The Galacon/Sicily trip, Part 6: Taormina: and @$#% you too, Siri · 10:22pm February 28th
Announcement for the few people who read the travel blogs: I'm going to start the all-followers poll and Ko-Fi drive for a 2024/5 MLP convention destination on March 1st. The recaps will resume and wrap on the other side of that date. I just don't want to put off poll launch beyond that point.
At that time, I'll reveal the potential destinations and ask for a vote. Most popular choice wins. (The poll will likely last one week.) Once we've got a city, I'll run a cost sheet and adjust the goal number accordingly. And for those who don't care about travel, I'll also be putting in a poll for future cover art. Pick a story, and perhaps your favorite will get the Harwick treatment.
I'm hoping for a 10% voter rate among my followers. This may sound low to some of you. It's actually high. I've got a lot of Americans here, and they rather notoriously don't vote.
But that's in the future. Starting this Friday, to be exact about it.
In the past...
September 22nd
Damage check.
I know I overdid it yesterday: I'm still feeling some of the effects. That many miles, in that level of heat... I didn't wake up well, and I'm struggling to make sure I get the suitcase fully packed. But it's also a matter of just checking the suitcase itself. The little wheels are definitely showing signs of wear. No cracking yet, though. Good. The manufacturer is out of business, and that's going to make it a little hard to find replacements.
The real issue is my shoes.
I was asked if I intended to pick up classic Italian shoes while I was here. No, because the cost is that much higher and I'd hate to replace them in three months. Without a car in play, I destroy every purchased pair in one season. The soles get worn to the point where the envelope becomes exposed and after that, it's all over. And when I had a car? Maybe four months.
This is a cheap pair, because the ones I wanted were sold out. They're not really meant to do anything but get me through the trip, and I'm starting to wonder if they can manage that much. The walking treads are just about completely gone. We're starting to approach a smooth bottom, and there's a lot of situations where that's going to cause a problem. I do have emergency shoe funds, but they can't do more than a replacement pair of sneakers and I'd be dealing with local prices and, much worse, sizing.
No time to really deal with that now. It's too early in the morning, for starters: nothing's going to be open. The heat wave is still in town -- it won't permanently move out until I'm on the verge of departure -- and I'd like to get a start before the sweat starts pouring. I'm getting a little tired of soaking through my clothing.
Still, today shouldn't be so bad. This is the jump to Taormina.
The city has a history. (The entire island does. Take three steps, trip on an artifact.) But for the more modern part... a madman built a hotel, and it's still there. A five-star. And it's picked up plenty of company. It's the resort city, and there's a lot of prices to pay for that. I'll be dealing with the psychic ones shortly.
But it's also the home of the Blue Grotto.
I've got two nights in Taormina: after that, I need to jump coastlines. Cross-island bus -- oh gawds -- to Trapani, at the northwest corner. (There is one bus. I booked it in advance, and I have concerns.) But today is for Taormina itself, with tomorrow set for the Grotto -- if I can get a boat. You need to pay someone to take you inside, and I'm anticipating this as the single most expensive 'tourist' part of the trip.
But with the Grotto...
I was there once. I want to go back. Trapani? Everything there will be new. This is about reconnecting to a beating azure heart.
Check the room. Make sure the charging brick is with me. Sweat-soaked clothing is in a clean garbage bag. Nothing really dried out overnight.
Time to head for Catania Centrale. (Again.) Taormina's about thirty miles up the coast. I need a train.
...please don't let it be three hours late.
The streets are nearly empty at this hour. Very few pedestrians, and car traffic is minimal. Bakeries, of course, are open.
I'm passing graffiti in what feels like endless amounts, because I'm out of the tourist pen. The city is only cleaning what's going to be seen. There's also some old-fashioned Broadway debris: posters advertising mostly-upcoming events, plastered to fences. I missed a comics convention back in the early part of September. An approaching circus will feature Captain America and seriously, what's a copyright?
The day is already starting to heat up fast. Heat index is going to go over 100F in direct sunlight, and that's another reason to move out early. (The forecast for Taormina says 84F, and it lies.) I pass a self-service, one-car wash which is taking up most of a vacant lot. Pay for access, go in and let the automatics scrub your vehicle. No one's using it right now. I'm wondering whether to treat it as an emergency shower.
