Truly a hard life

Having had another rather grim breakfast, we made the most of the market at the end of the street to stock up on actual food like fruit, vegetables, salamis and bread. I even let some guy who obviously thought I was stupid scam me just to have an authentic experience! Anyway, it was a very busy street, and a wonderful slice of community life:


With a decent picnic and good weather ahead of us, we boarded the bus to Mondello. No words needed as to why:


The beach was empty and almost all ours, save for loud American teenagers flirting and generally being American (“Oh, my god, he is SO cute, he was SO totally hitting on me…”). We found a spot on the warm sand a wee way away from them and settled in. Lucy turned our shopping into a feast:


So, we just sat in the sun, ate and read our books for a bit. After a while, Lucy felt it was warm enough to get her bikini on, and a man called Frank decided he would come over and say hello. (I’m not suggesting the two are related, but…) I also thought I should take a dip in the Mediterranean:


Eventually, having exhausted ourselves with all the leisurely nothing, we said goodbye to Frank (poor Frank) and wandered up towards the more commercial part of Mondello for a look around. Being the off-season it was just the right sort of crowded and the cafes were doing a roaring trade.

We found a sunny spot from where to watch the crowd and eat tiramisu. Shortly thereafter we hatched a plot to hire a seaside apartment for a week and kidnap my brother to cook for us. (I’ll let you know how that goes….)

Being away from the hustle of Palermo, I had forgotten it was Good Friday – but was reminded fairly authentically upon our return by the re-enactment of Christ’s Passion that was going on in the piazza beside our B&B. Earnest-faced men were carrying enormous wooden and glass boxes with mannequins of Jesus and Mary in them. Each box took 32 men to lift above their shoulders and they could only walk ten steps or so at a time before they had to stop. A man with a clacker coordinated the up and down to prevent anyone stepping on anyone else. There weren’t many people involved aside from the box carriers, the brass band (which played ‘How Great Thou Art’) and a ten year old playing Jesus, but it felt like they all really meant what they were doing.

It was an interesting end to the day.