Week 35 - Seasons change in Italy

 Edited BY

G P Kennedy

Ellie - Milan, Italy

Well, we have something to celebrate here in Lombardy, and that is we are now an orange zone!

You see, in Northern Italy, the color orange is emotionally coded differently.

It means a little respite for the red zone, which is not just an area but also a time period: when we were under a (relatively strict) lockdown.

Starting last Sunday, we are a bit freer than that.

And one of the changes is that, instead of walking around the block of one's house, the physical challenge we can afford is going for a run or a walk around one's own commune, or within city limits.

So we decided to open the orange season by walking to the geographic end of the town.

With that, you are invited to join. Let me show you around a little, for a glimpse of a town that has been transformed radically in the last, say, 50 years. The coronavirus story starts a bit early when cascinas like this (agricultural community buildings) were transformed into purely private residences. But some signs of the town's agricultural past are still there.

One of the typical features of the area is of course the small textile factories, some of which are still in operation.

I showed you some of them in the spring. But others are small stores like this florist. What I found significant is the message of perseverance and struggle that it is displaying.

It reads "50 years of sacrifice, pride, and satisfaction". Not sure when they marked their 50th anniversary of operation and if the sign is new (never paid attention to it), but it struck me how front and center the message of suffering is, even part of their trademark claim.

It is possible that the pandemic brought out endurance as a value and a guarantee of good service. It has definitely been an advertising-based effort in uniting the community.

And another typical feature, as we head to the edge of the town, are hotels, small and big, luxury and B&B.

Our town is close to the airport as it is a convenient gateway to downtown Milan, so fancy buildings (and newcomers) abound here.

So residents are people who mostly follow their entrepreneurial intuition, which in some cases is expressed in going overboard with imaginative outdoor house decor.

This hodgepodge is rather the exception, though. Most homes (and their residents) keep to themselves, with buildings facing an internal courtyard, where apartments form a small community or houses feature a garden. 

I am glad that our town has such a gorgeous forest. I have to be honest, though, without being forced by the pandemic, I would never have explored the outskirts.

I would have gone, for a long forest-bathing opportunity, in one of the more impressive natural spaces in Northern Lombardy outside of the restrictions of the commune.

I am grateful, though, that the orange time-zone led me to this discovery.