I did check the transit system. The fare isn't horrible, and there's multiple trains per day. On Sunday, services are cut down substantially -- but you can still move. It's just a question of timing --
-- okay. Centrale. (I glare at the bus stops as I go by.) Get a ticket from the automated dispenser, and then a sign directs me to the subway: in Italian, that just means I'm taking a walking tunnel under the tracks in order to reach mine. Screens flash times, and I learn my train is going to be on time. We'll see...
It is. I board, and we continue to bleed out seconds as we go up the coast. Starting as a Catania local doesn't help.
It's possible to find USB ports on these trains, and some of them even have small tables between the seats: work, enjoy your bread.
There are no guarantees that any of the ports will function. More screens show upcoming stops, but you need to find a car with a functional display and still, it's best to listen for the announcements.
The old god is thinking matters over today. Even in the train, there's some smoke in the air.
We're working our way up the coast. The sea is on one side, and looking inland? Some manufacturing, a few stores, more graffiti -- but for the most part, it's farmland. I pass a winery, and the late-season grapes are looking exceptionally good. Sicily has some issues of local geography, and when it comes to anything level --
-- but that's coming up during the westward jump. Today, I watch the Mediterranean go by, and get ready to invoke the GPS again.
Some of you may be wondering how I'm doing that. Don't I have a dumbphone? One so stupid that it can't even receive texts? Yes. But I've been steering on that 40GB temporary data SIM and the tablet, which is an iPad. A gift, and I'm still thankful. Several years old now. I'm dreading the day when it breaks. It already rebounded off a plane wall. I've got to be more careful...
...here's the station.
Taormina's train stop is on the edge of the city. You get a few houses, an auto shop, and a two-lane highway going by. Nothing else. Right next to the ocean (and about seventy feet above it), but the bulk of the city is about seven hundred feet up a cliff. This island got invaded. A lot. The natives were looking for defensible positions. It's possible to drive in -- thin roads wind and weave their way up what's currently a hidden part of the slope -- but there's also a cable car from city to near-sea level.
There's a few Roman artifacts in the train station, within a glass display case. Where else are you going to store them?
I walk out. Stare at the water, try to remember. And then I ask Siri for walking directions.
...okay, not so bad. 1.3 miles in total. (In a stunning display of idiocy, I don't check the turn-by-turn column.) And I almost forgot that I'm going to be in a hotel for the next two nights. The lone hotel of the Sicily portion -- but at least I won't be struggling to arrange a meet time with a B&B owner. Actual check-in desk. I can't officially get the room until 2 p.m. -- but after that, I can drop off the suitcase and go right back out. Hopefully quickly, because the heat index already went into the 90s and it's not looking back.
Turn right. Go past the repair shop. Following the curve of the highway --
-- okay, this is a side street. Barely visible from the main road. I'm starting to slant up. Maybe Siri knows a shortcut --
-- the street runs out.
I am standing at the base of a walking trail. It runs across sun-baked light brown dirt and scorching thin wooden railings. It's a switchback trail, moving back and forth across the face of a cliff, gaining about forty feet of elevation on each passage, and it goes almost all the way up.
I stare.
Climb this, says Siri.
...excuse you?
You wanted the walking directions. This is it. Climb. This.
Okay. Funny AI girl. Let's pretend you got out of whack at some point. Recenter. The actual directions are now to --
-- climb. This.
I back up slightly and take a long look at the suitcase's little wheels. The uneven dirt trail. The rails which are going to be the only thing preventing me from coming back down a lot faster than I went up. The railings don't cover all of it. The sun beats against my skin.
Well.
@$#%.
...yeah.
(Please consider that every time I take a picture, I am stopping completely, taking the tablet out of the bag, aiming it with both hands, and trying to line up any kind of shot.)
I keep startling lizards. Little scaly bundles of life stare at me from warm rocks, then run away from the insane person. Sweat is already falling from my body. If I put my hand on a railing, it shifts. The suitcase wheels...
...sometimes, especially when rounding turns on the switchback, I have to lift it and put the weight against my spine. It's not made for this kind of trail. What is?
Up, and up, and up...
...I can see homes at the top now. There's a hotel built into the cliff edge, because it is a piece of land in Taormina and therefore, someone is going to stick a hotel there.
...sweating too much...
