Going Out With A Smash

We just want to go to the park for fuck's sake......

I don't want to leave Sicily.  It's too good.  I mean it.  It's a top place. I recommend coming here, but perhaps not in the peak summer months though.  I can't imagine how insanely hot it gets.  It's not hot now though.  And Mount Etna had it's first topping of snow the day before yesterday.  A volcano with snow looks tremendous.  Surprisingly, for a bunch of slackers, we really gave the sightseeing a red hot crack this month. There are lots of cultural/historical activities to be had - if you're keen for that kind of sight of course.  We recently drove for hours to get to The Valley of The Temples in Agrigento.  It was pretty fascinating for a bunch of old stones.  I was impressed.  Thus I took lots of photos and intend to bore you with them now.

This was right after Valli touched the statue's "dicky" many times over.  The question lingers - should I be concerned?

Cordi + old stuff

From another angle just in case.....

I'm always keen for an historical sight.  Chalky's not, but I make him marvel at them too.  History was one of my favourites at school.  I also liked my teachers - Di Davidson - the bra strap feeler who used the word "dishy" a lot - hence she became known as "Dishy Di".  I saw her in the Jackman and McRoss bakery recently, and I thought she was going in for the lash.  Having never kissed a teacher before, I was shocked at how our relationship had developed since school, but leaned in myself anyway to give it a go.  However, I had forgotten she had a habit of putting her head on the side, and was not planning to start the hello kiss ritual with me.  It was awkward.  I was already on my way in.  She then had to kiss me too, we both fumbled, and it ended up being on the lips.  I left without my almond croissant.

My other history teacher was Mr Williamson - the fuzzy little red headed dwarf (not literally - that would be socially unacceptable to use that term).  He also taught Outdoor Ed.  I will never forgive him for tipping me upside down in a kayak in the Derwent during a Tasmanian winter just to see if I could get out.  For a start, Nutgrove beach was highly polluted back then and I ingested a very large amount of water.  I also discovered that getting out of a overturned kayak was not a strength of mine.

This shits all over all the dolphin

Back to Sicilian sights - we also traipsed all the way to a recently uncovered villa that is rumoured to have once belonged the imperial family of Rome at the time, nearly two thousand years ago.  Villa Romana del Casale - I mainly went at my Mum's urging, it was still being restored when she visited Sicily, and thus closed.  I was like, "Yeah Yeah mosaics whatves".  It was fucking unbelievable.  I was impressed and remain so.  The site itself consisted of 40 rooms which were all carpeted by incredibly detailed, remarkably intact mosaics.  I've never been into mosaics really.  I had to be dragged into my friend's bathroom to view her weekend work once.  Well no offence to my friend (I don't think she reads this, and if she does she doesn't acknowledge it so I will punish her publicly now), but I think she needs a lesson form the north African slaves of Emperor Maxentius...or whoever it was.....  Her dolphin just doesn't cut it now, and I will never admire it again.

Nice hallway - if you've got a few hundred slaves why not?

More of the same - anyone?  anyone?

Lame

There was also some viewing of a couple of the major cities of Sicily.  Catania and Palermo.  Catania was ok.  There was no love.  A little bit of like.  Wasn't really feeling this shithole (read ancient city - full of palaces, an amphitheatre, happening churches and some serious statue work - what can I say, you can't like everything).  But Palermo was brilliant.  It was the grungiest, coolest, most beautiful city.  Fantastic.  It also gives new meaning to the phrase "Out of fucking control driving".  No lanes marked, everyone just driving.  No stopping at intersections, no letting people out, no indicating.  Nothing.  It's basically do whatever you want at anytime.  Anything. Far far worse than Tel Aviv.   I am shocked (and more than a little impressed) that we made it out of there without smashing the crap out of the car.  Well done Chalks.  Though we needn't have bothered with our care....read on for further explanation.

now run and play in the bins girls

We headed straight for a restaurant described as a "family place".  I'm not sure their definition of family.  Family of heroin addicts maybe.  Family of rats?  I doubt I've been in a dodgier, filthier place in my life. Really rough looking dudes giving off that shifty vibe, complete with a gun-shaped lump in their pockets.  Prostitutes showing us what they've got (not much to be honest), broken furniture lying around in pools of stinking water.  A "park" that was simply dirt and rubbish.  And there's us - parking our shiny rent-a-car, with our 3 year olds in their pink outfits carrying baby dolls, and openly using a GPS set on "walking directions" in order to find the restaurant.  Basically we were wearing a sign that said "I'm really stupid and I deserved to be robbed".  If the Mafia control most of Palermo, that's definitely one area they leave to it's own devices.

grungy brilliance

Dudes of Palermo

It actually cost money to park here

We split of course.  Drove to another part of town that didn't seem to be populated by murderers, and parked in front of a rubbish bin on an old dirty mattress. Wandering those streets was brilliant.  We looked in antique shops - even though we could hardly get in the door they were so full of junk, saw plenty of statues, amazing churches, shrines to various catholic do-gooders.  It was raw and it was great.  The people were friendly, the outfits were tight, and the vibe was enticing.  We wanted to stay.  Unfortunately it was getting dark, and we had promised to take the girls to a puppet museum.  What we ended up doing was terrifying them, and most likely scarring them for life.  That place housed the creepiest bunch of puppets I have ever seen.  Marionettes are eerie at the best of times, but rooms full of them??? I was scared myself.  The hairs actually stood up on the back of my neck when I let my mind wander and imagine that I was trapped in there all night with the freaky little wooden bastards.  There was even a clown marionette. Could you get  scarier combination?

