Tuesday, May 30, 2017

It is 5:00 am and Palermo is waking up. Slowly, with the murmur of cars and vespas (italian scooters) barely audible. Then, the light intensifies and so does the business of life. In this sea of apartment buildings, sound travels up, bounces between balconies and abruptly interrupts your sleep.

We had a taste of city driving yesterday and it is all true: palermitans are crazy drivers! With smaller cars, it is easy to zoom in and out of places. The problem is… everybody is doing this “zooming in and out” (including pedestrians), thus creating a constant motorized chaos punctuated by relentless honking and hands gesturing (I will leave it at that since this is a respectable blog). I think Raymond will sweat (literally!) a bit over this when he finds himself behind the wheel…

We had a “live” taste of this chaotic world in the evening, when my brother-in-law took us for an updated drive around town (our last visit was 8 years ago). To spice things up, he chose to do it during rush hour, counselling our upcoming driver (my poor husband!) on what to avoid or to pay attention to. Yikes! We might opt for the bus or our running shoes instead!

We stopped at a famous pastry shop and with the first bite into our delightful selection, all the worries of the word vanished! Marvellous!!! As we were introduced to the owner of Pasticceria Capello (www.pasticceriacapello.it) he told us that one of their students opened a big bakery in Toronto. What are the odds?? We will have to check it out! With our belly full of pistachio and whipped ricotta, we can now face the chaos again!

Sicilian Pastry

Sicilian Pastry

After dinner – usually between 8:00 and 9:00 pm, Italian style – we lingered around the table (also Italian style!) and our family conversation lingered until about 1:00 am. Talk about catching up!!! Still being a little jet lagged, we managed to survive this extra long day.

Off to bed and looking forward to step into those wonderful historic buildings in the few days to come.

Ciao,

Anna