Whenever I travel in Europe, I like to get on a bus and ride the entire route.  I find public transportation a great way to see the city and to save money.  However, I didn't ride any buses in Rome because my italian friend insisted the best way to see Rome was on foot.  Now that I know how impatient some bus drivers can be, I'm so glad I listened to her.

My only bad experience with a bus driver was in Spain.  After I entered the bus, I held out a handful of change and told the bus driver to take what he needed.  Instead, he pointed to the door and told me to get off!!

Does anyone of you know that crazy one, driving five years ago on a bus of the line number... well I don't remember, going from the Pudong airport to centre of Shanghai?

The most astonishing thing was that nobody but me seemed to care at all of the speed and the continuous giant slalom among the cars and trucks.. And, from the horrible rolling and yaw, I think the tyres were completely flat too... Everybody were quietly speaking on their mobiles!

is one of the most famous songs by Renato Carosone, and these are words and music (you should be able to listen to it).

...but, are you able to understand the words?

More or less. It's always more difficult for me to understand when people speak in dialect or with a heavy regional accent. On the other hand I speak Italian with a Sicilian accent (cioè con i vocali molto aperti...) so I usually have more difficulties with the northern dialects and accents.

ciao

And I was typing a bit too fast in my previous comment. It's not i vocali aperti but le vocali aperte.

My wife is the fan in the family of his many books, but she was able to convince me to read one of his latest ones. So I've just read "Il tailleur grigio".

It is not belonging to his main stream about Commissario Montalbano, it's a story that, in a way, remembers me George Simenon (the other most favourite one of my wife) in his darkest  novels, but Camilleri is a little bit.. lighter? At any rate, a good book to read, if you are  talented for il dialetto Siciliano, like I guess you are!

In Ravello, the tabaccheria which sells the bus tickets is right next to the town piazza. And my friend's Zio Ignazio has a permanent seat, not on the UN Security Council, but just outside the tobacconist's. So when I go to Atrani, or Amalfi (or Salerno or wherever), the ENTIRE TOWN knows where I went -- and even with whom I went --, because I bought the bus tickets. The Italian Small Town Radar Tracking System is very powerful!

On one trip to Ravello, my friend and I tried to sneak off the radar. Every restaurant in Ravello proper had already been covered by my hosts, not one single place would accept my money. So I decided we would trek discreetly all the way to the Villa Amore to eat, halfway to the Villa Cimbrone.

At Villa Amore, I did not recognize the waiter, and we had a great meal. Too great; at one point I asked myself, "Wow, did we go for the really fancy wine after all?" "Why are there so many prawns in this dish?", but didn't linger on the topic.

When the time came to pay the bill, the waiter, Giorgio, said, "Non. Va bene", with a huge grin. I asked (groaning inwardly), "Fabrizio?" The waiter said, "Non Fabrizio.Dario! Dario, il cugino, il cugino!"

Later that day, I learned from Zia Giulia (who heard it from Zia Tina) that the waiter, Giorgio, had realized that he had "le Giapponese di Dario" in his place. He telephoned Dario's office, but Dario was at home having lunch at home with his Mamma, so Giorgio called Dario's Mum and received firm instructions to let him pick up the tab. Dario loved it when my friend and I told and re-told to everybody the story of how his network had tracked us down! We went back the next day to tease the waiter and give him a present from Asia (=Asian revenge).

Sorry for another super-long post, part of me wanted to share a side of Italy that is incredibly gracious and generous with its time and hospitality.

Well, the fact is that in all his novels, magari is used in the same identical way you've done here. I was used to think, up to this moment, this was one of his well known literary expedient to give a strong dialectal colour. I'm saying so because, in my experience, to use magari to say anche give me a sense, even not of an explicit error, of a little tripping(?) into the flow of the speech. Of course, having read some by Camilleri I was trained to get its meaning in this sense, but I was thinking that it was a merely peculiar usage of dialetto Siciliano (it would be interesting to know this: Lunetta do you say magari in this meaning?).

 The simple fact that you use it in the same way give me a strong hint that it's a wider area to make this usage, at least Campania and Sicilia.

So I took my Dizionario Garzanti della Lingua Italiana, and i've found this:

1 inter. interjection (che) esprime vivo interesse; anche con senso rafforzativo: "Ti piacerebbe fare un bel viaggio?" "Magari!" Would you like to have a nice journey? Yes I would! (my English transaltion are always merely, rough, approximate ones) And that's the main usage I've always known and practiced.

2 cong. quand' anche, anche se, con valore concessivo: Lo aspetterò, magari dovessi restare qui un giorno intero! I'll be waiting for him, even though I should stay all the day along! And this is the closest usage to Camilleri's and yours. But it seems to me that it is not exactly the same one.

3 avv. forse anche, persino: magari riuscirà a farcela; magari dirà di non saperne niente maybe he will be able to make the grade(?), even he'll say he doesn't know anything about it. This is very common for me too

Well, Auntie I want to thank you, because you've just gave me a good opportunity to get a deeper and more clear understanding of my own language!! BTW, please don't change anything in your Italian, specialmente magari!!

ciao a tutti Michele.

Btw, I bet that your Dizionario Garzanti della Lingua Italiana weighs at least 1.5 kg!!!! 

P/s: Michele, thanks for being so gracious and supportive to learners like me, always!

ciao Michele.

One meaning is just about the equivalent of "I wish!" It usually comes as a response to a statement.

-Ma, l'Italia ha vinto la partita?

-Magari!

(Did Italy win the game? / I wish [they had]!)

(In this case, it's an expression of a wish or desire. The first person sets up a situation and the second person responds "I'd love to," or "I wish!")

As Michele and Fabrizio have described above, the other meaning is more like forse (maybe).

-Magari un'altra volta.

(Maybe another time)

To translate Fabrizio's good example of the third use of this word:

Non è che magari hai trovato il mio portafoglio...?

You haven't, by chance, found my wallet...?

Everyone please share your experiences and let's solve the mystery. Where can you buy tickets on the bus in Italy??

ps: I found an italian blog called noticketonthebus where the focus everything related to this matter. ["...discussioni su controllori, bigliettai, autisti e abusivi nella estenuante ricerca della verità di chi deve fare il biglietto, chi lo deve controllare e soprattutto chi lo deve pagare!"]

neverstop.marco. :)

But this means not for tourist.