London...

traveling light...

i now remember why my motto when traveling is, "pack light!"
unfortunately, because i was away for 3 months, i had to travel with more things than normal, plus i had gifts i had to buy (and in Sicily, you can't leave without taking some wine and olive oil with you). needless to say, my 2 suitcases were full and HEAVY!!

when i got to London, i made a last minute decision to leave the heaviest of the two luggage at the airport while i trained into the city for my 4 day stay. it was a very fortunate decision since the tube station i got out with my "lighter" luggage did NOT have escalators or elevators! some nice guy took pity on me towards the top of the stairs and helped me hull the heavy thing up.

ending...

saying goodbyes....it's been hard to have to say goodbye to some of the people i've met here. it's especially hard when they start crying....i wish i have more time to do it properly, but as it stands, i've just had barely enough time to finish all the paperwork. all this means, i'll have to come back, that's all.

it's london for a few days before heading home.

oh matchmaker, matchmaker....

okay, so i'm no matchmaker, but i might have just set the wedding date for paolo and elenora (friends here who have been dating like 12 years!). anyway, we were eating dinner together the other night, and among the joking i casually mentioned that they should get married on 08.08.08, seeing that "8" is considered an auspicious number in asian cultures. everyone around the table started saying a bunch of things that i couldn't understand--apparently they were all planning the details of the wedding day....all the while, paolo was sitting there in pain (literally, since he had fallen off his motorbike that morning), but he wasn't saying "no."

i think i've single handedly ended paolo's bachelorhood....(& elenora is taking me shopping.)

san martino...

san martino was yesterday....it marked the beginning of the farmer's year, usually celebrated with the first tasting of the new wine and eating of the chestnuts. i celebrated it by going to fabio's family farm, and helping them with their olive picking (very hard work....but fun for a foreigner like me).
we had to lay down huge nets under the olive trees to catch the olives that were raked. we used our bare hands, some with a small raking tool, and fabio's dad with this hand held motorized beating tool. the olives we picked will go on to a place that presses them into oil. i was told that there is only about a 15% yield for oil from the olives picked....hard work indeed.

to the opera or bust...

Tosca is being performed in the Bellini Theater in Catania. i really want to attend an opera while i'm here, however there are no more tickets for any of the performances. ida and i are hoping we could go to the theater the day of a performance and see if there are any nose bleed seats left.
she called the theater tonight, and was emphatically told that there were NO MORE tickets to be had, not even the bad ones...when she suggested that perhaps someone might not be able to attend, for example, an accident, sickness, or perhaps...death (she has very good persuasive powers)....more screaming from the other end of the phone....so we gave up.

breakfast of champions...

one should always be allowed to have granita*, brioche, and cappuccino to start the day.









*wikipedia: Granita (in Italian also granita siciliana) is a semi-frozen dessert of sugar, water, and flavorings from Sicily, Italy. Related to sorbet and italian ice, in most of Sicily it has a coarser, more crystalline texture.

silvio update...

we found him! (met him on the street --while driving.)

honey festival...

we went to the annual honey festival in Zafferana Etnea:

one can get a variety of honeys
to treat different digestive
problems:

...taste all sort of alcoholic
drinks, including one that's
called "Fuoco di Volcano."
(50% alcohol!)
and as far as i know, pigs can't
produce cheese....