Wednesday, September 10, 2014

La Fine di un' Epoca - The End of an Era


The view from my balcony


 

In January I plunged back into surfing as much as I could and Neptune was delivering lots of waves. By chance I had a few inquiries for english lessons and I made arrangements to begin in February as I wanted January all to myself for surfing and planning paintings. In comparison to the previous year, finding students was effortless as I had a steady flow of referrals and even found myself doing more lessons than I wanted some weeks. I also restarted lessons with the doctor who was my student last year, and I rode my bike 20 minutes to his office once a week.
One winter afternoon I had an amazing surf session during a storm. I was one of only three people in the water and had caught a few good waves when it started raining and then......... hailing! It was quite magical and surreal but also difficult to see and a bit hard on the head so I packed it in and ran back to the cabin using my board as a shield.

I went on a few weekend getaways first to Catania with Zoe in January and then to Pisa/Florence on Valentines weekend with Zoe and Vicky who had to deliver a puppy and do an audition there. Unfortunately our Saturday night took a turn for the worse as we went to a club out of town with a friend turned asshole that we had met in Palermo on New Years Eve. It was nothing an expensive cab ride couldn't fix and we'll probably be laughing about that night for awhile.



The end of February brought the departure of a good friend, Gabriele, who was accepted to intern at the European Commission in Brussels. We had a nice dinner to thank him as knowing him had really changed our experience in Palermo. Soon after I was off to London to meet my mom and her friend, Connie. 
We enjoyed touring around the different neighborhoods of London and had a great Sunday roast with a woman from our town who lived there. We also spent a friday evening  at the theatre to see the broadways show, Wicked and on Saturday I met up with my ex-roomate from Florence, Rosie, who had been living in London and having success as a painter. We spent the evening in a pub near Camden Market and despite having intentions to go dancing, we got wrapped up in english banter which ended up being quite amusing.





 It was near culture shock for my mom and Connie landing in Palermo from London. My mom compared it to Mexico. Unfortunately the weather  had also taken a turn for the worse and we often found ourselves caught in the rain. We took a day trip to Cefalu` and were lucky to have the sun come out and allow us to climb the path for the breathtaking view. We also planned an overnight trip in Taormina which was another scenic place that I knew they'd like.




One evening we went for an aperitivo in the chiavettieri street in the center of Palermo and I invited my friends to join. On the way there, my British friend Eue was attacked and her bag was stolen. Then Vicky showed up with her arm in a sling as she had slipped on the street earlier that day. As bad luck usually goes in threes, the next day someone robbed 70 euro from my bag in the cabin while I was surfing.

Determined to show my mom and Connie the town Monreale before they left, we stuck it out waiting for the bus, and then another bus, and then packed onto a shuttle. Not worth repeating the frustration we decided to take a taxi back to town after visiting the church and having lunch.
On the morning of their departure I accompanied them to the bus stop for the airport and while we were waiting a taxi driver offered to take a group of people to the airport at a good rate, so they accepted. It's a good thing they did because after saying goodbye I was running a few errands in the area and 10 minutes later there was a car in flames directly in front of the stop. I was thankful that my mom didn't see it as she was already scared for me living in Palermo as she felt it was dangerous.
With the vacations over I plunged into painting and finished my first 2 out of projected 10 paintings in the following weeks of March. My friend, Claudia, had finished her degree in medicine and I attended her ceremony and presentation as the university graduation is a big deal in Italy. She hosted an amazing lunch at her parents restaurant in Cefala` Diana, a town 20 minutes outside of Palermo and we had a happy reunion with her sister, Eliana, who returned from Australia to celebrate. 


My first swim in the sea (without my wetsuit I mean) came on April 13th, after a saturday night out with Zoe and her visiting British friends. We met at Mondello on sunday morning with the sun shining and I had ridden my bike there so I dived right in to cool off, and convinced her friend, Sam, to accompany me. The others were too chicken.


On Easter Sunday in April a group of our friends took a little road trip to Gangi and Petralia in the Madonie Mountains, a zone in Sicily that I hadn't visited before. We had an amazing meal at an agriturismo (this is like a farm house/ hotel, a very common holiday destination in Italy where people stay in nature and eat food grown on the farm) outside of Gangi before touring around the small town. 











The beginning of May brought the departure of another good friend. Zoe decided to move back to London to be closer to her family and grow her career. We had a goodbye dinner and a goodbye night out and it was a bit of deja-vous as I accompanied her to the bus the following morning with her bags as I'd done in September when she was intending to move back to London but changed her mind and returned 2 weeks later. During this time we had become best friends and I knew I was going to miss her, but I knew my time inPalermo was winding down too.
 
