Venice

As things are beginning to get a little fuzzy up top thinking of my recent vacation, I figure I need to set down what I can before it's all a blur. We took the very early morning train to Venice from Salzburg and arrived around 2:00 PM. It was a strange experience, all that land around us while we were sitting in the train, and then suddenly it was like we weren't on any land at all, the train floating over the ocean in the direction of a distant island. I got pretty excited at the sight of sea water, as it's been a couple years since I've been to the ocean (my trip to Maine with Adam a while back must be what I'm thinking of). This mystic feeling I had over the water didn't leave anytime soon, as Venice was unlike any city I've ever been to. Of course, most European cities are unique, but there were a couple things that make Venice stand out from the rest.

First of all, and perhaps the most obvious, it's a city on top of water. It's not really one island but many islands (that seem to form the shape of a fish from above), connected by a couple bridges. These islands are packed, both with people and with buildings. In the main canal running through it you see all kinds of boats, from the big vaporettis that serve as the bus system, to the speedboat taxis and police, as well as that classic gondola, which are both run by private companies to carry romantic tourists around as well as the traghettos, which are the same type of boat, but not as well maintained and used only for ferrying people for 50 cents from one side of the grand canal to the other. But any trasportation you have is going to be water-based. There are no automobiles and bicycles are forbidden. The whole city is something like a monument dedicated to bygone times, and there are strict laws prohibiting any sort of modernization done to the buildings or streets.

In past trips to Europe, I never cared about going to Venice, having always heard about the nightmare amount of tourists milling around, to the point of suffocation. And the accounts were not wrong. There were a ton of tourists, and at points I felt I was about to start throwing someone out of the vaporetti. Still, the swarms of tourists seemed to be restricted to a very few areas, and most of our time was spent strolling the tiny alleys (even smaller than Salzburg's), literally getting lost in them. There are very few demarcations to direct one while walking these alleys, so you really had the sense that you were getting "lost in Europe."

When we first arrived, we were swarmed by men trying to get us to book a hotel with them. We pushed our way through and into the tourist office, where I bought three expensive 3-day tickets. We were told we had to click these before getting on the transports. We walked out and got our first glimpse of that majestic decay and our first whiff of that sea-salted wind.

We set about clicking our tickets in the clicking-machine, only something was amiss. It wouldn't click for anything. I stuck it in a thousand times in as many ways and no click. Other hopeful passengers would walk up, stick in their ticket, and *click!* My mom walked up, stuck in her ticket, and *click!* My dad had a little trouble like mine, but eventually got his to work. We literally stood there for about half an hour trying to click the durn ticket. Finally, I got one last idea as to how to insert the ticket, and it worked! I proved it wasn't a fluke later at the end of the trip when we were at the train station again, by clicking the ticket on the other side.

So the first vaporetti ride was packed. We knew we needed to get off the boat at Rialto Bridge, one of the two most heavily trafficked areas, so after about 20 minutes on the slow boat, we grabbed our bags and entered the storm. The tourists were everywhere. Not just tourists, but locals, too. It was sort of hard to tell the difference with a lot of them. A lot of them were Italian, but were also tourists. My parents and I had worked out a system of hooking up to carry our bags more easily up the steps, and so we used this system in going up the many steps of the Rialto, only this very economical system became awkward with all those people to snake through.

Luckily, our hotel wasn't far from the bridge, and once we were a couple blocks out of its vicinity, the traffic really died down. As I mentioned, there aren't a lot of good street markings in Venice, so it took us a while to find the hotel, even though it was right under our noses. But we finally found it, Hotel Guerrato, and went in to meet the very nice men in charge. The hotel  was very nice inside, filled with old furniture and chandiliers with a very classy air. The lighting was soft, and the peaceful atmosphere was a nice change after all that madness in getting to the hotel. The room was just as nice. A little bigger with nicer beds than our room in Salzburg, and we were happy to take a shower and rest a bit before hitting the streets of Venice once more.