...okay, that was a glimpse of where the switchbacks end. And turn into -- a narrow one-lane road. Which has a steeper climb angle than the walking path.
This is a joke, right? It's all a joke --
-- transfer over. The ascent angle increases. My calves are starting to burn. Same for my skin.
...and here's the hotel. Pity it isn't mine. I risk going inside, then ask the front desk if this is the normal path. They don't know. They also give me a free bottle of water. Immediately. And tell me it's okay if I sit for a few minutes while I sip it.
Nice place. Kind of wish I was booked here. If not for, y'know, trying to get in.
(You can just barely make out the train station against the shoreline.)
(This may be where some of you start to ask why I didn't rent a car. Because it would have been an additional expense, and I would have been trying to book it with nothing more than a foreign debit card. Problem.)
Back out there.
The ascent angle increases again. A van goes by me, heading the other way. Hotel supplies. It's riding the brakes. Off to the left, a construction crew is working on a house. Trash goes into a vertical tunnel, which means gravity is constantly providing me with a preview.
...there's a plaza up ahead. The road starts to level off. And now I'm going around the upper edge of Taormina.
I made it. There's even a shop where I can get another drink, and -- yes, here we have a park. I'm... just gonna sit down again for a few minutes.
You'll find war monuments around the island. Some of them are dedicated to Americans. During WWII, Sicilians were designated as second-class citizens: the grand result of that was that when the 'invaders' showed up, the collective reaction was a little closer to What Kept You? And that's part of why we've still got a joint naval base.
I explore the park a little. There's a manned torpedo, and you heard me. Two-rider operation. Get in close to the enemy ship, plant a bomb against the hull, hope to get away.
People move around me. I just sit and recover. I didn't expect the climb to take that much out of me, but -- harsh angles, baking sun, and the back-and-forth meant I moved across more distance than the directions indicated. Plus towing a suitcase. But I can't stay here that long. Just get up, let Siri put me on the trail. It can't be far now.
I move back out to the street. Keep going around the edge of the city. We're nowhere near the tourist section, and it's peaceful. At least I can sweat in some privacy --
-- take the stairs, says Siri.
...sorry?
Over on your right. Take the stairs.
I look.
There's a staircase. Going down. Then it turns to match the cliff facing change, and goes down again. Out of sight.
...I -- want to see the turn-by-turn now. Exactly how far am I --
-- take staircase.
Back to near-water level.
For half a mile.
While, incidentally, still towing a suitcase.
Sixteen newborn profanities enter the world, and I wish I could remember what any of them were.
Carrying a suitcase.
Down this.
People go by me. Some are heading down, others up. None of them have suitcases.
...oh, look. Another hotel.
Still not mine.
Going down. And now it's a residential staircase.
...I step out of an alleyway and am confronted with the sea cliff, a two-lane highway, several small stores, a couple of restaurants, the mandatory bakery, and Siri telling me to turn right. There's still a few hundred feet to go --
-- wait.
Two-lane highway.
Don't @$#%ing tell me --
-- I had the choice of more steps to reach the front desk of my hotel, which is on the second floor -- or a one-level elevator from the street. I took the elevator. And I am once again dripping my way in, where I ask the desk clerk two things: first, even though I'm early for the room, can I just leave the suitcase here?
...oh. The room is ready. Good. Thank you. And second -- I walked here. See this screen? That's the path. Is that normal?
...oh.
So this happens all the time. It's just the way Siri shows the walking trail. As opposed to the driving one, which is 'follow the curve of the two-lane highway for about a mile and there's your hotel'.
Well.
Megacrap.
The desk clerk gets me checked in. The only weird part about this is that I have to leave the key at the desk every time I go in and out, but I'm assured there's someone ready to hand it back at any hour. I make sure of departure time for when I have to check out, and then go up to the room. I need to change clothing, and I really need to take a shower. It's a three-star hotel in Taormina: there's going to be a shower --
-- the room is smaller than the average college dorm.
My bed is a twin size. Maybe a little smaller. The walls around it are stained.
There's barely any outlets. I need to unplug a lamp just to recharge.
The 'desk' is a wooden shelf with a chair.
The AC unit has no reachable controls.
I do get a tiny balcony, with a thin plastic chair on it. Iron railings, and the sea view is spectacular.
But then you have the bathroom. That's what I need right now. The shower.