 
They day I gave my friends surfing lessons  
The end of May brought me another visitor, my Canadian friend, Hailey, who I had met in Florence. She was going to Hamburg to house sit for the summer and decided an italian stop was in order to see me. I was happy to have her and we started things off immediately at, where else?, Mondello beach with some friends who ended up taking us for dinner later that evening.

We decided to rent a car for a little getaway to Castellammare, Scopello, The Zingaro Nature Reserve, and San Vito Lo Capo. In the nature reserve we had to follow a path on foot for 20 minutes to reach the beach but it was totally worth it. Unfortunately due to a sensitivity to cigarette smoke, and the difficulty to avoid it in Italy, Hailey came down with bronchitis and my friend Claudia who was interning at the hospital helped us to see a doctor and get a perscription for antibiotics.



It wasn't hard to say goodbye to Hailey as I knew I'd be seeing her soon. She had helped me book a little european tour at the end of July, which included Hamburg as a stop.
Andrea and I waiting for waves



The rest of June was a bit chaotic as I was scrambling to finish my paintings while simultaneously trying to organize the exhibition. As it goes in Palermo, people hesitate to give confirmation and change what they say from one minute to the next, but I finally managed to secure a one night outdoor showing for Friday, July 11th at Mida, a lounge bar right on the beach in Mondello.

An english student of mine, Simona, helped me figure out how to hang the paintings and we did a trial setup a few days before. By chance, a couple who were friends of the manager came by for lunch and saw the two paintings that I had brought for the hanging trial. The woman approached me to ask about the price and after they left the manager negotiated with me a bit on their behalf.










As luck would have it, the waves were on the way and the greenlight was on for a surf competition hosted in Sicily. It ended up being an epic day. After a near sleepless night, my friends helped me assemble the paintings before we headed to Magaggiari Beach for the competition. The men were up first so we had a free surf session and I kept my eye on the clock to see if I would have time to participate in the women's competition and make it to the exhibition.




                                                          The design for the Magaggiari Surf Open T-shirts that I did

The exhibition officially started at 7:30pm and they ended up finishing up the mens around 6.30pm, so I decided to sign myself up and got warmed up, knowing that it wasn't a big deal if I showed up a bit late for the exhibition. With the heats only lasting 15 minutes I felt really anxious to catch as many waves as I could. The waves at Magaggiari primarily break left, but my best wave was the first one I caught and I rode to the right. I caught a couple decent left ones after that and was thrilled to get moved into round two.
 
The waves had changed a bit by the time I was back in the water for round 2 and despite paddling as hard as I could I missed a few big ones. It wouldn't have mattered much as I was against the italian female champion, Valentina Vitale, and another really good surfer who had been living in Mexico, and besides I needed to get to my exhibition!

I got changed and did my makeup in the back of Andrea's car on the drive over to Mondello. Arriving with my hair still wet, the manager immediately handed me a check from his friends for the paintings. That evening I confirmed 2 other sales to friends.

There were 5 pairs of paintings, 10 in total as I had planned and I was very pleased with how it all came together. I was exhausted of course but stuck it out until the end of the night. My friends helped me dismantle everything and I carted the paintings home.

As the venue was outdoor it wasn't the right place for an extended exhibition. There wasn't even storage space available. So I set my sights on the place where I had initially imagined the paintings on display. The face of Mondello's shoreline, and the building which makes an appearance in many of the paintings, The Charleston, or Le Terrazze as it had been renamed. 

I had been there numerous times already to speak with the manager, but for one reason or another he remained wishy washy. I was desperately looking for back up venues but nothing else was quite coming through or making cut. I knew what I needed to do.

One evening I passed by The Charleston to speak with the manager in the company of my vivacious Sicilian friend and new graduate from law school, Silvia. After an hour or so, all the plans were cemented as the manager was taken with her and she had him convinced.

This man continued to be a bit high maintenance as on the day of the opening he had instructed his staff not to let me start assembling the paintings until he arrived. He didn't arrive until 6:30 pm and they opened for dinner at 8pm so I was under a bit of pressure getting everything up and to his liking. I finally finished around 8:30 pm and was so happy to see the paintings there as I had imagined, even before I had even started actually painting the paintings I had imagined them there. Despite being super late, I went for a celebratory swim to soak in the moment of seeing my dreams come true.
So happy and tired!







