Syracuse: the sleeping Beauty
Photos by Francesco Mule`
Syracuse: the Sleeping Beauty
by F. Guzzardi
With an unemployment rate of 50% Syracuse is the symbol of a beautiful Sicily devastated from the wild industrialization practiced in the late sixties. A shy entrepreneurship lacking in resources, puts the labor market tight on the endless promises of politicians unscrupulous. The natural inclination of the Sicilians to wait for aid from the central government, makes the economy poor of initiatives to generate jobs. Yet it would take very little to trigger a revival that should be primarily a tourist destination. The natural position: lying on the Mediterranean, a meeting point between cultures Arabic-Greek, Baroque architecture of rare beauty, mild and sunny climate for eight months a year's. Farm activities' could provide much more if favored by a policy of reducing the costs of export (if you think that we rarely get to see Sicilian oranges or lemons beyond the borders of the country). The bite of the Mafia hits the few entrepreneurs willing forcing them to close or to pay a burdensome "Pizzo" that deprives them of the already modest income.The openings of several large shopping malls that are sick with most of the empty shops,evidence a system of money laundering run by the organized crime .Syracuse is the tail of the snake Italy weakened by corruption that becomes routine practice in the State and Regional administrations. Syracuse asks for help and does so in the conspiratorial silence of which are guilty even the best young forces of the city, aware of an unimaginable future and a present uninhabitable. Many emigrants to the city se and many descendants in America that bear witness to the "Siracusani", a`laboriousness people if who put in the right condition, can give the best, not forgetting their roots wet from the source (Nymph) "Arethusa", where the waters of the source Cyane merge the Mediterranean aromas of citrus and tomatoes in the sun.
