penso che tu sia molto fastidioso e devi smetterla di piagnucolare", (I think you're very annoying and you need to stop whining).

"What did she say?", Clara looked over at my granddad, who was also as lost as her.

"Não sei", (I don't know), he shrugged.

"Now that I have proven my point here, imma go and pack my bags, cause I'M GOING TO ITALY!!!!", I screamed the last part out loud.

This was only the beginning of a new life that I dreamed all my life of. Imagine how good my new life in Italy will be. New friends, new college and most importantly I'll spend more time with granddad, which I hardly do anymore, since he's always busy.

Leaving Portugal to go to Rome, Italy is like the biggest transition of my life. What, if I meet a cute Italian boy and we fall in love? And what, if I stay there for the rest of my life, make a big career and be in love with my Italian boyfriend? Sounds awesome to me.

UNEDITED