On my way to the bus I stopped at the gelateria for 'dinner' and politely sabatoged an old lady's attempt to bud in front of me in line. I made it back home and got ready in lightening speed before Andrea and Claudia passed by to pick me up and take me back to the Charleston where other friends had already arrived and were waiting. It was another lovely night and I stuck it out as long as I could before storing the paintings in the office and crashing.

The next night I left on my mini euro trip, but first I needed to return to the Charleston to give assembly instructions as they would be responsible for hanging the paintings in the terrace every day and storing them in the office every night while I was gone. That went smoothly and I felt that they were in safe hands as I went back home to pack my bag and get to the airport on time.

I had decided to spend the night at a hostel in Pisa so I could do a round of dropping off postcard samples at souvenir shops at the popular tourist town. As it had been such a busy time I hadn't spent much time choosing a hostel, I just picked a cheap one with decent reviews and left it at that.

It wasn't until I arrived at the address around 11 at night and didn't find the hostel that I started having doubts, but I was accustomed to Italy afterall so I can't say I was that surprised. I called the number and a guy answered asking where I was. I told him and he told me he'd be right there. A greasy ponytailed italian pulled up in a car and told me to get in, explaining that my room was in another building on the other side of the station. Suspecting what sort of hostel this was, I asked if they took credit card and he said no so I asked him to make a stop at the bank (ie. one that doesn't pay taxes).

We made it to the other building and I stifled his verbal advances while we climbed the stairs into a dim corridor. Still seeing no signs that we were in a hostel, he wrote up my receipt and then showed me my room. I was happy to see 3 cute German girls who I'd be sharing with. The room was super hot and stuffy and they recounted their experiences to me from the night before which nearly involved one of them without a bed to sleep in. They told me that it appeared to be a room in a house of an old man, who they periodically saw on his way to the bathroom.

I managed to get some sleep and hit the ground in the morning for a quick round of the city before I got on the train to Florence and called my friend, Sally, to tell her I was on my way. I dropped lots of postcards on the way to her apartment near Santo Spirito and, as in Pisa, was quite pleased with people's reactions. In Palermo people were quick to reject me and say they weren't interested, often not even accepting the samples, but here the vendors were very positive and cheerful.

Sally and I had a good catch up and a nice dinner before heading out for our evening plans. A Hawaiian themed party with Giuseppe, my ex-boyfriend, and his friends. We met in Santo Spirito and drove outside of the city for the party which proved to be good fun.



The next day I finished my postcard run and met Giuseppe for a gelato before heading to an aperitivo to catch up with some other friends.

In the morning I was back to the Pisa airport to catch my flight to Hamburg. It was my first time in Germany and I managed to catch the bus and make it to Hailey's place. The following day I rented a bike and we went for a nice bike ride around the lake and then for dinner on a lively street. It was a Tuesday so but we managed to have a good time, staying out late after running into a few people that she knew.

 
The next day we were on a bus to Amsterdam where we met Zoe and another friend of Hailey's and mine from our time in Florence, a polish girl named Kamila. We had rented an apartment in a great area and we were excited to start scoping out the beautiful city. We all loved it as it was full of fashion and art and canals and beautiful tall people on bikes. The nightlife in the tourist places was a bit of a disappointment as we found it quite seedy but as it was a weekday and the local places closed early.





On our last night our group split up and I convinced Zoe to pass through the red-light district with me before we headed to our local destination for the evening, a bar at a hotel outside of the tourist district. She almost got beaten up by a hooker as we weren't aware that taking pictures is forbidden and the women spotted Zoe with her phone out.

After our time in Italy, we were surprised by the friendliness of the Dutch girls. We made some friends easily in the bar who were offering to buy us drinks and complimenting our fashion. Many of the guys however seemed quite out of it and we concluded they were on drugs, including a guy we met on our way home who was skipping down the street high as a kite on ecstasy. We made it home super late to find Hailey waiting for us in the stairwell as Kamila had gone to bed early to catch and early flight and she had been locked out!

The morning came early for us too as Zoe and I had a bus to catch to Brussels to visit our friend, Gabriele. He met us at the metro station and being the great italian host he is, had a pasta lunch ready for us. After a nap we toured around the city and ate dinner in a more historic neighborhood before we got ready for the goodbye party for him and the interns at the European Commission. The party was in a basement of a bar and was stifling hot so we ended up mostly hanging out on the street for the evening. There we met a british bachelor party who were on a type of treasure hunt. I was happy to help out when they asked me if the groom-to-be could lick my armpit, one of the tasks on the list. Zoe had to write something on his back. She chose a bad word.



