Palermo!

The Cathdral - Cefalu. 
The whole trip is worth it when you have seen this.

"Andre!" Georgio, our taxi driver provided by booking.com, calls to us.  He can see an Englishman a kilometre off.  He then announces in English, using google translate, that as we are heading into an UNESCO heritage site, his minibus will have to leave us to make our way on foot for bit. 

Like a mighty sword fighter he plunges into Palermo's crazy rush hour traffic. The drive is poetry in motion; a murmuration of cars.  The braids of the three lane motorway are skilfully divided into five (stationary) strands. Street vendors take advantage of the confusion by setting up stalls in the fifth lane, intensifying the chaos; and the thrust and parry about us (calm, and experienced, without recourse to pointless honking or gesticulations).  Together we have created a Saturday market on wheels; the stall holder's equivalent of a drive-throu.  

Where we are in Palermo is incredible.  The tiny alley- I can almost stretch and touch both side, is no bar to all manner of traffic.  I fancied that our minibus drive could have made it, based on what we had just experienced.  Instead, look both ways and check the that vespa roar is not singing your name.

 Across from us is a dilapidated mansion.  From the window we see the brightly tiled dome of a Carmelite Abbey church, except that the tiles are cracked and falling, and the building is boarded up.  I am reminded of the splendid decrepitude described  of Havana.  But here, in amongst the faded glory we see restored gems, and we are staying in one of them.  

The market this morning is incredible.  It's for the locals.  Buy your octopus, and we'll cook it for you right away, on smoky grills, and wash it down with Aperol.  Two Sword fish heads stare out at us as we rush past, and decline the offer.   

Further away from the food is the flea market.  Here the whole contents of a house can be seen on the pavement, as if it the owner had just been evicted onto the streel.  Some plies look rather similar to the enormous piles of garbage that are also a feature.  perhaps their bin collections are more sporadic that the rare collections we experience back home.

What do we make of the filth, the smell of sewers, the down-and-outs, the asylum-seeker sleeping on the park benches, with babies in prams! The dilapidated buildings, the graffiti everywhere?  Today we went to Cefalu were everything is beautiful.  The street are lined with pots of flowers.  The building are universally splendid, the Cathedral is  astonishing, the sea is blue, and people are beautiful.  

On the train home we know we are staying in the real place; the Palazzo Reale.  Cefalu is where you visit.  Palermo is where you stay, and 'live'.  Cefalu is Ardington Row, or Bourton on the Water.  Palermo is... Well there is no where in the world to compare it with.