I want to talk about the fucking shower.
See those accordion walls? They're the only things keeping the floor from being soaked. See how close the toilet is? Sink's just about as bad.
I step into the shower, because I very badly need to clean up. Close the walls, which magnetically click. Try to wash.
Try.
I can't raise my arms.
This isn't a medical issue. I didn't just strain something. The shower, when sealed, offers so little square footage that I literally do not have the space to make a human shoulder function.
At this time, I would like to call the viewer's attention to the sadistic placement of the control. And the soap dish. Especially the soap dish.
Well.
Fuck.
Yeah. The hotel has some problems. There's a pool behind the main building: the access is a door located on the main staircase, halfway between third and fourth floors. Why do I mention this? Because that door is open all day and most of the night. There's no screen, and that's why I spend a couple of nights getting bitten by mosquitos in my sleep. And this is the three-star. But to be fair, it's definitely worse than my previous four-star outside Stuttgart.
Eventually, I manage to get clean. Then I have to wipe down the entire bathroom floor anyway, and then I get dressed to go out again. Siri says the cable car to the upper level is less than a mile down the highway.
...like I'm gonna trust you again.
I stop for more drinks, and toss in some beautiful little tomatoes. The cable is located, and I pay for a roundtrip passage, slowly ride with a lot of other people up to the outskirts of the main city. There's quite a bit of traffic moving through both ends of the stations. Cats stalk in and out, occasionally get into the cars and take the trip.
Exit at the top, and there's souvenir shops. More drinks for sale, and a gate.
I pass through the gate, and the forces of Merchandising scream into my skull.
In the previous blog, I described Taormina as the tourist trap.
When I pass through the gate... the babble of talk changes. It turns into English, along with so many other languages. It's barely possible to make out any Italian. And here come the tourists in their summer finery, they wander and shop and swarm, and there's so much to shop for because everything around you wants to inform the travelers of where they are. Would you like a wall map? A ceramic head to paint, just like the natives? How about an apron, or a pinecone lamp? Look, Godfather merch! (This is offensive for many of the locals, but the tourists expect it.) And everything around you is just screaming at top volume all the time, like a direct burst of psychic static: Sicily Sicily Sicily!
It's not the crowds. I can deal with those, as long as I move carefully. It's the oversell. To be a true traveler, you leave the @#$% path. The pen. And I'll do that in Taormina, but so much of the city is nothing except path...
...gawds, my head...
...but it's time to move.
There's the five-star. The original hotel. It's not what I came to see.
I wanted a day at the theater.
I also get a night.
Sicily's dating page:
Hobbies: Getting Invaded
Everyone's tried to conquer the island. They all left pieces of their culture behind. Perhaps that's why I keep seeing anniversary posters plastered on walls. Anniversaries of the day on which the depicted person died. Memento mori.
(Palermo...)
The Greeks came through. So did the Romans.
And they wanted a place for entertainment.
So welcome to one of the oldest operating theaters in the world.
...oh, I'm sorry.
Amphitheater.
Why is there a more modern stage there? Because the place is still in use. Taormina has film festivals, and this is where you watch a movie. There's a more 'standard' arts center near the entrance, and a lot goes on there, but -- you pay admission for this one, and then you just walk around as much as you please. Maybe climb up outside the edges and get the view.
...this crazy, stupid, beautiful island...
...I wander. Sit for a while, and think about sharing my seat with two thousand years of playgoers. There are ghosts in my lap.
After a while, it's time to get lunch. I actually wind up with dessert first: a cart is serving gelato, and one of the flavors is listed as Ferrero Rocher. Chocolate hazelnut. The only word is 'perfect'. And then I duck into a hole-in-the-wall to order some carbonara, because I haven't had any since my mother died. It was her dish, and -- this is where she learned to make it.
Needed more parsley and bacon. I do startle the staff a little by getting a lemon soda instead of a Coke. What did they expect? I'm a native.
I do have to go down the tourist byways in order to reach anything real, but I make sure to leave the pen whenever I can. It's just too loud (in several senses), to the point where I watch a steel drum player at work because he's the quietest thing around. And the gouging is everywhere. I find a candy shop from the What's A Copyright? chain -- multiple licensed characters poorly decorate the place -- and the prices for simple sugar are insane.
