LCBoniti

Very well done and enjoyable! Looking forward to more . . .

toni

Wonderful writing Peter. We live in Sydney and know four people (two couples) with those beautiful leather? jackets bought for a bargain in Rome. Maybe there should be a club! You could always donate one to our Pauline Hansen, who also loves a bargain, saw her at the markets at Noosa last weekend.

Peter_S_Aus

7.

There is a chain of stores in Melbourne called “Sexyland” - product range is obvious. I've found no corresponding chain in Venice, not that I'm looking in particular, but it has not always been so.

Gutenberg invented movable type, and Caxton the press. Venetian printers were onto this in a flash, and a stream of publications followed, many of them of a licentious nature. Bookshops need books, even bookshops like Sexyland, where the pictures are more important than the text and wood block prints won't cut it. Enter stage left the skilled engravers and lithograph techos. The Church issued an “Index of Forbidden Books” in 1449 - Venetian printers naturally ignored it, seeing it as restraint of trade, and a most lucrative trade at that. In 1605, Pope Paul V attempted to exert Church authority on Earth, and the Venetians were not about to concede to this authority – it would have threatened the book trade, along with other commercial activities. The Pope retaliated by threatening to excommunicate anyone who did not yield, and more significantly, confiscate property. The Venetians upped the ante, in the usual Venetian style, by forbidding publication of the Papal edict. The Jesuits obeyed the Pope, published the edict, and were expelled from the city for their pains. “Publish and be damned”, or “Publish and be expelled”.

This war of the scriptures was watched by all Europe, until a Venetian friar, one Paolo Sarpi (who told the truth not to everyone) came up with the solution. There are two distinct empires, one Holy and one Temporal, and they co-exist, a version of the “Render unto Ceasar” dictum, and so there should be no conflict. This put the whole church taxation regime in jeopardy, along with church military activities, and so was not well received. Paolo survived two assination attempts for his troubles, and Venice continued to thumb its nose at the Vatican. The thumbing of the nose tradition has existed for a long time here, the Rialto bridge being a fine example.

There have been a number of Rialto bridges, built in 1180, 1264 and 1310. In 1144 the bridge collapsed under the weight of a crowd gathered to witness the arrival of the wife of the Marquis of Ferrara, a beauty in her day. (Eat your heart out, Paris Hilton, you are too late on the scene.) Antonio da Ponte (Tony of the Bridge) built the present structure between 1588 and 1590. The three year construction period clearly inconvenienced the Rialto merchants, who were partly funding the Works, and the rumour was started that the bridge wouldn't be finished until the male organ grew fingernails, and the female counterpart caught fire – or words to that effect.

The contractor can always have the last word. Tony placed small statues of these very events on the adjacent Palazzo dei Camerlinghi. They survive to this day, and are quite graphic in their detail. That's what I call having the last word – 600 years later.

There's a concept here - restaurants with cashiers. You order with a cashier, who gives you a ticket for what you want – “due cappucini e due brioche”. Take the ticket to the counter, and an exceptionally suave gentlemen will furnish said coffees and croissants. Front up to the counter without the ticket and receive derision instead of coffees from less than suave gentleman – or you will simply be ignored. This is a particular trap at the railway station, for tourists just off the train, unfamiliar with the system and desperate for a caffeine hit. One wonders what Herr Baedeker would have thought – maybe that is why he reported “cafe-poor” at the station in his 1905 guide to Northern Italy. However, his descriptions of San Marco are still accurate, and he recommends Quadri's over Florians “unless the sun is hot, in which case Florians will provide welcome shade for the visitor” – as would I, if I could afford to buy a coffee at either of those fine establishments, and make an informed decision.

He also comments on dealing with street beggars - best ignored, or possibly a copper coin if one is generous - and the availability of porters at the station. One can imagine porters struggling with those trunks – the Edwardian generation never travelled light, and Baedeker could never have endorsed the “carry it yourself” generation of back-packers. He comments “A gondola can be taken from the station to your hotel, and porters will transport your luggage promptly”, taking the assumption that no traveller would stay at a hotel anywhere but on the Grand Canal. My Baedeker has margin comments pencilled in the best copperplate - against the Scuollo San Rocco, “fine Tintoretto”, courtesy of some long dead lady of good taste – and well funded too, I suspect.

