7 PM
Just before 7pm Piazza dei Signori is an inaccessible space. The crowd is so big that it muffles even the loudest choirs and the brass bands…
6.50 PM
Piazzetta Palladio is a bedlam where Raffaella Carrà’s songs mix with Alpine choirs. Piazza dei Signori is so full that “not even a pin can fit”.
6.45 PM
Irony and humor are part of the traditional paraphernalia of black pens. And so, thanks to a few too many sips, in Corso Palladio there is talk of an unspecified but “very fearsome Teetotal battalion”: a “terrible bogeyman for every self-respecting black pen”. Young people are in droves and the refrain is that Vicenza has never been seen like this.
6.30 PM
The center of Vicenza is “a frenzy of pens”. Wine, songs, choirs, applause, irony, dialects from half of Italy, drown Corso Palladio seamlessly.
6.20 PM
It is an already packed Vicenza that is preparing to kick off the national Alpini rally in the centre, or rather in Piazza Castello. In fact, in a few minutes the so-called parade of banners is expected to begin from Piazza Castello which will proceed towards Piazza dei Signori. There the mayor Giacomo Possamai will hold the opening speech of a celebration in front of a crowd that is already cheering and colorful. Adults, children, men, women, ex-servicemen, supporters, curious people and people who pass by by chance are all one thing made of black feathers dotting a marching green carpet. After thirty-three years the Alpine troops return to Vicenza.
