Diaries from the Quarantine - III

In recent history, one might think that Italy has always been divided into two sides. 

North and south. Fascists and communists. Artists and criminals. I could go on and on about this.

Despite being true that Italy has always had two parts fighting each other, it is also true that they are parted by one big grey area in between. At the end of WWII, partisans fought against fascists for our freedom; we rightfully remember these brave men and women, and the sacrifices they made for us. One might mistankenly believe that the whole country was, suddenly, either red or black, a supporter of Mussolini or an allies' sympathizer, a slave to the system or a warrior for freedom. The reality is that most of the population was neither a partisan nor a fascist - they were just trying to survive. In the same way, most Italians are neither an artist nor a criminal, but a creative mix of the two. The spheres of legality and illegality are often overlapping for us - most of us won't even realize when breaking the law, as rules are something we are not prone to follow and we might come up with the most creative inventions to overcome them. 

The COVID-19 crisis showed us that this part of our national identity is still the same at core. Some of us understand why we need to follow the quarantine, why the restrictive measures are necessary, whereas some of us decide not to do that in spite of what the government and the scientists say. Most of us will follow most of the rules, despite believing that some are excessively limitating and that they do not apply to ourselves. "Yes, I stay home, I only leave the house to go grocery shopping, but I want to see my partner, who doesn't live with me, so I will take off and go with them for the weekend anyway". "Yes, I stay home, but I will go on the rooftop and do some excercise with my neighbour from the first floor, and then maybe we will share an aperitivo - we live in the same building, so thats not really breaking the rules, isn't it?". There are many examples like these. We always believe we can overcome rules, that they do not apply to us because we have some special reason for not following them that others don't have. 

Italy was described in the past as a country that develops at a split velocity. The fast-growing, wealthy North, were most industries are settled and operate, and the traditional, rural South, from which many emigrated to other parts of Italy or the world due to the lack of prospectives. Both parts of Italy have beautiful landscapes, tasty food, soul-warming traditions and people, but they do live in different times and offer different opportunities to those living there. As much as we don't like to acknowledge it, being born in a suburban area in the North is still different from being born in a small town in the southern countryside. 

Luckily, it is much easier nowadays to move around the country and have different opportunities, not just from South to North but in the opposite direction too. Leaving your home and your family is always tough of course, and our roots are something we can hardly get rid of in Italy. When the COVID-19 emergency broke out and we witnessed so many people transferring from one side to the other of the country, we were all reminded of our social history and of the deep division between our regions; if in the North getting sick is just ordinary business, in the South, were a major part of the population does not live close to a hospital, there are fewer beds in the ICU and there are few doctors available, being ill is a risk even in ordinary times. 

In this crisis, Italy is once again ruled by a different pace: a fast, tragically unstoppable spread of the virus in the North, and a slow but constant increase in COVID-19 related cases in the South; this is what an external observer will certainly see at first, failing, if one doesn't own the art of digging into the iceberg of our culture, to see what other real, devastating scar is being cut into our country, a scar that will part us even more than before. What will come next will certainly be led by economics, but the social trauma that is happening right now will hurt the country (and the people living in it) as much as a war, and will deepen the cut between North and South. 

As I said already, I come from Northern Italy. I grew up in the area that is now the eye of the storm in our country, the Bergamo province. Everyday, I see news, videos, pictures, reportages from the hospital where I was taken to get my vaccines as a baby, where I had my X-ray when I broke my knee, where the ambulance took me that one time I was sick in school. Everytime I talk with someone, they tell me someone they know - or they are related to - got the virus, sometimes they died because of it. I have friends who have it. My parents have been living locked in the house for almost a month by now, and everytime we speak on the phone I am afraid they will tell me they feel sick. I consciously decided not to go back there as I was afraid I could bring the virus in with me, and I believe it is still not safe to travel, but the latest decree our Prime Minister signed forbids me (and thousands of others of course, it's not personal) from returning home. This is a feeling I never felt before, I never even imagined I could feel, and I hope I will never feel again. 

Despite what I - and many others - am feeling, many Italians in other parts of country - where the virus has not been so aggressive at the moment - still behave and act like this is just a nuisance, as if it doesn't affect them. They even get in cars and trains to move southward, going back home to their family, uncaring of the virus they might be taking with them. Unfortunately, this is the same way other countries are behaving, which makes me feel hopeless for the future - how can we stop this pandemic, if most of the Earth's population doesn't understand how bad it can turn for them as well?

I guess this happens when you don't have connections to people or the area that is suffering, despite maybe living in it. When you don't hear this stories first hand, or when you don't know anyone who is personally going through it, you can barely relate. The same happens with most people who cannot relate to migrants or refugees - if you don't know what is it like to take shelter from bombs in a basement, or to be so desperate that you try crossing the Mediterranean Sea on an inflatable draft, isn't it easier to pretend not to understand what they are coming from? 

In the foreseeable future, this epidemic will be the splitting point of our life, in Italy and, likely, the world. We will remember what was going on in our life when it started, which consequences had on us as individuals, on our family; if we are lucky, it was more like a nuisance - if we are not, it meant saying goodbye to a loved one. There will be one more division we could make of us Italians, those who lived through the COVID-19 emergency, and those who watched it from afar. This two parts will keep growing at different speeds, mourning their deads in different ways, each part with very different memories from this weird, surreal time.

Roma. February 2020.