Baedeker never had to visit our Billa supermarket, as he would have had peple to attend to such matters. Our Billa – built in a palazzo on the Zattere – is the biggest supermarket in Venice. It is microscopic, about the size of your average 7/11 times six, but has barge access to the front door, acqua alta notwithstanding. It is frantically busy of an evening, when one mixes with well-furred Venetian women buying the evening meal. While the supermarket is microscopic, the range of produce is astronomical. Three different types of radiccio (in Melbourne, we can't even buy it), and rabbit sausages. Cooking here is an adventure, and buying fish at the Rialto market is like being exposed to the contents of a most exotic acquariam.

Billa also have this old tradition, long dead in Melbourne. Green trading stamps (or actually, red stamps), handed to one when a purchase is made. We've witnessed people negotiating the quantum of stamps – one per ten Euro spent. “Hang on, E49.95 – surely that's five stamps”. “No, No, Giacomo”. Collect enough, and receive a discount on a promotional item. We've collected 24 stamps, and will receive a discount on the risotto pan that we are about to purchase. Frequent flyer points may not be worth a cracker, but loyalty to Billa pays off.

8.
There was a public holiday on the sixth of January, and this marked the end of the high winter tourist season. Venice seems to be sleeping, hibernating a little before the start of Carnivale in February. Many restaurants have closed for a month, some for holidays and others for renovations. A lot of shops are closed on the major tourist trail, and we are discovering smaller places, workshops doing shop fittings, guilders laying on gold leaf to mirror frames, workshops creating masks. Shops are no longer selling Christmas product – the windows now feature masks in bulk. There are fewer visitors, and more tradesmen to be seen – or maybe the tradies are just more visible now. It is now possible to open up pavements without causing a traffic sensation, and in a way we are able to see more of a working city. The African bag (Gucci, genuine, guaranteed, here, look at the label) sellers have departed to warmer climes, and the gondoliers spend more time texting one another than at the oars.

It is cold. Weather report issued at 9:00 on 9th January, courtesy of me. Sky – clear. Temperature - minus 1 deg C (or that is the reading on my thermometer, and I think it is accurate). Acqua alta forecast for 60cm, which won't cause any issues in San Marco. It has been cold since New year when it snowed, and there is still snow on next-door's lawn. There was a micro heat wave yesterday when there was a little snow turning to rain, and the mercury shot up to 4.5 degrees. The sky is absolutely clear and it is very sunny.

I'm tracking the sun with all the enthusiasm of a Druid at the Stonehenge observatory, constructed to determine the time of the Winter solstice. “I just asked for a bloody sundial, and you gather a thousand tonnes of bloody rocks” - contract negotiations still continuing. If you make it to the Winter Solstice, then you've got a chance of seeing Spring, and it's OK to eat more of that pig that you killed and smoked in Autumn. The Winter Solstice is a real marker for survival. Even though we've got Billa and central heating, the advance of the sun is welcome. We've watched it climb a little higher each day, scraping over the Istrian stone parapet next door, then clearing the 300 year old tiled roof, brushing the top of the neighbours conical brick chimney. Today it will clear the satellite dish, and we see more and more sun on our balcony. The conical chimneys are a curiously Venetian affair, maybe constructed with an internal matrix of brick to prevent spread of sparks. It's only 4.5 degrees outside at noon, too cold for Lou to paint “en plein air”.

The tradesmen at No 2686 are back on the job, carrying bricks. Italian bricks are half the size of the Australian version, about 9” x 4.5” x 1.5”, and are solid, so they weigh about five pounds. The guys have a trolley with about 250 bricks on it – so they have dragged more than half a tonne of bricks 200 metres from the unloading point in Campo San Barnaba down Calle Lunga – but at least there are no bridges to cross en-route. The work proceeds slowly – Calle Lunga San Barnaba, while being a “big” street, is two metres wide, and the guys are mixing it with the rubbish collection barrows and a lot of pedestrian traffic. Tradesmen being tradesmen the world over, and attractive girls being a big part of the pedestrian mix, and in good supply on Calle Lunga, the guys take more than the occasional pause and lingering look. Or maybe it is just the cold they are feeling.

Morris - James or Jan, take your pick – wrote what many consider the definitive book, “Venice”, in MCMLX, and comments on the attractiveness of Venetian women. “The women of Venice are very handsome, and very vain. They are tall, they walk beautifully, ...”. He's right, and the tradesman over the road would agree. Morris also speaks about rats and mice being common in 1960, and cats being about in gangs, troops, indeed armies of cats. I visited Kakadu a while ago, and was advised “you are not at the top of the food chain here – crocodiles are”. Maybe St Theodore, with foot on crocodile was making a statement. Cats are at the top of the food chain here, and better rubbish collection and sanitation over the last sixty years has reduced the rat and mouse population - we've not seen any – and so there is less food for cats. The cats are around, looking most satisfied and completely un-feral. They always welcome a pat, and respond to “Gattim gatti”.

