Sicily: Part One (Termini Imerese)

This is Termini Imerese in the province of Palermo, Sicily. It's the hometown of my great-grandparents Frank and Rosaria Amato. It's also the town my great-great grandfather Salvatore Amato decided to return to in order to live out his final years after he'd brought all of his sons here to Portland, OR to help them start new lives.

The view from the Falcone-Borsellino Airport which was named after two anti-mafia judges who were murdered on their way into Palermo in 1992. 

Since childhood, I've longed to return here. Back then I heard stories about Termini from other relatives who'd returned to visit family. I knew I would too, but I'd never imagined it would take this long. 

Grandma Rosaria posing at the door to her tiny kitchen empire in SE Portland. She was considered one of the best cooks in the family and time spent at her table was a gift. 

I'd heard about it from my great-grandma too. If only she could have seen me there! Just thinking about it truly brings tears to my eyes. I flew through the streets of her tiny hometown in our rental car. I think she would have smiled her wide smile and laughed a bit. 

Then she would have asked if I would be a good Italian girl now. 

Our dear rental car. I recommend the 4-door Fiat. Fun car to drive—especially through narrow twisting streets at high speeds. (Oh how I miss those olive trees!)

As soon as we arrived for our 5 days in Sicily we picked up our rental car and drove to the agricultural area just east of Termini on the opposite side of Monte San Calogero. (More on that below.) It was our home base for this part of our trip. 

Not sure if this kind of decorative chain would work in the US. I see lawsuit written all over this one.

Visiting the cemeteries while in Italy is a must—especially if it's your "home turf". 

Since many of my family members came here to Portland, Oregon generations ago, I didn't find many Amato family members, but next time I'll make the necessary connections. 

It's a complicated affair. Sicilian culture and family life is not for the meek, mild or wildly independent. You can't really be part Sicilian because you must dedicate yourself to the lifestyle with gusto and a loyal heart. 

For me, this was simply the trip where I went from dipping my toe into the pool to stepping down onto the first and second steps. (Honestly, I was way too emotional to meet relatives.) 

Next time I'll dive. This trip was really just to scout it out. As you'll see, I very much enjoyed myself.  

What a lush Crassula!

The cemetery is Termini Imerese was alive with plants and many people were there visiting gravesites.

Although the island bakes in the summer sun—with scorching sirocco winds from time to time—there are a few tall evergreens in places. (I always look for tall trees.) Overall, the inner island was much greener than I'd expected it to be but it was logged long ago by the Greeks and Romans. It was fun to try and imagine what the original island must have been like botanically but since humans have been living there for so long it's impossible to know.

Sicily is rustic. It is full of folk traditions and simplicity. There are no false pretenses. Everything central to the society and important is hidden, and yet much of life is lived out in the open. Sicily is elaborate and ornate, and yet it is gut wrenchingly brutally honest.

Much more is spoken with the eyes and the body than the mouth. That is Sicilian. That's why the island is advertised as "being for poets". It truly is a magical and unique place.

Not sure what this succulent was, but it caught my eye. (I'd love to grow one here at home.)

The whole cemetery was full of amazing plants, planters, and cut flowers. There were so many unique variations on the same theme.

Then there was this guy.

In his left hand he's holding a pack of cigarettes. I was a bit shocked he wasn't holding coffee in the right hand, but instead, it's eternally posed in such a way as to have a flower inserted into it.

I'm sure that his conversation with God is always an interesting one. Sicily is dramatic.

This sculpture was my favorite. In addition to the woman's facial expression—which is uniquely Sicilian and deadpan to me—she is admiring the agricultural products still harvested on the island.

She appears almost uniquely longing for the life of the harvest but is unable to reach it any more. This was really touching to me.

From the top of the hill in town it was truly a vista looking east towards Monte San Calogero.

Just a few paces from there we reached a park where many residents promenade.

I was of course fond of this broken down concrete baby greeting us at its gates.

I cannot recall the name of this tree but I've seen it before in San Diego, CA. Its orange flowers looked lovely against the shades of terra cotta paint and clear sapphire blue sky.

Down below was the older part of town. There is a park there and a square with a gelateria. It's the park I'd seen in postcards depicted in black and white. It's where my Grandma Rosaria had celebrated many festivals as a girl.

