Theresa Maggio

These are not tree trunks, but shoots or branches the banyan tree sends down to the ground that then root. This is not even one -third the diameter of the tree. This one happens to be the largest banyan tree on the European continent.
Filippo Basile, one of Palermo's finest architects, designed this small, square park in the Liberty style. Read More 

I just realized my last eight posts were all about food and places to get it. I've been on a diet, so I'm obsessed, I guess you could say. So today I took a walk in the park. A guided tour of the Villa Garibaldi. The cast iron fence that surrounds it and the  Read More 

The food is so good and the prices so reasonable that the crowd spills out the door a full hour before traditional Sicilian lunchtime. Not so bad, though, because across the piazza is the fabulous medieval ( 1300s) Basilica di San Francesco. To see what they serve, go to www.afsf.it for mouth-watering photos  Read More 

I left thinking, now I know where the good-looking Sicilians get their good looks from.

The largest foreign population of Palermo are the people from Bangladesh. Every time I walk home from the Teatro Massimo neighborhood, down Via Maqueda to the corner of Via Napoli, I pass this one fast food place, Bangla Sonar, that emits the most delicious aromas of spices unknown to me. It's a clean, well-lit  Read More 

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Pietro Tramonte, whose family is from Gibellina, runs a bookstore in an alley in a street parallel to Via Roma. The books go from floor to ceiling and now spill out into the alley in these shelves he covers with tarps at night to protect from weather and thieves. He is also a poet.  Read More 

Norman kings were crowned in the cathedral but came out to exhibit themselves on this stone terrace behind the cathedral in Via Incoronazione.

A sunny Saturday.

Pizzo is the Sicilian word for protection money, which most businesses in Palermo still pay monthly to the mob. Read More 

Sunny this morning. First day without clouds on the mountain all March. This is our view from the kitchen balcony. Palermo is ringed by mountains except for the part bathed by the sea.