Our adventure to Venice, as hinted at in my Madrid post, was indeed very stressful. The day before our trip we had fully believed that it wasn't going to happen, but we still had our train ticket for a 8:25 pm departure from Milano Central to Venezia station if we happened to be at the station in time.
Here were all the things that had to happen to enable us to make our train:
1) Our 30 Euro RyanAir flight to Venice had to not be delayed. (Cheap=unreliable??)
---> If it was, in fact, delayed, we agreed then and there to just not even try to get to Milan in time and instead go in the opposite direction to Bergamon (Spelling?) where we would enjoy the Italian countryside.
2) We would have to get seats in the front of the plane because we had 20 minutes to get to our bus
3) We would have to get off the plane and make it through passport stuff in under 20 minutes
4) The bus would have to leave at exactly 7:20 to make the advertised hour-long-50-km journey from airport to milano central (one stop in between.)
5) The bus would have to not get stuck in traffic and make it in that time frame
6) Given that we get to the station on time, we'd have to be able to navigate ourselves to our platform in 5 minutes.
7) The train might have to leave a bit late
8) Our Printed online tickets would suffice as proper evidence of payment- we were not sure of this.
Here is what happened:
-Our flight was not delayed
-We sat it the front-most seats
-Our flight got in 15 minutes early
-There was no passport check and we made it to the bus terminal in 3 minutes
-There was an unexpected early bus that left at 7:00 instead of 7:25
-We were ecstatic on the bus Evidence of this excitement
-We got on the train with our tickets and were off
[Side note about plane: I was so content about getting front seats and was feeling very optimistic. And I was charmed by the Mozart (Eine Kleine Nachtmusik) playing in the background very elegantly, accentuated by the Irish-accented-voice-overs telling me how great RyanAir traveling is. However, after settling happily in my seat, I noticed that they only played section I of the piece over, and over and over and over and over and over and over. I heard it about 30 times. It reminded me of that one part in the Douglas Adam's Restaurant at The End of The Universe in which the passengers on the plane are stuck on the grounded plane for 900 years hearing the following message periodically: “Transtellar Cruise Lines would like to apologize to passengers for the continuing delay to this flight. We are currently awaiting the loading of our complement of small lemon-soaked paper napkins for your comfort, refreshment and hygiene during our journey. Meanwhile we thank you for your patience. The cabin crew will shortly be serving coffee and biscuits again.” ]
I wrote about our view upon exiting the station already, and i have pictoral evidence that does no justice to it. But really. Looking out from one end of the trainstation through the archway on the other end.... seeing a glassy surface of water sparkling with the reflection of the building lights and the lamposts, with little boats floating mildly down it.... just that one glimpse made the whole thing worth it.
Our night was hectic, scattered, and our we did things very inefficiently. Meandering from one end of the street to the other, over the same monstrous bridge about 10 times, talking in broken spanish to the italian, receiving answers in broken english, we finally gleaned the information we needed. All the while taking frantic pictures, trying to preserve the beauty that we were experiencing.
We paid too much for a taxi when we could have taken a bus had it not been 1 in the morning and had we actually known about them. We arrived at this hostel called "Camping Jolly!" which was actually a campsite, and we could have stayed in a tent for 12 Euros each but didn't have bedding so we rented a little "Bungalo" which consisted of two rooms, three beds, on bathroom, no towels. My solution to this problem was to use an extra bed sheet.
The man in charge of the campsite spoke no English. The Senegalese night guard spoke some English and French. It was a complicated process booking everything. However, we eventually were escorted by the Senagalese guard riding a bicycle. He stopped, however, midway to yell at some Americans who were playing music on their laptop while sitting at a picnic table.
Guard: *gestures with hand in downward sort of way* alto alto! too loud! turn it down!
Pompous American Boy: We did already
Guard: Too loud!
PAB: Alright, geeze.
Guard: It's not for me. *points to self* it's for them *gestures around* people are sleeping.
Then he proceeds to escort us all the while fuming and shaking his head, making sort of high-pitched-exasperated sigh. And when he finished showing us our little room, he added... "Don't play music loud." and we said "yeah, we know." and then "In Senegal, if you act like that..." and then he makes this sort of gesture that resembles hitting someone in the head with a bat. we assured him once more that we would not play our music loudly.
Anyway, the next day we decided to simply meander around the city with the idea that we would only consult our map if we wanted to get to a particular part. Venice has about 6-7 sections or rather... island groupings. I don't understand it. I guess they are like neighborhoods. It also has a taxi fleet of tugboats which will take passengers to different island groupings. We didn't go on one, mostly because I felt the deisel engine would ruin my romantic view.
We explored shops, which unfortunately all contained much of the same sort of tourist-trap items. There were a ridiculous amount of Paper/journal/letter stores. I thought about buying some fragile, expensive,writing paper but i decided I didn't have enough room in my suitecase. I also almost bought Travis a glass octopus (with five legs) but I concluded that I would probably break it or lose it by the end of the trip. (I bought myself a Venetian Blown-Glass Necklace.)
One of my favorite parts of Venice were these Chamber musicians who took turns playing a few pieces at a time around a large Plaza. I was amused that Ein Klein Nacht Musik was a part of one of the medleys. One of the Chamber groups was sort of an.. impromptu folky group consisting of instruments piano, accordion, bassist, some-other-stringed one. It was cool because they took requests and improvised their way through the song. And apparently most of the songs had words, because random Italians in the crowd started singing along and one woman actually was prompted to stand up and sing to the crowd. It was very enchanting.
Other things about Italy:
The people were gentle, and kind. They were always willing to help with directions and with other information and they did so with such a happy and bubbly sort of demeanor. I have a theory about it: To live in such a beautiful place, perhaps, induces a sort of relaxed and optimistic view about life. My host-brother, Jose, told me today that he thought Italia was "como una cuenta"... a story. I bet it helps.
mmm. Like.
I also ate Gelatto and it was glorious. (I might have mixed the Spanish name with the real name, don't know.)
I'm so glad I went. I'd recommend it to anyone. Seriously.
(feel free to comment on this entry, any other entry, or any of the photos. ;) :) . )
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment