A London resident expressed appreciation for his Italian neighbors in a touching personal message the day after the United Kingdom voted to exit the European Union in a so-called "Brexit."
The note suggests that even if the U.K. formally separates from the EU, many British citizens will continue to maintain strong ties with their counterparts on the continent.
HuffPost Italy obtained the postcard that David, a British Londoner, slipped under the door of Mattia and Adele, two Italians living next door, on Friday morning. Mattia works for a marketing company in the U.K. and Adele works at an art gallery, and they have been living in the country for about two years.
Here is what David wrote:
Mattia and Adele,
This is awful news this morning of course, but I hope you realise that you are welcome here, that you give so much to London by choosing to live here and that I hope you will stay and be part of the city for many, many years.
David
On a day clouded by uncertainty, Mattia and Adele found the note uplifting.
“This unexpected letter made us very happy,” Adele told HuffPost Italy. “A small gesture that makes us feel less lost in front of the outcome of the referendum.”
Italians, like other EU citizens, have been free to live and work in the U.K.
Thursday’s Brexit vote will not change that overnight; Britain now has two years to renegotiate its relationship to the EU.
It is likely that the U.K. will keep some free movement provisions in place for people from EU countries to retain critical access to the bloc's single market.
But as WorldPost reported, that has not prevented many residents of the U.K. from other European countries from growing anxious about what a Brexit could mean for them.
“Everything that happens today will affect me, without me having anything to do with it,” Marlou Hermsen, a Dutch citizen living in Liverpool, England, told The WorldPost on Thursday.
A version of this piece was originally published on HuffPost Italy, and has been translated into English and adapted for a U.S. audience.
