From Argentina to Italy, during a pandemic

It has been a great ride, my almost-three-month period here in Rosario, next to the huge slowly flowing river of Paranà. This is a city full of life, embraced by the warmest summer I have ever seen. Populated by wonderful citizens.

I have been living in an apartment where the sun awakes me very early in the morning, through a wide window next to my bed. I could see the roofs of the centre of the city as I opened my eyes, including the top of the Monumento National a la Bandera, a gigantic building that celebrates this great nation. For the second half of the day, I had the light from the opposite window and I could follow its changes, while I was working, as the hours passed by; I saw every day the same magic ritual: as the photons from our star went through thicker layers of the atmosphere, they changed their frequency, turning redder and redder, culminating in a warm explosion, just before the night.

And in the meanwhile, news from Italy was scarier and scarier and the hypothesis that the new coronavirus could reach this continent was more obvious as the weeks passed by. Now we have the virus here, and president Alberto Fernandez has declared the state of quarantine from March 20th.

At that point, the connection between Argentina and other countries (including Italy) has become uncertain; my flight planned for March 28th has been cancelled and I have decided to get one of the special flights organized by the Italian government to bring back its citizens from Argentina, before a complete shut down of international travels. So I had about 48 hours to find a means of transport from Rosario to the airport in Buenos Aires, where the flight will take off tomorrow, at 1:00 AM.

But there was no way I could find a flight from Rosario to Buenos Aires in such a short time, also because of the shut down of Argentina, and no trains were available. Fortunately enough I have found a Pullman, and I am going to leave this apartment in a few hours.

My come back to Italy is becoming more and more adventurous also because I will land in Milan, one of the places most hit by the infection in the whole planet. There I have to reach Rome. I have been able to find a plane from Milan to Rome, so it will be possible to be at home on the evening of March 23rd. I have to avoid getting the virus though, during this travel. I will be exposed to it for sure, so I am taking any possible measure to ensure my safeness.

This travel to Argentina has been a success. My health has improved, even though now I am deteriorating again, as was expected, as the light of the summer of the southern hemisphere becomes weaker. But I have been able to use my new energies to write and submit a paper on the cingulate cortex in ME/CFS, I have gone further with my studies on the analysis of the immunosignature (measured using random peptides) in my own serum (R), I have started the study of a mathematical model for the diffusion of Coronavirus 19 among the Italian population (R). I have learnt a great deal about computational neuroanatomy (R) and neurosciences in general. I have finished a complete model for solar radiation at sea level (R) and I might have found one of the environmental parameters that determine my improvement during summer. And yes, I have also been able to draw a portrait.

The adventure in the realm of science and art has been great, now I have to live the adventure of coming back home going through a world that is facing one of the greatest health challenges of the last century.