And hit them we did. Since it was already around 4 PM, we weren't sure if we'd have the time to take in the really big sites that day, so we decided to walk the back alleys and see what we could see from a local's point of view. Rick Steves talks of a certain church de Frari in his book, saying it's one of the best things to see in Venice, so we decided to look for that, as it was located relatively near to us on the map given us at the hotel. On this trip I sort of became a fanatic for good maps. Something I didn't relate in my account of Salzburg (or did I?) was how we bought a € 5 piece of crap map at the train station, which didn't have a street atlas and hardly even listed any street names. I quickly stepped into a tobacco shop and bought a much better map for € 3. So if anyone wants to take a trip to Europe and see Salzburg with me, you can rest assured I have the right map. The same situation came up in Venice. The map the hotel owners gave us was actually pretty good, listing every street name, even the tiniest alleys. Only this doesn't do you much good if you haven't a clue where the street you're looking for is in the first place. So again I went on the hunt for the right map. We stopped at a stand and made a foolish blunder in buying a map wrapped in plastic. I can't imagine what the allure of that map was. But once we opened it up, we found it, too, was a crap map. Another € 5 down the sewers.

We were pretty hungry, and had passed a little pizza joint on the way to the crappy maps, so we headed back and had some thick pizza. Usually pizza in Europe, or at least what I've had, is pretty thin. It's only made thicker when I think they don't want to use as many toppings. Anyway, we had the pizza and it was all right. Then we walked a few meters down the alley to a gelato shop, where mom and dad had their FIRST italian ice cream ever. If you've ever had it, you can surely imagine how quickly they fell in love, relishing every lick. I got cherry and hazelnut, dad chocolate and vanilla, and mom something else I can't remember (though I bet she can). We walked toward the grand canal and found a group of gondoliers working there with some "construction" workers at something in the water. Couldn't really figure it out at first, though dad was really interested in what they were doing, so we stayed there a while to watch and eat our ice cream slowly.









After finishing our ice cream, we  set off walking. We kept walking, asking people occassionally where this church actually was, getting fingers pointing this way or that, and then walking on some more. It was a really nice way to get to know Venice, and even there in the daylight my heart could hardly stand it. All those little alleys, the broken-down flats, the rotted shutters, twisted trees, salt in the air, people playing football (soccer) on the squares, the shops, the masks, the tiny bridges over canals and the gondoliers going under them. I was looking at my dad and wondering how he and my mom weren't making out by now. Here, have some pictures:

We never did find that church that day. Instead, we kept on walking until my dad's leg really started to hurt him, and then we turned back. But not before I finally found a very good map (and paid dearly for it... have you seen me w/o sunglasses on recenty?). I also had the opportunity to introduce my parents to italian ice cream, that is, gellato. And I mean the real stuff. For those of you out there who think you know what gellato is, I'm assuming you've been to Italy, or at least to Vienna, where they brought the stolen secret recipe and exploited it. Wow, I could really go for some of that right now.

We headed back and found a restaurant we had seen before and thought looked pretty good, and guess what we had... you guessed it, Pizza! But I didn't go all out and order the tuna fish and onion pizza. I laid pretty low and we had a mushroom pizza, a ham pizza, some very expensive beer, and even more expensive glass of water. That's the thing about Italy; the food ain't cheap. It's frustrating how expensive it is, really, especially since I eat just as good or better foods in austria all the time for a lot less cash. But I guess the thing you have to remember about Venice is that just about everything is imported. They don't produce much of anything on their own there.

Day 2: We started out this day with a healthy breakfast provided by the hotel: musli, juice, bread, and yoghurt. Dad was taking a long time getting ready, so mom and I used the time to plan out the day. We decided to check out what everyone is supposed to see while in Venice, that is, San Marco Square.