Evil little wooden bastards

That's the look that says "I want to rip you apart with my wooden claws"

Stop freaking me out lady

piss off Pinochio

I, like many people, hate clowns beyond compare.  I remember the moment when I first feared for my life due to clown induced terror.  It was at the Russian Circus on Ice.  I was three years old and just relaxing into it, enjoying the ice skating bears - that's some cruel shit right there though, ice skating grizzlys - surely it's banned or something these days? But back in the 70s we were just amazed that any form of entertainment could supplement the two television stations).  Anyway, out came the clowns.  And they didn't just stay on the ice.  Oh no.  They came into the audience to terrify the kids on a more personal level.  I got under my seat, and I could hear the screams of the other children.  I waited and waited for them to come and get me.  Apparently I waited a long time.  My parents couldn't coax me out from under my seat for the rest of the show.  I missed the bears.  I hate those stupid clown arseholes.


So today was out last day here.  It was for the most part,  a relaxing one.  We decided, on our way home, to have a final gelato up the hill, and visit a small village about 2km higher up the mountain than Taormina.  We parked, and as we were getting something out of the boot an incident occurred .  I have a small piece of advice here.  Don't ever give your keys to your three year old.  As Chalky slammed the boot, we looked around for the keys, and then realised that Valli had indeed put them in there.  We tried all the doors.  Locked of course.  It was already late and cold.  We had no mobile reception,  but managed to use the internet to call Avis in the village below.  The news wasn't good.  There was a spare key to the car, but it was in Rome and wouldn't arrive until Tuesday (we were leaving at 5.30am the next morning) - plus the house keys were attached to the car keys, lots of our stuff in the boot.  There was no locksmith either.

The Avis dude recommended the following course of action.  Smash the window with a rock, and then pay for the damages.  It was not a good option.  We had no idea how much a smashed window on a shiny new Audi would cost.   But ok then......We came around to the idea once we realised it was the sole alternative - What could we do but smash?  We decided on the small triangle window on the side of one of the back doors.  Chalks chose a large rock and took aim.  Smashed the crap out of it.  After clearing the glass he stuck his hand in and......couldn't open the door.  It was locked on central locking.  FUCK.  Then the alarm went off.  More fuck.  A group of people had stopped to watch.  Chalks had a new skin head hair cut and was wearing a black t-shirt with a black guy on the front shooting a gun.  It was definitely a car jacking outfit.

There was nothing to do but smash another window.  It was too awful to comprehend.  But away he went.  The rock bounced off.  He chose a bigger one and bashed into the window as hard as he could several times.  Still nothing.  If anything, a slight scratch.  Maybe they were bulletproof - with the mafia and all it could be possible??....... A passerby joined in.  Still nothing.  Then our new assistant found a metal girder lying amongst the rocks.  While his wife and friends were screaming "Sergio Noooooooo",  old Serge tried to smash in our car window with the metal railing.  And again, nothing.  Then Chalks again - three times with the hunk of rusted metal, and then finally...... success (if you could call it that).  Of course now I wish I hadn't taken some photos for show and tell.  But believe me when I say, it was no time for photos.

Chalky then had to Dukes-of-Hazzard his way in through the shards, wearing Sergio's parker for protection, crawl into the back, feel around the boot in the dark, and finally unlock the bloody thing.  Then we had to try and scrape out the shards of glass - which were everywhere - back and front - and high tail it down the hill before Avis closed, picking tiny sharp fragments out of our bleeding fingers.  Amazingly we made it.  More amazingly they didn't seem phased we smashed two windows and dented the door frame.  In fact they apologised to us.  Within fifteen minutes we were off home in another new car, glass-free and with a bill of......two hundred euros!  Unbelievable.  It's also possible that insurance will cover us, which mean we will hopefully slide out like nothing ever happened....  We'll see.

Bye bye house

It's times like this I love being a renter.  If that was our own car, it would have involved tears, hours of vacuuming glass,  possible overnight robbery, and of course, eventually getting repairs that would take several days at a garage and surely cost more than 250 bucks.  It certainly would not have been as easy to deal with as how it was tonight.   Take our house for the last month as well.  A little smash here and there, a few wall scuffs, dirty marks on the white couch, filthy floors that turned our feet black (I hate washing the floor it's my most hated housework), a broken kettle and  DVD player, a manky smell around the sink area.....All of the above = not our problem.  Pack the bags, hide the broken light, superglue a vase or two, a quick spot of "deny deny deny", and it's ciao for now. Next please.  Renting is great.

Well, as I remarked earlier - it's bye bye Sicily early tomorrow.  It's been ace.  I love it and would be happy to stay longer, but as this is the last time we'll be in Italy for quite a while, we're ready to do some more exploring.  Chalky just drove to Avis at the airport to swap the replacement car they gave us tonight for a bigger one (there was limited selection in that tiny town).  We would have never squashed our luggage in otherwise.  That means we're on our fifth car of the trip.....Shit!  I wonder if he checked the spare tyre before driving away......if we hit another pothole it could be lucky number six next......

So long Sicily.......