Species leap

The Arsenale della Pace is located in a working-class, multi-ethnic neighborhood, just a stone's throw from the city center, in the heart of Turin. Over the years, things have changed so much, both inside and outside the old arms factory: on one street, you look around worriedly and tremble with fear; on the next, everything is brand new and beautiful. Turn one way, and the colorful faces you see make you feel like you're no longer in Italy, while if you go the other, shop windows and monuments announce that history and wealth are just a stone's throw away.

Aurora is a complex territory marked by profound inequalities, filled with ghettos and enclaves everywhere, where the division between Italians and foreigners, whites and blacks, rich and poor, graduates and illiterates becomes separation, an invisible apartheid for entire families who live side by side without ever meeting, and for whom everything is different and opposite: language and religion, but also the size and comforts of the home, the means of transportation used, the clubs and facilities frequented, the educational and career paths available.

You're either on one side or the other; there's not much room for gray areas. A condition of economic, housing, cultural, and linguistic disadvantage that goes beyond religious or ethnic differences. In the morning, some families move their children to other areas of the city to ensure their right to a quality education, others make the reverse journey to attend schools where they can feel less foreign and less out of place. One two three... Stella – Save the Children's Atlas of (At-Risk) Childhood in Italy 2024 reveals the inequalities of a country where starting conditions are not the same for everyone: statistics reveal, among other things, a percentage increase in empty plates and turned-off radiators for children living in food and energy poverty. Before compulsory schooling, more children stay home with their mothers than attend kindergarten, and the data is particularly alarming for families of foreign origin: daycare is a luxury for the privileged few who manage to get in, recognize its importance in the developmental process, and navigate the procedures for receiving bonuses and discounts.

Children who have yet to begin their journey and are already behind schedule, because the path that leads you out of the house one morning and off to university for an exam or onto the street to commit a crime begins a life earlier. There are houses that were once rented to southerners, where now there isn't a single Italian in the entire building. Gardens full of brand-new toys that end up in pieces in a flash, and streets where everyone knows it's best not to go, but also associations of ordinary citizens and international organizations that redevelop and inhabit public spaces, welcoming and helping the most fragile and vulnerable.

Meanwhile, the Arsenale della Pace continues to fill up every day with children and their families, a multitude of people knocking on the door to learn Italian, play, finish their homework, play sports, get medical care, fill their pantry with food or their closet with clothes. Their older brothers and sisters meet every day in the educational programs offered by Sermig, looking around and inward. They're on one side but would like to go the other, to stop being the slightly uncool and exotic guests of the city where they live and feel a little more equal, normal, at home. They need cross-fertilization and intermingling; they were born here, but managing to feel like they belong here is like making a kind of leap in their species. These are the invisible walls that must be torn down to break out of ghettos and enclaves and create a truly multicultural community.


Marco Grossetti
NP April 2025