Miss Travelette

Being in a new country - even for a few days - means learning new things about that culture - and the country itself of course! Sicily has a few cultural & archaeological things I noticed and I think these were worth writing here at least in one post!
These important points are going to be the points that should be kept in mind when you are in Sicily.
Because people will talk about them anyway...


One of the Largest Theatres in Europe: Teatro Massimo  

Teatro Massimo di Palermo

Designed by Giovan Battista Basile, Teatro Massimo di Palermo is known as one of the largest and most prestigious theatres in Europe. The theatre has a surface area of almost 8.000 square metres, and its magnificent Neoclassical facade is definitely worth seeing! In the picture on the left, you can see me standing right in front of the theatre. I wish I could have entered the theatre to see its inside, because most of the sources I read later on mention how beautifully it is decorated inside the building.

Me on Mondello Beach, Palermo, SICILY

One of the best places in Palermo...

Mondello Beach is a bit far from the town - you definitely need to hire a taxi, preferably a good one, because otherwise they'll ask you to pay more than it actually takes - the distance is not comparable to the distance you'd have in the town - you're going a bit far - 15 minutes in total maybe, but Palermo is a small town, so 15 minutes is a long time there.

In Sicily, I've been to three different cities - Catania, Palermo and Siracusa. These three cities have very different characteristics. Catania is a bit smaller compared to Palermo, and looks more traditional than Palermo does. Palermo is the biggest and busiest city of all and mostly the wealthy people live in it, while Catania could be explained as a place for the poor. You could spend a whole day in Palermo (but surely that would be enough to see every important thing in the city; palaces, theatres, squares and etc.) Catania had a street going down, which is the only famous one in the city, and there are loads loads loads of cute small shopping stores from where you can buy Italian-made products. (I would like to mention something I've learned when I was there: Catanians and Palermo citizens don't like each other at all; they're like two different football teams who hate each other - When I asked "why?", noone had an answer to that.)

Cattedrale di Palermo

And Siracusa is way too different from these two, because it's just some kind of holiday place where you can find very quiet beaches and Mediterranean restaurants where you can eat some Carbonara or Mediterranean salads.

To start with Palermo - one day would be well enough for the whole city, because there are not much to see. One cathedral, one palace (where you have to wait in a long queue), one theatre, one city centre, two popular boulevards and a huge seaport. That's all! I was lucky enough to meet an Australian while waiting in the queue for the palace, so we went around to see all these within only a few hours.

I love the historical places more than anything else, so I would never compare such place with a modern city for sure - and when the Mediterranean is included, too, it's like a heaven to me.
I went to Sicily last summer - a place way too hot throughout the summer, and never so cold in winters. The worst thing about my journey, it was so hot that I hated sun for the first time in my life! The best thing, I've seen a beach like Mondello - and an environment more than sincere we could call it.
People in Sicily are strange - even more than that.
As a Turkish, living in a very strange culture with strange people, who yell at each other all the time, who love speaking loud as most of the Italians, and with more low class people than the high class people living in the country, I wasn't expecting to see something different in Sicily anyway.
Well I sure did.