Morris is interesting. As journalist for The Times, he was accredited to the successful Everest expedition in 1952 (or was it '53), wrote “Venice” while living here with his family for a year in 1960, followed this up with a three volume history of the British Empire in the Victorian era. The description of his gender re-assignment half way through writing that trilogy makes good, if perplexing, reading, and Morris, at the age of 81, attended Ed Hilary's funeral in New Zealand last year. I've stolen phrases from Morris, for which I offer a somewhat insincere apology.

Lou pointed out a funny anomaly this morning – no cars in Venice, but all the boats are strung about with car tyres as fenders. The used tyres would have to be imported – by boat. Another anomoly – the last steam powered ferry was withdrawn from service in 1956, but ferries are still known as steamers, vaporetti.

I keep on mentioning rubbish collection. It's the engineer in me. The garbage boats are little more than a compactor with a hull wrapped around them, a cab for the operator and a jib crane. This superstructure makes them too tall to pass uinder some bridges when the tide is high. They passed under the bridges to get to our Campo San Barnaba, and this morning the garbage boat and the paper recycling boat are trapped between two bridges (one bridge being the Ponte de Pugni) by the rising tide. They have enough garbage to keep them busy until they are liberated by the falling tide. Actually, the above “tall superstructure” thing is wrong – the operator's cabin telescopes down by a metre, allowing clearance under the bridges. I saw this happen this morning - ingenious

We are close to the Municipal Fire Station, and a fleet of fire boats is wet berthed, ready to steam out and fight the latest conflagration. It looks just like a normal terrestrial station, with traffic lights, “No Parking” signs on the canal, warning hooters and bored looking firies lounging around. Fire fighting is problematic, as ladder access is impossible. Add to this a total lack of fire segration of buildings, shared staircases, chimneys and ventilation shafts, no reliable fire water (you need fire water? – put a pump in a canal) and you have a disaster waiting to happen. It happened at the the opera house, La Fenice, in 1996 – the canal had been drained for cleaning when the fire broke out, and la Fenice burned to the ground, as no fire water was available. The fire was set by a disgruntled electrical contractor, running late on his Works, and looking to gain some time. I believe he may still be in jail, and if not, he should be, fit punishment for torching Venice's heart.

Buildings here are friendly and good companions to each other, relying on each other for mutual support, slumping together in a cooperative fashion, linking their arms around each other as people do in the street. There are arched brick compression struts built across alleys, so that the corners can be supported by neighbours. Walkways, sotoportegi, are built through and under buildings, created by the City authorities taking a room by compulsory acquisition. The city is a maze. We walked down what is said to be Venice's narrowest street, the Salizzada Zusto, twenty metres long, and a scant two feet wide. A real challenge for members of Weight Watchers.

9.
Radio is said to have been invented by Marconi or by someone else. We came to Venice equipped with some CD's and an iPod shuffle with scant contents which are now exhausted. So we're listening to the radio, Easy Network, “Rete facile”. Easy Networks are the same the world over, and it's like being in an audio time warp. To quote the play list for the last twenty minutes:
l What's in a kiss
l Evil Woman
l When you get caught between the moon and New York City (make sense of that, I challenge you. Go call a cab, or ask a cop for directions.)
l Sex 'n Dwugs 'n Wock 'n Woll (what, all together, or in that order)
l Won't you take me to funky town (a question better addressed to a travel agent. I'd rather stay in Venice, if that's OK, but Bologna is nice too)
l Boogie Wonderland (surely an oxymoron)
l We're all American Girls and we love the life that we lead. We're all Amercan girls, hear what we say and know what we mean. (“You know, you know, you know”, to quote the recent interview transcript by Ms Kennedy)
l Fernando - Abba (the definitive history of a failed Mexican uprising)
l Dancing Queen - Abba (Hear the beat of the tambourine! Obviously, if it rhymes, it goes into the lyrics. Possibly a musical legacy of Bjorn's tambourine playing time with the Salvation Army).
l Dance like an Egyptian (Belly dancing classes, anyone?)
l la Bomba (!!)

I rest my case. The architects of Mestre were listening to Easy Network.

