A Tale of Two Cities

Two cities, both alike in dignity, in fair Europa where we lay our scene, where ancient customs break through to modern interpretations, where German stoplights make Sicilian streets unclean…. I introduce you to Palermo and Dűsseldorf.

I left the village of Butera feeling incredibly positive, having said yet another tearful but happy goodbye to several new friends.  (There is a spectrum of goodbyes, ranging from those that are unemotional to those that break your heart.  The best I have found is a goodbye that makes you sad but not sorrowful, that makes you cry because you care enough to cry, a goodbye that proves you knew somebody wonderful and are saying goodbye in peace.)  I took a bus South to North through mountainous and green Sicily up to the city of Palermo, where I promptly entered a different world.  By day it is perhaps like any other Italian city—bustling, confusing, riddled with cathedrals and strangely artificial public gardens.  I visited the sea, enjoyed a gelato or two, looked at architecture. But Palermo by night…. My couchsurfing host Matteo took me to the outdoor market, scrunched like a serpent into the labyrinth of winding and crowded streets, where all the youth of Palermo were gathered.  Music bumping, vendors selling arancione and zibibo, people sitting on beer crates and everybody having a good time.  Arabic and Moroccan influence meet Italian lightheartedness, and the market place became a party.  Tuesday night.  Matteo and his friends were perfect, all gathering together to cook dinner and sing (seriously, everybody set to work chopping a different vegetable, all the while singing “No Woman No Cry” in ten-part harmony and drumming on the table.) After the slow and quiet life I have been leading in the country, it was a delightful yet drastic change.  After dinner, we took to the streets, to the market.  I made a new friend—Giuseppe the journalist who reminded me of a Sicilian Woody Allen and had me laughing all night.  Everyone was relaxed, loose, open, a little crazy.  I felt I could have stayed much longer, but the next day, far too early in the morning, I boarded a flight to Dűsseldorf. 

At the station I met Birte—a friend I have not seen in nearly five years—and she introduced me to Germany.  It reminds me strikingly of home, though this could be simply that in contrast to Palermo everything is tamer.  But it is true; German city structure is decidedly more Western, and the people are decidedly less Italian.  For example, when the crosswalk light is red, a native to Dűsseldorf will stop and wait, even if there are no cars.  It would be laughable to imagine a street in Palermo with people waiting patiently on either side for the light to turn.  But Dűsseldorf is alive in its own way.  When the sun shines on the Rheine the banks are filled with people on beach towels drinking beer.  I have seen every color of the rainbow expressed either in hair color or jeans, and plazas and coffee shops are always packed with friends and families taking a relaxed, yet punctual break to enjoy each other’s company. 

I love the Rheine, and it has inspired several silly yet serious poems.  Here is one…

There is no time when I sit by the Rheine, for time, too, lost itself

I wait by the wharf in Dűsseldorf, for how long?  I could not tell.

For time on the Rheine is a swallow in flight

It journey’s with nary a care

Where the river will flow, I surely don’t know

Though I’m sure it will take me somewhere.

For there is no time as I sit by the Rheine, and time is a flying thing

At the wintery wharf in Dűsseldorf somewhere a bird starts to sing.