In the hotel guesthouse there are no assistants and/or educators, but only work colleagues. The more experienced and mature become tutors for the newcomers. Giacomo, who came for a three-week internship, lived in a mini-apartment with Niccolò.  After this experience, returning home, he told his mother how he felt ready to go and live alone. It is obvious that this is not the case, but this is the thought of almost all of today’s twenty-year-olds. The mother, who has had to manage moments of fear and worry (imagine her son finishing the evening service at a restaurant, in a city he doesn’t know, and goes for a drink with other colleagues and then returns with a colleague in an unsupervised apartment that, like any self-respecting teenager, forgets to make a call to his mother), though attenuated by reassurance (Niccolò called to warn that they had returned home), had to overcome moments of strong emotional impact. This mother could react by closing up like a hedgehog or rejoice in her son’s new autonomy and spur him to overcome other limits. Which she did.

Daria, Guglielmo’s mother, speaking of her son’s three-week internship experience at the Albergo Etico, defined it as an Erasmus (university program that allows you to attend one year abroad). They live in Switzerland and they sought, organized and lived this experience as a moment to start learning about autonomy (just like an Erasmus).

The mother moved to Asti for three weeks, but in an independent accommodation. Guglielmo returned home, stronger and more aware of his own resources, looking in the mirror and said «You don’t see so much that I have Down’s Syndrome!». It is an experience that they rated as very positive and that they will try to replicate in Switzerland. This is the contagious spirit that the Albergo Etico aims to have.