Donkeys to promote

by Eleonora Anello

A different experience from the classic carousel ride. It appears so to the children running alongside the promenade of Finale Ligure (Italy) the initiative promoted by AIVAM (Italian Association for the Promotion of Donkey and Mule) based in Giaveno (Piedmont) that for ten years has been fighting to ensure that donkeys and mules would not be forgotten and would not disappear from the countryside and mountains, inventing new uses and disseminating their culture and history.

When we meet Aldo Vico, a retired teacher, founder and coordinator of AIVAM, a child is waiting patiently to give him a drawing that represents herself while riding Grigina, a mule that in 1990 after attending the Palio of Alba (a donkeys race) was destined for the slaughterhouse.

Aldo walks tirelessly back and forth to interact the children with animals for many never approached or petted, and does so in a way very similar to his four-legged, in a slow and relentless, step by step, hoof after hoof. Waited for their turn, the children are placed in the animal almost like a ceremonial: before Aldo tells them some curiosity about the donkeys, then carefully choose the more appropriate helmet, and, finally, they are ready to mount on the back.
Mr. Vico, what are the AIVAM’s activities?
«The exceptional rusticity, the resistance to fatigue and the frugality of these horses so-called "minor", make it the ideal companion for hiking in high mountain and irreplaceable means for transportation of materials of all kinds such as food, camping, sports (canoes, mountain bikes) or cinematographic equipments. At this time, we are working with a construction company that is building a house in a place not accessible by heavy vehicles on the Ligurian coast. Today the donkeys at the margins of society because of modern mechanization and cultural patterns that favour speed, immediacy and little attention to the environment. Unlike the donkey is slow and thoughtful in its certainly ecological exist and work and we "raise" for this».

The communication of your association has therefore the educational purpose, but also serves to introduce you to finance the survival of animals protected. By what means do promotion, in addition to the tour in Finale?
«Our animals need daily care, food, wide space in which to live and shelter. To finance us manage a site, let us expand the number of our members, about a hundred in all Italy, and for years we have been teaching in schools. After an initial inspection by competent teachers, come from schools with donkeys so that the students can see up close. We give more information about the peculiarities of these special horses, do a tour to each student and comment on our photo exhibition, organized in collaboration with the municipality of Giaveno and the Piedmont Region, composed of 23 panels 70x100. The photographs are divided into two distinct strands: one historical and civil, to the beginning to the present day, the other military».

Two girls continue to tear the grass beds to feed the mules of the avenue. Maybe it's time we leave. The tour, monotonous and inexorable, may resume!