Trecentesca 2012, Morimondo Italy. In english.

Happy man: Riku was taking part to a night battle as a member of handgonne-team. Next day he was surprised by Ronnie, Daniel and Thorsten: they gave him a shooters team badge too.

Tämä kirjoitus on englanniksi, suomeksi on kirjoitettu aikaisemmin.

Last year we had an opportunity to take part to wonderful event at Ronneburg Germany. This yeat the group MIM asked if we wanted to go to Morimondo Italy with them and take part to Trecentesca 2012.
Yes please!
We had a great trip, some suffering but wonderful experience.
Unfortunately Elina was not able to travel with us, but Riku and I took a plane to Frankfurt. There we met Taija and Sarah, who took us to Mühlheim. There we spend the day as guest of lovely Vetters and in the evening we packed one medieval camp with ten tents in a bus.
It took 12 hours to go to Morimondo by bus: mostly we were sleeping. We arrived the village in the morning and started building the camp.
When I was looking at the amount of stuff the camp and 20 people had, I could not understand that only two hours later it was all done. A camp kitchen, ten tents and sun roof. One could see, that these people have done it many times during the years.

I am used to do a lot during events. Normally we do handcrafts, keep the shop open, cook... arrange this and that. Well, in Morimondo all the action aim to the battle, so there is no hurry in the camp.
There is some nice things happening: for example Friday evening the monastry and padre Mauro arranged a wellcome-evening to all reenactors.
Nice speeches was given there. I liked specially Maria Neijmans words "no one is special, but everybody matters". She ment that in order to make the event succesful, there was one person more important than other, but everybody has meaning. If one of the whole camp does not follow the rules, like "no moderns objects visible", it would ruin the repution of whole camp.
Well said.

 Mensch im Mittelalter just got paid for taking part to a war.

At Saturday all companies marched to the field front of the monastry. They were paid for taking part of the battle, like mercenarys. It was great to see all the troops: soldiers in they worn gambesons and mails, knights in - really - shining armours.

Troops marching. A lot of troops.

For me the fine moment was when Ronnie from MIM asked Riku to join the group and carry their shield. Even prouder I got when they asked my beloved carpenter to join the handgonne troop!
And then I was asked to join the forces in the battlefield as a water carrier. Oh yes! So, no pictures from the night fight: it started 9 o´clock in the evening.

I just loved it! Well, to be honest, it was also a bir scary to stand on the dark battlefield and see and hear all the men, ready to fight, full of adrenaline..I was happy that this was not the real year 1356.
"Mind the arrows", said Sabine next to me. What arrows? Oh, those they are shooting here!!
But I loved that boom boom boom, which side was making! The handgonnes are cool!
And there was my husband, igniting Ronnies handgonne. BOOM!
Luckily we were on winning side.

Here it goes!  BIG BOOM ! (Thanks Daniel for sending this picture )
Sunday we started like proper people do: we went to chuch. Well, some cafe perfetto first, but then to the church.
We did not understood what they said, it was in italy, but I understood that they told all the people that we were there too: padre Mauro listed all the nations who take part of the event and there was Finlandia too.
Then followed more speaking, singing and praying, because we were in a church. But it ended to a blessing: all the teams dressed in they best Sunday clothes walked down the aisle to the altar, where everyone was blessed. And then we marched as a parade to hear some more speeches outside.
Then started the rain. It rained. And rained. An by the afternoon everyone realized that the afternoon battle is not going to happen.

All as wet. Also inside our tent. On the straw mattres.
We did what we could: sit in the camp, cooking and talking. We went to sleep rather late and only few hours later me and Riku woke up. The wind was so hard, that Riku went out to see if the camp was okey.
Just in time to catch the sunroof. which collapsed. The whole camp was awake in seconds and we spend some time checking all the tents and tightening the ropes.
I think that no one slept during following hours. Specially after that lound sound and wobbly tent. Oh, it was just and earthquake.
When morning finally came, it was still raining and we spend three hours in rain packing the camp back in the bus.
Once again that day proved that wool is fantastic material: even my red woolen dress was wet after that evening, night and morning, I felt warm. My clothes were literally dripping water, but they kept me warm.
And I had new patins which Riku had made, so my feet were... well.. not completely wet. There was just so much water everywhere!
Before we could start the 12-hour drive back to Germany, we waited for a spare part to the bus: someone had hit the bus so that the drivers side mirror was gone. The busdrived mamaged to get new parts from Milan, so after few hours of waiting we could finally start.
We drove over the beautiful Alps and it was brilliant to see them! They are something special to people of rather flat country called Finland.

There was some swedish people too: finally I met Ida, who´s blog I am reading and I see her pictures everywhere. And there she was, in Italy!

Even the second battle was cancelled, the whole trip was unforgettable. We are very happy and proud that we could be there and we are moved by MIM:s hospitality and care which we received.
I also addmire the way that group works and how spendid their camp was. But about that I want to make a blog post later.

 Then there was a lot of marching.

 Funny tournament at Saturday: take a stick and hit his head as long as he has had enough...

 

Making battle plans?

 Fine people in the church.

 

Blaahh... rain. No fight today.

 

 Gambling with Marianne. Me loosing... Luckily I got lot of "dirty money".

 

 Her name is Sahra too and his name is Mirko and they got engaged at Morimondo.

 

No reason to worry, it is just rain! So sing, and dance!

 

 Back home: still wet clothes drying in the garden.