Shopping is simultaneously interesting and scary. Scary because it's SALDI time, 30% off everything (skins of endangered species being an exception), so the plastic can take a hammering. Interesting, because we've found some great shops. Two years ago we were here, bought paper products from Legatoria Polliero, and forgot both the name and location of the shop. It's taken four weeks to find the shop again in Campo dei Frari (I believe I've mentioned the concept of getting lost). Paolo Polliero, a gentleman of about 70, has been making paper products seemingly forever, and by the look of his shop, his great great grandfather occupied the same premises, probably refusing service to Austrian invaders. There's still no service as such, and Paolo gets on with his business while you browse his shop. You can stand in a corner and watch a volume being bound in leather, marbled end papers being applied, and the cut leaves being polished with graphite and an agate rubbing stone. It is very special to watch a master craftsman in action.

And then connection is made, and he is the most lovely person imaginable, the apparent mask of indifference hiding a person of great courtesy. I picked up a photo of him with his grandson, and he explained that while he has no English, his son has some, and his grandson, now eight years old, is fluent, like a bird, “e somigliare il uccello”. I envy his grandson, being bi-lingual. As we made purchases, he was at pains to explain “non fabbrica, artisan”, and he cut the wrapping paper on a guillotine. The fine objects that he makes and sells are certainly not factory produced, and he's an artisan. Shopping like that is more than buying stuff – there's a little relationship being started as well. He'll recognise us next time we are there, and I like that.

We found a tiny shop selling turned wooden items, wooden eggs, children's spinning tops, pedestals to mount an egg on. The owner left his lathe, covered in shavings. We explained that we needed a pedestal for an “uovo ostriche”, and he understood – there was, after all, an ostrich egg in the window. I did not try to explain that it was actually for an emu egg – I've no idea what the Italian word is for emu. We find that the older shopkeepers with no English take the trouble to speak Italian slowly, and so we get by. Again, the knowledge that one is dealing with an artisan, and a relationship started.

Of course it is possible to get it wrong, and I witnessed this yesterday at our local bar about 10:30 AM, after the breakfast rush was over. Real estate in Venice is tight, even the real estate taken by a table, which is why a coffee taken at the bar costs Euro 1.20, while at the table it is twice that. Two women walked in, asked “Do you serve lunch?”. Blank look from behind the counter – lunch happens around 1:00 PM. Slightly louder (if they don't speak English, talk louder. They must be thick or something) “Do you serve spaghetti, pizza, food for lunch”. Confirmation from behind counter, a rather grumpy “Si”. Women take table, and don't order anything. Shrug from behind counter, but as time progressed, the body language started to display consternation and we left. If you want a table, at least order a coffee, pay the rent.

Until last night, I've not been particlarly fond of quail, a legacy of my grandfather. He was the classic “poor boy makes exceptionally good” story, one of seven children, starting work aged twelve as an office boy filling ink wells, same employer for about sixty years, career finishing as Managing Director. In the course of turning himself into a gentlemen (children to fine schools, family takes European tour in 1927, Baedeker in hand) he took to gentlemanly pursuits, notably fly fishing and shooting – he never would have “hunted”. There was a gun room in the house, with guns, rods, fly boxes, gun oil, boxes of shells. It was forbidden territory to a six year old. Amongst the game he shot were quail, and I have recollections of my grandmother placing pieces of lead shot around her plate when quail was served. He was a good shot, by all accounts, and a 4-10 shell devestates a quail. It seemed like eating the family fowl, like the scene in the late 1950's film “Giant” when Rock Hudson's and Elizabeth Taylor's children burst into tears at the sight of the pet family turkey being served up at Thanksgiving.

I digress, a written ramble, pushing words around the page the way a child plays with its food, pushing the hated beans or quail to the side of the plate is an attempt to hide them and move on to the ice cream course.

Last night we cooked quail risotto, and it was both excellent and free of shot. We have a cook book, written by one Francesco da Mosco, a writer, architect, TV series producer, thorough Venetian and clearly an excellent cook. The Palazzo da Mosco stands on the grand Canal, and is the oldest surviving Palazzo, with the facade now covered in scaffold. The book is simply “Francesco's Kitchen”, and I'd recommend it. It is a great read, and is as much about Venetian life, both now and for the last 500 years, as a cook book. The recipe for quail risotto works well. He also includes recipes for eel dishes, and I can't quite come at them. Our local fishmonger had half a dozen of them, very alive and swimming around in a styrene box a couple of days ago. Not being armed with a 4-10 gun, I'd not know how to kill one, let alone butcher it.

