From Rome (Italy): Bassirou, warehouseman and actor
Big trucks arrive every morning and you start by unloading everything: it’s a long and organized assembly line, from unloading to packaging, right up to delivery to couriers for the pharmacies. Before entering we all have to put on a protective suit, gloves, goggles and mask, after having disinfected ourselves with Amuchina. We are divided into teams according to the job: unloading, packaging, assembly and so on.
My name is Bassirou, I live in Pigneto, a district of Rome, and I work in the Casal Bertone area as a warehouse worker at Comifar, the main operator of pharmaceutical distribution in Italy: these days I just need 5 minutes by scooter to get there.
Working in pharmaceutical distribution
I deal with everything as needed: I started working here at the end of 2017 as a porter and I gradually learned all the various roles. According to the contract I should work 3 and a half hours a day, but in this period there is an urgency for greater demand, so they asked those who already know how to move to make more shifts: it happens that I go home and, after the break, I’m called back because I live close. We supply everything, whatever you buy in the pharmacy from medicines to para-drugs to sanitary ware, masks and gloves included. Working well and being ready is even more important in this period: sometimes the company has to stay open late and so I also do 3 shifts. The most delicate and laborious part is when we prepare the baskets for couriers: only we can touch them and we have to check everything from codes to security and be quick because there are many.
Sometimes at work it is necessary to change the mask even twice a day: they are of different types, those with the underwire are the most comfortable because you can stop them on the nose and you can breathe well, others make you breathe with difficulty.
The dream of continuing to be an actor and social life
I have a permanent contract and it is important: my dream and my passion is always to go on as an actor, but an economic base is needed to be able to pay the rent, the bills and support myself. Before it all started I had two more auditions after the last role in Nanni Moretti’s film: the film would have been presented right at the Cannes Film Festival, but it was all canceled. I also had a project for a documentary for the RAI Nemo program, which has also been postponed for now.
In Pigneto I live with other African boys, who are now at home for 15 days because they work in a hotel that is closed. Fortunately they too have a permanent contract and so they have not lost their jobs. We live in the African way and so when I come back dead tired during the week, I always find dinner or lunch ready: Sunday is my day and I like to cook for everyone and take care of the shopping.
Rome is deserted, in the morning when I go out I see few cars, it seems almost absurd thinking about the area. I meet few people: most of them wear masks and are attentive, others do as they wish. We always go out one at a time because it is not right to go two.
In the supermarkets near the house everyone knows me and so when I go I always have a chat: we tell ourselves how it goes and does not go, how we are. My biggest worry is: when it all ends, what will happen? I see all this as a teaching, in the sense that, whether you believe or not believe in someone or something, this time we cannot blame anyone else for what is happening: we are all responsible and must make us reflect on what is really important, such as spending on weapons instead of helping people feel good.
Thinking about my Africa: Senegal, my family and the different way of life
My family is in Senegal: I was born in Guinea because my parents are merchants, but after their separation I grew up in Senegal with my mother and sister at my uncles’ house.
A curfew has been imposed in Senegal: from 6 p.m. at 6 a.m. you cannot go out. The president would like the lockdown but most people live a daily wage and it would mean losing any gain: it is impossible, they would all revolt.
Schools are closed like some markets. For now there are few deaths. If the virus were to explode in Africa it would be terrible, because there is no technology and therapies that are here in Italy, but not only. Saying “stay at home isolated” doesn’t make sense: we all live together and in many, whole and very large families. Also if a person gets sick, you cannot be alone, distant relatives from other cities also come to see you as you are and be close to the family: if you don’t do this “you are not a good person”. And then when we meet on the street, we have to stop and shake hands: it’s our education, it’s impossible to think differently.
I have a big family: we are 7 brothers and sisters, but I have never seen some of them because I was already in Italy. Yet I feel the same way with everyone and we write to each other as if we’ve known each other forever. Everyone worries about me because they are seeing what is happening in Italy: mom calls me every day, she hardly sleeps at night.
After that…
When everything is over I’d like to go back to the cinema and go around the “Roma Est” shopping center, as I used to do every Sunday before.
I miss being able to go out quiet and free, but now we have to stay at home thinking about others and that there are many fragile people who cannot get it if they get sick.
