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Post by mickthecactus on Sept 3, 2015 7:43:50 GMT
Wonderful report Bixa - thanks.
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Post by amboseli on Sept 3, 2015 12:07:36 GMT
Thank you, Amboseli! Since you've been there, you can tell this is a really personal report. The next time I go I promise to be a more responsibly reporting tourist. I love it. And I do exactly the same ... I even made a picture of my sister's front door.
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Post by fumobici on Sept 3, 2015 14:41:26 GMT
Sicilian home cooking is famous all over Italy, and they are generally hard to impress and a little defensively parochial, so you know it has to be good. If you ask a Tuscan who has the best regional cuisine in Italy (outside Tuscany, of course) you'll hear Sicily and Bologna mentioned time and again. The thing you call a nessa looks like a crayfish trap to me. But I don't know.
I'm surprised fishermen make their nets there, here they buy them off huge rolls although the gill nets commonly used here use a lot finer fiber. But every fisherman has to know how to make them in order to do repairs, and the tools used look pretty much identical the world over. Pre-columbian Inuit fishing net shuttles look almost exactly like the nylon ones modern NW fishermen use today, and indeed the same as net shuttles from every corner and era of the globe.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 3, 2015 16:16:11 GMT
What an amazing surprise to see the workshop. The fishing nets look perfect, as does the big model boat. The photos of the city make it look more and more charming. Was there a big concentration of hotels and trattoria near the beach, or were things more spread out? Among my favourite pictures, though, is the one of the cats waiting for their share of the fish, and the views of the interior of the grocery store. Also, the order of the languages used in the display of guidebooks probably corresponds to the pecking order of the tourists who go there. I know that certain parts of Sicily get completely overrun by the French in the summer. Thanks, Kerouac. I could have poked around in that workshop for hours! Part of Cefalù's charm is that there are no high-rises -- no looming hotel zone hiding the beach, nor giant slabs of apartment buildings. The old town has more of a concentration of restaurants, but in old buildings so that the look is not disrupted. Also, many of those old buildings have rooms and apartments for short-term rental. There are hotels & places to eat all along the beach, but the hotels blend in with the residences and the there is no overly modern chain-business look to anything. I can't guess as to which tourist nationality predominates. People seemed to be from all over, although I heard little English. All the souvenir shops had recipe books in various languages. Everyone told me that the place was really going to explode in August, then tourism would taper off until the following summer. Another wonderful array of photos Bixa! Everything is SO interesting! Your family certainly treated you very well. I can imagine the ladies of the family trying to decide what to prepare and each wishing to put their favourite dish before you. I think the town of Cefalu is absolutely charming. I think you have lots of us interested in this alternative destination dear heart! Thank you, dear Tod! Yes, I was treated royally. That fabulous feast was presented as though it were just a snack, even though I know Concetta & Sandy must have spent hours in the kitchen. I'd had swordfish at a restaurant the previous day, but Giovanni said that the restaurants never got the very best fish. Obviously as a fisherman he knew what he was talking about, as what I had at their house was the last word in fresh and delicious. Wonderful report Bixa - thanks. Thank you, Mick! Actually, I'm rather jealous of you as people in England can get to Sicily cheaply & quickly. Thank you, Amboseli! Since you've been there, you can tell this is a really personal report. The next time I go I promise to be a more responsibly reporting tourist. I love it. And I do exactly the same ... I even made a picture of my sister's front door. Thanks, Amboseli! Ha ~ I have a photo of Giovanni pointing out one of the ancestral front doors. And you'll see in the next post that I took an alarming number of produce pictures. Sicilian home cooking is famous all over Italy, and they are generally hard to impress and a little defensively parochial, so you know it has to be good. If you ask a Tuscan who has the best regional cuisine in Italy (outside Tuscany, of course) you'll hear Sicily and Bologna mentioned time and again. The thing you call a nessa looks like a crayfish trap to me. But I don't know. I'm surprised fishermen make their nets there, here they buy them off huge rolls although the gill nets commonly used here use a lot finer fiber. But every fisherman has to know how to make them in order to do repairs, and the tools used look pretty much identical the world over. Pre-columbian Inuit fishing net shuttles look almost exactly like the nylon ones modern NW fishermen use today, and indeed the same as net shuttles from every corner and era of the globe. Fumobici, I had some very nice food in Sicily, but like everywhere, you have to wonder how restaurant food stacks up against real home cooking. The meal I had at Concetta & Giovanni's home was easily one of the best meals I've had in my life. I believe that nessa is a fish trap -- I assume for bait fish. I saw very small ones dangling from rear-view mirrors & was told some people turn them into lampshades. At the moment, mine is setting atop a lampshade where it actually looks rather nice. Everywhere I went in Sicily I saw fishermen on their boat repairing nets. You can see in one of the workshop pictures how much raw material he has for making the nets.