Of course we went there several times for gelato and while walking and eating I noticed this sweet act of Sicilian plant kindness.

It would have been fun to take more photos of private gardens but in Sicily I didn't like to take many photos without permission.

Trust me, if you've been there and you care and respect the people, you'll know exactly what I mean. You just don't walk around taking lots of pictures. It makes you stand out and that's the last thing you want to do.

For many generations my male family members were greengrocers and I very much wanted to see how that had come to pass. During this trip, the greatest joy was seeing the trade still fully functioning in a modern world.

Leaving Termini this is what you see if you head east and up the valley where we were staying. In the distance, many small truck farmer plots can be seen. For generations this is how farming has worked in this part of Sicily. I've read accounts of this kind of agriculture in other parts of Italy too, but it's not as common nowadays.

The most difficult part was that it is still a job and a lifestyle for men. In Sicily there is still a very wide gender divide and women only tend to small planters and garden plots attached to their own homes.

I should add that you don't see many women at all. There are some working, but there are many you don't see because they're at home. Even those who are working, are often behind the scenes, unseen.

The mother where we stayed did all of the cooking, yet she remained hidden the whole time we stayed there. I caught a glance of her one evening, but she saw me and went back inside of her room.

This was a familiar arrangement to me, but I can't deny how torn it made me feel. On the other hand, it helped me to better understand my own family.

The view of Monte San Calogero from our room was breathtaking. The scent of the artichoke farms in the morning is something I'll never forget. This place was already imprinted on me but being there fleshed it all out for me. I have never felt so at home.

Just for contrast, this is a town in the interior of Sicily. I stopped to take this photo on our way from an ancient Roman villa to see Greek temples in Agrigento.

I know many people love Tuscany, but I'm Sicilian and I'll never stop loving the light, the colors, the sounds, the tastes, and the silence of the people of Sicily. It's in my blood. It's an even larger part of me than I'd known until I visited there.

Yes, Sicily gave Italy cannolo(i), gelato(i), and sorbetto(i) too. Don't believe me? Look it up! For this reason alone I'll take Sicily over the rest of Italy. It's such a rich place culturally and it's so unlike any other place in the world.

It may have been invaded many times, and it's been ruled by many people, but that's what makes it so unique. My own DNA shows signs of the island's rich genetic and cultural history. Where else do you find Greek, Italian, Middle Eastern, North African, Spanish, and French influences blended together? Nowhere else!

Each night we returned to our room at the farm.

Our room was at one end, and at the other, some young Sicilian men returned each evening from working somewhere in the area on the artichoke harvest.

Normally you'd say 'Hi' or acknowledge another with a nod. Because I'm a married woman, for several days they pretended not to see me. It felt strange, but I knew the game.

One day the obvious leader of the group said 'Hi' to me very nervously in English. I was sitting in a common area near where we all ate. It was the only spot in the place with Wifi and I was alone. It was obvious he didn't know much more English than that so he then laughed nervously and hurried off.

After that, a few others in the group cast me sideways glances, but out of respect, they never said anything more. By the time our visit was ending, I felt very safe around them. That's how Sicily works. It's all about trust and respect. They respected me, and it led me to trust them more. This means everything to a Sicilian and I enjoyed the interaction immensely.

We also went to Cefalù and saw what sanitized and safe tourist-friendly Sicily looks like and I loved it there as well. The intensity of personal interactions was lessened dramatically and we walked around freely without the eyes of the people upon us. (We also had a lovely married couple comedy routine in Italian with a local cheesemonger while we were there. John and I made the young man crack up and I felt like we were really fitting in just fine.)

I was also able to take this photo of a produce vendor. The old donkey carts my family used have been replaced with these little trucks. As you drive around the Palermo area you see them everywhere. They have the freshest produce in them and they get to market quickly. They simply pull up to the street, park and vend.

And of course that little truck had fresh local artichokes! So glad we ate them in a zillion dishes at the Agriturismo La Targa Florio.

Oh the fresh artichokes of Sicily!

I won't soon forget you and your sister the mythical ancient pistachio of Bronte.

To be continued...

My Garden To Do List: 2014

Happy 2014!

I hope you, your family, your pets and your plants are all thriving, alive, and well.

