Treat for all English speaking readers:)
Excellent piece!
Very long quote from brilliant book written by Valentina Gebbia "Palermo. Survival Manual."
"Are you a PEDESTRIAN?
Lastly, keep in shape athletically to avoid the bag of rubbish or refuse thrown from a car that accidentally might hit you as it flies. On days of heavy rain, equip yourself with fisherman’s galoshes and inflatable boat to sail on the flood created by the filling of the gutters. In this connection, the sewage network leaves something to be desired.
Do you go around by BUS?
If you are not among those people that use public means of transport solely to socialize or spend your leisure time, go to the stop at least an hour before.
The fact is that buses do not have a schedule to respect and even less is it guaranted that you will be able to get on the most crowded lines, which at critical times are only accessible to free-climbing experts.
Forget about those countries in which you get in a queue and wait politely for your turn: if you get distracted and chat with the people near you, forget all about them as soon as you see your bus number, rush to get in front of the entrance, stick your elbows out and push forward among the crowd.
As compensation, the bus is an opportunity for anthropological study, a way to learn the latest news updates filtred the city’s philosophy and ... you will experience an illumination: you will realize you were deceived about everything you thought you knew before, considering that the Palermitan always has first-hand information on anything.
Are you a CYCLIST?
You have to possess a good dose of courage and contempt for danger. If there is anyone that is hated by the Palermitan, it is precisely the cyclist. An evident example is that of the notorious cycle lanes, currently at the second edition and awaiting the third one. It is like the doughnut: it does not always turn out with a hole in it.
The secret, on the cycle lanes, is to go at walking speed. Go dead slowly if you don-t want to run down pedestrians, wrap yourself around a lamppost, the street signs or a little kiosk or the barriers that interrupt the cycle lanes. Beside, you will be busy all the time goind up and down because of cars and motorbikes parked halfway along that have precisely the mission of avoiding bicycles getting up too much speed on the cycle lanes. Of instead you love a thrill, pedal on the road together with the cars, we promise you free the incommensurable emotion or feeling like a ninepin in a bowling alley.
Do you ride a MOTORBIKE?
War has been declared between Palermitans and motorcyclists. One category against everybody. Besides knowing how to drive with dexterity and aggressiveness in order to challenge traffic, intersections, wheelies, performances on pavements and oneway street, you have to possess gifts of clairvoyance; it is fundamental, in fact, to forsee the movement of the people - pedestrians-motorist-cyclist-people on mopeds-buses - moving around you. It is matter of life or death. To really get into spirit, exaggerate with the use of the mobile phone while you are driving, take up the (proper) posture and let your hair enjoy the Palermo breeze without a helmet.
Are you a MOTORIST?
First of all Palermo licence. The fact is that the traditional test doesn’t prepare you for driving in the city. If don’t want to be connoted as a sacrificial victim, never wear a safety belt, which would immediately identify you as a foreigner.
In brief: 1) don’t attribute any importance to the sign, which are only considered an urban ornament; 2) in certain narrow streets what counts is the „predominant direction”, the direction of the person that, in the case of a showdown, imposes his will on the other and convinces him to back off; 3) get used to the oral aggressions that you will undergo from who those who are going the wrong way or don’t respect halt signs and rights of way and, proud of being in the wrong, cover you with insults because of your conformism; 4) at junctions, the person that is most determined wins, and a simple hesitation can be so fatal as to keep you jammed for hours while everyone goes past."
Excellent piece!
Very long quote from brilliant book written by Valentina Gebbia "Palermo. Survival Manual."
"Are you a PEDESTRIAN?
You only have to convince your lungs that, if you are not near the sea, you will breathe in the equivalent of hundreds of cigarettes a day. The dream of some spurious people about the pedestranization of the centre stays in the waiting room together with other dreams and possibly a new council will change things sooner or later.
Assuming they worry more about the city and less about the electors. The fact is it will be a true enterprise to combat the mania of the pure Palermitan for his car. You the pedestrian only have to pay the greatest attention to the following: 1) potholes and ruined sidewalks; 2) excrement of dogs - goats, hens or horses, depending on the district; 3) piles of torn-down election posters whose glue on the pavement is worse than a serial killer; 4) cars and others means of locomotion that have too much to deal with to worry about passers-by or ghost pedestrian crossings, more invisible than an ectoplasm. Lastly, keep in shape athletically to avoid the bag of rubbish or refuse thrown from a car that accidentally might hit you as it flies. On days of heavy rain, equip yourself with fisherman’s galoshes and inflatable boat to sail on the flood created by the filling of the gutters. In this connection, the sewage network leaves something to be desired.
If you are not among those people that use public means of transport solely to socialize or spend your leisure time, go to the stop at least an hour before.
The fact is that buses do not have a schedule to respect and even less is it guaranted that you will be able to get on the most crowded lines, which at critical times are only accessible to free-climbing experts.
Forget about those countries in which you get in a queue and wait politely for your turn: if you get distracted and chat with the people near you, forget all about them as soon as you see your bus number, rush to get in front of the entrance, stick your elbows out and push forward among the crowd.
As compensation, the bus is an opportunity for anthropological study, a way to learn the latest news updates filtred the city’s philosophy and ... you will experience an illumination: you will realize you were deceived about everything you thought you knew before, considering that the Palermitan always has first-hand information on anything.
You have to possess a good dose of courage and contempt for danger. If there is anyone that is hated by the Palermitan, it is precisely the cyclist. An evident example is that of the notorious cycle lanes, currently at the second edition and awaiting the third one. It is like the doughnut: it does not always turn out with a hole in it.
The secret, on the cycle lanes, is to go at walking speed. Go dead slowly if you don-t want to run down pedestrians, wrap yourself around a lamppost, the street signs or a little kiosk or the barriers that interrupt the cycle lanes. Beside, you will be busy all the time goind up and down because of cars and motorbikes parked halfway along that have precisely the mission of avoiding bicycles getting up too much speed on the cycle lanes. Of instead you love a thrill, pedal on the road together with the cars, we promise you free the incommensurable emotion or feeling like a ninepin in a bowling alley.
War has been declared between Palermitans and motorcyclists. One category against everybody. Besides knowing how to drive with dexterity and aggressiveness in order to challenge traffic, intersections, wheelies, performances on pavements and oneway street, you have to possess gifts of clairvoyance; it is fundamental, in fact, to forsee the movement of the people - pedestrians-motorist-cyclist-people on mopeds-buses - moving around you. It is matter of life or death. To really get into spirit, exaggerate with the use of the mobile phone while you are driving, take up the (proper) posture and let your hair enjoy the Palermo breeze without a helmet.
First of all Palermo licence. The fact is that the traditional test doesn’t prepare you for driving in the city. If don’t want to be connoted as a sacrificial victim, never wear a safety belt, which would immediately identify you as a foreigner.
In brief: 1) don’t attribute any importance to the sign, which are only considered an urban ornament; 2) in certain narrow streets what counts is the „predominant direction”, the direction of the person that, in the case of a showdown, imposes his will on the other and convinces him to back off; 3) get used to the oral aggressions that you will undergo from who those who are going the wrong way or don’t respect halt signs and rights of way and, proud of being in the wrong, cover you with insults because of your conformism; 4) at junctions, the person that is most determined wins, and a simple hesitation can be so fatal as to keep you jammed for hours while everyone goes past."
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