Sicilia « baroquesicily.com - Sicily Stories and Travel Tips from Jann Huizenga

Is My Existence Legitimate?

January 24, 2010

I had cast myself into a new life with all my heart.

But I’d forgotten my head.

Cold reality soon set in. My new digs recalled the toilets at Penn Station: grimy white bathroom tiles were glued to every available surface. Water stained floors and ceilings.

I dropped by the comune to ask about getting a building permit for a renovation—secretly hoping they’d wave me away with the well-worn Sicilian phrase Non preoccuparsi!, Don’t worry, and tell me to go do as I pleased.

Not quite. A goggle-eyed man in a pink cravat presented me with a garbage pail and a list.

A list so long and bewildering it brought tears to my eyes. I’ve translated it to the best of my ability (italics mine).

I’m so doomed.

graffiti on the back of my house

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La Zagara, or How I Was Drugged in Sicily

January 21, 2010

Here’s how I got into trouble.

After teaching a short course in Ragusa in 2002, I’d returned year after year to Southeast Sicily to root around for a little casa. The Fates pushed back with all their might and I finally admitted defeat.

In the spring of 2007, I came to see friends one last time and close the Sicilian chapter of my life. Ciao, Sicilia.

A day before bidding the island farewell, I scaled the long staircase up from Ibla’s Piazza Duomo to see the cupola from on high. After many years cocooned in scaffolding thick as wool, it had reemerged triumphant.

It looked good enough to eat, like whipped cream on a tumbler of granita. I felt a secret joy. Bells tolled, clouds slipped up from the valley. I inhaled la zagara—orange blossoms on the breeze—like a drug.

I turned. There, on an unassuming little row house with a mottled wall and weatherworn door, I saw the magic words: VENDITA.