Theresa Maggio

More than 300 dead. The 29 bodies were just those that were recovered. There four gommoni, large rubber rafts, in the worst seas the Italian coast guard had ever seen. The survivors said they were forced to leave Libya at gunpoint. The 29 bodies were PEOPLE WHO HAD BEEN RESCUED off the coast of Libya but died  Read More 

Twenty-nine people died of exposure to the cold on a rescue from the sea. They died while being rushed to Lampedusa, the Sicilian island closest to Africa. They were rescued from some of the worst conditions at sea, waves twenty feet high.

Update: here is the story in the NYT:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/10/ Read More 

Voyages of desperation. The Mediterranean is a graveyard for people trying to escape, war, famine, cruel dictators and genocide at the hands of Boko Haram.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/luciano52/15097563993/


Photo slide show of Serpotta's white plaster sculptures at Palermo. Incredible.
Photos by Luciano Romeo. Excellent!!!! Open the slide show and use the zoom tool to see the incredible details.

Here is a fine shot of Palermo by day, the same scene as Palermo by Night, of my Feb. 1 blog post below. If you don't look down at the refuse and garbage on the ground, things look really good.

This park,used very much by retired me who sit in the sun and play cards, has been vandalized, abused and neglected, like so many spots in Palermo. You have to take the good with the bad here.

Here is the mosaic of Il Capo, one of Palermo's three suqs. It is an art deco (in Sicily they would say Stile Liberty) mosaic depicting Demeter, the goddess of grains and agriculture, the mother of Persephone, and it is embedded in the exterior wall of the now closed Panificio Morello. A few tiles  Read More 

The feast is happening live, now, and Antenna Sicilia broadcasts salient parts live on the internet for several hours at a time.

Today Sergio Mattarella, who in 1980 pulled his dead brother, Piersanti, then President of the Sicilian region, from his car, was elected President of the Republic of Italy. Yes, if you lose your brother to dirty assassins, you are a victim. A man from the south, one who has shed tears because of the Mafia, is now at the head of the country.  Read More 

She is never more beautiful. This is a view of the Palermo cathedral from a rooftop in the historic center. Photographer unknown to me.