David and Casie’s return to America began from Milan early on February 20 and then Kevin and I had an early train ride scheduled that same day to the Ligurian coast where we were going to meet up with Wayne.
On both of these trips with our friends, we were visiting in the off season so the crowds were small and, in the case of the coastal towns near Sestri Levante, many restaurants and hotels remained closed in anticipation of the big tourism season which starts in northern Italy around mid-March. It was the beginning of Fashion Week in Milan so getting away from the crowds was a blessing. Sadly, we weren’t able to get our friends tickets to Da Vinci’s Last Supper in Milan because it is the 500th anniversary of Da Vinci’s death and all things related to Da Vinci are fully booked throughout Italy and elsewhere for months in advance. In fact, the minute Last Supper tickets become available, at 10 am three months in advance, they sell out almost instantly to tour groups, leaving few tickets available for people like us who live here and who want access for our friends without having to pay an arm and a leg to a private tour company.
This phenomenon of ‘all things booked up’ related to Da Vinci is/was also found at the Louvre where there is a special exhibit of about 11 of his original works (out of only 16 or so paintings he actually completed). Even Da Vinci’s painting of “The Musician” (which is a proud part of the Pinoteca Ambrosiana museum in Milan) was loaned to the Louvre for this special exhibit. When the Louvre exhibit was first announced last summer, the tickets for the limited exhibition sold out in about 90 minutes- it felt like trying to buy tickets for the local concert of a major rock star on her/his/their last tour! I regretted not getting tickets to the exhibit because I would love to see so many of his paintings hung together. I strongly recommend Walter Isaacson’s book on Leonardo DaVinci (called Leonardo Da Vinci), and if you get it electronically on whatever service you subscribe to, you can enlarge the illustrations and really see the beautiful paintings found in the book and get a feel for Leonardo’s style. Having seen many of Da Vinci’s original works both in Italy and in Paris now, I feel like I am finally starting to have some knowledge about him. But I digress.
I have lots of time now to digress…
Fast forward to Sunday, February 23 when we returned by train back from Sestri Levante to Milan and I start to read online about disturbing reports that the mysterious “coronavirus” was being found in neighboring towns outside Milan. We had heard reports coming out of China about the virus a month earlier, and it had even caused Milan’s parade celebration of the Chinese New Year on Saturday, January 25 to be cancelled in Milan’s Chinatown. Milan is a tremendous tourist destination for Chinese tourists (incidentally, for Russians as well).
We were not watching or reading much news during this week of Kevin’s vacation- we were out and about, hiking and enjoying the beautiful scenery. Unbeknownst to us, the first lockdowns in Italy began around February 21 (the Friday of Kevin’s White Week break), covering eleven municipalities of the province of Lodi in Lombardy, affecting around 50,000 people. Milan is the largest city in Lombardy,but it was not among the areas locked down. As we began to travel back to Milan on Sunday, February 23, my WhatsApp groups began to buzz with reports of the lockdown and rumors that Milan was going to implement some forms of restrictions as well. Since many of the Milan schools had been on break (like Kevin’s school) during that prior week, one of the rumors was that schools would be closed for another week.
Lo and behold, we arrive at the main train station in Milan and one could see on the train schedule boards that local trains to these 11 municipalities were being cancelled. We also saw cancellations to and from Venice. We had arrived on a direct fast train from Sestri Levante, so even though we travelled through some of these affected towns, we didn’t stop. There was a mild feeling of something being different. People were looking up at the boards and there was just a tiny feeling of wonderment. What was going on? What would this all mean?
We got home and we first heard about this strange thing called social distancing. Kevin’s school announced that it would be closed for students for the next few days while they waited for instructions on what Milan was going to do, but Kevin and the other teachers were to go in on Monday without the students, to get instructions and guidance on how to teach online. I contacted the head of the Benvenuto Club’s Language Exchange group that meets on Monday afternoons, and suggested that we follow the guidelines of the Mayor of Milan, which was to avoid large crowds. She agreed and cancelled our Monday meeting. On Tuesday Kevin also went to school without students, so our friend Wayne and I hung out around the neighborhood and I took him to our neighboring pizzeria for lunch. The mayor of Milan announced that schools should be closed for 2 weeks, I think (I am hazy on the various initial restrictions because so many changed in fits and starts).
