“I'm not Sardinian. I'm not Barbary. At least at the registry office. My heart, however, beats for this land that contains so many in one. Even my feet feel they are touching a friendly soil when they step on those forests, valleys, mountains ”. It begins with these words "Barbagia is freedom" (Ediciclo editore, pp. 208), not a travel guide, but a real story of affection for Barbagia above all, for nearby Ogliastra and for all of Sardinia.
The author of the volume is the journalist Luca Bergamin to whom we ask first: how did the decision to walk and then tell the story of Barbagia born?
“We always start to discover something that is far from us, and then discover that we feel it closer to ourselves than we would have imagined. It was like this among the centuries-old trees of Barbagia, in the design sheepfolds, above the mountains, in the canyons, on stone heels, in the forests, in front of the murals and above all in the midst of the people of this proud land, never tamed and never dominated. For everyone it was the inextricable cave where the kidnapped were hidden when that plague infested the whole of Italy. Now to kidnap you is its virgin beauty, its magical villages, its food that you will never get enough of. You always want it again and again, like its nuraghi, natural pools, giants' tombs, gallops into nothingness, sudden, daring, convoluted descents towards the Ogliastra sea ”.
In what sense is Barbagia the heart of Sardinia for you?
“A love cannot be explained, it is experienced, it consumes. Every feeling, for me, must defeat otherwise it is not felt. And there I felt a love: I walked alone and with other people, known previously and known later, I felt joy, warmth, anger and fear. I mean, I heard. In Barbagia the sensations, the disturbances are never superficial. There are few lands like this now that we can go anywhere, anytime. When you cross the Lanaittu Valley you feel a mystical sense of belonging, it is like a mother. And mom loves each other. All time".
Why is Barbagia "drunk" as you write in the book?
“I was not referring to the cannonau! Even if you have to go to Jerzu to know the history of this wine and of a truly bizarre and brilliant doctor who embodies the spirit, curiosity, desire to learn and create a system that unites so many people from Barbagia. It is the views that inebriate you… and the friendships. I tell about Gianni, my Virgil, my botanical guide. I wish you all to find in the journey of the days that we have a person who knows so deeply every branch that appears in the place where you are walking. Because that is the true sense of belonging, a science also of living since it is not jealously guarded, but is made available to those who are willing to undertake the hardships of the journey. Yes, because Barbagia can also be tiring, rough, clinging to hearts and streets ".
What did you find in this land that you just didn't expect?
“I was surprised by the love for animals. In Urzulei, property exists and does not exist: in the sense that whoever owns a horse keeps it free in the prairies, he is content to see it pawing, moving and running wherever he pleases. It made me very happy to understand the link with the past, from the shepherd grandparents to the ancestors of the nuraghi. A barbaricino feels good among the vestiges of its history, for him the ancestors are concrete presences. And then there are the human stories, from farriers to tenores, from artists to peasants, from embroiderers to those who put on their heads a mask with horrendous features and once again play a part so that the thread with tradition does not break. And finally, there is Grazia Deledda. What she did with the pen represents a plot interwoven with feelings and truth that has never been reached by any other human being in Barbagia. I humbly tried to follow in the footsteps of the writer from Nuoro. And I am lost, happily lost, there in this intertwined. Here, try to do it too: you will not be disappointed. On the contrary".