I Vanniaturi

Mobile shops are not a thing of the past in Sicily. Local merchants ply their wares around every town; their small vans billowing over with fresh, local produce. And when I say local,  I mean it: the produce was probably grown within about 3km of where it's being sold. For the vanniaturi to travel further would be counter-intuitive; why drive further, wasting petrol, when the customers in the nearest town have the same Euros in their pocket as those in a town 20km away?

 

The Ape (pronounced "app-peh") - a small, three-wheeled truck which is a typical sight in both town and country in Italy - seems custom-made for this purpose. Vanniaturi (pronounced van-nya-TOO-ree) affix loud-hailers to their Apes, from which they announce their stuff. In fact, vanniare means 'to shout' in Sicilian.

 

Readers in Liverpool will know that the vendors of the local newspaper, The Echo, each have their own, unique call; one shouts "eeeehKO-KO-KO", while another calls "E-ko....E-ko". London's Evening Standard vendors have a similar racket going on.

 

Similarly, Italian Vanniaturi all have their own calls, usually in dialect and very often difficult to understand. Part of the reason for the incomprehensible calls, of course, is so you have to go out and see for yourself what they're selling - and what great quality it is!

 

Today Ispica's vanniaturi was touting seafood (not that it was obvious at first). Sicilians often have quite soft consonants; Simona explained that "BOO-pee-BOO-pee!" was actually "Puppi" (the Sicilian for Octopus - the Italian being polpo or polipo). "alaMAAAAree-alamarETTee" was Calamari, Calamaretti (squid, small squid). And just to push home the point that he had octopus, he was also shouting "poh.LEE.poh!".

Arriviamo in Comiso!

Comiso airport, in the province of Ragusa, Sicily, was a US-controlled NATO airbase until about 20 years ago. Since then, the Sicilian people have eagerly been awaiting its reincarnation as a civilian airport.

We chose to fly to Comiso for a few reasons (novelty, I'll admit, was probably one), but primarily because Ryanair were running flights there from Stanstead for a comparatively reasonable £85pp or there abouts. That's reasonable when compared to BA's Gatwick-Catania fare which has been steadily increasing recently (we considered ourselves lucky, at Easter to find flights on that route for 'only' £225pp).

As we disembarked, crowds of people were pressed up to the windows of the arrivals hall observation deck, eager to catch a glimpse of their loved ones descending from the plane. Once we had cleared passport control and visited the baggage carousel we headed out to the arrivals hall to an excitable crowd. Ours was the only plane arriving and it wasn't even full; the were far too many people here! The feeling of this being an event was almost tangible. But of course, the first time you go to a newly opened airport IS an event. Rather than having to search for someone willing to drive out to the airport to meet family members returning from their journey to London, everyone wanted to come along for the trip! The result was that that there were probably three or four times the number of people waiting as passengers on the flight.

Aeroporto Civile di Comiso is so new you can practically still smell the paint. It doesn't even seem to have a 'bar' (coffee shop) yet, however if you arrive hungry, the little panineria outside will be a welcome sight.

Dov'é Giovanna?

Before take-off, we heard someone on the plane ask, "Dov'é Giovanna?" ("Where's Giovanna?"). Shortly someone else asked "Dov'é Giovanna?". Before long, there were five or six people enquiring as to Giovanna's whereabouts, recounting where they last saw Giovanna, exclaiming that they hadn't seen Giovanna board the plane, that they couldn't see Giovanna anywhere at all!

 

At one point Nonna panicked that they must alert the pilot immediately that we were missing a passenger and bustled off to the front of the aircraft to speak to the cabin crew in an urgent voice.

We speculated that Giovanna had set up an elaborate ruse, escorting everyone aboard the flight before absconding to who knows where with who knows who. Perhaps she had eloped with Darren, of whom her family did not approve?

 

Presently Giovanna arrived aboard (disapproving our fantasy that she was half-way to Gretna Green by now). Apparently she had been told her hand luggage was too big and was charged €57 to check it into the hold. Giovanna's family had much to say about this.

Getting into the Sicilian groove ahead of time.

We don't fly to Sicily until tomorrow, but this morning for breakfast (well, ok, maybe it's more like brunch) we decided to start to acclimatise with a frittata di zucchini e cipolle (that'd be a Spanish Omelette with courgette and onions... Although I'm not sure why we specifically call it Spanish Omelette here). For an extra touch of Sicily, we had a tomato on the side, seasoned with salt, pepper, oregano and a little extra virgin olive oil.

Granted, though, Italians wouldn't eat that with toast and a "lovely cuppa chaaaaaaaar!"

In search of some late Summer sun.

Would you look at that - it's nearly October!

Where I'm from it's pretty much time to get the wooly jumpers out of mothballs and start preparing for the long, cold months of winter. In Sicily, however, it's still shorts and t-shirts weather at the moment.

This Sunday I'll be catching a flight from Stanstead to Comiso intending to make the most of what I can only assume will be the last embers of Summer 2013. I've been to the Province of Ragusa in Sicily fairly frequently, but there's always something new and interesting to see and do. Here's hoping that this trip won't disappoint.