Strange Things About Europe, Volume 6
1) While riding a gondola our gondolier was singing a traditional Italian song. Then he broke into the chorus of Like A Virgin.
Quote of the Day: “It sounds like fun. I get to go to Quito and the Galapagos. And get high on whatever made Darwin think up evolution.” — My sister Alison, talking about her possible summer 2005 trip to Ecuador. She has officially been elevated to coolest person of the day.
So Venice… incredible. Beautiful. I’m speechless. But what would a blog be without a speech?
We all had to wake up bright and early on Friday morning to catch our train. The ride was about three hours, so not too bad. We took EuroStar, which is a really nice, new and fast train. I have to say though, after sitting with Angela and Jessica for three hours there and back my head was about to explode. They’re great, but their brains are on the same wavelength, which isn’t good in confined spaces.
As we were approaching Venice you get an amazing sight: a city on water. Now I know you’re thinking, “Duh, didn’t he know that before he left?” Well, yeah, I did. But you’ve just got to see it. It’s hard to wrap your mind around a city that has no cars or motorcycles and only has boats and gondolas.
We went to an incredible church first, San Marco Basilica. This is in San Marco Square, which I found out is where they filmed that stupid diamond commercial. You know the one. It’s got the guy who says to his woman that he’s got to do something and he starts yelling, “I love this woman!” And she tells him to stop and then he pulls out the anniversary ring. Then she whispers to the guy, “I love this man.” The moral of the story is that love can be acquired with shiny stones.
Anyway, back to the church. The entire church is covered head to toe with mosaics and gold leaf. They have an alter piece that is so encrusted with gems and rubies and pearls it’s almost sickening. I’ve never been in a church that was more decadent. Our next stop was Doge’s palace. For those of you who aren’t in the know (which included me as of about a week ago, so don’t worry), a doge is essentially the same thing as a duke. It was okay. I think going to Versailles messed up my perception of every other palace I’ve been to since.
We then had some free time before dinner. Most people went back to the hotel to nap or shower. Paulo and I decided to walk around the city for a couple of hours and see what there was to see. We did a lot of window shopping. We looked at all the glass that’s made and sold in Venice. There were some incredible pieces of glass. I saw a glass mandolin that was magnificent (strung with strings and everything). They also sell a lot of masks for carnival time. We found the store that made the masks for the movie Eyes Wide Shut with Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman.
We came back to the hotel exhausted. We were both going to the second dinner (the restaurant couldn’t accommodate the entire group at once), so weren’t going to eat until about 9 PM. It was about 7:30 when we got back. I took a nap and showered before going to dinner. Dinner was pretty good. Good pasta. Good lemon chicken. Great white wine (the first I’ve had since being in Italy, up to this point I’d only had red). I sat with some people I hadn’t really gotten to know. It’s gotten around that I’m a musician so my reputation had preceded me. It’s turning into something of a fish story thanks in large part to Mrs. Duckworth asking me to identify anything that has to do with music (in addition to religion) when we’re looking at paintings. Anyway, they were really nice, and they live in the room diagonal from mine in Florence, so I’ve got no excuse to not make myself a nuisance over there.
After dinner a lot of us went back into the San Marco Square. There are three restaurants there that play live music (all have a piano, bass, violin, and accordion; one had an additional violinist and one had a clarinet player). One of the bands played the main theme from Phantom Of The Opera, and very well may I say.
That evening I slept well… until Brian and Jason came home at around 5 AM. Brian evidently had to carry Jason home because he was so drunk.
Sunday I have to admit that I was a little disappointed with the vast majority of the group. There are 51 students in the program and around 45 went to Venice. Only about 20 went to the first half of the school tour and only 12 went to the second half. Now admittedly, the first half was just more of the same: looking at paintings in the Accademia. But the second half was hot. We went to some church, I don’t even know the name of it because it wasn’t on the original itinerary. But they had a painting of the passion that was unlike anything I’ve ever seen. It was an emotional experience. I couldn’t take a photo of it, but I bought a postcard. I’ve never seen it depicted to well. It’s hard to do it justice with words. I’ll scan it eventually and let you all see it, but for now just take my word that it was unbelievable.
So now for the weirdness. I really wanted to go on a gondola ride. It’s crazy expensive though. A half hour ride can go as high as 120 euro, but you can put up to 6 people in a gondola. Now we encountered a problem when we realized we had seven people in our group (3 girls, 4 guys). We managed to talk a couple of gondoliers into taking us on two gondolas with three in one and four in the other for 20 euro per person. So I’m thinking that one gondola will have two guys and two girls and the other will have two guys and one girl. The ladies had other ideas, deciding that they wanted to be in a gondola by themselves. Hmm, so that means that… crap. So I went on a 30 minute gondola ride with three other guys. That was awkward. I mean, it’s not like I’m dating any of the girls in the group, but in my head it just seemed a little more kosher to break up the ranks. All the same, I’m glad I went on the ride. Those gondoliers are really good at what they do, and it’s just an all around cool experience.
After the ride, Paulo and I walked around for a while longer, taking in the sights and doing a little shopping. Before we knew it we had to be back at the hotel to head back to Florence. Venice was amazing. I mean, how many times am I going to be in a city totally on the water? I was impressed. I took some hot pictures, and maybe I’ll get them up someday.
Now the not so fun part: the take-home test. It’s in Modern Italy and it’s due on Tuesday. I’m not going anywhere tomorrow as a result. I’m moving my trip to Milan back to two weeks from tomorrow instead. It’ll be right after my trip Rome, so I don’t think I’m going to go for very long, just long enough to see the Last Supper and go home.
But yeah, I’ve also got a midterm in Art History and a lot of reading to do for the Grand Tour. So tomorrow is going to be rough. Right now I’m ready to go to bed. It’s coming up on 10 PM here and I am just completely out of energy.
