Marco, a circus clown Italian in Baghdad: So I make the children smile while from above raining missiles

The last place in the world where images meet a clown is Baghdad. What makes a western with the red nose and the hat with propeller on the streets of a country at war? Why is he so obstinate a turn with his cardboard suitcase while Iran launches missiles against bases in iraq that are home to the american forces? “Gift a smile to children,” he answers in a quiet voice.

there Are at least ten years that Marco Rodari – 44 years, in art the Claun Pimpa - answers with a disarming simplicity to those who interrogate him about his travels in the Middle East: destroyed buildings, rubble, checkpoints, terrorist attacks, missiles, abandoned children, wounded in body and psyche, traumatized by war and violence... For five, six months out of the year, and his life, this is it. To Gaza in 2014 has been one of the few direct witnesses of the operation Margin of protection, launched by Israel to decrease the military capability of Hamas, in Syria, he met children who had never known anything other than the war in Iraq has lived through the terrible advance of Isis.

“This time, I thought that my journey would have been peaceful, from what we can define quiet as a country continually threatened by terrorist attacks. And I was even happy because, thanks to two non-governmental organizations, A bridge to and Intersos, I was able to go in the North of the country, in the liberated areas from Isis”. The Pimpa has reached Mosul to meet with the children grown up with Daesh. “We are talking about little ones who have only seen violence and repression for three years, wounded in body and psyche. – tells the phone to return to the capital, as a guest of the missionaries of the religious Family of the incarnate Word - When you are gathered around me, when the show started, and for a moment they, too, like all the children of the world, you are left to wonder... Well that moment was pure magic”.
Claun Pimpa, the magic of the clown in Italian playing with the kids in war zones a Few days after his return to Baghdad, the scenario has changed: the killing of Soleimani, in the words of Trump, and the response of Rouhani have plunged Iraq into a new nightmare. “Of this, I would rather not talk about: if you were an expert in geopolitics, I would, but I'm only a clown that he met the war and has decided to return a little piece of childhood to those who have been robbed”. Before that his life would turn into a long journey on the roads of the Middle east, Rodari wore the red nose for the friends of the parish, the classmates, the boys of Leggiuno, the small town in the province of Varese.

Then there were the hospitals, the clown therapy and, finally, Gaza. “I did not seek the war, but the war to meet me”. From that moment on, his commitment tripled: travel more and more frequent and long, the birth of an association - “to Bring a Smile To the Sky” – that has the objective to take care of children who have undergone trauma, physical and psychological consequence of war lived or are living. Among the activities, the shows in the hospital, creating schools of magic and workshops for children, food support and medical to families in need, schools of clown for operators adults in the most difficult places on the planet.

“I don't know when I will stay in Baghdad. Usually if things are bad I'm not leaving, the rest. I will see the day-to-day, I am not a hero but I am convinced that a child to which you have given us the wonder, will be healthy carriers of peace.”

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Carlo Verdelli SUBSCRIBERS TO REPUBLIC © Reproduction reserved Today For now, Trump wins the bet with the ayatollahs of Tehran and the dream of the new Persia, Because between Iran and the Usa, the conflict is not finished Trump, the war declared via Twitter, and the issue of social media with the politicians “In the bunker under the missiles.” The night of the italians in Erbil

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