Monday - Carini, Capaci & Terrasini

Monday

So after a good nights sleep, Monday morning arrived as per normal on our first day on holiday we go and suss out the local places, the beach etc.  We first found the local supermarket in Carini, it was quite an experience because the locals can spot the tourists a mile away, and the first thing you get asked when you speak English is "Americano?" seems like Sicily only know of one English speaking country in the world and this is America, do you think this might have anything to do with the Mafia?  But it was great fun, what would normally have taken about 10 minutes in our grocery store back home, took over an hour.

 In the supermarket each section e.g. Fresh Fruit is run by a person and you have to tell her what you want, she then wraps this all in a bag and puts a tally slip onto it.  But while she is doing that she is helping you to say the items in Italian and in return you have to help her with the English word.  Most of the younger generation are learning to speak English in school, but a lot of the older generation would not know any English at all.  Then it was off to the cold meats & cheese counter, and we had to wait in a queue which took ages, because the guy behind the counter is having a conversation with each of the customers.  Then off to the Fresh meat counter, where the gentleman is so friendly and tries to sell hubby some kind of sausage that looks a bit like boerewors, and to top it he cuts each of us a small piece to try (RAW), of course being polite we eat it with long teeth but Em just says YUK and spits it out, not to offend him I buy some mince meat which I need anyway, a couple of days later when I went in to buy mince he actually took a prime cut of beef and minced it up for me.  Anyway it turned out that this old guy new a little bit of English because he lived in New Jersey in the United States, so I had to hear his story before I could leave, it would have been rude to walk away.  I wondered there and then if he had any connections to the Mafia, you know having been in New Jersey?

After a little shopping expedition, we dropped our purchases at home, made a sandwich and then headed down to the local beach in Capaci.  I didn't check the brochure but we could have had access to a private beach, the local beach was filthy, litter everywhere which did not stop little Miss Em, no sooner had we stripped down to our costume and we were running in the Ocean, sand and water everywhere.  Em always looks for other people to play with, and headed down the beach to befriend 3 boys, she had great fun playing with them and although they could hardly speak any English they all got on really well and understood each other in child language, the two young boys took a shine to her.  It turned out they were from Milan and on holiday, with their mums as there were no sign of any dads.  I told D this is because all Italian men have affairs once they are married, so the mums and kids were sent on holiday while the dad was with his mistress (only kidding).

After her swim it was a promise of ice-cream and her first or was it the second Italian Gelato since we arrived.  Actually D & I had the nice Gelato and Em settled for a yukkie factory made one, which she never did again that holiday.  Then of course we had to sit near the "boys" which resulted in them taking many pictures of us and vice verso.  We left with promises of meeting them again on the beach, but which never materialised.

Once home Em was in the bath to get all the sand and sea out of her hair, while mom made a pot of Spaghetti bolognaise and then it was off to bed, or did we watch friends in Italian first?  Can't Remember...

Wait I almost forgot, before we went home, we took a drive along the coast into some small villages and ended up stopping at the sea front in Terrasini outside the archaeological museum.  D & I had a coffee and Em wanted a ride on one of those machines that cost money.  While I was watching her and drinking my coffee an Italian guy who heard me speaking English, started chatting to me he then invited Em to the park to play with his daughter, turns out they recently returned to Sicily after being away for 10 years.  Em went and played with Melina while D, this guy and I had a conversation about Florida in the States where he had lived for the past 10 years.  I think he was quite grateful to have other English speaking people, as was his daughter who now had to adjust to life speaking mainly Italian and nothing else.  When we left I felt quite sorry for them, but I guess we all have choices in life and theirs was to return to Sicily to their family.