Southern Italy?

Sardinia is going strong on the Italian motorcycle NG.
A couple of links from their reports:
http://picasaweb.google.com/Omnihm/CMRS2009#
http://picasaweb.google.com/SkizzoGSXR/CMRS2009#
and look for CMRS 2009 in it.hobby.motociclismo if you understand a bit
of Italian.

F

 

Thank you.

I need an image that would go with fish fingers.

 

Ah. That explains a lot.

 

Have you seen his Facebook profile picture?

 

You speak the truth if the movie Gomorra is anything to go by - Jesus,
what a vision of horror.

A million miles from the Italy that I've visited, and now I have
absolutely zero desire to visit anywhere south of Rome.

 

heh.

Have you read Clive James story [1] about arriving in Tuscany in the
late 60s as apparently the first man with a beard that the locals had
ever seen? He got lots of threats of violence.

[1] in the 2nd or 3rd volume of his memoirs

 

Super. You know where we live.

 

When you two have quite finished ...

 

Don't listen to him, Colin, I think you look very distinguished.

 

Don't kid yourself that Milan or Marghera are much better.

I would visit Naples and some of the coastal towns, and Sicily is well
worth a trip, but Caserta and such places inland from Naples, or the
small towns in Sicily are nasty. A bloke I knew in Palermo told me
that Palermo has petty crime carried out by people who need to eat,
but the small towns have the Mafia mentality where the bosses run
things and you *will* defer to to them.

 

I spent 1 month during my military service in and around Palermo to
"show the presence of the Italian state" (which meant: drive around on my
military truck with a sergeant on my side smoking cigarettes and watching
out for nice sicilian girls, with 2 unloaded 1950's rifles on the back of
the truck). That was in 1998.
Palermo is a mess for driving (but Napoli is even worst), especially on a
3 axes truck and I agree about petty crime there. Outside Palermo the
villages are quite nice and relaxed. The food was cheap and people were
really really friendly to us (free coffee and free cannolo at every stop).
I agree that mafia mentality is there (or at least this is what I've been
told). However, if you are there as a tourist or just for a short time
I don't think you can notice anything unusual. Maybe, if you live there and
you have some businnes there, or if you need to deal with public
administration, then it may be a different story. But as a visitor I don't
see the risk of being kidnapped or anything like that. Maybe the restaurant
where you are going to have dinner has a strange form of accounting, but
it's very unlikely you'll notice anything.
If you go to Palermo, go to Mondello for dinner and to Monreale to see
"il duomo".
Mind the driving habits, they change a lot from North to South, you should
adapt accordingly ;-).

F

 

My ex's parents lived across the street from one of Peppino
Impastato's comrades. That makes certain things feel closer.

Da Calogero for fish with no face. I've also eaten similarly and very
well in Brancaccio.

 

Agreed. I've been to both Croatia and Slovenia twice now. Lovely places,
with some great roads and friendly people. Slovenia also produces some
fabulous wine.

 

It does. I had a rather pleasant evening enjoying the hospitality of
the sommelier at my hotel in Lake Bled.

 

I went to Bled to ski. This was before the scrap kicked off. The lake is
lovely, but the folks, certainly back then, were miserable as ****. And
the bars closed at 10pm. Might have all changed since then of course.

 

They have. I've had some jolly times in Bled & Kranska Gora with no problem
getting a drink well into the night.

The Slovenes are very happy about their independence and proud that they
have been admitted to the EU.

They become rather bitter when the other Balkan nations are mentioned. They
have tried to adopt a non-Slavic national identity by associating
themselves with the ancient Veneti people of NE Italy.

 

I stopped there when I was working in Jesenice (post scrap) and the
bars certainly didn't close early when we were in town. I liked the
place but I'd use it as a stopover rather than a destination iyswim.