The Many Sides of Sicily

I've looked at life from both sides now
From win and lose, and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall….

The Spouse and I recently returned from a 10-day trip to Sicily and I’m still trying to figure out how I feel about it.

To cut to the chase… we were robbed.  We were not physically harmed, thank goodness, but it was shocking and a bit traumatizing.  

Fortunately, it happened near the end of our trip.  On Easter Sunday we were driving into the city of Catania in our rented Fiat 500, following a map handed out by the Hertz rental people that purported to show a major route into town.  As had happened to us repeatedly on our visit, the street we’d planned to take, the Via Garibaldi (there’s one in every Italian city, it seems), turned out to be one-way the wrong way.  So we went left onto a narrow side street to get to the Via Vittorio Emmanuel (likewise ubiquitous).  On this quiet Sunday afternoon the street was empty.

Suddenly I looked up from the map to see a young man on a moped (TS insists it was a Vespa) riding out of a side alley and directly in front of our car.  By now we had become so used to vehicles darting in front of us – Sicilian traffic is without doubt the worst – that at first we didn’t think much about it.  But the rider stopped, forcing TS to hit his brakes.  At the same instant two other people ran at the car from both sides, pulled open the doors to the back seat, and started grabbing things.

Pandemonium ensued.  Someone also opened my door and tried to grab my purse, which was under my feet, but I was able to take hold of the arm – I have a vivid memory that it was covered in a striped cotton sweater – and as TS got the car in gear and moved forward whoever it was had to let go.  (TS thought that person might have been a female, but I didn’t get a look at anything but the sweatered arm.)

We raced to the end of the street, turned right onto Via Vittorio Emmanuel and sped on, fueled by adrenaline and nerves.  Afraid we were still being followed, I kept trying unsuccessfully to close the back doors. The assault had been so sudden and well-orchestrated that we were in a state of shock.  We had thought the car doors were locked, but it turned out that we'd been using the wrong button.  Finally, we pulled over to assess the damage and figure out where we were and how to get to our B&B.

When we finally found it and were admitted – like most places in Sicily it was located in a large former palazzo with a gated courtyard – our hosts could not have been more comforting and helpful.  Marco took TS directly to the nearest police station to report the robbery and Teresa settled me in our beautiful high-ceilinged corner room with a tray of tea and cookies.

Somehow we didn’t feel much like exploring the city that evening, but our hosts recommended a very comfortable restaurant just across the street and we gradually adjusted to the new reality.  Ironically, in planning our trip we had been most apprehensive about staying in Palermo, famed as a Mafia center.  We were very careful when walking around the city but had warmed to its rich mix of ancient treasures and relaxed Mediterranean lifestyle.

Up to that point, our experiences in Sicily had contradicted most of our preconceptions, which admittedly came from that middle section of the first “Godfather” movie depicting brown sun-blasted hillsides.  True, it was April, but over and over we were impressed by the island’s lush green landscapes.

Our first stop upon arrival was the city of Siracusa, founded in the 8th century B.C. as a Greek colony which grew to become one of the most important cities of the Greek world.  We stayed a little way out of town at the Villa dei Papiri, an agriturismo inn surrounded by orange groves and bordering on a spring-fed wetland teeming with papyrus plants – hence the name.

On subsequent drives to archaeological sites farther afield we passed through vast fertile fields of wheat and everywhere we walked through grasslands filled with spring flowers.

We had come to Sicily primarily for the history, and we found it in ample quantities.  

Siracusa boasted both a Roman ampitheater... 

Greek theater preparing for summer production of Orestia

and a smaller Greek theater where the last plays of Aeschylus had been performed.  

The archaeological park also contained a massive quarry from which most of the city had been carved.  

There was a mysterious grotto said to have been used by the 5^th century BC tyrant Dionysius to imprison thousands of Athenian prisoners captured in the Peloponnesian War.

And there was the largest fig tree we’d ever seen – though in coming days we would see other giants.

The ancient city built on the island of Ortygia enchanted us with its charming narrow streets and genial squares. 

We were especially delighted by the cathedral, which had literally been built over the columns of a Greek temple to Athena.  

As our guidebook noted, many buildings were being restored with funding from the European Union.   But we appreciated the fact that it was not being done so thoroughly as to give the impression of gentrification.  Coming from Switzerland, where even the oldest buildings look brand new, we found the relaxed seediness rather restful.

With the rise of Rome, Sicily became part of the Empire, valued as a breadbasket and rural retreat.  On our third day we drove into the interior to visit the Villa Romana del Casale, a luxurious 3^rd Century AD hunting lodge whose astounding floor mosaics had been preserved under the mud of a 12^th c. flood.

Animals being captured for a Roman zoo

  

A Unesco World Heritage Site and a popular stop for tour groups, it was crowded but nevertheless fascinating.

Female athletes

The next day took us to Morgantina, once a major Greek city in the center of the island, but which declined after it sided with the wrong side in the Punic Wars.  Far fewer tourists found their way to its windy hillsides, but we enjoyed hiking along its gridded streets and tracing the outlines of its once impressive agora.  Its villas’ mosaics had been looted back in Roman days.  (This recent blog on Morgantina by our friends at Peter Sommer Travels provides additional context.) 