As for me, I'm recovering from a busy holiday season and am relaxing in bed with my two loyal felines. I can see a few trees from my back garden out the bedroom window and the weather is cool and crisp in Portland. There is sunshine mixed with some hazy fog and it's beautiful out right now.

What a great time to be thinking about gardening.

It's still seed shopping season so I'm continuing to dream today about the months ahead. I'm making plans for the garden.

The list so far isn't a long list, but that's because it's 2014 now and I'm planning on working and traveling a lot more this year. The list must be manageable.

There will be plenty to post about and to follow again. I'm dedicated to being a garden blogger and communicator. My only hope is to expand my writing a bit more beyond the blog.

So, here's what's on the menu for 2014.

1: Edit. Edit. Edit. Then edit some more.
There cannot be enough said about editing. I don't plan to make this place picture perfect—and definitely not matchy-matchy—but it will be edited. I'm eternally nothing more than a wild Bohemian at heart and my garden needs to better reflect that back to the world. Gardens are, after all, somewhat a reflection of what's going on inside of us in a deeply aesthetic and often personally spiritual realm. That is when they're personal gardens, and not simply designed to function as low-maintenance or move-in ready. Mine is not yet as intimate as it will be, but I'll get there.

I also want to better define a Bohemian Garden, or maybe you might already call it an Artist's Garden. A whole thesis could be written on this and maybe that's what I'll be starting this year. Who know!?!

Gardens need more categories and words. I'm beginning to realize how limiting many of the definitions can be so it will be fun to use my art criticism and aesthetic theory for some good. I honestly cannot wait.

2: Finalize a design for a fence along the back of the the garden. 
This is of the utmost importance. Anyone who knows me knows that this has been a thorn in my side for many years—pretty much ever since I moved into this house. The design challenge is upon us and I am so excited about it finally happening. Sure, I would love an 8-foot stone wall, but since that's not going to happen, what other options are there?

3: Plant lots and lots of seeds again this winter and spring. 
Seeds have stories and a provenance. A Bohemian Garden is a Collector's Garden, but instead of having scientifically collected data and facts, there are stories too.

4: Expand the herb garden and redevelop the kitchen garden. (We're looking to rent community garden space again too. We have a lot of heirloom and Italian veggies we're looking forward to growing.) 
Well, a girl has to eat right?

In all seriousness, for me, eating foods I've grown matters because I'm an Oregonian and an Italian-American. It is traditional for my family to eat what it grows, or else to purchase fresh produce. It's respectable and honorable. This is my heritage and a part of who I am and where I come from. Self-sufficiency was important to my pioneering relatives. It is important to me too. I am looking forward to writing more kitchen garden and cooking posts here too now. I've got some skillz in that realm that I've seriously underemployed for many years.

Then there is the extra added value of being able to have produce you can't buy at any grocery store or farmers' market. That feels good. It's like going on a major expedition to bring back something very special to share with others. I am getting hungry just thinking about the cooking plans I already have for the garden harvest of 2014.

5: Creatively redesigning some space for outdoor dining. 
Sharing a meal with a spouse, family, and/or friends is what good living is all about—especially when you grew some of it yourself. (Or caught. More on fishing some other time...)

I sound kind of Italian, but I am kind of Italian. Food is very important to me, and so is the community of sharing built around food. It is what makes a good life a great life.

6: Add a lovely European-style flower box to the front of the house and dress the place up a bit. 
The uncertainty of my time spent in this house is coming to an end. It's going to become my home in 2014, and I'm looking forward to making it a place that brings comfort and calm, peace and pleasure to my family, friends, and most of all, to me.

2014: The Year of the Bohemian Garden.
Hope you're looking forward to this as much as I am.
Happy 2014!

Wordless Wednesday: I giardini delle due donne

Climbing Monkshood (Aconitum episcopale) grown from seed.

Staghorn Fern (Platycerium) in its new home.

Pink Turtlehead (Chelone obliqua) grown from seed. Sadly the plant was eaten a bit this year.

The backyard.

Tradescantia 'Bridal Veil'.

Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis).

Fuchsia 'Celia Smedley'.

Unknown Rosa.

Unknown cabbage (Brassica). 

Notorious female feline.

Potted geraniums (Pelargonium), with St. Francis statuary, at the home of an Italian woman. 