Peter_S_Aus

Here's anothe bit - a brain dump almost.
Don't blame me - I just write this stuff.
10.
Venice has never been big on public monuments to notables – one will walk many streets before finding an equivalent to Nelson's column, or our Melbourne monument to the explorers Bourke and Wills (who sadly failed to take copy right on the phrase that best described their ill fated adventure – “Get Lost”). Melbourne even has a statue of Kylie Minogue – the reason for this escapes me, but at least it is at one of Melbourne's more windswept locations. A monument to Carlo Goldoni the playwright stands near the Rialto, and a happy man he looks with a slightly quizzical gaze, a life well lived. He has a smile, and looks as if he is about to greet a dear friend. There's a monument to Vittorio Emmanuel near the San Zaccaria vaporetto stop, but these are a dime a dozen in Italy, and Rome's monument makes the Venitian version pale into insignificance. The statue to Daniele Manin, leader of the 1848 revolution against the Austrians, stands in Campo Manin, with a most excellent winged lion. Taxidermists would wonder at the lion – it is not clear whether the lion should have fur or feathers under its wings, and would seem to have a mixture of both.

The exception, however, is the equestrian statue in Campo SS Giovanni e Paolo and it's a monster. I'm no judge of horseflesh (my bookmaker can supply confirmation of this) but I reckon the horse stands about 37 hands. It's magnificent, and was meant to be somewhere else – like in the Piazza San Marco, to be exact.

The statue celebrates Bartolomeo Colleoni. I recollect that Marlon Brando played Don Corleone in “The Godfather”, and if the horses head in the bed had been as big as the statue in Campo SS Giovani et al, the bed would have collapsed. Colleoni was a mercenary commander from Bergamo (Venice has never been averse to contracting out the dirty work, as evidence the Fourth Crusade) and was most successful. He made a small fortune, or maybe a not so small fortune, as a part of his military service – perhaps it was written into his Conditions of Engagement. “A dollar a day, plus a percentage of loot.” Military operations would appear to have been self funding, for the Venetians at least.

Colleoni, patriot to the last, or at least knowing who buttered his bread, left his fortune – half a million ducats - to the State of Venice which was broke at the time, on condition that a statue be erected to him “in front of San Marco”, with his estate to fund the statue. Big conundrum for the City Fathers – while wanting the money, a statue of anyone in front of St Marks was inconcievable. But a deal is a deal, and Venetians honour deals. So the statue stands in all its magiificence in front of San Marco – the Scuole Grande San Marco. Colleoni should have defined his conditions a little more tightly, and the Venetians delivered on the agreement – to the letter. If not the spirit. Molto Veneziano. The Scuolo Grand San Marco is just around the corner from the site of the Municipal Gasworks, next to the Hospital, and a fair step from the Piazza San Marco.

It is, even to one with a less than perfect eye for horseflesh, a fine bronze statue, and Colleoni looks quite magnificent, and not cheesed off in the slightest to be in his present location. He's been there since 1496.

Sunday 11 January, so we are just over half way through out time here. We can feel the days racing past. Happily, we are having a micro heat wave – the mercury hit 10 degrees – and the remnants of New Year's snow next door have almost all melted. “Molto freddo” is not so often heard, and I think the last couple of weeks have been exceptionally cold, even by Venetian standards. We can now take coffee because we want a coffee, not because we need refuge in a warm bar from the cold.

We went to the opera a few nights ago. They gave Verdi's “la Traviata”, with a small cast, leading to some confusion, and a chamber orchestra, piano, two violins, viola and 'cello. The first violin was exceptionally good, indeed all the music was excellent, and the performance was in the Scuola Grande S. Giovanni Evangelista, in a hall dating from the 1700's. The story of la Traviata is simple – Courtesan takes up with gentleman A, she is also fancied by another gentleman B. There is an argument between Courtesan and Gent A, possibly a duel – certainly a challenge to a duel, between Gent A and Gent B, as Gent A has insulted the woman that Gent B fancies. Gent A and Courtesan are reconciled, she dies of TB in his arms. Closing aria, Gran Dio! morir si giovane - “O God, to die so young”.

Walk out into the streets of the most lovely city in the world at mid-night, freezing cold, ice crackling underfoot, voices fading away, silent.



11.
Big problem – Lou's set her heart on No 1, Santa Croce. Close to all facilities, short walk to the Punto supermarket, widows walk at roof level, wine shop just over the bridge, choice of three fishmongers within 75 metres, and a florist 100 metres away. It's all just too, too convenient. Nice corner room, with two windows overlooking the Nuove Rio di Ca' Foscari (she's promised me that room). Canal entrance, place to park a small boat, vacant shop that can certainly be put to some good use. The clincher, the thing that sold it to her, was when she discovered a postcard, shot in about 1900, of No 1 Santa Croce. It is quite recognisable in the photo – even the news stand and my corner window are visible. It is quite vacant and derelict, the TV aerial looks as though it would be connected to a black and white set, the bottom bars of the water gate rusted clean off, the shutters rotting off their hinges. It looks ready to tumble into the Nuove Rio di Ca' Foscari, which will certainly be a hazard to navigation. If I can find a lazy 10 million Euro I should be able to secure it. She really wants it. Another million or four for renovations – just a Venetian tad of rising damp to cure – and we're set. There is even a firm of architects in the adjacent building to supervise the renovations.

