# My cousin lives in Cambiago



## fabsroman (Jul 14, 2006)

About 7 years ago my cousin moved to Cambiago. At first, he said he was moving to Milan, but about 6 months ago I found out via Facebook (i.e., friended his son) that he was living in Cambiago just outside of Milan. He has been in town this week and we had dinner tonight. We started talking about Cambiago and I brought up bikes. He knows I am big into bikes, but had no clue I now owned a Colnago.

Anyway, he said that Ernesto pretty much takes a stroll through town every day, and the Ernesto knows pretty much everything that is going on in the town. He also said Ernesto is one of the nicest people that he has met and that Ernesto will give people a tour of his house and the factory in the blink of an eye. He also said that Ernesto has done a lot for the town and that almost everybody there adores him.

My cousin took a tour and said that the amount of history that he saw was incredible. He also got to use a Colnago for a day, the exact model he could not recall, and he said that it was like nothing he had ever ridden. He said it made somebody like him even feel fast and it was the smoothest thing he had ever ridden. Mind you, he isn't a complete cycling junky.

Sounds like Ernesto is a pretty good guy.


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## Mapei (Feb 3, 2004)

Hey, Ernesto is practically your relative.

About twenty years ago, me and Il Sogno had a couple of hours to kill in Milan, so we trekked to workshop of Pogliaghi, the address of which was on one of her water bottles. (You know, of course, that she's a longtime Poghi owner.) The place was shuttered. Shut. No sign. No nothing. Was Sante at lunch? Was he long gone and in retirement? We never found out.


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## fabsroman (Jul 14, 2006)

Mapei said:


> Hey, Ernesto is practically your relative.
> 
> About twenty years ago, me and Il Sogno had a couple of hours to kill in Milan, so we trekked to workshop of Pogliaghi, the address of which was on one of her water bottles. (You know, of course, that she's a longtime Poghi owner.) The place was shuttered. Shut. No sign. No nothing. Was Sante at lunch? Was he long gone and in retirement? We never found out.


Since my dad was born about an hour, by car, east of Milan, he very well might be a relative of mine. LOL I'll have to get started on that family tree sometime to find out.

If I remember correctly, Il Sogno had one heck of a good time in a California bike shop when Ernesto personally fitted her on her bike and signed the bike for her. According to Il Sogno, Ernesto spent a decent amount of time with her and was rather nice to talk to.

Edit to add: You should have made the trip to Cambiago instead of looking for Pogliaghi.


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## Mapei (Feb 3, 2004)

fabsroman said:


> If I remember correctly, Il Sogno had one heck of a good time in a California bike shop when Ernesto personally fitted her on her bike and signed the bike for her. According to Il Sogno, Ernesto spent a decent amount of time with her and was rather nice to talk to.


Yeah, you have a long memory! I was there. I bantered with Ernesto a little bit in my tourist Italiano. Took some pics. If I could find them, I'd post them. But I can't. So I won't.


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## Salsa_Lover (Jul 6, 2008)

Ernesto should be just like many up-starters that went medium sized companies and then global. 

Sure Colnago is a large and globally known bike company, but I guess the size of their operation is similar to many medium-sized european companies in other sectors.

What you describe remembers me about the owner of the company I used to work for, until he retired, the man is an Austrian inmigrant in Switzerland and started as an small telecoms company that went bigger, he made millions, but he stayed friendly and open with everybody. It was a pleasure to work for him.


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## Dajianshan (Jul 15, 2007)

Ernesto made a surprise visit to my LBS, a Colnago retailer, and signed everything in sight with a Colnago logo on it. You'd think he was running for office.


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