Thursday, July 4, 2013

Amalfi Civil War & Ravello

Tuesday started off like any other day:  we had breakfast and cappuccino over looking the sea, walked into town to catch the bus to Ravello, etc. Since we were thinking about hiking back from Ravello, mom decided she should buy a hat for protection from the sun. And so started the Amalfi Civil war. As you you can imagine in a small town built into a cliff, stores run right up against each other and some of said stores sell pretty much the same junk. So mom finds a hat she likes at store 1. I keep looking to make sure there isn't something else at store 2, which literally blends with store 1. There are different awnings so we picked up on the difference. Mom remained in the unmarked borders of store 1 while I went over to enemy territory. I found a possible front runner and handed the hat across the invisible boundary for Mom to try on. Keep in mind we are both in one of the stores sidewalk boundaries. Shop owner 2 is right beside me and fine that I have handed one of her hats over to mom. Shop owner 1 screems from inside her doorway, "Miss that hat belongs to this shop," referring to the original hat mom was holding. Mom nods and smiles to acknowledge that she is aware and isn't going anywhere. Shop owner 1 then sees mom try on the enemy's hat and all hell breaks loose. She screeches from inside the store "come in and try on my hat, I have a mirror."  That must have been the shot heard round the piazza because shop owner #2 starts telling at her in Italian. Then owner #1 starts screaming back and we are in an all out old Italian lady bitch match. Moms eyes get wide as saucers and I'm just standing there with my mouth hanging open. I know shits going south when I  hear#2 call #1 a cretin. At this point mom has put down the original hat in favor of the second and #2s son has come out to break up the fight. I am now desperately trying not to laugh for fear of getting hit by one of the old birds. People on the street are just staring. It was awesome!!!!  As we pay for the hat #2 apologizes and says she has been putting up with that old woman for 30 years and today was the last straw. And I thank her for waiting till today to lose her mind!
Here she is at the scene of the crime 

Once we created civil strife between neighbors we boarded a bus to Ravello. Only in Italy can do many people be packed into a bus that will be driving through cliffs and around hairpin turns suitable only for a donkey. I would NEVER have survived the Sita bus front Sorrento to Amalfi. Ravello is a small beautiful little town hanging on the edge of a cliff with crazy awesome views. They do a summer concert series in the gardens of Villa Rufolo, which would be pretty spectacular to see. We had an damn fine lunch at Cumpa Cosimo of mixed posts and of course a litre of house white wine.  And because we are so charming we also got a sample of the best damn tiramisu I've ever had.

 View from Villa Rufolo

 Villa Rufolo

 Concert space

  Villa Rufolo perfect name for a store in Ravelllo
The lemons grown on the Amalfi coast are HUGE

Once back in Amalfi we had beers in the main piazza then headed to dinner at a little place near our hotel. Il Preferito is run by a very sweet old man who is also a little on the dirty old man side. I dropped my fork and when he went to pick it up he rubbed his face on my leg. He also put on American music just for us with a lineup that included Elvis then Lauren Hill, followed by Lionel Richie . . .interesting. At least it ended with free Limoncello, yay!!

Beer and church, amen!






1 comment:

LaLa said...

What a great story! You always have crazy happenings on your trips.

Those lemons are massive, you could play baseball with them!