Here's a -- ticket booth? It's right outside the arts center. People keep going up to it. So what's going on?
...huh. Okay, it's a production of Carmen. Tonight.
Opera.
...a night at the opera? In Sicily? I've never been. I'd thought about checking Palermo's opera house once I got there, but...
The cheapest ticket is seventy Euros. I didn't budget for that.
I take out the tablet. Ask if anyone wants to see me suffer through opera, then put up a short-term Ko-Fi goal. Just a few hours. Back to it.
Too many tourists. Too much English. This is why I avoided Sigonella: I feel like I came to Sicily to visit the States. And they're not getting the real experience, these people. It's polished and branded. I wind up ducking into a church just to get some more quiet time.
I sit in the upper level, resting. Check the tablet -- huh. Okay, tips are starting to come in. All I need to do is invoke suffering, right? (Semi-joke. A few people really wanted me to see the opera, and I'm grateful for their help. But when I tell people I might suffer, it doesn't seem to exactly hurt in fundraising. Except for the part where it hurts me.) I tell everyone about all of the Americans and Brits, and someone asks if there's any Australians about.
I get the answer a few minutes later.
It's 'yes'.
The Australian, wearing a hometown shirt, is lying in the street. Twitching as limbs flail. Epileptic seizure.
He's surrounded by people. His companion is trying to help. I scramble to the nearest restaurant because I need someone with a working phone and knowledge of local emergency numbers -- oh. Good. Someone already called. An ambulance is on the way, and the doctor arrives before that.
...it's never just your story.
I duck into an alley to recover again.
It's Taormina. This is what passes for an alley.
Tell the server what's going on. Check the Ko-Fi drop account --
-- oh.
Thank you.
Night at the opera it is, then.
I make my way back to the arts center, reach the ticket booth. One, please. They show me the seating charts --
-- wait...
This isn't being put on in the arts center.
It's the amphitheater.
...
...one, please.
I get a ticket just out of the plastic seating area. I've got a centerline view, and I want stone. I want to sit with the ghosts. And now I have time to burn, because each extra roundtrip on the cable car is another fare. Guess I'm having dinner up here.
Scout stores. I go into the candy shop for opera snacks.
I will show you horror in a dusting of sugar...
(Why wood in the background? I took that one at the library. Utterly tourist-proof. I tried to find the bathroom and just encountered kids playing downstairs.)
Naturally, there's a toy store.
No one in the server wants anything shipped. Well, not in the postal sense.
I find a restaurant which advertises lamb loin, then wait for them to open. Naturally, they don't, and that leaves me looking elsewhere.
Still got lamb, though.
(If you're curious? 30 Euros for dinner, which included my mineral water. And this is in Gouge Central. I paid nearly half of that just to get candy.)
I'm a little worried about getting back down the cliff, so I check the cable car. Last ride down is 1:30 a.m. I should be fine. So it's time to just sit and wait.
And then I go into the crowd waiting to access the theater.
The crush.
Put it this way: I have been in less tightly-packed subway cars. There's a few thousand people who want to see this opera, and the police are keeping them all in a rather small space. They have to keep clearing aisles for those coming in and out of the five-star. I barely have room to breathe and whenever I do, I worry that I'm harassing someone. I keep waiting to catch covid, along with everything else. It's an effort to make myself stay here, everything keeps pushing against me, and then someone hits their limit. One of the waiting women faints, and a path has to be cleared for the medics.
After six eternities, they let us in. I climb the slope to the entrance, get my ticket verified, and go to find my seat.
The show doesn't start.
The show still doesn't start.
The last car down is at 1:30 a.m. Carmen is over three hours. It's 9:17 p.m. and people are still being seated. Everything is running late. Vaunted Sicilian Efficiency does not exist. The band isn't even in position.
The seat below mine is taken, and the occupant casually puts his backpack on my right foot.
I move my leg in such a way as to deliver a backpack directly into his spine.
Oh, hi. Didn't see you there. This is my polite smile. Isn't it polite?
...@#$% right you're moving that.
Oh, good. Music. Maybe we can start now.
My first opera. Something which helped define the modern version. People donated to get me in here, I'm thankful, and --
-- I have to be honest.
I hated it.
From my notes in the chat server:
Opera is the processing of pummeling an audience with musical notes until they go unconscious.
Prove me wrong.
(Poor kid didn't make it.)
