Covid-19 Lockdown, A Rural Diary - Italy
While this post is going a little off-piste in terms of my own rural experience of the Covid-19 pandemic, I wanted to acknowledge a country which is very dear to my heart. N and I lived for four years in Italy: firstly in Padua (Padova) in the Veneto region of North-East Italy (1990-92) and then in Milan in the Lombardy region of North-West Italy (1997-99). It was in Milan that our first child was born and it was the most perfect experience of new motherhood that I could ever have had.
During our time in the land of La Dolce Vita, we grew to adore the Italians, to speak their language, to absorb and admire their extraordinary cultural legacy and to understand their energy, their innovation and their creativity. We travelled the length and breadth of this diverse nation - yet one thing remained constant: the Italian spirit.
Along the A4 autostrada that takes you all the way from the east to west of northern Italy, there is a string of extraordinary cities: Turin, Milan, Brescia, Bergamo, Verona, Vicenza, Padua, Venice and Trieste. This was a route we travelled regularly over the years and all of these cities hold such special memories for us. We had friends in all of them, some of whom we are still in touch with.
Northern Italy was particularly badly hit with Covid-19 and Bergamo's immense losses, close as it was to the 'ground zero' of the disease, featured regularly on the English news before our own situation worsened and took over the airwaves.
For this reason, I wanted first to direct you to the Concert For Hope which Andrea Bocelli performed, on Easter Sunday, in an empty cathedral in Milan. The images of those cities which appear during the video are, for me, particularly haunting; and I find the emotion I still hold for Italy spills over as the music fills the empty magnificence of the Duomo.
Secondly, is this video which was made for the citizens of the beautiful city of Bergamo in the depths of their crisis (their population has been decimated), by Italy's most famous band of the 1970s. They have donated the copyrights to Bergamo Hospital. Every click on the video means a gift, because YouTube pays the owner of those copyrights per click.
I hope you enjoy the music and the powerful emotions it evokes in a time when solidarity is all.
Thank you for reading and watching.
During our time in the land of La Dolce Vita, we grew to adore the Italians, to speak their language, to absorb and admire their extraordinary cultural legacy and to understand their energy, their innovation and their creativity. We travelled the length and breadth of this diverse nation - yet one thing remained constant: the Italian spirit.
Along the A4 autostrada that takes you all the way from the east to west of northern Italy, there is a string of extraordinary cities: Turin, Milan, Brescia, Bergamo, Verona, Vicenza, Padua, Venice and Trieste. This was a route we travelled regularly over the years and all of these cities hold such special memories for us. We had friends in all of them, some of whom we are still in touch with.
Northern Italy was particularly badly hit with Covid-19 and Bergamo's immense losses, close as it was to the 'ground zero' of the disease, featured regularly on the English news before our own situation worsened and took over the airwaves.
For this reason, I wanted first to direct you to the Concert For Hope which Andrea Bocelli performed, on Easter Sunday, in an empty cathedral in Milan. The images of those cities which appear during the video are, for me, particularly haunting; and I find the emotion I still hold for Italy spills over as the music fills the empty magnificence of the Duomo.
Secondly, is this video which was made for the citizens of the beautiful city of Bergamo in the depths of their crisis (their population has been decimated), by Italy's most famous band of the 1970s. They have donated the copyrights to Bergamo Hospital. Every click on the video means a gift, because YouTube pays the owner of those copyrights per click.
I hope you enjoy the music and the powerful emotions it evokes in a time when solidarity is all.
Thank you for reading and watching.
Comments