 
 

It's said that Napoleon called this square "the drawing room of Europe," and I read just the other day that it's perhaps the only main square in Europe where the sound of human voices isn't drowned out by the sound of automobiles. Well, given there are no automobiles in Venice, I'd say that's a safe bet! Though on a busy day in downtown Vienna, you aren't paying much attention to the noise of what few cars there are.
I read also sometimes in the summer this square actually floods, and I saw and bought and sent a lot of cool postcards of such an event. The town actually sets out benches for the tourists to walk across so they don't have to wade through the nearly knee-deep water. Luckily this wasn't the case while we were there. The square was already so populated and hard to get around, I don't want to imagine the chaos that ensues as thousands of tourists are shimmying across those thin planks of wood into church and palace.

We started our tour of San Marco Square by visiting the Doge's palace. In former times, the Doge was the head honcho at Venice, and for hundreds of years the succession of Doges (dukes) reigned without fail, and hardly ever an upstart. Apparently, there was in time one renegade Doge who somehow led a coup, or so the history books we were reading say. Not sure how you can lead a coup if you're already the chief, but it's a mad world. Within the Doge's palace, there was a gigangtic room on whose walls a painted of each and every doge was hung, including the renegade doge, only his spot was blacked out. They destroyed all memory of him save that black cape, and even today the citizens don't mention him except by referring to the black cape. It was a really interesting tour within the palace, to see how the mightiest of former times made themselves comfortable. Lots and lots of gold, elaborate everything, especially the ceilings for some reasons, and everywhere you look you see the Venetian Lion, or the Lion of St. Mark. The story behind St. Mark becoming Venice's patron saint is pretty interesting, if not a little ridiculous. Back in the days when church and state were really one and the same, and everything political was christened, Venice was an independent state. However, being right next door to Rome, they sought protection from the Orthodox Christians of the Ottoman Empire in the east. In order to show their gratitude, they took St. Theodore as their patron saint. He was a great conqueror who was said to have freed some body from someone. And maybe he slew a dragon sometime in there, too. You can see him standing with shield and sword in hand atop one of the two pillars as you enter San Marco Square. But as time went on, the Ottoman's power waned, and Venice didn't want to pay homage to a failing system by honoring one of their saints. So they spurned old Theodore and began the search for a new patron. They knew if they took someone like Peter or Paul as their patron, they'd essentially be bowing to Rome, which, as an proudly independent state, they weren't about to do. So someone went about in stealing the ancient bones of St. Mark, and brought them to Venice. Hence San Marco Square, and now they are buried in the church there on the square. St. Mark is always represented as a fierce lion, bearing a beautiful mane and holding a sword as well as a book, which is sometimes the gospel and sometimes another book. Hence, by claiming St. Mark as the new patron saint, Venice was somehow able to maintain its independence both from Rome and Constantinople. Strange things Christians did back then.
Unfortunately, I wasn't able to take pictures inside either the Doge's palace or the Church of St. Mark, so you'll have to be content with the pictures I took outside in the Doge's courtyard. The only pic I got from within the palace is placed at the very top of this blog.

After touring through the palace, and then a short wait in another line, we went into the eastern-looking Church of St. Mark, where we were always mindful of where our wallets were, as the places was packed and we'd read of how pickpockets prey on unsuspecting tourists whose inclined necks all keep their attention on the magnificent ceilings and not their pockets. We paid a euro or so to see the tomb of saint Mark, which is in the very middle of the sanctuary, and girded with thousands of precious stones. Strange to think of all those expensive rocks being glued to a guy's coffin, and it always makes me think of what the guy himself would have to say about it, if he were to open his coffin and have a peek out. We filed around the church and made our way into the less-populated area for peope who wanted to pray. We lit a couple candles and watched the custodian come by and change out the low-burning ones for new ones. I always wonder what those custodians thing about all that traffic in the church, how his living faith in Christ and his Body is seen as simple history on display by perhaps millions a year. How many thousands of people file through those churches, gazing up at all that meaningful iconography, those centuries of hope and aspiration after everlasting life imbued within its walls, and pass out of it with nothing more to say than "pretty."