Carmen is an opera where the main female character dies at the end and after sitting through the whole thing, I wish she'd bitten it at the beginning. Along with the rest of the cast.
You've probably heard some of the music. The music isn't the problem. The score is iconic, and 'Toreador, toreador' echoes on classical stations everywhere. And the performers did their best, the dancers were good, and they even had local children performing in the chorus. The issue is that opera exists to go so far over the top as to fall down the cliff and hit every switchback before reaching the ground. Singers treat every note as Wanna See How Long I Can Hold This? There's no chance to see the characters as people, or make a connection. And the opera itself is about bad things happening to those who should have known better. The main male character has an endless succession of chances to just get out of this, and takes none of them. Carmen herself is manipulative, the bullfighter is machina on a stick, the former girlfriend gets victimized, and it quickly reached the point where I was glad this was a tragedy because maybe they would all die.
Was it a good production? Account for what had to be a minimalist set, and I feel that it was. Most of the scenery was lighting and mist, added to a few strategic fake rocks. I feel that it was a strong showing, and you can't beat the backdrop. But... I didn't like the story, or how it was presented. That's me. You might feel differently.
But I'm still glad I got to go, and thankful to those who put me there.
Hey, if I was going to hate my first opera, best to hate it in one of the world's oldest active theaters.
Several acts and infinities later, we all file out. I ride down the cable car. People and cats make up the rest of the load.
Back to the hotel.
The AC is incredibly loud. I get bitten several times in my sleep. The room has no sound isolation, and I get woken up several times by every other room.
...three stars, they said...
September 23rd
...the forecast is not encouraging. Chance of rain all day, just about a certainty from the afternoon on. All I can do is hope that the tourist boats are running to the Grotto, and that starts with taking the staircase down to the beach.
...another staircase. Vendors are selling on the steps. Nice sundresses. Where do you try them on?
It's a pebble beach. Rocks, really. There's a couple of bars at sea level and you can wade across a narrow passage to another hotel, along with checking out some of the older buildings. Some people are already -- well, not so much sunning themselves: clouds are moving in and out. But they're staking out places early. You just can't spread a blanket on this. The Princess And The Nothing But Rocks.
I spot a man sitting behind a folding table. The sign says Tours.
Grotto?
Yes.
How much?
Fifty Euros.
...the top number in my budget. But I did plan for this expense in advance, and the bill is passed over.
Go down the beach until you see my brother. (There's a heavy family resemblance.)
We'll load up the boat once there's more people to take the ride.
Well, this is going to be a problem. They don't bring the boat up to the rocks for people to board and in order to keep from having soaked shoes for two days, I'll have to take them off and go across sea stones barefoot. Yay. Also, fifty Euros, you said?
Walk. Find a place to wait...
Tourists start to flow in. I'm mostly riding with Brits today. One of them has a dog with her: a Dalmatian cross. People chat about the run and once there's ten of us, we can get on. I get to be first, and pick out a good seat near the back. The dog does not deal well with being carried over the water, but is perfectly content to be within the boat.
The driver starts the motor...
This is where pictures really don't work. Cameras are better than ever, screens offer millions of hues, and you still can't get the Grotto into a photograph. It's a little cave off the coast, and the water is blue.
In a way, that's all you need to know about it. The water in the Grotto is blue.
It's just a blue which can only truly be appreciated by the human eye.
There are boats lined up outside the entrance, waiting to glide within. Taking turns. You don't get more than five minutes, and you're paying fifty Euros for that view. Later in the day, in looking at the more sophisticated ships, I start to realize that I was paying on the low end.
But once you're inside...
...I forgot.
I forgot that blues like this could exist. That's why I came back to Taormina.
That is worth fifty Euros.
And a few tears.
The boat is only out on the water for thirty-five minutes. We tour part of the shoreline, see the hotel which is built into the lower cliff, look at a couple of smaller caves. Then it's back to start. I get out of the boat, start to make my way across the sea rocks with bare feet, and then I fall.
...I just barely catch myself before I go all the way down.
The tablet bag dips into the water.
...oh no. No, please, no --
--- scramble to shore, as fast as I can. Did it...?
...the bag is water-resistant. Most of the exterior is soaked. But I caught myself before the top went under. The tablet is fine.
(One to go.)
