L'Italo-Americano

www.italoamericano.org 8 THURSDAY, AUGUST 19, 2021 L'Italo-Americano I taly is blessed with a g o o d c l i m a t e a l l over. Even the colder North tends to have a g o o d f e w w e e k s o f enjoyable warmer weather in the summer, and the pres- ence of the sea on three out of four sides of the country means plenty of our regions enjoy mild winters, too. And if you love cool, crisp air, nothing is better than the Alps, or the balmy evenings of Tuscan or Piedmontese hills. B u t t h i n g s h a v e b e e n changing fast. I, for one, can testify the summers of my childhood and adolescence were quite different from today's and we're not talking a century ago, just the 1980s and 1990s. For a number of years, Europe has been hit by w h a t w e c a l l c a l d o Africano during the sum- m e r m o n t h s , c a u s e d b y A f r i c a - o r i g i n a t i n g a n t i - cyclones that bring scorching hot air to the Old Continent. Of course, Mediterranean countries, Italy included, get the worst of it. L a s t w e e k , n o r t h e r n regions' temperatures ranged anything between 32 and 35 degrees, with higher peaks in the Pianura Padana and in cities. But it's been the South a n d o u r m a i n i s l a n d s , Sardinia and Sicily, to suffer t h e m o s t , n o t a b l y a l s o because of the incredible losses caused by wildfires. There is a place in particu- lar we can use as an example o f w h a t ' s g o i n g o n , t h e Sicilian town of Floridia, in t h e p r o v i n c e o f S i r a c u s a , which unwillingly reached international fame because of last week's unprecedented temperatures of last week. I n a r e c e n t N e w Y o r k Times article, author Jason Horowitz explains Floridia did have some interesting claims to fame even before, with, once upon a time, a B o u r b o n k i n g ' s w i f e a s a ruler, famous local produce – snails in particular – and the youngest mayor in Italy, Marco Carianni, who is only 24. B u t l a s t w e e k , o n W e d n e s d a y , F l o r i d i a became the hottest place in Europe, hitting 49 degrees C e l s i u s , o r 1 1 9 . 8 4 Fahrenheit. Weather histo- r i a n s h a v e b e e n q u i c k t o point out that was the high- est temperature reached in Europe ever, or at least since records have been kept. T h i s i s n o t n a t u r a l f o r Italy, not even for a Sicilian summer. These tempera - tures are disastrous for our country in more ways than one: there is, for a start, the increased risk of wildfires, a risk that, with 38% of our territory covered in forests, is high in every region. Since the beginning of the summer the heat, along with unpre- dictable winds, have caused extensive wild fires especially i n S i c i l y , C a l a b r i a a n d Sardinia, but also in other areas, including the Rome province of Lazio, where a town had to be evacuated. Then, there are the dam- a g e s t o f a r m i n g : t a k e Floridia again, for example, w h e r e f u l l o r c h a r d s o f v e r d e l l o v a r i e t y g r e e n lemons have been destroyed by the heat, literally burning while still on the plant. And it isn't only citrus fruit that p a y t h c o n s e q u e n c e s , b u t other typical cultivations of the area like grapes, too, to the point some have been thinking to switch to more heat-resistant fruit, like avo- cado. Similar has been the fate of the town's famous snails, which are widely farmed in surrounding fields and are a protagonist of local, tradi- tional cuisine: as Viviana Pappalardo, a young farmer, said to Horowitz, snails liter- ally burned inside their shell. This heat is unnatural and it isn't only difficult to han- dle for people, it can cause immense problems to the economy, too. Pappalardo says it well: "People don't understand that the damage is everywhere," but, she con- tinues, "All of us who work in this sector, in agriculture, understand it." A n d a g r i c u l t u r e , t h e a n c e s t r a l m e c h a n i s m through which earth, water and air feed humanity, is at the heart and at the root of our own very survival, let's not forget it. This heat is, of course, a danger to us human beings a n d t o o u r f o u r - l e g g e d friends, too. At the height of last week's heat wave, many villages and cities turned into g h o s t t o w n s , w i t h p e o p l e avoiding to leave the house, where electric fans and air conditioning made the tem- p e r a t u r e m o r e b e a r a b l e . T h o s e w h o w o r k o u t d o o r w e r e n ' t g i v e n t h e o p t i o n though, and while sugges- tions to keep hydrated and avoid being out in the hotter hours of the day are all true and welcome, one wonders if, in temperatures this high, they are actually sufficient. Truth is, it isn't only this summer that should worry us, it's the past 20 we've been living through: hotter and hotter, dryer and dryer, we've been sailing further away f r o m o u r b e l o v e d – a n d m u c h e n v i e d — M e d i t e r r a n e a n c l i m a t e , s t r a i g h t i n t o t h e a r m s o f tropical weather. More proof of it is, in fact, the regular floods Italy has been experi- encing in recent years: once upon a time – but not so far back – floods were a once-in- a-lifetime event, something you may experience, perhaps but not necessarily, once in your life, depending of where you hailed from. Nowadays, we have a bona fide floods season, that starts usually around October and lasts until the winter cold arrives. What does this all tell us? That non ci sono più le sta- gioni di una volta, "seasons are no longer the same," as our elders would say, but firstly, that we need to take action before it's too late. Climate change is real and is now knocking hard on our door: Venice risks to drown, the South could turn into a desert, floods could change our territory and geography. We can adapt or we could try to fix things while (or if) we still can: it's a huge step, but perhaps one it's time to con- sciously take. People in the city trying to cool down under the water (Photo: MZeta/Shutterstock) Europe's all-time heat record. Sicily soars to 120 degrees CHIARA D'ALESSIO NEWS & FEATURES TOP STORIES PEOPLE EVENTS

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