And I can't even afford table rental at Quadri's – where does she get these notions!

It's a worry, I'm here to tell you.

But there's another story there as well, to do with this door numbering protocol in Venice. The adjacent building, with the architects, has door number 2 – and that door did not exist in 1900, in the postcard. So when did the door numbering system kick in? There's a little research project to consider. I suspect that it is after Napoleon, because the numbers have not changed where he had a few buildings torn down to create the public gardens between the Piazza and the Grand Canal. We tried to find 1 San Marco, but I don't know that it exists – the closest number we found was No 3, facing the Piazzetta, close to St Theodore's (and the crocodile's) column.

We are quite disconnected from reality here, the World exists in a parallel universe that we're mostly ignoring. I'm not going in search of English language newspapers, which I suspect will be full of the horrible events happening in Gaza – we can pick that up even from the Italian language papers.

There is, of course, the internet. The letter “W” does not exist in Italian, there is no Italian word equating to the English “W”. But even Easy Network has to advertise its web site in case one wishes to stream their audio, and return to the 60's. So one hears “Vou vou vou punto Easynetwork punto ita”. I've yet to visit their web site, but I would expect their home page to be written on paisley pattern wall paper or maybe lime green text on burnt orange background. Technology does abound, but in a discreet fashion, as does advertising. Satellite dishes are common, but all the roof mounted dishes are coloured terracotta. This may be a planning requirement, and there is no outdoor advertising – maybe a small sandwich board in the street, but not much more. We found the same in Rome. Even Maccas has been forced to comply – the Golden Arches look like an “M” in 24 point font.

I've seen technology in the form of a GPS in Venice. The GPS owner was lost, and was asking directions. He'll be given the standard Venetian response – Sempre diritto, straight ahead. Maybe “straight ahead” is designed to reduce the number of visitors – walk straight ahead to Mestre – it's too crowded already here. Summer must be unbearable, standing in line to cross the Rialto.

Venetians have been advising “straight ahead” since Pepin, son of Charlemagne, entered the lagoon in 809, bent on invasion. The Venetians, outnumbered and out-gunned (actually, out-crossbowed), pulled up all the stakes that marked the channels and retreated. Pepin invaded Malomocco, a small island in the lagoon, the then seat of Venetian power, vacated in a hurry by the Venetians. Except one old crone remained, determined to defend Malomocco (or maybe just left behind as too grumpy – the truth not to everyone). History, or at least Morris, records that she was summonsed by Pepin, and asked “Which way to the Rivo Alto” (later to be the Rialto). She advised “sempre diretto”, straight ahead, with quivering finger, towards the unmarked channels, tide races and mud banks of the lagoon. Pepin followed her directions, his fleet was grounded, and his troops slaughtered. The channel running to Malomocco is called the Canale del Orfano, because so many orphans were made that day.

So, when advised “sempre diretto” by a Venetian, take it with a grain of salt – it may not be kindly meant.

12.
Old crones feature not infrequently in the history of Venice – one is credited with ending a revolt by one Biaminti Tiepolo. Biaminti was cheesed off when the Golden Book, the list of notables and persons of clout, was closed (unless one was prepared to buy one's way in), and figured a revolution was the way to resolve his ego problem. His little revolution proceeded towards San Marco, up the Merceria from the Rialto, as far as the intersection with the Merceria and the Calle Capello. A brave show it must have been, drums, standards, shouting, confusion, probably women in furs, dogs of various breeds, the whole box and dice. The revolution was brought to its knees when a mortar was dropped or hurled by said crone from her window, braining Biamintini Tiepolo's standard bearer. Or maybe she just knocked the mortar off her window sill as she leaned out to see what all the fuss was about, or maybe she was just adjusting her flower pots, hanging out the washing, or hurling everything to hand at the revolutionaries – I think I've previously mentioned the concept of “the truth not to everyone”. Confusion reigned, revolution failed, and the episode is immortalised in statuary and inscription. A bust of the famous crone with mortar high on the wall, and a stone let into the pavement marking the point of impact. The stone bears the inscription XV-VI-MCCCX, 15th June, 1310, and you can see it on the left, about 15 metres after you walk under the clock tower towards Rialto.