The sky is clouding up fast, and I now need dry socks. Back to the hotel, change clothes -- oh dear gawds, I'm going to need to do laundry again...
I pause to check on tomorrow's schedule. I have to get back into Catania -- but my bus to Trapani does not leave from Centrale. It's a few blocks away. If I leave early enough, I can use the same laundromat. I test out the highway, prove that there's just enough walking space. I'm not using the switchbacks again. And I'm also not going up to main Taormina for lunch. It's too loud and the rain is moving in. I saw a restaurant halfway down the staircase to the beach...
...hello. Can you seat -- yes, thank you. Menu? ...oh. Sorry about the glass. I'll pay for -- okay, if you're sure.
Swordfish. That's fine.
...there.
There it is.
Just... eat the whole thing. Leave nothing behind. Fish, bread, pineapple, mineral water. Just... be here...
I don't leave a single drop of olive oil.
The rain comes in.
There really isn't much to say about the rest of the Taormina stay, because I couldn't do much. The rain moved in and out, but breaks were short. There was no point in getting poured on. And since I had a rainout, I used it. I went back to the hotel, set up the tablet on the plank, and finished writing To Swim Among A Sea Of Stars. The first story I've both written and posted from outside the States.
I paused occasionally. Got up, walked around, found the swimming pool, cursed at the perma-open door. (More mosquito bites overnight.) I didn't do anything about dinner beyond getting some fruit from one of the lower stores. I often forget to eat when I'm writing or rather, don't want to risk losing the flow through stopping for too long.
I did get a picture close to sunset.
Even I can't screw that up.
But once the story was posted... I went to bed. The next day was going to be all travel. I needed the rest. Just in case something went wrong.
So naturally, something went wrong.
From Estee's Photo Non-Album:
When I say they built a hotel into the beach cliff...
Outdoor services begin at...
Just before the opera started. I put the tablet away when the lights went down.
Part of the tourist herd.
"What's a copyright?"
(This turned out to be a chain. I found another one in Palermo.)
Death anniversary notices.
At one point, I left the tourist area, found this guy perched in a window, and vented to him for three minutes. Great listener.
Dress shop on the way to the beach.
Main plaza.
Cast of a much better opera.
More from offshore.
If it was the States, those would be eagles. On fire.
...
...look, are you going to tell them?
According to the internet it costs maybe $60-$75 to resole + heels for shoes. If you're buying sneakers $100 & up.
Temu woman's boots $20 -$30
Amazon, about $50
Macy's $50 & up
They say that the best part of going abroad is remembering why you don't live there.
I find it difficult to believe that opera such as that can survive in a country known for hit men.
(It's also vaguely comforting to know that Siri doesn't just hate me, it hates *everybody* on the planet. Expect it to mutate into Skynet any day.)
I sometimes watch Lost In The Pond (Lawrence)
An immigrant from Europe talks about how different life is in the USA.
1) AC
Most of the USA, you've got AC. Much of Europe, you don't
2) Americans think 100 years ago is a long time
Europeans think 100 miles away is a long distance.
We've got better roads, they've got WAY better trains
The trope is
Books & plays may end badly or well
BUT
Movies end well &
Opera ends badly
The ghosts. Yes. Yes. When I went to my first amphitheater I just sat there. Imagining being there. Then I also went on the ground. I tried to spend time as a theatre goer. An actor, and also a slave forced to work there. To see an ampthiter that is still used as a theatre. To watch a play? That would be so wonderful. I am so jealous
As for operas. Yeah. I find that alot of operas don't have good stories. But when they do their amazing. The Othello Opera was fantastic.
I do startle the staff a little by getting a lemon soda instead of a Coke.
Honestly, I'd probably do the same, and I've never been to Italy.
"Well, what did you expect from an opera? A happy ending?"
Holy cripes, Estee, I was in freaking Soviet Era Estonia and the showers where bigger than that! (No hot water admittedly.)
Well, hopefully now you've internalized the concept of checking all of the available routes and not just the walking path. Sometimes the listed bus route is better than anything else even when on foot. Best to look at the map itself first to see the listed roads and paths and make your best judgment from there,
Ahh, the Poor Man's Shoes Dilemma, a classic. I really should keep better track of when I buy shoes as it seems I've been doing so more often as of late. Twenty dollars U.S. adds up over time.