You don’t need adjectives to tell what happened to Brazzano di Cormons, tiny village of not even a thousand inhabitants in the province of Gorizia.
A night of extreme rain, a hill that gives way, a series of houses overwhelmed by the crazy river. And a 32-year-old man who, instead of just saving himself, went back.
Quirin Kuhnert was not a local, but he had chosen that place. He came from Bavaria, and had decided that that Friulian village at risk of depopulation, like many in Italy, would become home, work, community. For him and for others.
Not by chance, after 25 years of coming on holiday in these parts with his family, last February 1st, as reported by the local newspaper The Little Onehad taken over the town’s historic shop and transformed it into a lively place, “Buon Sapore”, a shop that had become a meeting point rather than a commercial establishment and which risked never being reopened after the historic owner, Antonio Bon, had decided to retire and lower the shutters.
On the night of the landslide, Quirin had recorded the video of the staircase submerged in mud and had sent the video to some friends. A clear alertness, almost an instinct of responsibility. Then he took his partner Jessica to safety. But it wasn’t enough for him: he knew that, on the other side of the wall, an 83-year-old old woman lived, Guerrina Skocaj. And he chose to go back inside to warn her. To tell her to run and save herself.
They didn’t make it. The mudslide hit them both, while he was still trying to reach it. There is a simple truth within this story: for the life he had chosen, Quirin did nothing exceptional.
In a time when fear divides and instinct leads to closing doors, he did the opposite. He put the other before himself. Starting from the choice to reopen the shop in the village as a meeting place starting from the sharing of food: local wine, cheeses, cold cuts, homemade desserts.
«I would like my shop», he said on the day of the inauguration, «in addition to offering an important service to residents, over time it would become a meeting point, a place of sociality and aggregation, where you can exchange a few words in friendship».
We hope it remains so for a long time also in the name of Quirin, of his sacrifice, of the example of courage and dedication he gave.
