4 nights in Palermo

Landing in Palermo, our plane stopped randomly on the runway and walking down the steps out the plane I felt like a famous actor about to begin filming a new movie without a script. It was a little after 9:00pm and the air felt around low 70s. Perfect. We took a short bus ride to the main part of the airport and went through the passport checkpoint. I wasn't asked a single question. That was easy. Walking through the airport I stopped at a cafe that was still open and ordered a Panino, and the people were energetic and even singing to a song on the radio. I like this place already. I made my way out to the taxis lined up and no one spoke much english. I managed to find out it was 35 euros to the nearest city, and I start this train of thought like "well seeing as it's around 9:30 and I no nothing about this area, I can't speak Italian, the logical choice would be to take a taxi... but logic is flawed in that it lacks adventure. I would rather walk out under the vivid stars dripping bullets. I don't care how far it is. I'm walking." I grab another Panino, which was delicious, and just like in Dublin, I walk out into the unknown. After maybe 10 minutes I come to the runway. Hah. So I turn around and walk the other way I came from and keep going. Now I'm on the side of the highway and luckily there is a sidewalk. I walk and walk and walk some more. At one point I saw a shooting star, which to me is always a good omen. My sense of time could be off, but around an hour and a half I look over and see a sign that said "Hotel" so I hopped the middle barrier and made my way around. It was closed, so I decided to continue down this road that ran parallel to the highway. After walking through some kinda sketchy parts I came to a restaurant that was noisy and had a good amount of people. That made me feel better. A little after that I stopped a dude and his girlfriend on the side of the road, luckily he spoke a tiny bit of English, and I explained I was looking for a cheap hotel. His friend happened to be driving by right at that time and he made some gestures to get in. At this time not a single ounce of worry is running through me. The vibes are great. We drove maybe 5 minutes and made it to a hotel, and upon walking in I see an Italian family playing cards. I get the feeling I'm probably the only person in the hotel that speaks English. Talking with the hotel manager is like playing a game of charades. I made it to my room, take off my shoes, the floor is slightly sticky and the water tastes like badly filtered ocean water. My kind of place. The raw imperfectness of life is where the magic is. The next morning I was able to use a computer to reserve a hostel for 3 nights in the city, and ate close to 12 croissants. Had to fill up on something.

On the bus ride to downtown I met a New York native who was sitting in the front, and he told me some awesome facts about the city, and offered to show me the stop to get off of and where to go to get to an information kiosk. The bus driver was the classiest dude ever, having an energetic conversation with a lady in front. I'm sitting there munching on my little nutritionless piece of bread thinking how extreme of a change this is from Ireland. From the lush, green, wet, moist, fresh environment of Ireland, living in a small village by the ocean of less than 1000 people, to the hot dry Sicilian heat, now in the 5th largest city in Italy with a population over 700,000. If change is good, what about extreme change? I say it is. Going through the city there were endless, and I mean endless apartment buildings. On the poor side, but not like dirt poor.

After a little walk, and asking a few people who were all super nice, I found the hostel. Nice place, very welcoming atmosphere. They had a world map and every person who stayed at the hostel would put a pin up on the map. I was the very first from Utah! Carving new territory baby. The first day I journeyed around Palermo with Jaime (pronounced Jime) from Portugal, he's such a cool guy. He was there because of his ex-girlfriend, and knew a lot about Palermo so he was my tour guide. Freshest of vibes kickin it with my new homie. He works in Portugal as an airplane mechanic. He puts together planes, and he said it's great in that it provides a new challenge everyday. At the hostel later that night I met a bunch of other people from all over the world. 

There is Jaime to the right. Sometimes I'm not in the mood to take pictures together with everyone I meet, I'm too busy enjoying their company. 

The market was insane. I got a kick out of seeing motorcycles pass through the narrow space between stands on both sides. Anything goes in Sicily. That's what I love about it already. The people are so free-spirited. The food is shockingly cheap. I got maybe 20-25 pounds of fresh local produce and 12 dozen eggs for about 15 euros. Wow. I cooked a meal at the hostel and Ilaria said, "This is fantastic, where did you find the recipe?" and I just smiled and said "I don't use recipes." Ha. And I had a softball sized nectarine that had the perfect ratio of tangy/sweet.

Never have I experienced so much history in one place. I'd describe the city as semi-organized chaos.

 Cattedrale di Palermo

Vita di S. Rosalia

My last day me and Jaime met up with Jack and his girlfriend Ilaria (love that name) from Turin, whom we met at the hostel, and journeyed to the top of a nearby mountain via bus. It was an awesome experience exploring the ancient Vita di S. Rosalia and the view on the way up and the way down was perfecto. I kept the family tradition alive by subway surfing with no hands on the bus. 

Wow...

The first farm I had setup at Luigi's fell through so I asked the next farm if I could come earlier, they said yes. I borrowed Jack's phone to call Salvatore and I had to pass him the phone to translate. A sign of an authentic experience to come.