Happy Blogoversary! Amateur Bot-ann-ist Turns 5 and Ficurinia Celebrates with Some Prickly Pears

Usually I'd post a Wordless Wednesday post here but today is special so I will forgo that formality.

Today my blog turns 5 and I wanted to celebrate. The cheesecake is not yet complete, but the prickly pear sauce for it is, and now you can all hear about my relationship with the prickly pear...

First off, that's not Pepto-Bismol pink. This is no shy fruit color. It will stain you and stain you well. It's Barbie pink, hot pink, not understated pink, and it's loud and proud.

Tasting of apple and watermelon, it's really a strange fruit. Not sure if these were unripe or older fruits though since they happened to taste more of Aloe vera to me, but they tasted of prickly pear and that's all that matters. Tasting subtly of prickly pear is the way to go. (Yes, I eat Aloe vera too.)

I will have pics of the chèvre cheesecake that will be drizzled with this stuff up here tomorrow and I'll include a recipe with it. 

So for now, just enjoy the warmth your computer screen is giving off because you've stopped to look at my blog. I am happy you're here and grateful too.

Here's to the next 5 years!!!

*****

Ficurinia is Sicilian dialect for prickly pear and I chose it as an online name years ago because of a story my father used to tell me about my Sicilian-American grandfather. 

As a boy, his family had driven to CA to visit my Grandma Virginia's brothers. Once over the Oregon/California border my grandfather was looking for every opportunity to stop and eat prickly pear cactus fruits. My father told me that as he sat in the car, pulled over next to the highway, he watched as his dad chowed down and other cars passed them. It embarrassed him that his father was acting like such an "immigrant" and he was ashamed. Later in life, after he'd lost his father, he regretted having felt that way. 

I never knew my grandfather since I was born after he died. This story about him always fascinated me though and I wanted to eat the fruit myself to see what it was that drew him to it. During my 20s when I had the opportunity I fell in love with them too. Though I don't eat them often, when I do, I think of my Grandpa. I think of him eating them while stationed in Italy during WWII and I imagine him eating them along the highways of CA whenever I go in search of seeds. 

Through the prickly pear I am firmly connected to what I can only call the most mysterious and special part of myself. I am a gardener and I love plants and it is a gift that comes from somewhere deep inside of me. When I close my eyes to look into the still darkness it is the prickly pear I see and it is the image connected to the tie that binds me to the earth. I should add that it connects me to the kitchen too. But more on those activities later...

Salvatore Amato, soldier (October 31, 1944).

My Sicilian great-grandfather Frank Amato, my Grandma Virginia, my father as a baby, my Grandpa Sam. (Looks to me like someone might have been working in his garden that day.

È arrivato l'autunno! And darkness is falling...

Virginia Creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia) from the bedroom window. 

Due to my seed collecting and my husband's grape harvesting, bottling, and pressing, for us autumn is when we return to our roots. It's when I begin to feel like cooking again and it's when I return to my Catholic past. From now until Easter we'll cover all of the holidays with food and friends. Once Easter hits though it's back to the "fields" for both of us. (I still have 4 weeks though before Mr B returns home for winter from California. That's when the kitchen really gets going!)

Burst of gold from the bedroom window. That's our old garage behind the house and beside it is our overgrown willow  arbor. (This is what happens when you break your pruning fingers.)

This year I will be making one last road trip to the San Francisco Bay area and I will be taking everyone along with me again. Believe it or not blogging along the way makes the traveling a bit less lonely. And trust me, the Redwoods in the rain and fog can be very scary even for this girl from the heavily forested Pacific Northwest. 

Looking into the heart of the Cyclamen. 

Before I leave I still have so much work to do and that's why my blogging has been a bit slow. At least the Ikebana work has been picking up thanks to my enrollment in a course. My teacher is a wonderful woman I met over 20 years ago when I worked with her husband as an ESL helper for Japanese exchange students. He is also a much loved Buddhist minister and it was such an honor to me that he came to our class solely to say "Hello" to me on my first day. I am still smiling about that! Glowing really.

Perennial Impatiens arguta.

Autumn has had a few surprised for me in the garden too. With the onslaught of a lot of rain, my perennial Impatiens has gone crazy with bloom after bloom. It is so beautiful to see such delicate jewels just before it's the end of the season. The lilac is so unlike so many of the other fall colors but I don't mind a bit.