Wayne’s flight back to America was scheduled for Wednesday, February 26, and he had already planned to head to the airport Tuesday and stay in a nearby hotel. Sadly, I got word Tuesday morning (our time) that Kevin’s father had passed away. I let Kevin know while he was at school and he came home early. We struggled with decisions about when to head to America, not knowing when the memorial service might be scheduled, but also not wanting to get caught over here and unable to get out. At this point, we did not really think this virus would take over Milan too- it was more of an issue of tourists leaving and difficulty getting a flight out during the busy time of Fashion Week and because areas were being closed (Venice, for example, had cancelled several of its Carnivale celebrations, and one of the famous designers had presented his runway show in Milan with no people in the audience, just to be safe). Little did we know what was in store for us.
Wayne took the train from Milano Centrale to the Malpensa airport Tuesday afternoon and noted back to us that the train station was pretty deserted. Kevin’s school then informed all the teachers not to return to the school premises and we started to feel like if we didn’t go ahead and book our flights, we might not be able to fly out. Kudos to Delta for helping me find round trip flights there and back, with a stop on the way in Atlanta to let us drop off some of our belongings. We booked our flights for that Thursday, February 27, with plans to head home for the memorial service and visitation. The morning of our flight, we walked over to the nearby taxi stand at 6:30 am and our taxi driver said that he had been waiting 100 minutes. We were his first customer. He said no one was taking a taxi anywhere.
Our flight from Milan to Rome left Linate at 8 am on a weekday and the plane was very empty. Another tip of things to come. We had a long layover in Rome before our Delta flight got us to Atlanta. The Delta flight was totally packed and the Rome airport was bustling. On the overseas plane there was not a single seat empty. The seats seemed to be filled with study abroad students heading home, as well as Americans returning from Italy. We landed in Atlanta and no one in customs or anywhere else asked us where we had been. The customs lines were pretty sparse. I overheard the customs agent ask the person in the line next to me whether he had been to mainland China recently. That was it.
It was nice to be with family in Maryland for the services. There were a few family members concerned about our travel from Milan, so we maintained our distance from anyone who did not want to be near us, and we even offered to stay away from the visitation, but the consensus was for us to go, but not to hug anyone or to shake any hands, and we stayed in a corner of the room and did not seek out anyone, but rather we let people come to us if they felt comfortable. We also warned people who wanted to approach us that we had come from northern Italy and we did a few elbow bumps to the brave folks willing to try that.
As the week drew to a close and we were getting closer to the time when for our return trip to Italy, I got a little nervous about whether our return flights would get cancelled. We were flying back by a circuitous route due to our last minute trip- from BWI to Detroit, then via Air France to Paris and then to Linate (Milan). We got word that Air France and other airlines were beginning to cut back their flights to Milan because of lack of travelers, so I called ahead and we got re-routed for an earlier departure date, now with KLM to Amsterdam and then Milan. Several days later I got a call that the Amsterdam to Linate flight was also cancelled (again due to low ridership), so we were rerouted for a later flight from Amsterdam to Milan via Detroit. Then the morning of our flight, our overseas flight from Detroit to Amsterdam was cancelled again so we reverted to a flight from BWI to Atlanta and then Atlanta to Rome via Delta. Then Rome to Milan via Alitalia. We wondered all along if we would get stopped somewhere and we prepared for delays. The tension was rising.
The flight from Atlanta to Rome, on a plane that typically holds 319 people, probably had 35 passengers (and about 11 flight attendants). We had whole rows to ourselves and people were definitely keeping their distances. Many wore masks. The mood on the plane was somber. We arrived in Rome and it was a ghost-town.
We experienced another long layover in the Rome airport with just a handful of travelers around. We boarded our Alitalia flight to Milan with very few people on it. In Maryland and through calls and texts while we were heading back, our friends and family were asking if it was safe for us to return, and if I should just stay back in America since I don’t have a job that requires my return to Milan. As for what I should do, staying back just didn’t feel right to me. I wanted (and still want) to be with Kevin- if he is here, and if I can be of help to him, then I want to be here too. It really wasn’t a point of debate for me. We arrived in Milan on Saturday March 7 to sunny skies. Then early on Sunday March 8 (and by early, I mean 2:30 am Milan time), the Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte announced the expansion of the quarantine zone to cover much of northern Italy until April 3, affecting over 16 million people, restricting travel from, to or within the affected areas, banning funerals and cultural events, and requiring people to keep at least one meter of distance from one another in public locations such as restaurants, churches and supermarkets. A new chapter was beginning.
