Confine | Umanità

There’s a city which is not a place. And in the centre of it, there’s a square that is a place instead. It’s called Piazza della Libertà. Every evening, in this place, a lot of tired souls and exhausted bodies come together, after a long journey that started years ago and has culminated in an exhausting walk which is not at its end.
These souls and bodies are migrants in transit, who managed to cross the border between Slovenia and Italy after coming along the Balkan route, who were so lucky not to be illegally pushed back to Bosnia from the italian border authorities and reached the centre of Trieste. Here in the square, they just sit down and wait because they know that there isn’t anything else they can do.
In fact, their journey will continue toward their final destination in Northern Europe and they know they will be like ghosts until they reach it. So they wait until Lorena comes, holding her green little cart. Next, her husband Gian Andrea and some women who give away home-made food. Then there’s Beatrice, co-founder of the medical collective Strada Si.cura, which offers medical treatment to people who couldn’t receive it because of their legal state. There’s Umar, a boy who was tortured by the Croatian Police and now helps people like him.
For all of them, going in Piazza della Libertà is a pause from geographic borders, a safe space in which the only dividing line is the one marked by the humanity of people who choose not to turn away.