His name is Ben and he comes from Boston, the tourist who this year decided to spend his weekend immersed in Paliese activities: “It’s the first time I’ve come to Legnano and I already love it”
Legnano – Any Palio enthusiast knows that in 2002 the event crossed the Atlantic, docking at the Fifth Avenue Of New York where he paraded, on the occasion of Columbus Day, with a Carroccio specially made in the USA with Legnano projects. They had also arrived from the Lombard city three containers full of clothes, jewelry, armor and equipment necessary to dress the figures.
Today, however, the roles, even if on a different scale, are reversed and it is the Palio to welcome Bena citizen of Boston who currently works at American barracks Ederle in Vicenza and who decided to spend the weekend immersed in the reality of the Palio. Accompanying him were his friends Contrada of San Domenicowho welcomed him with open arms: “They gave me this tonight – He says, pointing to the green white scarf that he wears around his neck – which means that they are part of the Contrada, so let’s go to San Domenico!”
We met him in the audience of the Try itand this “taste” of Palio was enough to make him fall in love with it: “It’s the first time I’ve come to Legnano and I already love it – He made his debut – This is something really special because brings this community together. Obviously there are eight different districts and I know that each is its own community, but for the Palio the whole city comes together, and I love it – It is difficult for him not to compare the reality of Legnano to that of his homeland – In America we don’t have something like that: I come from a city that’s about the size of this one, but where we have lost our community in today’s world“.
As a connecting element between two worlds, Ben can’t help but think about how to connect them: tourism could be, in this sense, a good means: “The Palio di Siena is not known to most Americans, but it is still very crowded: Many Americans go there, many tourists. The Palio di Legnano on the other hand is almost entirely local, and this makes it a fantastic weekend and a fantastic place to visit: I think more tourists should come here to learn about it, it would be a fantastic experience.”
Even if, he himself admits, part of Paliesco’s charm comes from being a demonstration genuinely Legnanese: “I think more people should know about him, but it’s his unknownness that makes him so special“.
Which path to take? That of a ever stronger tourism or the acceptance of being a small, but truly, tradition identity for the whole city? At the Palio Foundation the arduous sentence.
In the meantime Ben and his friends they will come together in a truly intrinsic activity of the human being regardless of time and latitude: typhoid. All together: Go Palio of Legnano!
Laura Defendi – Filippo Mairani
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