I suppose that Venetian women of a certain age, clad in fur, take this story to heart. Don't get in their way if they are armed with pestle and mortar. Revolutionary Tiepolo was tortured and then hanged for his trouble, others merely hanged. Do not, on any account mess, with Venetian women.

Lou's into painting, and painters need paint, plus all sorts of other artistic paraphenalia, so we went shopping. We found an artists supplies shop, complete with jars and trays of powdered pigments. I've never seen that before, pigments in the raw. Just add linseed, gum arabic, ox gall or whatever and attack that canvas or fresh frescoe. I suppose that is how Antony Canal, aka Cannaletto, mixed his paints, or had an apprentice mix them for him. A little mercuric oxide (toxic), a little plumbum oxide (ditto), and advertise for a new apprentice. The shop looks as though it has been serving artists for a long time – I fancy I saw an instruction pinned up, “No more paint for Senor Tintorretto unti he settles his account. Same applies for Titian. I don't care if they are painting the Doge's dungeon – NO MORE CREDIT”. But maybe I mis-translated it, and artist's shops are the best fun. For Lou.

I have my revenge by subjecting Lou to the contents of a hardware shop that sells Proxxon machine tools. They are miniatures – reflecting the size of the shed of your average Venetian bloke. Tiny milling machine, drill press, lathe, a buzzer and a band saw that I'd love to take back to Aus. This hardware shop is the best fun. But not automatically fun for Lou.

There's Venice, and then there's Giudecca, that long fish shaped island just south of San Marco. I won't say it's a different country, but I think it might be part of a different city. It is to Venice as Melton is to Melbourne, or Mount Druitt is to Sydney, lacking the post industrial buzz of Yarraville or Ultimo. Like parts of Castello, it retains a working class feel, and one guide book that we have records that some houses on Guidecca did not have indoor plumbing as recently as 1960. At one end of Guidecca, the east, there is the Church of San Gieorgi Maggiore, a magnificent structure designed by Palladio. (Yes, purists, I acknowledge that San Gieorgio is on it's own island). Move west a little and one comes to the Hotel Cipriani, run by the Harry's bar folk, pretty flash with its own dedicated water taxi from San Marco. Move past the Church of the Redentore (Palladio again) and it gets pretty gritty. At the other end, there is the Gothic pile of the Mulino Stucky, once a flour and pasta mill, owned by one Kevin Stucky (or was it Bruce), employing some two thousand people, now converted to a five plus star hotel, with Venice's only rooftop swimming pool. In between, it seems depopulated and desolated. Heavy cranes on the south side, waiting for ships to come and be repaired – except those ships now go to Korea to be repaired. New housing for workers, with the salt already leaching out of the 1970 brickwork, and not the press of people to brush the salt deposits off the face brick. Sorry folks, but that's how La Giudecca seemed to me – I'm sure that in Summer it would be a different story. We found a good bar, but.

Again the engineer in me raises its ugly head, and I work in the area of Water. Otherwise known as sewage treatment. The bathroom equipment shop just over the Ponte de Pugni sells a fine range of sanitary fixtures. The thing I don't understand is how they feel it a need to have fourty nine (yep, count 'em, folks), fourty nine toilet brushes of different configurations in the window. That shop is toilet brush central. They do sump pumps, too, for the acqua alta. Most shops have a barrier they can fix across the doorway, and a sump pump to discharge water that flows past the barrier – the pump discharges back into the street, and you can see them going flat stick when the water is high. Flooding is interesting. I'd expected to see water overflowing from the canals, but water just rises out of the drains in a most discreet fashion, creating ever-expanding puddles.