We made our way out and into a small alley in search of food. We were all really hungry but not wanting to pay lots of money for a lunch when we'd surely be eating an expensive dinner (as there's little else to eat there) in the evening. Somehow we found a relatively cheap sandwich shop at which we ate panini and talked to another american family who took our picture.

We made our way back to the hotel where we rested a bit and asked the man at the desk about a good place to go that wasn't so touristy or expensive, and he gave us a good recommendation that we looked forward to trying out. Once it got dark, we spent a while looking for the place and after walking under many clotheslines with a number of unmentionables on display, we finally found the nice little restaurant right across a little canal with a garden and a warm light within. We quickly found out that this place was authentic, as no one spoke english and the menus didn't pander to our ignorance of Italian. We sat for a while just staring blankly at the menus, thinking "What could this be. I wonder if it's good." Of course, we recognized "spaghetti", but it was all those words after it that we didn't get. I looked in one of our many maps that had a small lexicon and was finally able to figure out enough to know what I wanted to eat (spaghetti with clams), and I knew enough from eating at pizzerias almost daily in Vienna to know what other pasta dishes would be good for my dad, as they usually have the italian listed in the menus there. He got the spaghetti carbonara, a creamy pasta with bacon bits (not the brandname). Mom also got the clam spaghetti with a salad. I also ordered her a vial of wine, as she was looking forward to trying out Italian wine. When we got our drinks (my dad and I a beer, and mom wine), we also got a plate of bread with oil & vinegar. I performed the perfect blunder in not recognizing the wine for what it was in it's vial, and poured it in with the oil and vinegar, thinking it was just another liquid seasoning. It made for an interesting concoction to dip our bread in, and after a while of waiting for the wine to come, I stuck my finger in the clear, cold liquid I had already used to dip my bread in, and found upon tasting my finger that it, indeed, was a vial of wine. Mama Mia!

We finished our meal and paid the somewhat-less expensive check, and headed back out into the Venetian night, losing ourselves again in the small dark alleys, something I'm sure we'd be more eager to avoid than enter into were we in the States. But there you knew you were safe. We made our way to the Rialto Bridge, and spent quite a while just enjoying the smell of the salt water, the sound of the passing vaporretis, watching the lovers romance one another on the bridge and in the gondolas. The water was calm, aside from the slow wake from the boats, and there was a distant blend of musics coming from various cafes along the canal. I moved off a bit and let my parents sort of take it in for themselves, as I myself watched the people below at the base of the bridge breathe in the life around them.

We moved on, down to the base of the bridge on the other side, and along the main alley where mom kept an eye out for lace she wanted to buy. I knew I wanted to walk those streets alone, or deep in the eyes of a great love, but I accepted gladly where I was and with whom, my parents, and prayed they would sense the magnitude of the moment we had approached. It occurs to me now that the very magnitude of that moment is what we could call Romance. I don't think Romance is simply an element of a bygone era, foisted off in light of more realistic and egalitarian ideals. It exists and it thrives, cradled in streets of places like Venice, and is nurtured and cherished as something worth preserving, not as a memento of the past like an artifact cloistered in a museum, but as a component necessary to a life well-lived. However that Romance works itself out, whether in friendship or marriage, the decisions and actions that lead up to them, or in a life set apart for the Lord alone, it is to be understood and practiced and not foregone in favor of Epicureanism parading itself as progressive thinking.
 