I couldn't help but chuckle a bit when this box arrived on my doorstep. It's full of dried plant material for crafts, as well as heat sealable teabags and dried kelp for making compost teabags. 

There are all of the last minute craft projects too that I have been planning for my shop. Some are things I have always wanted to sew, like sachet bags, and some are new ideas, like bath time teabags with fresh local dried hops and honeycomb extract from France. Sounds tasty too, right?

Dried Praying mantis. 

Autumn is also the time we have to say goodbye to things we find beautiful until the next season, and when I found this amazing specimen dried between my exterior and interior window today, it saddened me and I felt a little tear well up in my eye, but there will be more Praying mantis bugs in my garden next year. Until then, it's a little bit of feasting around these parts...

"Ogghiu di 'n summa, vinu di 'mmenzu e meli di 'n funnu." 

"The choice oil is from the surface, the best wine is from the middle, 

and the best honey is from the bottom."—Sicilian saying

(I tend to practice my Italian this time of year too by singing a lot out of boredom so here's a little Italian pop music courtesy of my favorite Italian singer Jovanotti. The first one is a corny love song, the second is a classic funny song about love, and then the last one is s new "magic happy" song I am kind of really into right now and the foster kids seem to love it because it's bouncy: Baciami Ancora, Bella & La notte dei desideri).

Entertaining from the Garden (and the Heart) with the Hands and the Head

Whenever my husband drives up from California, I make plans with as many people as I can because when he was a cook—and then a chef—this was entirely impossible. Now that we care for foster children, and he works out of state at a vineyard in California, this becomes even more of a challenge at times. It seems we are getting a feel for it though and yesterday we had a smashing success when I invited over an old Italian friend from college who I hadn't seen in years!

The most difficult part for me is often just letting go of the menu completely. I want to do this, and I need to do this, and I can trust my husband completely, but it can be a difficult dance because it begins and ends quickly. This time, it went something like this, "Italian brunch to me means: frittata, leftover pasta from the night before, fruit and lots of veggies." We planned to go to the Farmer's Market on Saturday and that was the end of it. I turned to crafting with the foster respite and cleaning the house while additionally getting ready for our impending trip to California.

The Farmer's Market was amazing and I just pointed at a few green items and I honestly had no idea what the plan was and I didn't ask. The chef likes some mystery.

Yesterday, before our guest arrived, I looked around in the garden for some flowers to harvest for the table. I knew we had what I refer to as "bread and butter" Dutch irises in the Hell Strip by the street so I picked one of them first. It went swimmingly from there: long-spurred Aquilegia, Aucuba Gold Dust, and then some orange Buddleja globosa for some umph!

Then our foster respite asked me if I was going to use the other cool black Japanese vase and I thought about what to add to it. The Green Rose Rosa viridiflora immediately dove into the vase with a low wrap of Coleus and I didn't even have to think about it.

Our guest arrived, and with his help, our table was lovingly set reminding me in so many ways of the rituals done almost without thought but with great reverence during the Mass. Again, I am not a seriously devout Catholic nowadays, but I will always be Catholic by culture and I am proud of that as an Italian-American. 

We brunched upon a spring beet salad with fresh greens and a horseradish and walnut oil dressing, a spring asparagus frittata with a splash of white truffle oil, dragonfruit, honeydew melon, and mango, and lastly, there was a peanut soup with spring peas and a splash of whipped coconut cream. (This last course was added due to gluten and dairy intolerances and it was a perfect surprise!)

In addition to the fruit, our guest also brought carnations and I immediately thought of something I had read last week about the American singer Katy Perry. How could she demand that there be no carnations in her trailer? Sure we all have issues with some kind of flower for some kind of personal reason, but these little dolls were just so cute yesterday I just adored them. (These are for you Katy Perry XOXO.)

In less than a day, we will be departing for another whirlwind plant and garden tour from Portland, to the Bay Area of San Francisco, and then back again along the southern Oregon Coast. This time there will be more gardens, more plants, and who knows what kind of shenanigans! 

Hopefully I will not be soaking wet and shivering like I was last time when I did this about two months ago. Our rain totals so far this year are seriously off the charts. ¡Gracias La Niña! Now pleeeeaaaaase go away!

Marin County Open Gardens 2011