Liberation Day - Invasion

Liberation Day, the 25th of April, is now celebrated as the day Italy was liberated by the Americans from, uh. . .um. . . Italy. It was the day that the insurgents, as our president would call them, democratically overthrew the elected government of Mussolini, and replaced it with the provisional government appointed and approved by the Allies. Two days later Mussolini was hung upside down. Things were quicker back then.

Anyway, many patriotic Italians will try to tell you, before they think about it, that Liberation Day celebrates Italy's freedom from Nazi Germany. So of course two days after Liberation Day, I was 'invaded' by a German couple from Frankfurt. Kirsten was a friend of a woman I met on the train between Stuttgart and Mannheim, and Tomas is her boyfriend. Because Nadja and her husband could not visit, they sent Kirsten and Tomas instead.

They had planned on staying only one night, and ended up spending four. They toured this part of Sicily on their motorcycles during the day, getting as far afield as Corleone (in the rain) and in the evening they came back for long talks about everything from politics to life in America, Germany, and rural Sicily. They moved on in time to get to Siracusa for the Labor Day celebration, but I was sad to see them go. I look forward to the opportunity to visit them, along with Nadja and her husband, in Frankfurt. Indeed, as I sat on the terrace with them, I once again felt lucky - this time lucky to find and get to know such wonderful people.