Mohamed lo svizzero
Mohamed der Schweizer
Switzerland, January 2001
FILM,
Documentary,
51 min.
- directed by
- Luca Jaeggli, Tiziano Gamboni
- Status
- In distribution
Mohamed Berranem, 71, is married and the father of two: Nadia, and Elias. Mohamed is a taxi driver. He has lived in Switzerland for forty years, and became a Swiss citizen about twenty years ago. We met him at a taxi stand in Zurich. His cheerfulness and calmness, as well as the story of his past made an impression on us. As an illiterate and penniless 15-year-old he left French Algeria to emigrate to France. He lived a life of hardship in post-war Paris where he experienced racism, unemployment and poverty. He worked as an unskilled construction worker in Alsace, then as a seasonal labourer in Switzerland, together with Spanish and Italian workers. He taught himself Italian and Swiss-German, completed an apprenticeship in metallurgy, and found employment at Escher-Wyss and Bührle. This Moslem also worked as a driver for a sausage factory, before he finally passed the test to become a cab driver in the city of Zurich. We asked him to share his memories with us. He agreed to recount the different steps of the journey that brought him from Algeria to Switzerland.
Mohamed Berranem ha 71 anni, è sposato, ha due figli, Nadia ed Elias, e fa il taxista. Vive in Svizzera da quarant’anni, e una ventina di anni fa si è fatto svizzero. L’abbiamo conosciuto a Zurigo, alla stazione dei taxi. A quindici anni, analfabeta, lascia l’Algeria per emigrare in Francia, senza un soldo. Sopravvive nella Parigi del primo dopoguerra, sperimenta il razzismo, la disoccupazione e la miseria, lavora come manovale nell’edilizia in Alsazia, poi come stagionale in Svizzera, insieme a spagnoli e italiani. Impara l’italiano e lo svizzero tedesco, compie un apprendistato nella metallurgia, lavora alla Escher-Wyss e alla Bührle, poi, lui musulmano, fa l’autista di una salumeria, e finalmente supera l’esame di taxista a Zurigo. Gli abbiamo proposto di raccontare la sua vita. Ha accettato di fare un tuffo indietro nel tempo, di ripercorrere con noi le tappe del suo viaggio dall’Algeria alla Svizzera.
credits
- World Premiere
- January 2001
- Original Version
- Italian (english/german subtitles), colour, Digi Beta, 51 min.
- Production
- RSI Radiotelevisione svizzera
- Producer
- Federico Jolli
- directed by
- Luca Jaeggli, Tiziano Gamboni
- Editing
- Gianni Schmidhauser
World Sales / World Rights
- World Rights
- RSI Radiotelevisione svizzera