Naples .... squeezing cars, people and lots more on to those narrow streets

Now you can never get enough of pictures of Naples and of these it is the ones showing the narrow streets where everything squeezes in every available space.

Location; Naples

Picture; Naples in 2017 from the collection of Saul Simpson 

Naples ........ the woman and a fading poster

Now sometimes a picture has a fascination way beyond your first impression.

This for me is just such a picture.

The woman sits on a battered old chair and off to her right is one of those narrow Neapolitan side streets with buildings that climb cliff like in to the sky and seem to be constantly in gloom.

Someone on the Italian side of the family will be able to identify the footballer on the poster and for all I know he may have played for Napoli which for over 70 years has been Simone’s team.

And even now having lived in the north for decades he still watches every match and can remember all the great games.

This summer we were back in Naples following in the footsteps of our Saul and Emilka.  I had hoped we might have encountered that old woman but we never did.

As for the footballer I am still none the wiser

We shall see.

Location; Naples

Picture; Naples in 2017 from the collection of Saul Simpson and Emilka Cholewicka

Other people’s pictures …………. Lisbon …… no. 3 ….. roof tops

Now I remain fascinated by other people’s pictures.

It is partly because the pictures are often of places, I have never been, but also because it is an insight into how other people see the world.

So, here just a few years after they were taken are two from our Saul, featuring the bits we all see, but do not always decide to record.

It was a December day, the sun was shinning and unlike Manchester, it was warm.

Location; Lisbon









Pictures; Lisbon, 2019, from the collection of Saul Simpson

Other people’s pictures …………. Lisbon …… no. 2 ….. the monument

Now I remain fascinated by other people’s pictures.

It is partly because the pictures are often of places I have never been, but also because it is an insight into how other people see the world.

So, here just a few years after they were taken are two from our Saul, featuring the bits the history books are hot on.

Later in the week there will be more more, but for now here are two of that other side of any big city.

Today we might rightly question the story behind the figures with the assumption that Europeans could go anywhere and exploit other people's across the globe.

Location; Lisbon

Pictures; Lisbon, 2019, from the collection of Saul Simpson

Other people’s pictures …………. Lisbon …… part 1 ….. just before New Year

Now I remain fascinated by other people’s pictures.

It is partly because the pictures are often of places, I have never been, but also because it is an insight into how other people see the world.

So, here just a few years after they were taken are two from our Saul, featuring the bits of Lisbon which are off the tourist beat.

Later in the week there will be more more, from the more traditional haunts, but for now here are two of that other side of any big city.

Location; Lisbon








Pictures; Lisbon, 2019, from the collection of Saul Simpson

Other people’s pictures ...... Rome ..... no.4 .... across the roof tops

Now I remain fascinated by other people’s pictures.

It is partly because the pictures are often of places, I have never been, but also because it is an insight into how other people see the world.

So, here just a year or so after they were taken are some from our Saul.

Location; Rome

Pictures; Rome, 2020, from the collection of Saul Simpson

Other people’s pictures ...... Rome ..... no.2 .... the statue

Now I remain fascinated by other people’s pictures.

It is partly because the pictures are often of places, I have never been, but also because it is an insight into how other people see the world.


So, here just a year or so after they were taken are some from our Saul.


Location; Rome

Pictures; Rome, 2020, from the collection of Saul Simpson

When the lad from Chorlton made a Neapolitan Margaretta in a Polish pizza oven

We often joke that our Saul learned how to make pizza in one of those small Neapolitan pizzeria’s  you come across down a side street off a busy main road.

They are the places only  frequented by a loyal local clientele and a few tourists in the know.

We have eaten at more than a few over the years and have never been disappointed.

All of which takes me back to Saul’s pizzas which stand equal to many of those we have had, and despite my best efforts mine have never come close to his.

We were talking just the other day and out of that conversation came the news that he had bought a pizza oven.

Now, Saul lives in an apartment in the heart of Warsaw, and there is no way that even a small wood burning pizza oven would fit or pass a safety check from the local municipal authorities.

So, instead he bought an electric four-minute oven which judging by the results looks pretty neat.

Eric from Swansea will no doubt tut, but we can’t all have the luxury of a purpose-built pizza oven and a ready supply of wood.

Leaving me just to reflect on the internationalism of food which some Brexiteers would rather deny.

For here is our Saul who was born in Chorlton making pizza in a Polish pizza oven admired by the Italian side of the family who were from Naples.

Location; Warsaw

Pictures; the magic pizza oven and the pizzas, 2021, from the collection of Saul Simpson

Other people’s pictures ...... Rome ..... no.3 .... looking for a bargain

Now I remain fascinated by other people’s pictures.

It is partly because the pictures are often of places, I have never been, but also because it is an insight into how other people see the world.

So, here just a year or so after they were taken are some from our Saul.

Location; Rome

Pictures; Rome, 2020, from the collection of Saul Simpson

Pictures from a backroom, on a moment of self-isolation ..... the view from Warsaw ...a Christmas tree, a balcony and nobody in sight

Now, our Saul lives and works in Poland, but the plans to go over and visit him have taken a bit of a back seat.