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Post by bjd on Sept 3, 2015 16:49:09 GMT
I thought "nesse" rang a bell. In French, a fishing basket is called a "nasse".
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 3, 2015 17:17:46 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Sept 3, 2015 17:19:17 GMT
Fruits and vegetables in southern Europe are obscenely beautiful.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 3, 2015 18:16:11 GMT
Aren't they, Kerouac?! Thank you for validating my perhaps unseemly fascination with them. So in the afternoon this dear couple collected me for a tour of the town.
An ancestral front door! Ancestral balconies!We stopped here to take pictures of each other & I made another attempt at an "iconic" shot of Cefalù ~And around back to the oldest part of town, where we visited the medieval wash house, which was still in use in the 1950s. I have Rinaudo cousins in the US whose grandmother died by falling on the slippery stone here. Concetta told me that she has a great-aunt who was almost lost here as a child. Apparently the water used to flow much more rapidly and the aunt, then a four-year-old, fell into the outflow sluice. She was snatched back moments before being pulled out to sea. The wash house was constructed in Saracen times and rebuilt in 1514. It was known as u ciumi -- the river, a reference to its source, the river Cefalino which originates in the mountains. It runs for several kilometers underground and beneath some of the houses in town, and flows here into the sea. Note the small windows in the wall. While looking up the history of the wash house, I found out that those windows go to a tourist apartment, with balconies overlooking the sea. That's tempting!Apparently, with the decreased flow and not being used for its original purpose, sand tends to accumulate in the wash basins ~
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Post by bjd on Sept 3, 2015 18:29:18 GMT
Given the size of the doors, people were obviously smaller and thinner in the old days!
I see those flat peaches are the same price here as in Sicily. They are pretty well finished now, but July was indeed high season. What are those long green things in the photo above the eggplants?
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Post by Deleted on Sept 3, 2015 19:00:11 GMT
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 3, 2015 19:41:29 GMT
Thanks, Kerouac! I would swear that people were saying "nessa", which could either be a regional pronunciation or I just heard it wrong. Interesting link. Bjd, I didn't notice that when I was looking at the actual door. Either it's a distortion caused by the camera angle or a very dinky door! The long green things are cucuzza. My family kept seeds going for a long time, but when my stepfather died, I think the supply died out too. There are several US outlets for seeds, and I also found this one for those of you in Europe. This is a lovely and accurate essay on the importance of cucuzza to Italian-Americans: almostitalian.com/the-cucuzza-chronicles/
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Post by whatagain on Sept 3, 2015 19:52:21 GMT
Beautiful report. Makes me want to go back to Sicily... I can imagine feast there are nice ! Even as total strangers we found ourselves in a very nice restaurant hosting a wedding party, and were warmly treated and welcomed. Italians can make parties... especially when it concerns family matters :-)
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 3, 2015 20:32:18 GMT
Aww, thanks, Pariswat! I am planning on going back to Sicily next year and hope you'll give me some pointers on places you particularly enjoyed. Well, let me try to finish up this report. I guess I'm reluctant to leave it, as it feels like leaving Cefalù once again.
