Everyone wants to visit America. People from Washington to China want to visit the Big Apple and Hollywood because of its fame on the media. Yes these two cities are great and really show off what America is all about but there are countries that have culture and ancient history that I think are more interesting and meaningful. One of these countries would be a small country that many people forget is around and that is Sicily.

Sicily is a small island country that is located just beneath Italy. Many people when they look at a map think of Sicily as a soccer ball and Italy as a boot kicking the country.  I first traveled to Sicily in the summer of 2009 with my family to visit my mother’s long lost cousins, in which they reconnected through Facebook.  When we landed we headed to Marsala where over cousins lived and where we would be staying. My first reaction to the island was that is looked a lot like a desert when we weren’t near the water. Marsala was right next to the water and it had a lot of buildings and people. Our first day was rough due to the different time zone. I remember falling asleep when we reached the house we rented and when I woke up I thought I slept through a whole day and in reality it was just a few hours. That first day we also met one of the cousins whose name was Angelo and he had a wife named Francesca. They were very nice and could speak English very good but they sometimes didn’t know the English word that they wanted to say.

During our stay we visited a salt factory. The factory consisted of multiply windmills and a lot of open land. There were mountains of salt piled and it was a sight that you could not see in the city. While we were at the salt factory there was a gift shop and I didn’t know it was possible but they made jewelry out of salt. It didn’t look like expensive jewelry but it was pretty cool the only downside was that you couldn’t wear the jewelry if it was raining or else it would dissolve. We visited a small city that was on top of a mountain. It was a old castle that was now surrounded by shops and apartments. The people there really know how to preserve an old building and keep it alive for people to see. We also visited a lot of other locations that consisted or ancient ruins, beaches, places where they filmed movies and a vineyard.

I think people should travel all around the world to learn about other cultures by eating exotic food, sightseeing, learning the language, approaching the art and architecture and just doing things in general you wouldn’t do at home. The only bad part about traveling is the time it takes for you to get to your location. Every time I visit a country I always learn something new and always have fun.