Venezia – La Serenissima, The Most Serene
It’s been 3 days since I saw Venice. Oh, it was magical. This excerpt describes it, and refuses to describe it, better than I ever will:
“By day it is filled with boat traffic – water
buses, delivery boats, gondolas – if something floats
and it’s in Venice, it moves along the Grand Canal.
And by daylight it is one of the glories of the Earth.
But at night, especially when the moon is full
and the soft illumination reflects off the water and
onto the palaces – I don’t know how to describe
it so I won’t, but if you died and in your will you
asked for your ashes to be spread gently on the
Grand Canal at midnight with a full moon,
everyone would know this about you – you loved and understood beauty.”
― William Goldman, The Silent Gondoliers
On the first day, we explored the canals, walked around the alleys and over millions of bridges that entangled the city of water that has more water than city. The colors are bright, the canals are beautiful, the gondolas are even more romantic than you can dream. In the afternoon we went to Burano, a small island of Venezia. If you go to Venice, it is SO WORTH the 14 Euro water taxi cost to go to this picturesque town with square houses in bright colors.
We returned, found a place to eat, and for nightlife we roamed through 2 piazzas before we found the main college square. Only Indira, Alex and I braved the nightlife, and it turned out to be one of the funniest nights I’ve had: including late night frittellas, family pizza (HUGE), and being extremely close to an Italian brawl outside a bar.
On Sunday the other sweet girls from our trip woke up earlier and made everyone breakfast quesadillas! I also finally learned how to make the espresso with the weird coffee-making contraption called a caffettiera. However, (embarrassing story alert) I wanted to compost the coffee grinds from the night before so I flipped the machine out the window for them to fall out, and WHOOPS there was a piece that separated the water from the grinds that I forgot about and it floated away in the canal… just kidding, there was no canal out the window, but it did fall down a flight onto the small sidewalk so I ran down there before anyone thought I was completely pazza.
We left the apartment for San Marco, the piazza where all the Carnevale celebrations were kicking off. It is a famous, glutunous festival that leads into Lent. People are in costumes and everyone wheres a mask, traditionally for the purpose of bringing together everyone from all social classes to enjoy one period of time without prejudices.
I also became a little sad because the city is literally flooding. To get around the piazza to see all of the porticos and the church and the bell tower, the city sets up these plank boards that are uplifted and stabilized on the pavement that is being flooded so you don’t have to get wet, so thousands of us cram onto them to walk around haha. It was really bizarre. After exploring, we went a stone-throw away to the Palazzo Ducale– the absolutely stunning past residence of the Doge of Venice. Y’all, it puts the Biltmore to shame. Next trip: in 4 days I’m taking the train to Padova, Italy for a day trip with my History of Italian Art class!
