BCBuSInESS.CA 82 BCBusiness MAy 2018
TRAVEL
We'd gone to the main plaza in Siracusa
for our usual evening walk and so that
I could apply my investigative skills to
what is said to be this Sicilian town's best
ice cream, at Gelateria Fiordilatte.
Settled in at a table with a cup of
orange-almond so delicate that it almost
made me whimper, we prepared to
watch the usual parade of tourists travel-
ling in bunches behind their guides,
the accordion player who made an
appearance every day, the local kids on
bikes crossing the big plaza's limestone-
coloured blocks.
And then, coming down the steps
from the city's biggest church, the very
baroque Duomo di Siracusa: a wedding.
Not just any wedding, but clearly a wed-
ding among the 10-percenters of local
Sicilian society, with women in stunning
full-length dresses and men who
looked like they could play surgeons
on American television.
In the warm September air, they
stood for pictures on the steps and
everyone swarmed them to get pic-
tures, not just their own guests and the
paid photographer, but people passing
by and some of our fellow ice-cream
eaters. The bride and groom and their
attendants smiled, happy to provide the
entertainment.
Just another night in Sicily, the place
that Italians we met elsewhere said was
their favourite place to go, a place that
was richer in food, history and scenery
than their homes in Rome or Tuscany.
Italians account for almost half of the
tourism in Sicily and, at a guess, I'd say
that other Europeans made up at least
another 35 percent. It was unusual to
encounter English speakers. Judging from
the Google searches that pop up in rela-
tion to Sicily, it looks like crime, refugees
and the Ma‰a may be worrying them.
Oddly, the only experience we had
of any of those problems as we travelled
mostly on the eastern side of Sicily, to
historic towns like Noto, Catania, Scicli
and Ragusa, were in the pages of the
Inspector Montalbano mystery series
that I read obsessively while there. Those
books by Andrea Camilleri, which have
signi‰cantly boosted interest in Sicily
While North Americans
ock to Rome and Tuscany,
Italians vacation on an
island o their coast
by Frances Bula
Sicilian
Holiday