Warsaw is a very cosmopolitan city and along with the plans to visit the sites and take in some excellent vegetarian restaurants, there was the promise of going into the forest to sample the forest skills he teaches through his business.*

But like the rest of us, all is very quiet and with not a lot to do, but catch up on reading, and box sets, he took up the challenge to take a series of pictures from his balcony.

So, here is Warsaw, on a sunny Monday.

And yes they keep their Christmas tree on the balcony .......... after all, where would you decide to park it during the year?

Location; Warsaw

Pictures; view from a Warsaw balcony

*Pines Forest School, https://www.facebook.com/pinesforestschool/

Naples .... where the houses rise like cliffs and look down on narrow and busy places

Over a century and a bit ago a group of Neapolitan photographers set out to capture something of the vibrancy of their city.

And because then as now much of that vibrancy was conducted on the streets they photographed families eating off battered old tables, and women having their hair done in the streets while conversing with water carriers shop keepers and anyone who wandered into the street.

Nor has much changed.

Location; Naples

Picture; Naples in 2017 from the collection of Saul Simpson and Emilka Cholewicka

Naples ............ the event in the street

Sometimes you just wonder what was going on to attract the attention of the four men.

Whatever it was it proved amusing for one and provoked another into a comment which we will never know.

Location; Naples









Picture; Naples in 2017 from the collection of Saul Simpson and Emilka Cholewicka

Naples ........ eating what the city does best

Now if you are in Naples the obvious choice of something to eat just has to be pizza.

We had ordered up some good ones in Sorrento but the Neapolitan ones were better and turned out to be cheaper at 3€.

And when our Saul was there last week he ended up with two fine pizzas.

Enough said.

Location; Naples

Picture; Naples in 2017 from the collection of Saul Simpson 

Naples in April

Now if you don't live in Naples the next best thing is that one of your sons is there and is happy to send back pictures of the place.

I fell in love with the city the first time we went there and continue to find it fascinating.

It is noisy, and chaotic and at times bewildering.

The voices you hear speak a language which is unique to the south and when Tina had her siblings washed up in the north of Italy how they spoke and what they said marked them out as from Naples.

The first time we went her parents who were both born there warned us to be careful but  the warning was unnecessary.

Like any city there is a lot to see, and you can fill your day wandering from former palaces to wonderful churches and taking in plenty of ancient ruins.

But for me it is the streets themselves which I adore.  They are narrow and give off onto even narrower streets and everywhere the buildings climb cliff like into the sky.

And from every available balcony the residents will hang out their washing.

We won’t be back for months and so I shall content myself with Saul’s pictures.

Location; Naples

Pictures; Naples, 2017 from the collection of Saul Simpson and Emilka Cholewicka

Pizza, pesto and a trip up country ........... getting closer to my Canadian history

Until recently I had no idea just how deeply my family’s past was linked to Canada.

Our connections with Germany and Italy were pretty straightforward but the Canadian side rested on a few stories of my great aunt Dolly who crossed the Atlantic in 1925.

Of course if I had thought hard enough it would have been obvious that a fair few of the family would have chanced their arm and started a new life on the other side of the world.

After all with an empire upon which the sun never set there were plenty of open spaces.*

I knew about Uncle Charles who had gone out to East Africa and later India in the 1930s and pretty much never came back but was totally unprepared for the rest.

These included the brother of our great grandfather who had slipped off to New Zealand before settling in Australia the relative who had plied the high seas as a ships engineer and great grandfather Montague who in the course of serving in the old Queen’s army had seen the sun rise in the West Indies, idled his spare time in Gibraltar and spent three years in South Arica.

All of which could be the story of many British families but what I never expected was the great uncle migrated to Canada in the spring of 1914 by the Derby Poor Law Guardians because my great grandmother “was incapable of caring” for him and his siblings which included my granddad and great aunt Dolly.

Once established he persuaded Dolly to join him which she did but in her own words not “fancying the open wilderness of the far west” she settled in Ontario got married and that is how we now have an extensive Canadian family who in turn can draw on French and British settlers from the late 18th century along with a Mr and Mrs Pember who set out from Salford in the 1840s and never looked back.

And in the winter of 2015our Saul wass there in Ontario,.

He did the tourist bit of visiting New York, Memphis and Texas before making the 36 hour bus journey north from New Orleans to Ontario crossing the border at 6 am on a cold Saturday morning and has spent the last week with our cousins.

During that week he met more of the family, saw some stunning countryside and in return dished up homemade pizza and pesto and in the process brought all of us a lot closer.

All of which could be a prelude to a shed load of family stories but instead it will just be a thank you to Chris and Andrea and their two sons for making him so welcome and to our  Jac who sent me the first picture of them all together.

Andrea has more photographs ready to send but for now that’s it.



Pictures; a meal and the landscape of Ontario from the collection of Saul Simpson

*Possibly according to one American journalist because God didn’t trust the British and so wanted to always be able to see what we were doing.