Brother and sister – her t-shirt and multicolored stripes, him an olive green sweater – just have time to hear the voice of teacher Alicia announcing some news, “tomorrow two migrants will arrive in class”, when the bell rings to announce the end of lessons. The two rush home, where their grandmother’s risolatte awaits them, their favorite dish which they always repeat. However, they cannot forget that word, said by the teacher, which sounds unknown and mysterious to their ears. In fact, who will be “the migrants”? Pauli, the greedy little girl, imagines that it is a type of sweet, perhaps filled with chocolate. The brother, after thinking for a while, decides that it can’t be about sweets because there are fourteen students in the class and two sweets would be too few. Pauli, after further reflection, develops a new hypothesis: migrants must be cute little animals, the kind that curl up and roll, like hedgehogs. It will be a lot of fun to play with them! However, this hypothesis also immediately turns out to be impracticable because the teacher Alicia does not like animals, much less animals in the classroom. She would therefore never allow two pets to enter her classroom…
Migrants, title of the “Books for dreaming” series by Kalandraka Edizioni, tells with brilliant humor and profound intelligence the emotions, questions and worries of two children when faced with a new word and what or who it could refer to in reality. Curiosity, imagination, innocence characterize their attempts to imagine a solid and realistic answer. But they don’t find it and the word “migrants” remains suspended even above their sleep, so much so that it leads them to face the morning with some fear and a lot of uncertainty. Having arrived at school before all their classmates, they enter the classroom with blue trepidation. They fear finding migrants in the guise of ghosts. But there is nothing scary in the classroom, just two new children, also brother and sister, with “their hair full of curls and a smile that lights up the whole classroom”. It’s so nice to meet them and be able to become their friends that the thought of the terrible migrants completely abandons the minds of the two protagonists. The book, with witty and profound text by Marcelo Simonetti and illustrations of rare effectiveness and expressiveness by Maria Girón, tells a story of equality and encounter suitable for all ages.
