Posted by chase on Thursday, June 1, 2017 in 2017 Blog post.

The following interview has been scribed and paraphrased by me through listening to the 20-minute recording and translating as much as I could. Although it may not be perfect, I found the experience satisfying and hope that most of the information is correct and conveys Julieni’s answers well:

Audio Recording

I decided to interview Julieni, a 23-year-old girl who works near to where I am staying in Cefalù. She doesn’t speak much English so I prepared all my questions in Italian and thought it would be excellent practice to conduct my interview in the native language. Julieni’s place of work is a little shop on via Roma Vecchia called Tentazioni Mediterranee, a wine cellar that also sells meats, cheeses and other typical Sicilian products. She works with another girl around her age named Stefania and her boss, Simone. I chose to interview her regarding family and a typical Sunday for a Sicilian, but was pleasantly surprised when we touched on many different aspects of life in Cefalù and Sicily in general.

 

Juli was actually born in Brazil and moved to Lascari where she lives now (just outside of Cefalù in the Province of Palermo) at a young age and has been here for nearly 20 years. When asked a few question on how most of her Sundays play out, she answered like so: ‘Usually, I spend them a little with family and a little with friends, but more with friends in the winter and at the beach and working in the summer.’ During the week, she goes to the beach as often as possible and goes out on weekends to popular clubs to dance (she likes il ballo caraibico—Caribbean dance), one of them being Maljk, a club that was frequented by our Maymester group on our Saturday nights in Cefalù. I asked her if there are any specific activities that all Sicilians do on their Sundays and she replied, ‘in Sicily, there aren’t many traditions or particular activities like those I have seen with my American friends, like playing outside or hanging around inside. Mainly during the period of festivals/parties, her friends play Sicilian card games like briscola and scopa at the house and sometimes tombola, similar to Bingo. Since she’s Catholic—like most of the small town centered on the towering Duomo—she goes to church when she can.

 

‘Here in Sicily, the people, the different areas, and the whole land is very beautiful and graceful. Of course, land is land and I find it quite nice here. Cefalù is a very graceful place. There are many different organizations in the city that attract tourists, because, above all, Cefalù has built its economy on tourism. But most of the tourism occurs in the summer months from April until around October, and in fact in winter, there are few visitors in the city. I prefer the summer mostly because I can swim and it gets a little boring without visitors. I don’t play any instruments, but I have other preferences like listening to music, working out, and fishing (or hanging at the pool—I might have translated wrong), but I mainly like to dance. My parents have a little boat that we take out to sea sometimes.’

 

She asked me how I’ve liked Cefalù, how I’ve found it. Not being able to find the words quickly enough, I timidly responded that I simply like to take daily walks (haha), which led to a brief comparison of the change of pace from America to Sicily. I believe she said that nobody wants to be unpopular in America—implying that the faster tempo is a result of constant efforts in self-improvement and fulfillment—sort of similar to the ideals of northern Italy. “In fact, many people choose to take vacations to Sicily because everyone loves Sicilians!”

 

I asked if she visits Brazil, she said no, “but I should go there soon.” Then we tailed off to more casual conversation. I told her that our group was heading to Siracusa for a couple of nights and she commented that she’s been there before and it’s a nice city. She suggested that I visit some of the other touristy yet beautiful cities such as Taormina and Agrigento and I was happy to say that I’ve visited most of those places in my time here including Solunto, Etna, Lipari, Barcellona and other historical sites. I commented on the difficulty of speaking Italian, especially conducting an interview in the language, because of its many tenses and ambiguities. Juli thinks that learning Italian can be quite difficult for a non-native speaker, but once you learn everything it isn’t that bad to speak. She thinks that English is actually easier to learn and a little bit harder to speak—but easier than Italian—because there are fewer modes and verbs of saying the same thing, unlike in Italian. I asked if she learned a good amount of English for the tourists (basically making her more valuable in a purely business sense) but she replied that she only studied the language in school, until the end of high school as is usual in the States, as most Italians grow up doing. She did comment that she learns a little more vocabulary from tourists, much like how I’ve been learning new words and phrases as I spend my time in Cefalù. She said it’s an easy way to learn more about the language in casual conversation when someone is speaking and you say, “I don’t know that word” and they can attempt to explain in your native tongue or you can use a translator to search the meaning.

 

She briefly commented on the difficulty of finding a job pertaining to your career path in Italy, especially southern Italy and Sicily. Although one day [I believe] she aspires to work with children from birth to age 6 in a hospital setting, she has been taking up temporary jobs and supplementing them with school in the meantime. I hope she keeps working hard and feels fulfilled when she starts a permanent career. Overall, Juli was very understanding and helpful when I didn’t quite get what she was saying during our talk. Although I wasn’t saying much, I loved listening to what she had to say and it was awesome just having a casual conversation with a native and learning more about a country that fascinates me with its perseverance through family and community. Shout-out to Julieni for helping me further understand her culture and telling me a little about her life!

Selffiiiee