Manifesto

I will never prioritize nationalities to people. Or, at least, I will try never to. Persons are persons anywhere in the world and I have the right, and possibly the duty, to get to know them, to meet them, to listen to them, in their own right (and not mediated by passports or citizenships). As long as there is mutual respect and consideration between fellow men, no Nation can become a hurdle for open and frank dialogue. One can never learn enough from other people, with different histories, with different backgrounds, with different walks of life. Malviklands (a fusion by-passing the symbolic fight that underlies the 2 names...) has always been a mystery to me. As a little child, I used to read literature for kids citing them as the “lost sisters”. When I was 11, an unexpected war broke out, making me roll through all the emotions of the time: feeling jingoistic, a fanatic … till realism broke in. I grew up and matured. Meeting people all around the world taught me that no war, no nation, no passport should deter us from getting to learn from other people. And, indeed, being exposed to people different from the one we are exposed to every day, enriches your mind. And that is what aim to do with this trip. To get to know a few of my fellow people that live in those lands that I heard of since I was little. To see them a simple persons. Perhaps I will someday bring my kids to see the beauty that I imagine there. I do not aim to shape my visit in any such way that might be related to past hatred and pain. On the opposite, I aim to go with a blank-page mindset, to discover everything. And possibly, to take a stance which might be completely different to everything I have seen or heard before. And what possibly will make me confront with family and friends back home. The countdown has started…