Old nomads and new landscapes. Tiny Spaces Deep Connections, Day 4

Civitaveccia - Roma - Bologna - Rovereto

I slept like a rose in the red poppy room (Papavero, the other 2 rooms are called Ortensia and Mimosa) in a B&B in the centre of town. I wake up early and go for a walk. The first seedbombs of the day I leave in a little field around a tree under a permanent rainbow. The rainbow colours are everywhere around this square, a symbol of peace, tolerance and the acceptance and embracing of otherness. Since the 70s it has been used as a symbol by the LGBTQ community. Civitavecchia Pride, a 3 day event, is starting today but I have a train to catch to Rome, from there to Bologna and then Rovereto, where La Foresta is located.
The train to Rome stops at many small stations, sometimes in the middle of fields, and the seedbombs land inbetween abundantly growing plants and crops. 

The landscapes—if you can call them that—at the main station in Rome couldn’t be more opposed to each other. We arrive in a far corner of the complex where everything is rough and wild and chaotic and I think my seeds will like it here, but what I mean of course is that I like it here. I also like it when I arrive at the other side though, where the train to Bologna is already waiting. The area in front of the buffer stops or bumper blocks has been turned into a little meadow with abundantly growing plants and yellow flowers. In the middle there is an olive tree. A water system keeps the plants and the tree in good shape and I think my seeds might like it here as well but on second thought I am starting to doubt: cosmea thrive in poorer soils with little care. No reason not to leave them there: as Masanobo Fukuoka says, seeds know best themselves and we human beings can try to create the perfect—according to our human minds—conditions for them, especially when we want to use what they produce, but sometimes it is better to see what happens and how nature organises itself. It didn’t need us to thrive before we existed and it won’t if one day humans are no longer around.

When leaving the station 40 minutes after I arrived I think about the people who got really excited about my itinerary when I told them where the trains would bring me. Leon! Valencia! Barcelona! Rome! All beautiful cities indeed, but the focus during this journey isn’t on visiting cities. I’ve never been in Rome. And I still haven’t really. “What a pity!” somebody said, “Why don’t you stay longer in those places?” “Because I am working and I’ve got a specific task to fulfill” I answered, “I am not on holiday”. I rather stay in nature or villages or small cities anyway so I don’t feel any regret when my 2 hours in Bologna are spend in and around the railway station,. First I explore the area below ground level where there is no daylight but a resting area filled with plants that are kept alive with artificial light and a little birch tree that upon inspection turns out to be made out of plastic. I double check the other plants, but they are indeed all alive and breathing. Breathing in their own way: exchanging gases—oxygen and carbon dioxide— through their microscopic pores—stomata— and roots. Whereas human beings inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide, plants do the opposite.

The last stretch to Revereto I embroider a question while the 3 people next to me and the 4 on the other side are all on their phones. It is a bit crammed but fortunately I have fed the sourdough starter on the train to Bologna. It stands quietly on the little table and nobody takes an interest in it.
Martina welcomes me at the station and we sit for a while on the bench in front of the building of La Foresta, a Community Academy, catching up. When I looked into places that could be interesting to visit on my journey, La Foresta was on the top of my list because of their work with community building, education, art and gardening. When I got in touch I got an answer from Martina, who has been working there since three years, but who I have known for more than 10 years and hadn’t been in touch with in the last years. We once spent time together in the Nomadic Village on a mountain in Austria and afterwards in a former factory surrounded by other artists during Schmiede. It was a complete surprise that she is here and a joy to see her again.