We decided to take it easy Sunday morning, so we slept a
little later, got ready for the day, got breakfast (which was quite delicious),
and then Maggie took a nap while I finished my homework and submitted it by
noon.
Then we walked to some of the archeological sites in
Siracusa. There is certainly a lot to see in this beautiful city!
The archaeological park is called Parco Archaeologico della Neapolis, and includes the Greek theater that was built in the 5th century, and is still in use today during the summer months!
Carved straight out of the stone that was already there..
Simply amazing.
We were able to get a glimpse of the Sanctuary of Apollo, but unfortunately the Roman Amphitheater was closed, as was the Catacombs of San Giovanni. This seemed to be the theme of our weekend..
This is the Basilica Santuario Madonna delle Lacrime. We had a very interesting experience when we went inside: mass was being held since it was a Sunday, but a few minutes after we entered a woman walked up to the microphone and started shouting very passionately in Italian. There was almost no reaction, and we were left wondering what we had just witnessed.!
When we were looking for the Basilica di Santa Lucia an elderly
gentleman saw us staring at our map for a while and stopped to try to help us.
He made a great effort to explain everything to us through the language barrier,
and I tried extremely hard to understand what he was saying and respond with
what little Italian I know. It proved I've learned a little bit, but certainly have a long, long, long way to go!
Today was also the first day I have actually been scared in
Italy. We were getting a quick lunch at a shop near our hotel, and as we were
leaving to find somewhere to sit, this middle-aged man started eyeing me,
saying buona sera. He followed us around the corner, and stood staring at us
about three tables away. I got up and walked quickly away, and he followed us
around the corner but no further. Later, after we had seen a few more sites, we
walked back the same way and encountered this man again. He smirked at us and
kept repeating “bouna sera” as we walked by. I tried to ignore him, but ended
up giving him a disgusted look. We continued walking towards the train station,
which is very close to our hotel, when he drove by us in a white car and slowed
along where we were walking, saying “buona sera”. He couldn’t stop because
there were cars behind him, so we decided to skip the train station and just go
straight to the hotel. We were almost there, when he drove by us again from the
other direction, doing the same thing. We were really freaked out and
disgusted, so we waited until he was far enough away that he wouldn’t see where
we went, and ran into our hotel!
Observation of the Day: I should have become an archaeologist. The great thing about a career in film, is that if I do it right and become a relatively successful screenwriter and director, I'll be able to learn about and travel to so many interesting places! I have a wide range of topics I would love to explore, so I'm excited that my profession will allow me to do so in the most interesting way.
