It is a usual Friday early morning in a Madrid covered by a drizzly rain that recalls me the gloomy winter days of Milan. I’m in a colourful bar. I read an article on an economical journal, understanding that I would have preferred not reading those news. I order my usual coffee with some cold milk in it, just to shake off that morning torpor and being ready for the day. While drinking, I notice with a glance an entire panel full of banknotes coming from all over the world and my sight just catches in a second a note of 10000 lire. In an instant a pervasive feeling of nostalgia comes all over my body remembering the pizza for a 5 thousands lire, the newspaper for a thousand lire and so on. How many years have passed since the end of Lira? At least fifteen. I remember those notes and the power they had, a power crashed with the arrival of the Euro thanks to a change probably wrongly planned and no controls following up. Where is Lira gone? There, pinched on a wall in an unknown bar in Madrid while I’m already sailing along a sea of memories under the flavour of coffee. As someone that did the history of a place or a nation, also Lira has its own statue. Did you know it? In the geographical centre of Italy: Rieti. A woman looking at the sky proudly holding a huge Lira in her hands. I will go to visit her sooner or later, in the meantime the coffee is over and I must pay 2 €.
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