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or for moral shame.

My aunt Esterina who had left Palermo because of the bombings now lived in Corleone, a small town in the interior of Sicily. Meanwhile her husband, my uncle Giovanni Mariano, who had been recalled in the army (Alpine Corps) during the war and later
taken prisoner, was still a prisoner of war in North Africa.

It was decided that I should go and live with my aunt and continue my high school studies in Corleone. The trip to Sicily was a nightmare. First my mother and I had to go to Naples. We got there with an old car that got three flat tires on the way. In Naples the section near the train station was called "the Maddalena". It was a section of crowded streets, filled with carts, "the bancarelle", with all sort of articles. Hustlers tried to sell anything. It was probably the biggest open black market in Italy, the worst that the war had brought to city life.

We had to wait two days and one night in line inside the train station to purchase tickets for Palermo. The train came from Rome and was going to take us to Villa S. Giovanni in Calabria. It was already

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crowded when it finally arrived, and people squeezed into any space
available. Many traveled on the wagon platforms and steps, some were literally sticking out of the windows, and few others on the roof of the wagons. We were lucky. When they finally opened an empty freight wagon which was carrying four coffins containing the remains of war victims who
were being transported back home somewhere, we jumped in with other people and refused to get off. It took thirty six hours from Naples to Villa S. Giovanni in Calabria. Besides the normal delays, the trip included getting off the train to cross on foot over a makeshift bridge over a small river and boarding another train on the other side. We finally reached Villa S. Giovanni where we waited again a long time to board the ferry that took us to Messina where we took the train to Palermo. In Palermo we took another train for Corleone. It was a long and slow ride into the hills and we finally arrived.