Plexiglas, templates, reservations and filing? Here's what happens in a Milan bar at breakfast time. We went to try
The news that had circulated in the past few weeks had been so alarming and contradictory that we didn't know what to expect. Hospital rooms rather than tea rooms and safety measures to make the desire to taste the much-desired espresso after two months of lockdown pass. What has changed? Is there really fear? And do the required measures really make it so impossible to enjoy the experience? For the record we went to do a test with a lot of photographic reportage. To discover that reality is much less "different" than before what we think.
The post-lockdown bar
8.00 am, Milan, NoLo area (aka north of the city). The bar is the MiCasa Tosteria, the first tosteria in Milan and a very popular place for people from the neighborhood who come here to have breakfast before going to the office, with children for a snack after school, a weekend for a brunch and an evening for the appetizer. A place above all that I know very well, and of which I now have a ten-year history. I go on a mission in search of the much-desired cappuccino with foam and a brioche, and very curious about how it is really this Phase 2.
There is good weather, i tables outdoors they are all occupied by people, close because they are "joined" or spaced diagonally if "affects not stable enough" which therefore must keep a meter away. Inside the tables they have been thinned out and all made for couples or at most 4, for families. The girl at the counter brings the mask and gloves and moves quickly to prepare coffee and cappuccinos.
I wait to know where I can sit, and the patrons after me do the same, orderly and in line (which we now know how to do better than the English). The coffee can be ordered at the counter, but then it is consumed sitting in the usual cups. The brioches and toast that instead previously arrived at the table above the beautiful wooden cutting boards are now served in the takeaway containers: the wood cannot be sanitized like ceramic, so for now goodbye, waiting to find replacement dishes. Newspapers are also missing, because they pass from hand to hand, while the disinfectant it's wherever you turn. People have the usual bar talk, exchange greetings between the tables and once the drink is over, put on the mask again. No gathering.
There is no usual crowd, but during breakfast time I hear the phone ringing several times for lunchtime. Yes book leaving your name, surname and telephone number and you are kindly asked to respect the chosen time. That's all. In the meantime, delivery also continues, with deliveries in the areas adjacent to the two shops in piazza Governo Provvisorio and via Tolstoj.
At lunch the breakfast ritual is repeated, close and separated relatives alone or far, with the usual service with disposable placemats. Only difference, the menu is gone, you can consult it on the website or reading the slates that (always) cover the place, in the dear, old and practical way.
People? Serena, greets the waiters whom he hasn't seen for months, asks how it goes, waits without getting impatient about what to do and then has breakfast. Normally. Of course there are fewer customers for now, but it will still take a few days to regain the rhythm. In short, for now the "new normal" in short, looks a lot like the normalcy of the past.