𝔎𝔯𝔦𝔰🌹🇺🇦🇵🇸🏳️‍⚧️

Another thing I also managed to see at the Palazzo Abbatellis is one of the greatest portraits of all time--Antonello de Messina’s Annunciation.

Moved from the Palazzo Sclafani to the Palazzo Abatellis, which serves as the main gallery in Palermo now.

It was split into 4 pieces and reassembled. You can see that the paint gradually started to come off at the points where the cuts were made.

Hot take alert: This massive 15th century Triumph of Death fresco by an anonymous Palermo master is an underrated masterpiece and better than Bruegel's later version (sorry Bruegel fanboys).

This better be good! My Europoor ass is trusting you.

Going inside Monreale in an hour. I've already semi-lost my mind.

Yeah, must have missed the posts from the last couple of days!

Stupid person voice: Multiculturalism has failed!

Me: Well, you clearly haven't embraced the majesty of Sicilian-Norman-Arab-Byzantine-Jewish civilisation.

Quite a few of these from Catania and Syracuse btw @pymundgenealogy.bsky.social

Ok, fine. Here are some actual highlights.

Is it a bummer that the Museo Archeologico in Palermo currently has only one floor open to the public? Yes.

Does it have cute turtles in the courtyard? Also yes.

Espirit De Corps [Legendary: Success] - Keep it together! There are several more days of golden mosaics and great food.

Not following online discourse too much due to travel and then logging on is a wild experience.

Is everyone this racist and mentally ill 24/7? Why do I do this to myself? Will poster madness come for me too?

Yeah, it doesn't help that the place is kinda poorly maintained and under constant "renovation." I'm not surprised.

See, this is why we love you over here. I'm at the goo-goo-gaga stage with these languages.

I probably won’t manage to get to the Zisa Palace in the next few days, but I discovered an object housed there that’s an incredible example of Sicily's medieval multicultural society:

12th century marble stele with inscriptions in four different languages--Hebrew, Arabic, Latin, and Greek.

I didn't take a photo, but there's also a graffiti at the entrance that says "stupid fat Yanks go home" lmao.

[Looks through Palermo apartment window] Yep, everyone in Sicily is the maximum amount of cool.

The Catania-Palermo train had some majestic views today.

There is no such thing as western civilisation | Kwame Anthony Appiah The Long Read: The values of liberty, tolerance and rational inquiry are not the birthright of a single culture. In fact, the very notion of something called ‘western culture’ is a modern invention

Obligatory

quite a bit of offence to those of my fellow eastern europeans who are idiotic enough to cheer on trump in 'liberating' iran but how is your logic different from that of putin's russia

There is no such thing as western civilisation | Kwame Anthony Appiah The Long Read: The values of liberty, tolerance and rational inquiry are not the birthright of a single culture. In fact, the very notion of something called ‘western culture’ is a modern invention

Obligatory

Century of European humiliation.

It was me. I stopped further intervention by forcing the Ministry of Defence to play Resident Evil Requiem all weekend, but I get no praise in the press.

Oh shit! Welcome back!

I'm done, and the back half is atrocious! The last few hours of Requiem are a descent into absolute self‑referential nostalgia shlock, painfully dull linear sequences, with horrid pacing to boot.

Everything after the detonator assembly is a nosedive into pure nonsense.

Underrated just how much the US and Israel have been desecrating the very idea of diplomatic engagement by doing these obvious bait and switches.

This is the third time now that negotiations were used as cover to prepare for a war already decided. The lesson is to never speak to the US.

Saving the people of Iran from being massacred by their government in the streets by massacring elementary schoolgirls from the air.

Bibi Netanyahu is a corrupt, racist war criminal and also if you start spreading racist conspiracy theories in response to his actions then I’m afraid it still says more about you and nothing about him! You don’t get a pass on it!

I also really love Grace as a character (incredible performance by Angela Sant'Albano), until the developers start making her act like a complete moron--even though it’s established she’s very smart--just to have a clumsy excuse for Leon action sequences at the last third of the game.