A sojourn in Sicily

I love Italy. I love the history, the wonderful architecture, the glorious food, the amazing wines and I love the people, especially the people.  I have met princes and principessas and I have met farmers and factory workers. Of all the people I have met, there would be just a handful of men and women who I would not like to meet again and that’s saying something when I have been there over 80 times. I have made lifelong friends and every time I get back home I am already thinking of when I can go back.



Palermo

During my trips I have made several journeys to Sicily where I have seen Palermo and its beautiful baroque buildings and lively markets, the towering Erice that overlooks the land and sea, Monreale - which surely must be in the ‘Top Ten’ of the most beautiful churches in the world and the Greek ruins at Selinunte. I have been to the centre of the island where the land is  a golden yellow carpet of wheat and the slopes are a vibrant green with vines and the rocky outcrops that offer protection for the wild sheep and goats. I’ve been to the Straits of Messina, where the mainland can be seen on a clear day. However, I am not going to tell you about all those things, rather I am going to tell you about another comical tale of woe, my trip to ‘Wine Sicily’ where things as normal, went completely wrong. It was about ten years ago but I remember it as if it was yesterday.

I was chosen to be part of a group of six of picked by the Italian Trade Commission as representatives from Australia. This time I was the only journalist, the rest of the group were retailers and importers from Sydney, Melbourne and South Australia. I left for Italy a couple of days earlier than the group accompanied by a representative, Luana, from the Italian Trade Commission in Sydney. We arrived in Sicily and headed straight for the town of Marsala where for two days until the rest of the group arrived. We went sightseeing, ate in a few restaurants and went shopping. It was lovely to be able to enjoy ourselves and relax before the work began.




Erice

Looking down  Erice

Our accommodation was in a hotel on the edge of town. It was ‘four star’ without a restaurant (common in Italy) and without much service either. We basically came and went as we pleased and made sure we were home by 11.00pm when they locked the doors. Asking the reception anything meant huge sighs and dirty looks. Our outlook was bleak, we were both given rooms at the back of the hotel which looked out onto a building site (someone had started building a massive building but there was never anybody there while we were) and several industrial units. The hotel, which had been booked out for the whole event by the organisers, had views of the beach and ocean at the front and these rooms were given to the Italian guests of Wine Sicily. This was the perfect opportunity for encouraging international tourism by giving these rooms to the non-Italian guests but this obviously had not crossed their minds.



Saltpans of Marsala

At last everyone arrived. The group, which consisted of 40 importers and large retailers, had all been bussed to Marsala from Palermo and we had just that night together to get to know one another. Our little group of Australians decided to go to a pizzeria called ‘Detroit’, which Luana and I had discovered while waiting for their arrival. It was a memorial to everything Elvis, the decorations, the music and even the pizzas, which were named after Elvis hits. A group of four Canadians attending the wine show waled in and we invited them to sit with us. We had a great time swapping stories and just relaxing. The lone female in their group whose name shall remain silent to protect the innocent (hello Paula), had never been to Italy before and decided to try a shot of Sambuca after our pizzas. We warned her after the second glass that it was quite potent, she said she often had shots of tequila like this and drank several more. She appeared to be coping okay and managed to walk back to the hotel unaided. The next morning however, she looked like death warmed up and had a terrible hangover. She wore dark glasses all day and I don’t think she drank again - except for the tastings - for the rest of the trip.

A church in the distance - Erice

We were up bright and early and had breakfast in the hotel. Hotels in Italy always offer breakfast in a breakfast room but the room remains empty for the rest of the day. It seems a pity not to be able to have meals in the hotel but the cost of having the extra staff and possibly not filling the room prevents this. There are so many inexpensive trattorie, osterie and ristorante that it simply isn’t worth their while.

We were loaded onto buses and taken out to a tiny place called Palavetro. We were never quite sure whether Palavetro was the name of a town or the name of the old aircraft hangar that the wine show was in as we couldn’t see any houses nearby. It was located next to an air force landing strip and planes would come and take off and land every five minutes. It was obviously somewhere they trained the pilots of these military jets. The noise of them taking off and then the sonic boom was horrendous.

We were dropped off at the front doors and the buses left. There was no one to greet us, to tell us where to go, there had been no instructions apart from ‘get on the bus at 8.30’. We were in the middle of nowhere, even the Italians who been on the bus with us were confused. Finally we saw some cars in the distance - or rather we saw the dust of the unsealed road being thrown up as they drew closer.  They finally reached us and without further ado opened the doors. They had started the previous day to set things up and the exhibition was nearly ready. 

We were herded to an area and told to wait. Again, no one was there telling us what was going to happen. You can imagine every one was feeling a little frazzled by this point - the Italian guests included. We had been there nearly an hour when finally someone came over and directed us to another area with seating and tables and we were told the tasting would begin. We would be tasting 36 wines and after that we would be allowed to talk to the producers. That sounded great as we could see the producers had stands set up on the other side of the building. For the importers, they could talk to new producers, for the journalists we could talk to those already exporting. It sounded great.

However, and there’s always a ‘however’ when it comes to things like this, there was a catch. We would not find that out until later!

Planting new vineyards at Planeta

Before the tasting a gentleman got up and introduced himself and the relevant people standing around watching us. There was the president of the Consorzio,  an ‘assessore’ (from the local department of agriculture), the local mayor, Signore this and Signore that and by the time he had finished we had all lost the will to live. He then continued with his welcome for another ten minutes - which was lovely to think we were important enough to have this speech written especially for us but it was done in Italian and I would say that 80% of the visitors did not speak Italian. They were lost during the introductions.

