The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - A Sunday "Bridge" Special - Reporting from Inside Italy's Suffering

Episode Date: March 22, 2020

We are all facing the challenge of COVID-19, but perhaps no country more right now than Italy. On a Sunday "Bridge" Special, we reach out to journalist MariaTeresa Santaguida in Milan for her first hand account of how Italians are responding.

and hello there peter vansbridge here with a special edition of the bridge daily it's a sunday edition we talked about not do it putting out a podcast on the weekend unless something came along that i thought was important to talk about. And listen, I decided that we should spend a few minutes talking about the situation in a country that's near and dear to the hearts of so many Canadians. And that, of course, is Italy. Italy, sadly, now leads the world in fatalities. Last time I looked, well over 5,000 fatalities from COVID-19. And the difficulties increasing there, it seems, almost on a daily basis. So I could spend 10 minutes giving you all the terrible numbers about Italy, or I could spend a few minutes talking to somebody who's there, who's living through this

story, to give us some idea on a couple of aspects. Well, I found that person, a friend of mine in Toronto, managed to hook me up with this young woman in Milan, in northern Italy. She's a journalist. Her name's Maria Teresa Santaguida. She, as I said, lives in Milan. She is a freelance journalist, but she does work for AGI, which is kind of a partner to AP, Associated Press, and AFP, Agence France-Presse. She's just been in isolation for 14 days in her apartment. Most people are in isolation in Italy anyway, but she was in isolation and just for the first day had an opportunity to get outside on Saturday. But her thoughts I find quite fascinating. English is Maria Teresa's second language, so it may take you a moment

to kind of condition yourself for that. But she is clearly somebody who has journalistic skills because she knows how to tell a story. She does it with confidence and a calmness and a very difficult story to talk about. So I'm going to just, you know, I had a long chat with her on Saturday evening, her time. And I just isolated a couple of parts of that conversation because I think it'll give you a sense

of the difficulties they're undergoing and yet the strength of the Italian people at the same time. So once again, this is Maria Teresa Santaguida. She's a freelance journalist who was kind enough to spend a few minutes talking with me on Saturday night. And these are some of the elements of her story in our conversation about her country and the difficulties it's undergoing right now. And one of the reasons this is important is because all the authorities tell us if we don't do what we're being asked to do,

this is what could end up happening for us too. So listen carefully. Here it is. How would you describe the spirit of Italians today? Because when you see the numbers, they are horrendous, what's happening in your country. How would you describe the spirit of the people of Italy? Well, it's very hard to say because in a way, we are happy people in general. So the first days,

I was surprised of how people can react to this tragedy. And people started to sing on their balconies. They sang the national anthem but also some popular songs of our tradition that are very, very common. But now after two weeks, I may say that I start seeing some depression outside, because you know, every day you wait for the numbers and you hope that we are reaching the highest level,

but that doesn't happen. So every day is worse than the other day before. So, I don't know. It's difficult to have an overview, a complete overview about that. You told me before about the way your country between North and South is split in many ways in terms of the severity of this, in terms of the economy, in terms of where families are. And as a result, families in many

cases have been divided. Can you talk to me about that in terms of the separation that families have had to face because of this yes I think that one of the effect of this coronavirus would be because very well in fact in Italy cause we have very different different country we have a north which is productive and so you have many industries and many companies and you have a stop you have a south which is very poor and where the economy is almost only based on tourism and that we culture. So you have no companies, no industries. And the last 30 years, we've got a huge immigration from the south to the north so you have all the all these big generation and productive generation of young people who left the south to go to north and so in this situation

where people can't of course can't move from the cities to go to their parents in the south you have i mean a huge huge amount of family who that came to be separate and they will not they will not reach each other for four months for example my family my parents they live in the south they live in Calabria and I have a sister who lives in Rome and I live in Milan and I'm far from home from my parents house 1,400 kilometers and I'm not sure I was I will see them till this summer maybe or the autumn. Maria, Teresa, I really appreciate being able to talk to you and getting a glimpse of what life is

like there because for many Canadians, they are concerned that the odds are it's going to become that way here. We're still very much in the early stages of this, but nevertheless, there is social distancing. There's a lot of self-isolation going on. There are not very many cars in the streets, but the numbers are very low at the moment. But with every expectation that they are going to start climbing and start climbing rapidly as they did in your country. So giving us some sense. But let me ask you just one last question, because I've got to say, you seem to have a confidence

about the fact that this, you know, this will end and there will be a better day. But it must be hard at times in your country right now to feel that way. You know, hope is the last thing that the last thing that the the diet we say in Italian, I don't know if the existing

news. So we have to hope that that is gonna end every everything has an end and hope is important to just to carry on day by day and of course otherwise i wouldn't i wouldn't work so hard every day i wouldn't uh open my eyes every every day and think that okay another there is another day to live, at least one. We don't know the other one, the day after. So, and, you know, you see China, they got over that. So it's going to be a long time, I'm sure. I'm sure that we're not going to have the same freedom that we had before like never even though the the contagion will go down i think that it can happen not earlier than a couple of months months

and um but after that of course course, we're going to change our social attitude in every way. But I'm sure that this is going to end. Otherwise, I wouldn't find any meaning in everything I do. I couldn't believe even in this terrible isolation that I actually hate because I'm a very social person. We have to wait and be patient. We will wait and be patient with you. It's remarkable to listen to you and the telling of your story and your country's story.

We really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you, Peter. It was a pleasure for me. See, I told you she is a pretty special person. Maria Teresa Santagrida in Milan, Italy, telling her story about living through the COVID-19 crisis in her country. We really appreciated her spending a few minutes.

Once again, she's a freelance journalist. She works quite often for AGI, which is a partner to AP, Associated Press, and AFP, Agence France-Presse. And it was good of her to talk to us for a few minutes. So this was a special edition of The Bridge, daily. We'll be back Monday evening with the regular edition. In the meantime, thank you so much for listening. I'm Peter Mansbridge. We'll talk to you again very soon. Thank you.