A:

The title of this entry refers to the museums set in "The Chimneys" which used to house the sulphur works of Catania. The area now houses a cultural precinct, and we visited three museums this morning. (They all close at 1pm so we made sure we got there when they opened at 9). The Museum of the Landing (Museo dello Sbarco in Sicilia 1943) was our first stop and we paid our four Euros each and were given a guided tour in English at the commencement of our time there. (M: I think we were the only people in the museum the whole time we were there.) This museum was excellent and very realistic. At the start there is a replica of a typical Sicilan street and then we had to go through to an underground bunker complete with Sicilan chatter, vibrations, bombs overhead and smoke in the darkness. How frightening for the local people it must have been when the Americans and British bombed Sicily for 39 days in July and August 1943 to expel the Fascists.

M:

I couldn't help reflecting on the similarity of the experience that Dad would have had in Malta. The difference was that Catania only had 87 bombings (only!) while Malta had thousands.

A:

The Allies were led by General Patton (USA) and General Montgomery (Britain). There were photos of Australian soldiers standing in front of the Duomo, handing out food and mixing with the population after the invasion was complete. The museum had some very impressive, life size wax models of Hitler, Mussolini, King Victor Emmanuel III, Churchill etc.(M: Il Duce gets the cover page for this entry)

We could have spent more time but decided to check out the cinematography museum (Museo del Cinema) next door which also cost 4 Euros each.

M:

The tradition of personal treatment continued. Again we seemed to be the only people visiting - we outnumbered the staff, and again we got a personal guide - but this time for the whole museum. The benefits of the off-season!

A:

This time our guide spoke only in Italian (fair enough!) and Mick did an excellent job of translating for me. This museum was also very good and showed the history of movie making starting with the early drawings found in French caves, to the hieroglyphics of the Egyptians to crude cartoons made with a series of pictures twirled around a string to Charlie Chaplin type movies, to what we have today. The museum was organised around the themes of various rooms in the house - the kitchen, bedroom, bathroom, dining room, lounge room etc. In the various rooms they had screens in all places imaginable eg inside a fridge, in plates on the dining table, on the top of a bed. Each room had its own compilation of clips on a repeated cycle. (For example in the dining room there were clips about food so we saw a Woody Allen movie with him and Dianne Keaton and a crab) and in the bathroom an old movie about a man shaving. In the living room we also saw parts of the movie we have been watching in the flat over the last two evenings: Il Gattopardo. There were also two photos on the walls taken from this movie.

M:

The thing that struck me was the great Italian passion for movies, and yet the bulk of the material was quite Hollywood - including the "Godfather" room - about gangsters of course, and dominated by "Il Padrone". (Oh, and Woody Allen was clearly a favourite of the curator.)

A:

This was so good we asked our guide who had whisked us through, if we could go back to take a closer look by ourselves and he agreed so we did.

The final museum that we had only 35 minutes for was the Toy Museum but this was a lot smaller and also cheaper ie 2 Euros each. (M: and 35 minutes was about 20 minutes too long!)There was a display of toys and dolls some of which had been made in 1890. There was also a monopoly game from Verona which was claimed to be the first in Italy.

Sicily is famous for its puppets but unfortunately we seem to have lucked out here as there are no shows in town at the moment. Mick sent an email to the place where they are made which conducts tours but we have not yet had a response.

That evening we found a trattoria called La Norma on Via Umberto and had a lovely meal there after the waiter and his wife welcomed us and then the waiter spent some time explaining everything we may need to know about his menu. This is dining Sicilian style and was so different to the Trattoria we had eaten at a few nights ago when the attendants were much more interested in the football game on the TV- Milan AC vs a team from Russia. Mick enjoyed cuttlefish and I had some grilled small fish that looked like anchovies. We also had potatoes cooked in the oven and some other vegetables and bread. We were given a glass of limoncello to wind things up- delicious (M: and free!).

The final event of the day was to attend a live performance at Lo Zo', again in the Ciminiere precinct, to which our soon to be landlord Massimo had invited us . His wife Biancamaria was performing. The couple live in Malta now having moved three years ago from Rome. They happened to be in Catania tonight for this performance which involved Biancamaria reading various stories and another woman playing the piano at the same time or during breaks in the dialogue. The first story was about the little elephants Babar and Celeste, then there was some rather harrowing music composed by an American, and finally a Maltese musician had put music to five Maltese fables. It was something we had never seen/ heard before. We thanked Biancamaria and Massimo and their daughter Delfina afterwards and walked the twenty or so minutes back to the flat.

M:

The music was not really to our taste, but both Biancamaria and the pianist were technically very skilled. I think the crowd may have been a bit disappointing (about 2/3 full) but that didn't dampen the ardour of the performers. It was great to see this cross section of Catanian society - a bit different from the market stall holders, tour guides and cafe proprietors with whom we had been mingling so much.

A:

One final comment about today is the recurring elephant theme. This evening we had a story about an elephant. Catania has an elephant as its emblem- right near the Duomo of St Agatha! Also I had picked up a book dearly beloved on our first night in the Catania flat of "The Just So Stories" by Kipling which I loved as a child and you guessed it- I read "The Elephant's Child" where the little elephant has to go on a trip to the "great, grey, greasy Limpopo River all set about with fever trees." I knew nothing about the Catania elephant at the time. (This book is intended for people who are learning English as it has explanations on every second page.)

M:

Reflection on a couple of Italian paradoxes.

1/ Where do all the coins and small denomination notes go in Italy? If shop holders keep insisting that they have no change, then take yours, surely they already have it all already, and can't really expect you to have it? In any case, gettone are no more (phone tokens) and no one has given me a lolly in change yet! Maybe it's just a habit from the old days?

2/ How can a country with such an incredible sense of style in architecture, furniture and clothing tolerate such chaotic and run down street fronts? I suspect it has something to do with the sense of the public and the private...