We go whizzing off to the marina, which I've wanted to see since I arrived. There I got to meet two of Giovanni's brothers, Domenico and Salvatore, both warm and delightful. Again, more pictures, with me appearing as the wrath of god. (I shan't be showing those.)*Sigh* It's almost time for me to part from Concetta and Giovanni. But first we go for some refreshing granita under the shade of pine nut trees ~
My day was not yet over. I was dropped off at my hotel so I could get ready to go out for supper with Marco (son of Cosimo Rinaudo) and his very lovely and patient mother Francesa. They picked me up and we went winding way up to a mountain-top restaurant for yet another feast. I had an interestingly different pasta with olives, but they opted for the pizza. This was a very large pizza apiece, folded in on two sides to resemble a calla lily and served on a big white ceramic plate that mimicked a pizza pan. It was lovely being up there on an outdoor terrace in great company enjoying the fresh mountain air. But their hospitality didn't end there -- on the way home it seemed imperative to stop for some deliciously rich gelato.
Towards the end of our mountaintop meal we heard a live brass band. From a restaurant front window we could see a large group of musicians of all ages strolling along and playing away. "They came from Italy" we were told.
Well, if I must leave, at least I get to go out to a fanfare. Warm hugs and endless thanks to all my wonderful >>new<< family. Arrivederci alla prossima!
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Post by htmb on Sept 4, 2015 0:49:48 GMT
Absolutely fabulous in every way, Bixa! Of all the threads you've created, this is perhaps one of my favorites.The genealogy component adds a good bit of interest and I can certainly see the family resemblance. With your coloring and facial features, you blend in just like a native. Glorious photographs, too. Everything is shiny and sparkly; from the lush vegetables, fruit and flowers, to the beautiful visitas of the sea and looming mountain. Staying in the town must have been like living in a nice dream.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 4, 2015 5:36:25 GMT
Oh, thank you very much Htmb! Yes, it was quite the experience. The heat and my desire to get out and see things were at odds, though. I would go back at a cooler time of year to take in all I missed. I would also get serious about learning Italian. I was very cognizant as I walked around that each stone I stepped on, each doorway I touched might have felt the tread or touch of my great-grandparents. I kept mentally trying to peel away the modern day overlay in order to imagine back the 19th century with its hardships that made people decide to leave all they knew and seek a better life elsewhere. Here is a manifest from a ship sailing from Palermo to New Orleans in 1894. A quick scroll down, along with thinking about how many of these voyages there were in the peak years of Sicilian immigration to the US, will make you wonder how entire villages didn't empty out. files.usgwarchives.net/la/orleans/history/ships/00000008.txt
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Post by htmb on Sept 4, 2015 11:05:13 GMT
"...go back at a cooler time of year..... and get serious about learning Italian."
:-)
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Post by tod2 on Sept 4, 2015 11:23:31 GMT
Wonderful report! I so enjoyed going over and over your photos several times. Thanks for stopping to take some lovely shots of the flowers....It crossed my mind that you may have secreted some valuable cargo back to Mexico! I hope so.
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Post by nycgirl on Sept 8, 2015 3:51:34 GMT
Cefalù's beaches look pristinely beautiful. The colorful fruits and veggies are also a visual treat.
So glad to hear that you formed a bond with your family members despite the language barrier and that you were treated to such warm hospitality. And a handmade souvenir from the talented Giovanni, what a priceless memento. Thanks for taking us with you on this amazing journey.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 9, 2015 15:05:26 GMT
Okay, Htmb -- I get it! I appreciate that so much, Tod. As for the flowers, all of those things grow here as well, but they were so pretty and sparkling in that clear island light that I just had to take pictures. One thing that has become a symbol of Sicily is the nopal cactus, although there only the fruit is eaten. They were very surprised to hear that the pads are a staple vegetable in Mexico. So kind, NYCGirl -- thank you! Full disclosure: Concetta is originally from Brooklyn, so no language problem there. And Marco's English is excellent, as well. You didn't think I was that good at charades, did you? Although come to think of it, Giovanni & I managed to communicate fairly well without help when he showed me his workshop.