The white triangle in the center is snow atop Mt. Etna

But stunning views of Mt. Etna remained.

Despite its reputation for backwardness, we were often impressed during our drives around the island by evidence of investments in new energy in the form of massive wind-turbines and large arrays of solar panels.  Major highways were fairly modern, though from time to time signs warned us to slow down because of unrepaired potholes and bumps in the asphalt.  Not that anyone paid the least attention to these – we hadn’t seen so much flouting of the highway speed regulations since we’d been in the US.

We continued on to Agrigento, whose Valley of the Temples boasts a collection of some of the most impressive surviving Greek religious architecture anywhere.  

Like Morgantina, Akragas was once a sprawling Greek city, but in the middle ages the population had retreated to the hillside beyond for greater security.

The present town of Agrigento remains there  today.  Our B&B occupied an upper floor and a rooftop that afforded wonderful views of the valley and the ocean beyond.

After a full day of touring the temples we drove along the southwestern coast and then north to Segesta, another former Greek city, of which remained an impressive temple, theater and traces of an expensive agora remained.

As often happened, much of the city had been dismantled to build later structures, including a Norman fort at the top of the hill.

Segesta marked the end of the classical part of our journey.  We drove northeastward along the scenic coast toward Palermo, which the Normans established as their capital after they conquered Sicily in 1061.  

King Roger II being crowned by Christ himself

To demonstrate their power and sophistication, several generations of Norman kings spent lavishly on palaces and magnificent churches, importing artists from Greece to embellish the interiors with stunning mosaics.  

Palatina Cappella, Palazzo dei Normanni

We had been much impressed by mosaics seen during visits to Venice, Istanbul and Ravenna, and when we watched a television programs on the Normans that featured several Sicilian churches we immediately resolved that a trip to Sicily was in order.  

Jacob wrestling with an angel, Cattedrale di Monreale

The churches completely met our expectations, and as we generally do we took special delight in identifying the Bible stories illustrated in the glorious mosaics.

But our greatest pleasure came in exploring the narrow winding streets of Palermo.  On the one hand it reminded us of other Mediterranean cities we have visited over the years – especially Marseilles in its seedier days – but at the same time it exuded a relaxed bonhomie that made every café an enjoyable experience. 

Doorway to our palazzo

We enjoyed our stay in a small apartment in a palazzo that had been the family home of Giuseppe Tomasi de Lampedusa, author of the novel The Leopard.  Although small and overlooking only an interior courtyard, it let us feel just a bit more like we were living in the city.  

Palermo's relaxed atmosphere was a bit surprising because we were there during some of the most solemn days of the Christian calendar, the days leading up to Easter.  In fact, one of our more memorable experiences came on the afternoon of Good Friday.  We were walking down a street in the district where our apartment was located.  At first I heard the sound of drums and some kind of clacking instrument, then we came upon a large procession as it was forming outside the chapel of one of the city’s many confraternities.  

We watched in amazement as groups of men stumbled down the street carrying two large, heavy religious litters.  The first was a glass coffin containing a figure representing the crucified Christ, the second bore a massive statue of a grieving Mary, somber despite being gaily bedecked with flowers.

I have posted video that I took on YouTube.  It's long but worth taking the time to get a real flavor of that moment.  

The procession slowly made its way down the street. After it passed we found our way to the waterfront where we enjoyed gelati at a cafe overlooking the ocean.  Returning to our apartment for a rest, we later went out to a restaurant that we had noticed on our walk and we had a pleasant leisurely meal.  On our way home we encountered the same procession, which we realized had been going on ever since we saw it in the afternoon.  It was now about 10:30 pm, and the men carrying the massive litters looked to be on the verge of collapse.  Fortunately, they were close to their building and the end of the ordeal.  We left them impressed and moved by this demonstration of their dedication and faith. 

On Saturday as we continued our explorations of Palermo we noticed posters in other neighborhoods announcing the times and routes of other similar processions by other confraternities.  There must have been a lot of exhausted men in the city on Friday night! 

Christ Pantocrator at Cefalu

We left Palermo early Sunday morning to visit the cathedral at Monreale before Easter services and then went on to the seaside resort town of Cefalù, the final stop on our itinerary of Norman churches.  

It was still not warm but we enjoyed a picnic lunch at the beach before driving to Catania.

Despite being somewhat out of sorts on Monday we did enjoy a visit to the beautiful resort town of Taormina, north of Catania.  We were happy to find a quiet restaurant a bit off the busy main street, which was mobbed with tourists and locals alike enjoying the holiday.  

In the afternoon we returned the long way, circling Mt. Etna by car and observing the craggy lava beds left by the latest major eruption in 2002.

We were scheduled to return the next day.  Despite our apprehensions, we found that TS’s loss of his passport was not a major problem.  He still had his Swiss visa card and carried a copy of the police report of the robbery.  But we were also aided by the fact that because of travel agreements between Switzerland and European Union countries like Italy, there was actually no immigration control when traveling between countries.

Mt. Etna from the plane

So, after a little time to assess and recover from our losses, the painful parts of our experience in Sicily have receded in our memories, while the many pleasant surprises that the island held for us have only increased in luster.   Who knows, we might even go back there some day!