The idea was to give the participants the possibility of spending two hours having fun, meeting new people and discovering a bit about Italian history.
The Scavenger Hunt was thought as a journey through time and space. Participants were required to solve some riddles, games or tasks to recharge the time machine which was supposed to bring them back in time to experience the best Erasmus ever, but which was kind of broken and therefore allowed them to move across different centuries and Italian cities.
The activity started with a video to explain to the participants that since they were not able to experience the mobility of their dream in 2020, we could have brought them back in time to have a regular and unforgettable Erasmus. However, our time machine did not function really well, and they ended up in Ancient Rome in 45 B.C. In order to resume their journey, they were required to recharge the time machine by solving a hangman game to guess the name of the person killed in that year (Julius Caesar).
Once solved the riddle, the machine brought them to Apulia around 800 A.C., when Saracens were attacking the region. Here, participants were required to understand whether some pictures where actually about Apulia or not (using Mural to drag them into the Apulia or the Not Apulia boxes) to move forward.
The next “stop” was Sicily in 1200 (when Federico II had established his domain), where they were given a series of titles of films to be guessed through emojis. They, then, arrived at a Florence ruled by the The Medici family (1400). The task to recharge the machine and resume the journey was to use Mural to complete a puzzle to get one of the most famous work of art of this period (Michelangelo’s David).
At this point, the participants found themselves in Naples in 1600 and were asked whether they would have liked an amazing pizza. To have it and move on with the game the had to solve a memory game about pizza toppings. However, before moving on it was explained to them that actually pizza had been invented later on in time.
Participants were then found themselves in Turin in 1861: the Italian Unification has been completed and Turin is the first Capital of the Kingdom of Italy. The activity here was about naming the countries by looking at their flags. Solving this task allowed them to move to 1968 in Bologna, where students protested about imperialism, left-wing parties and trade unions. In order to move forward, participants recognize the look of some people and match them to the right 20th century decade (on Mural).
Finally, they arrived to the last stop: Milan in 2015 when the city hosted the World Exposition for the second time. First time has been in 1906. Event theme is "Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life". Complete a crossword about typical foods was the last task to complete.
Once finished this last activity, we explained them that unfortunatly, we cannot change the period of their Erasmus... But we really hoped that, at the end of this journey, even if they did not have the Erasmus of their dreams, we had been able to give them an unforgettable experience.