Temples at Selinunte

An interpreter appeared for the tastings. We were all set or so we thought, famous last words. Apparently we were going to taste all 36 white wines without a break (the reds we would taste after lunch). I have done this before as a judge at Vinitaly. It really doesn’t help you evaluate the wines but at least you get to pick out the volatile or the badly made wines and we were there just to try the wines with a view to import. One of the group piped up and asked that maybe we could have a five minute break after half the wines had been tasted. Not necessarily for us but it would help us with the wines as some people had never tried some of the varieties and it would help us recover our palates. This was agreed upon and we started tasting.

Each wine was poured and then the producer came out and spoke about his wine. They obviously spoke in Italian so we had to sit through that and then the interpreter would get up and speak to us in English. Being able to understand the Italian, I started writing notes as soon as the winemaker began. The others couldn’t start until the interpreter translated everything. The translator didn’t take notes and relied on his memory so the English version was extremely truncated and often incorrect and it got worse as more and more people got up and spoke.

We had our break as promised and I mentioned it to the others. They said I should say something to the organisers. As I approached the organisers they were already discussing this with another member of the group who was complaining about the translator. When we started again they had solved the problem: for the second half we had the whole thing in Italian and no interpreter at all. There were no technical notes or handouts which meant that any wine in the second group of 16 was missed out by non-Italian speaking people. Many of the producers looked very unsettled and a few refused to stand up at all.

By this time a number of people (about 400) had slowly been making there way in. The whole pavilion (sounds better than air craft hangar) was full. The entire town had been invited to attend and have lunch (which town?). We were told that lunch was now served. We got up and headed in the general direction and found platters with little or no food on them, just a lot of lettuce leaves. The townspeople, local Fuoco (fire brigade), Carabineiri (Police) and producers had been served while we were sitting tasting the wines. This was going to be a long day........

The official opening of the event was done after lunch and we were entertained by a dance group of folkloric dancers in Sicilian national costume. They were quite good and we all cheered up. They were the most professional thing we had seen by this stage. We were then seated for the second sessions - the red wines.

Once again it was entirely in Italian and the non-Italian speakers were bored. They started talking amongst themselves and the whole thing just disintegrated. The producers were embarrassed and again some of them would not get up to talk. The torture finally ended when the convenor got up and spoke for another ten minutes about how proud he was that we had all come and they had been able to show their wines etc etc, etc.... The we had to wait until the official photographs were taken of us sitting at our tables like school children and the VIPs all had their photos taken for the local newspaper.

We all got up and stretched our legs, we were told that there was going to be a special ‘rice dinner’ prepared for us. Several of the group attempted to leave but were told they could not. We waited for this special rice dinner, and we waited, and we waited - with nothing to do!

By 9.00pm this special rice dinner hadn’t appeared and a flurry of phone calls were made. I don’t know what happened but we were put back on the buses having had no lunch or dinner. We were absolutely ravenous. The drive back to town was extremely quiet, all of us lost in our own thoughts - of food mostly!

Spadafora Winery

We arrived back in town at 9.45pm hungry and tired. Some went straight to their room and others went to find sustenance. I was in the second group with the other Aussies. We went back to Detroit and had pizzas, again.

Day two seemed to be a repeat of Day one.  We got up, had breakfast and headed out. We were to be tasting another batch of red wines and then some sweet wines. Sicily produces some of the best sweet wines in the world: wonderful Ben Rye from Donnafugata, Marsala (which isn’t really that sweet if you have a good one) from Cantine Rallo and a plethora of similar products from companies such as Pellegrino, Marco di Bartolo and Florio.

The tasting went off without a hitch - as long as you spoke Italian. This time we had lunch as there were no guests crowding around the tables, only us and the producers.

Verzi, in the centre of the island

We began the sweet wine tasting with different presenters, many of whom spoke English but a number of people in the group had no idea how Marsala was made (using a Solera System). A trip to a winery or some materials with photographs would have been handy as the speakers couldn’t explain it properly without the visual aids. The same thing happened with passito wines. When the tastings were over, many people were still unsure of the processes but they loved the wines.

After the tasting we were told that workshops had been organised with the producers. In actual fact they were one to one meetings which they had set up without bothering to consult either the importer or producer. As a journalist I was keen to talk to the producers that exported to Australia. There were about seven in attendance. I asked if I could see them and was told by an extremely officious lady that ‘We didn’t bring you to the event for a holiday’. I explained that talking to people who didn’t export tWhat could they do, make me pack my things and see me onto a plane, by this time I would have welcomed it.

She took out her mobile phone and spoke to someone somewhere, she then turned and told me I was exempt from seeing the producers, I could talk to them at their stands if I wished. I thanked her and moved off to the stands as quickly as possible just in case she changed her mind. What she didn’t tell me was that the producers were not at their stands as they had ‘workshops’ with the importers. Many were very small producers who had brought no assistants with them so their stands were empty. I slipped out a doorway and into the sun. Several others were already out there. They were refusing to see producers.

The organisers had set up the meetings with absolutely no regard for either party. Importers were looking for specific wines that would fill a gap in their portfolios. The producers were looking for people who needed their wine, people who didn’t already have similar products. It would have been an easy task to send everyone a sheet before we got there asking what their requirements were. We had had information about the event sent to us by the organisers, a form could have been tacked on the end. It would have saved a lot of grief if a little bit of thought had gone into it.

I waited with other journalists as there was no transport back to the hotel. We were soon joined by a number of importers who had turned up for ‘workshops’ but the producers hadn’t. 

Day three started with arguments. Many people made their own plans to go and see producers and revolted when they were told they had to get on the bus. The woman who chastised me earlier was once again on the warpath. The bus was only half full and she was threatening people by saying their hotel bill would not be paid and once again, we were not on a holiday.

All in all we had wasted a lot of time over the three days. We could have done all the work on one day and made visits to the wineries on the second and third days. But hey, we were in Sicily!

Next: We visit some wineries