Currently browsing 'Sicily'
Salsa flows from Mount Etna
How did Nova bring some NYC urbanity to Sicily? By bringing her flaming red ipod with her and dancing salsa solo during the early morning hours in an orange grove with Mount Etna in the sky line. Mount Etna! If you erupted during my visit and it’s my time, then entomb me in a really cool salsa pose so I become a new statue of Pompeii, urban odyssey style. Sure I’m able to appreciate the old World pantheon that is part of Etna’s history, but given how everything’s connected, I can also bring some New World flavor and pay homage to the drums, fire and rumbling of Chango and his lineage. Being in the isolated wilderness that exists outside of our city cage, I’m reminded of the pulse that our city emits. You might forget it when you’re there, but step out and the silence will remind you of its absence. I take being out of the city as one big meditation exercise, with Ithaca in the distance calling you back. Do you feel the call of the city when you step out?
Here’s to you, Michael. Shake your body down to the ground…
Bus Graffiti
Seeing this mural on a bus in Acireale, Sicily made me think of NYC subway cars in the 80’s. During my brief trip I observed that the eastern coast of Sicily has a healthy appetite for graffiti, but more so “messaging” than art murals.
Airport Talk
Being in the airport with time to spare in a sea of strangers, your ears are more sensitive in picking up other people’s conversations, your imagination kicks into high gear. Some interesting conversations are heard in airports and planes. In the airport on route to Sicily the most memorable of the trip came from a clerk at a sandwich stand. A line was formed by hungry travelers wanting to wolf something down before being encased in a tube for hours with TV dinners that taste like ass. The clerk was missing about three fingers on one of her hands, and she was lecturing the cashier on how her baby’s daddy had just completed two of his five years of mandated time for stabbing someone. The cashier was in front of the register, but head turned away to partake in the conversation. No-one dared remind the girls that customers were waiting. You just don’t get snippy with someone missing fingers and having that type of conversation, job be damned.
Ode to… Good Food
The irony of traveling to the eastern coast of Sicily, where Helios unleashed his firery wrath upon the crew of Odysseus for eating something they shouldn’t have (the Oxen of the Sun), on a food trip does not escape me. And it almost didn’t escape us, because one of us almost literally ate ourselves to death.
Never in my life have I seen so much food. So much good food. So much really, really good food. I’ve also never traveled with foodies before. I’ll try to make this my only generic entry on Sicily (the rest more regional). Sitting at a table in the Sicilian coast or countryside with foodies is no different than group sex, I kid you not. The moans and groans from our table, the bulging eyes at the variety of dishes splayed in front of you- the pure ecstasy of flavors coating tongues. Love hath taken new meaning with a group of foodies unleashed in Sicily. We traveled miles, made three hour car drive pilgrimages to specific restaurants, one trip simply to eat one dish- a pistachio granita.
Ode to… Good Food – continue reading …
Back from the land of the Cyclops
Nova’s back… Recovering from Odyssey Jet Lag… will be posting some Siciliano Odyssey stories shortly.
Cyclops, Helios… in Sicily
No, it’s not a Ode to series on the Golden Girls (more than deserved though), but we are moving camp to the birthplace of Sofia Pitrillo. Not sure of internet access under Mount Etna, but if I can sneak some time in Sicily to give you all some live blogging of our Odyssey, I will. This part of Odysseus’s journey had the Cyclops (not the X-Man) hurling stones at Odysseus near Mount Etna, and his crew being punished by Helios for eating something they shouldn’t have. Did I mention that this was a food trip and we’re going to Mount Etna? We’re bound to have some fun things to report.
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Odyssey Essentials
Our Urban Odyssey is about to get a blast of Sicily. We’re taking to the skies next week. I’m bound to scrounge up some decent stories. In fact, the fun has already started! Here are some things I’m calling odyssey prep essentials, then a request to you:
- Ensure your passport is up to date. This is especially so if you are the owner of a blog called Our Urban Odyssey. Otherwise you’ll wind up with an appointment at the US passport agency luggage in tow 5 hours before your scheduled flight departure like Nova will be next week. C-mixto has already informed me he plans to be on that plane, Nova or not. Well!
- You really shouldn’t be blogging about how to prep for an odyssey when you have just days to actually prepare for an odyssey.
- Screw work and take care of your business. Nova made this mistake and thus we are brought back to bullet point one.
- If you have a passion that you want to take with you on your trip, research it. So far, no salsa on two meet ups in Sicily (disappointed for so many reasons).
- If you’re like C-mixto, this means you’ll research all the literary stars from your destination and read their work beforehand. This creates a mindset, context and mood for your arrival. If you’re Nova, you laugh until you get there and realize you have a valuable tour guide.
- Try to look at a map before you go so you have some sense of where you’re going. Try to read up on some phrases. Try to read up on some taboos. Nova has done none of this so far, which means she will have some odyssey ahead of her if C-mixto indeed goes on ahead of her and she has to travel on her own. Would nice payback be getting lost in the stores of Milan and never making it to meet him in Sicily?
Ok fellow Odyssians (not a real word)- send me some requests! What do you want to hear about Sicily? What sort of stories should I be investigating besides the spontaneous?