 

Day 3: It was out final day in Venice and we still had a lot to do. For one, I hadn't seen the Palazzo Contarini del Bovolo, a snail-like house (Bovolo apparently means "snail") one often sees in pictures, but apparently is very difficult to find when actually in Venice. Plus, mom hadn't seen the Frari church we had all looked so hard for the first day. Furthermore, we hadn't even ridden across the canal waters on a traghetto yet, much less a gondola. After breakfast, we got out of the hotel quickly onto the pavement and with map in hand.
I knew that church had to be somewhere, and since it was designated as a "major site" on the map we had, I knew it coudln't be as hard to find as we thought it was. We walked along the path we had taken the first day, passed all the same spots of interest and little shops that even still caught my parents' eyes, as they were continually searching for little presents to take back to friends and family. When my parents finally got sucked in by one, I told them I was going to forge on ahead like a scount and find that church, and I would return soon enough after finding it. Well, after a while looking at the map, I finally came upon the square where the church was. It was a big church, and I wondered how we had ever missed it. In fact, I remember having seen it before, or at least its high tower, two days previous, and wondering just what that was.
Collecting my parents, we made our way to Frari Church. A church built by Franciscan friars many centuries before, it was much more elaborate on the inside than its plain-looking brick outer facade let on. Filled with famous paintings and scupltures, a couple by the famous turtle Donatello, we easily understood what Rick Steves meant when he said it was well worth the time you spend looking for it. There were all sorts of stranges things inside I haven't a clue about, or how to explain them, so I'll just let you see the pictures:

 

After this one experience within the church, we were already pooped. But we knew we needed to keep going. I was determined to see that snail house! Close to the church was a traghetto station, and we paid our 50 cents and hopped on with a few other people. The ferrymen weren't particularly friendly, but they weren't mean, either. They were just shoving the oars to get us across. For a while, Mom thought this would be her only gondola ride, as the actual private gondolas ran from 60 to 100 euros, and at the moment that sounded kind of steep.

We made it across the canal quickly enough, thanking the men for the ride. While the boat wasn't in very good shape, and the ferrymen not exceptionally friendly, it had it's own romance about it, even if it only lasted for a few minutes.

We were certainly near the snail house now. I saw it on the map, one of the "minor attractions", but if you've ever looked at a map of Venice, maybe you know that finding it on the map doesn't count for much. We kept walking in a general direction, stopping at another pretty decently priced sandwich shop, eating something like panini but I can't remember how it's called. It was good though. It was rolled up like a burrito, with salami and cheese inside, heated up. Yum! Mom and I splurged and each had a coke, while dad drank water.  Eventually, we found the snail house, after getting a little lost and taking a bathroom break in a burgerking whose toilets didn't have any toilet seats (though this is nothing. Once in Milan I went in the bathroom in a restaurant, and the toilet consisted of a hole in the ground, with a button next to it you stepped on to flush). I was a little upset with the snail house, actually, because it was under renovation. Living in europe you sort of have to get used to this type of disappointment. All these magnificent and very OLD sites are going to have to undergo repair once in a while. The biggest church in Vienna, St. Stephan's, for instance, has been under renovation for literally years now. I don't know if I've ever seen it in it's true form.

The day was waning, and we had seen most of the sites. We went back across the canal via another ferry ride, but not before we saw a few enticing gondolier scenes, which I thing got my mom a little more eager about the possibility of a real gondola ride. The church itself was pretty interesting,  called something like the Church of Mary's Help, and was built after a plague, in order to thank Mary for her gracious intercession over and against the plague on behalf of the faithful Venetians. I didn't take too many pictures of it, though, as it, too, was under heavy renovation, the entire dome covered in scaffolding, and therefore somewhat diminished. Plus, my camera was running really low on memory. After we scoped out the church, we walked through some back alleys to the other coastline of Venice, where we sat for a while and smelled the ocean air and chatted.

We started to make our way back to the hotel, as we knew our time was in Venice was coming to a close. It felt like too little time, to be sure, and I knew I wanted to come back, someday, if not during this time while I am in Europe living, at least sometime before it sinks completely. We hung around the fishmarket for a while, though there weren't any fish there anymore, and I noticed an interesting incarnation of the smurf village in a store window, as well as a really cool clock right near our hotel I had never taken note of, as I was probably too busy avoiding being trampled by the swarm of pedestrians.

What to do in Venice with a few hours to kill? Well, thankfully, dad decided that a real gondola ride, to woo my mom, was the right thing to do. He sought out a gondolier, who called o