On our last night our group split up and I convinced Zoe to pass through the red-light district with me before we headed to our local destination for the evening, a bar at a hotel outside of the tourist district. She almost got beaten up by a hooker as we weren't aware that taking pictures is forbidden and the women spotted Zoe with her phone out.

After our time in Italy, we were surprised by the friendliness of the Dutch girls. We made some friends easily in the bar who were offering to buy us drinks and complimenting our fashion. Many of the guys however seemed quite out of it and we concluded they were on drugs, including a guy we met on our way home who was skipping down the street high as a kite on ecstasy. We made it home super late to find Hailey waiting for us in the stairwell as Kamila had gone to bed early to catch and early flight and she had been locked out!

The morning came early for us too as Zoe and I had a bus to catch to Brussels to visit our friend, Gabriele. He met us at the metro station and being the great italian host he is, had a pasta lunch ready for us. After a nap we toured around the city and ate dinner in a more historic neighborhood before we got ready for the goodbye party for him and the interns at the European Commission. The party was in a basement of a bar and was stifling hot so we ended up mostly hanging out on the street for the evening. There we met a british bachelor party who were on a type of treasure hunt. I was happy to help out when they asked me if the groom-to-be could lick my armpit, one of the tasks on the list. Zoe had to write something on his back. She chose a bad word.

The next day came fast and after another pasta lunch I had to hit the road and say goodbye. As I was leaving Italy within a few days, I let some tears roll, thankful for having met these great friends and sharing my experience in Palermo with them. My flight was to Trapani, a city on the west side of Sicily, an hour and a half from Palermo. I knew the bus schedule and hustled to the desk to buy a ticket but they told me there were no seats left.

Other people were arriving at the desk and were in the same situation but being Sicily, a solution was difficult to find. The next bus wasn't for 4 more hours! As it was Sunday the last train from the center of Trapani was also early and some people were scrambling to get there in time. I tried to arrange with a group to share a taxi to Palermo but it was super expensive. At a certain point I realized I actually had an advantage that I was just one person and lined up at the bus that was apparently full. Once everyone was on I asked the bus driver if there was an empty seat, and he let me on. Thank GOD.
Back in Palermo I had 4 days to finish packing and dealing with my stuff, get my paintings to their owners and figure out what to do with the remaining ones (they are currently in the window of my friend's clothing store, LAROS, on Via Liberta`), and say my goodbyes. It was a whirlwind but I managed to deal with it and as luck would have it, some waves rolled in and the afternoon before my departure, my old friend Salvo picked me up in his awesome volkswagon van and we hit the water. The beach restaurant in Isola Delle Femmine where the surf school is located and where I spent a lot of time over the past 2 and a half years was the perfect location for dinner with my good italian friends and Danilo, the surf coach. I had my tearful goodbyes and was up late whittling down the weight of my luggage. Marco, my faithful roomie, was kind to take me to the airport at 6am and I shed some more tears as we said goodbye at the check-in.




My friend, Silvia (the girl who convinced the manager at the Charleston to host the exhibition, as well as one of the friends who bought a set of my paintings, as well as one of my english students) was on the same flight from Palermo to New York with me and although we weren't sitting together on the plane it was nice to have her and her friend's company at the gate as well as in us customs once we landed. She was spending 6 weeks in New York taking a business english class (as well as dance classes, she's very well balanced). Due to pushy airport staff we had a quick goodbye at the connections desk and I continued my journey to Calgary which my 4 suitcases 5 hours later.

Home sweet home, it was the perfect place for downtime to recover from my whirlwind. I had lots of family time and nature time before I plunged into preparations for my next whirlwind. After a family trip to vegas the weather has turned and I can't believe it was snowing the other day!




 
 My prize from gambling

In a few days I'll be heading across the other ocean to Australia where I'll spend the next year. My time in Italy has come to an end for now and the next chapter of my life is leading me to Oz. Due to the age restriction on the working holiday visa, the time is now! I'm nervous and excited and just have to remind myself that that's basically the same thing:) Setting up in an english speaking country should be much easier than when I arrived in Florence in 2010 with only the most basic italian words in my vocabulary. I'll be staying initially with Eliana, Claudia's sister, in Bondi Beach. I feel so lucky for all the opportunities in my life, it's like I get to live many lives in one. Italy will always have a piece of my heart and I don't know where the future will take me, but for now I'm ready for this next adventure!