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Post by tod2 on Sept 10, 2015 17:40:41 GMT
Bixa - I saw streets in Sicily gushing with water on SKY news this morning! Seems you may have escaped some torrential rain.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 10, 2015 17:59:46 GMT
I see that, Tod! It's over in eastern Sicily. I spent most of my time in western Sicily & couldn't wait to leave the one place I was on the eastern side, which was excruciatingly touristy. Not that I wish floods on them, though!
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Post by amboseli on Sept 10, 2015 20:39:57 GMT
'The one place', was it Taormina? We have visited the eastern half of the island in - I believe - 2006. I really disliked Taormina. There were some pretty towns on the eastern part, but I much, much prefer the western half of Sicily.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 10, 2015 22:09:15 GMT
Amboseli, it wasn't Taormina. I avoided Taormina because of not wanting to go to a too-too-touristy town. Really, Trapani was a shock as well, since it is about as sanitized and tourist-oriented as it can be. However, there were enough things to do around Trapani & I was comfortable enough there (great hotel), that I forgave it. From Trapani I went on to Palermo, which I adored. As my birthday treat, I took the train from Palermo across Sicily to Siracusa -- specifically Ortigia, which had been recommended to me as the most wonderful place in Sicily. I was looking at my pictures of it a couple of days ago and, based on the pictures, it seems very appealing. Probably I had just had it with blatant tourism and over-priced pasta (pasta, for pete's sake!) & wound up hating the place. I went to the airport in Catania four hours early, I was so eager to leave Ortigia.
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Post by amboseli on Sept 10, 2015 22:29:19 GMT
Ortigia wasn't my favourite, either. I liked Noto very much. And Trapani, although pretty touristy indeed. But the atmosphere was great. And we always travel in low seasons. We also drove de Via del Sale between Trapani and Marsala, and visited Palermo, Segesta, Erice, Piazza Armerina, Agrigento, Sciacca, etc. As well as the very beautiful Parco Naturale delle Madonie, south of Cefalù.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 10, 2015 23:08:56 GMT
I know what you mean about Trapani's atmosphere, which is awfully nice. I would not tell other people to write it off as a destination -- if fact, it could be a perfect honeymoon spot. Nothing wrong with Ortigia, per se, just not my cup of tea at all. I am sure that cooler, less populated seasons would be much nicer anywhere. Also, having a car would cut out lots of stress and time.
When I go next time I will be asking you lots of questions!
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Post by lagatta on Sept 11, 2015 1:09:04 GMT
Despite the obvious things you've said of Spanish and Italian (to say nothing of Sicilian!) being different languages, your command of Spanish will greatly facilitate learning Italian if you should want to.
The problem is actually them being too alike. (French is a bit more remote, as is Portuguese, in another way).
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Post by amboseli on Sept 11, 2015 6:57:07 GMT
Despite the obvious things you've said of Spanish and Italian (to say nothing of Sicilian!) being different languages, your command of Spanish will greatly facilitate learning Italian if you should want to. Well, this was not the case for me! It's so confusing and I mix them all together. A simple example: vino blanco, vino bianco or vinho branco? I'm sure the waiter will understand what I mean but the vocabulary in these languages is so much alike sometimes (Portuguese somewhat less), which is what makes it difficult (for me) to speak 'the right language in the right place'.
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Post by lugg on Sept 12, 2015 19:16:56 GMT
Well , what can I say that others have not already said ? Fantastic read and a feast for the eye through your photos. What makes this so special for me is your pleasure with the re-connection with your family. I guess that your Mum really enjoyed hearing all about your travels and the family you met up with.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 15, 2015 1:21:56 GMT
Oh, I appreciate that so much, Lugg! I was wondering if the family part would only be of interest to me, but since that was the reason I went to Cefalù, I needed to include it. Besides, I was really excited about it! My mother was thrilled I was going, & would have loved to go to, if physically able. I actually swung by my mother's on my way home -- if stopping in the US on the way back to Mexico from Turkey can be called "swinging by" -- in order to tell her all about it.
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Post by mossie on Sept 16, 2015 19:09:04 GMT
This has been wonderfully entertaining and colourful report. A real tonic after the dull wet day we have had here.
I do hope your mother enjoyed seeing it all, and her dutiful daughter
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