In Leverkusen, tonight, Ukraine-Italy is worth a pass for Euro2024 which will be played in Germany. Two thousand tickets have been sold to “guests” but our compatriots will be many more
– leverkusen
To present Ukraine-Italy this time we will not talk about the genius of Spalletti, the shots of Chiesa or Raspadori, the desire for goals of Scamacca, the hammer Barella, the shutter Donnarumma. But of Raffaello Vacca, an Italian boy from Mola, province of Bari, who lives in Leverkusen with Giovanna, his future wife, also from Mola, but curiously met here, in the La Vecchia Osteria restaurant, where they found themselves working for seven years ago and which they now manage together.
Italians in Germany
—
Getting a result today against Ukraine and getting a ticket to Germany 2024 is not only necessary for our football movement which cannot afford not to go to the European Championships as reigning champions after having already failed in two World Cup qualifiers. It is not fundamental for the growth of many of our young footballers who need international competitions of this level to make the leap in quality. It is not just the deserved first goal achieved for Luciano Spalletti who took on an abandoned and frightened Italy and in three months gave it back security, soul, pride, play, bringing the flag back to wave. It is not the right reward for all the fans who follow the national team in Italy and fill our stadiums to cheer them on as we have seen in the last three matches in Milan, Bari and on Friday in Rome. It is also a caress and a gift to all the Raphaels and Giovannas, and there are so many of them, who live and work in Germany, sometimes well integrated and paid, others in less easy professional and environmental conditions, and they can’t wait to get back on track. flag in the window dreaming of reliving the joy of 2006, when we won the World Cup right here in Germany, in Berlin.
like at home
—
Easy Italian rhetoric? Melancholy emigrant-style postcard images from the last century? No, fortunately times have changed. The writings “no entry to dogs and Italians” are just a distant memory. In the past we relied on letters and postcards to communicate, whereas international telephone calls were a privilege for a few. Today, however, the explosion of technology allows you to alleviate the pangs of nostalgia at no cost, the web and social networks cancel distances and all you need is a mobile phone to be connected 24 hours a day via video call to your home in Mola, even from an elegant restaurant in Leverkusen (with an Italian cuisine worthy of applause…) located on a street “where Christ lost his shoes – explains Raffaello to indicate that we are not exactly in the center of the world – and if you lift your eyes the sky is mouse gray 6-7 months a day ‘year”. Yet even if you don’t see fellow countrymen around with hair dyed blonde to feel integrated like Manfredi in “Bread and Chocolate”, it’s not always a bed of roses. Maybe Gigi Buffon can tell it to today’s young Azzurri: Gigi remembers it when in 2006 before the semi-final against Germany a newspaper had put our team on a pizza with the headline “we’ll eat them” and the Italians here were begging for our to win otherwise life would have become impossible for them due to the teasing they suffered and others’ sense of superiority. That for many people abroad, “Italian” is still the one sung by Toto Cutugno, even if more than 40 years have passed since that song… “There’s no point in hiding – explains Raffaello again – for us who live abroad the national team has a particular flavour. It makes us feel at home, it’s pride, it’s belonging. The 2006 victory is unforgettable for everyone, but for those who live here it is a little more so. And not seeing Italy at the European Championships would be a truly great pain for us.”
nostalgia
—
Raffaello is one of the million Italians who live in Germany today: “What if I miss Italy? And you ask me? But reluctantly we stay here, where there is work, where we can get some satisfaction without always being with the calculator in hand. Then we wait for the month of summer closure to finally return to Puglia, on holiday. I won’t be able to go to the stadium against Ukraine, I have to work, but I’ll put the flag outside the club…”.
sold out
—
The sector reserved for Italian fans, around 2000 coupons, has already been sold out for days. Then there are the tickets in the rest of the Bayer Arena where other of our compatriots will take their seats. Many will come from nearby Cologne, one of the German cities with the largest Italian community, and Dusseldorf but also from further afield. Vincenzo Montella, new coach of Turkey, said that the first thing he was asked to do was to qualify for the European Championship in Germany where more than 3 million Turks live: the largest foreign community in the country. Vincenzo won two matches and achieved his goal: then on Saturday he beat Germany in a friendly in Berlin: «Turkey hadn’t won here for 72 years. There were 50,000 Turks in the stadium. A great emotion for them and for us.” When we talk about the flag, about pride, about national feeling, we also think about Italians abroad. In Germany in June, a million compatriots are waiting for us with open arms, eager to color a gray sky blue. Let’s not betray their wait.
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED