2012-4-13 Naples

Bill's family on his mother's side is from this area. Everywhere we went I looked for his nose. 

We took the panoramic bus tour of Naples today. Again, we had a well educated guide. Alfredo (just like the sauce) speaks Italian, English, French, German and Dutch. He had a little patter going. He said the police are all looking for him because he is the great grandson of Al Capone. He also said he is the only Italian who can’t sing. He tried to sing once last year and that’s another reason why the police are looking for him.

His narrative about Naples was considerably different than the last guide’s narrative about Palermo. He loves Naples but he lives in Pompeii. It takes him an hour on the train to get to the port. His grandparents still live in Naples but it’s an expensive place.

He said that people don’t eat breakfast here. They have a cup of expresso in the morning. By lunchtime, they are starved. They go home about one o’clock for their big meal. Then, they take a nap and go back to work about 4. Obviously, he can’t do this as a guide. It’s what he wishes he could do. We haven’t noticed any stores closing down for siesta but heard that it still happens in the countryside.

He said Naples has the best pizza dough and tomato sauce because of the water. They have excellent tasting water and it improves all kinds of food. He talked about Pizza Napolitano and Pizza Marguerita. They are both simple, well-known versions of pizza.

People in Naples do not worry about the future according to Alfredo. They believe ”Que Sera, Sera”—what will be, will be. He says they don’t plan ahead, they don’t drive carefully and they don’t worry about time (although they are always in a hurry and always late). He believes the reason they don’t worry is that they live in the shadow of an active volcano. They are pretty clear on what can happen at any time.

On one subject, our guide agreed with the gal from yesterday. They both referred to all the buildings built during Mussolini’s leadership as “Fascist buildings”. They are solid, simple concrete constructions with no sense of style or grace. These buildings are obviously disdained by the locals. They prefer the traditional Italian buildings with balconies and frescos.

Alfredo also said (with no prompting) that the biggest problems they have in Italy are due to the politicians in Rome. He thinks the mafia is much less harmful than the government. This seems like the common belief of the younger people, at least.

It was humid today and my camera got all fogged up. It was warm so I went swimming in the Lido pool after lunch. I chatted in the pool with Jean, a retired third grade teacher from Ohio. I meet many teachers on HAL.

We said goodbye to our dinner friends, John and Judy, who are going home tomorrow. It will be a big laundry day with all the bed linens being changed tomorrow. We sent our laundry in this morning and got it back this evening. It costs $30 for all you can stuff into one of their bags. There is no self-service laundry on the Eurodam.