Driving in Palermo? Best with a blinker – diepresse.com
In Sicily’s capital Palermo you can learn two things: how best to fight through the hellish southern Italian city traffic – and why markets lose their charm as soon as tourists search home.
My penultimate visit to Palermo is unforgettable. Because of the Norman mosaics? The ancient metopen? The Spaghetti Alla Norma? Oh no, because of the bypass on which I sweated blood and tears. You could belong to the genus of the highways, but only in the broadest sense: the lanes, four in every direction, are not separated by stripes and the many access and exits are very sharp, narrow and unmarked. As a non -local style with a Nordic driving style, you only have two options: Either you stay reasonably in the middle and almost certainly can’t get the right exit. Or you drive on the right-wing trail, where ongoing access to access cars and slow down brutally, which leads to a less popular rodeo rumbling effect on all occupants.
With the appropriate fear, I looked forward to my recent stay in Sicily’s capital. The first day was the expected debacle. It would also have had no sense to integrate the shocked fellow travelers into the navigation process. You would only have kept scratchlessly: Caution on the right! Attention on the left! Then prefer to be tense. But a slightly disproportionate « drive a little researcher » sparked the automotive Sicilian in me.
Two rules for the randominess
The transformation took place astonishingly quickly, two rules are sufficient for this. First, always drive up very close to the in front. This does not give any opposing vehicle that attacks the flanks or from the backing of the chance of cutting into an emerging gap. Secondly, always rigidly look out so as not to get the aggressive pre -pressing of the cars and mopeds from other directions. If you have problems with it, you can get the colorfully decorated blinkers of Sicilian carriage horses. There is certainly in the souvenir shop.
What we would be with in the second learning effect of this trip: The legendary, in all travel guides as « authentically » street markets Palermo, Ballarò and Capo, have deteriorated for tourists. But that is no wonder: as much as we love southern food markets with their lively hustle and bustle – our visit is already carrying the germ of their ruin. Markets are there to buy something on them. « I’m just looking » doesn’t exist. Even less baseless snaps.
Rip off instead of haggling
If too many just look and snap, the offer adapts: the dealers no longer hide with stingy locals around a few cents for the squid or the pomegranates. Instead, they push complaining tourists typical of the sinking snacks in the open mouth openly and then pull them out of their pockets inappropriately. A much better business. Authentic street life? Feel like one of the local? You have to get into the car. And accelerate.
Email to: karl.gaulhofer@diepresse.obstaclecom