Peter_S_Aus

Food and hints for travellers.
I've not attempted to do a trip report, rather a written ramble around my head, while my head is in Venice. However, some recommendations.
In Rome, have a meal at Le Tamerici, which is near the Trevi Fountain. Vicolo Scavolino 79, uphill from the Trevi, take via del Lavatore, and first left. Think 120 Euro for two, and we ate there twice in three days. They have a web site, www.letamerici.com. Best food we have eaten in all Italy, ever, and was one of the reasons we went to Rome this time. We were served by one Kate, who hails from the Hunter Valley ioin Aus, a girl of good humour. (“Would you recommend the pork or the duck?” “Don't ask me, I'm a vegetarian.”)
In Rome, the bar called “The Glass”, Via Carlo Battisti, left side as you go downhill. It looks very cool and expensive – but it's not.
La Bitta in Calle Lunga San Barnaba, Dorsoduro, is a good place to eat – they don't do fish. On the left as you walk west from Campo San Barnaba.
The bar, Ai Artisti in Campo San Barnaba, is fun, and the staff get to know you quickly.
Fabio Bressanello, Calle Lunga San Barnaba, Dorsoduro 2751 sells photos, which is a complete understatement. He's brilliant, some of the most evocative images of Venice and the lagoon that I've ever seen. Limited edition photos, printed on good paper, four colour offset for the technically minded, registration of the print is perfect. Pleasant guy, we talked for half an hour about photography, printing, selling stuff. www.bressanelloartstudio.com is worth a look.
The shop just west of him sells linen, and the woman who runs it is most charming.
Glass – try L'Isola, Salizada San Moise, San Marco 1468 (Salizada San Moise runs west of the Piazza.) This is the showroom for glass by Carlo Moretti, and not cheap. However, you can buy work there that you won't see anywhere else, except in the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art in NY, and the designs are spectacular. Expect to shell out 70 Euro for a glass that you'll use and treasure forever. www.lisola.com. He does mail order, for when you smash the treasured glass and can't live without it.
Paper – try Legatoria Polliero, Campo dei Frari, San Polo 2995.
Nice green grocer with good smile – Fondamenta San Basillio, Dorsoduro, near the church of San Sabastiano. He's fun, even if you just buy an apple and munch it in the sun on the Zattere.

Gondolas have a list price of 80 Euro for the first 40 minutes, plus 40 Euro for each additional 20 minutes. Charge may increase with additional passengers – I'm not sure. But traghettos, which cross the Grand Canal, cost 50 cents each way, and can save a lot of walking. It is de rigeur to stand up, and when embarking, walk to the farthest end of the gondola, and turn around. Dogs travel free – the Golden Retriever on the Ca' Rezonnico traghetto yesterday seemed to enjoy the voyage, but then, they are water dogs.

A 12 hour Waterbus pass costs 14 Euro, and must be the best bargain available anywhere.

MacDonalds. A Big Mac, Fries and Coke will set you back 7.60, but I'm not about to pass through the Golden Arches. Maccas are pleased to call this a Happy Meal, surely an oxymoron, up there with “friendly fire”, “military intelligence” and “fun run” on the oxymoron league table.

Hint for travellers – navigation in Venice is tricky. (Oh, derr, tell us something we don't know.) I've found that the maps, and more importantly the street index in the Moleskine Venice City Notebook to be the most useful, and it is pocket sized. The maps cover all of Venice proper, but not the Lido or Murano. It's a guidebook that you write yourself – there is not much other info, but it serves to scribble notes in, and makes a great memento. The best water bus route map is one you get when you buy tickets – most guide book maps are too small to read. Another hint for travellers – bring a copy of Venice by James Morris, if you are interested in the odd, the quirky, the unusual. Like dead elaphants, of which more later.

I know I keep banging on about food, but one does have to eat three times a day, approx. I'd expected fresh food to be expensive (I'm not sure why I expected this, but there you go). So I thought a list of things would be good.
Wine – you can buy drinkable wine for 4 Euro a bottle, and it will be better than Australian generic wine – Jacob's Creek, for example. Spirits – vodka, Baileys, etc – are about Euro 10.00 a bottle.
Meat – Red meat is expensive. Good quality minced beef plus pork is Euro 9.90 a kilo. It makes good ragu for spag Bol, and is good value.
Here's an interesting one – chicken livers are about Euro 6.90 a kilo, indicating that they are not treated as awful offal, as they are in Aus.
Chicken breast fillet – say Euro 7.00 a kilo, which is about AUD 14.00 – almost the same as in Melbourne.
Bread – Euro 3.20 per kilo, and it is sold by weight.
Mussels – about 3.00 a kilo, but more exotic crustacea cost more – and are worth every cent. Razor clams are excellent, 12.00 a kilo, and are live.
Can't comment on eel.
Tripe costs more than chicken – what we Aussies see as un-saleable, Venetians see as special.
Glass of wine and a little roll, a panini, about 4.50, taken at the bar.
Vegetables are about the same as in Melbourne, except for exotics. Potatoes and carrots – two Euro a kilo, tomatoes 3.50, radiccio 3.90, parsley thrown in for free. All in all, we find that we are spending not much more on food than we would in Melbourne.
There is less fast food – or less conventional fast food – than some places. A micro McDdonalds, a modest Burger King. Fast food is slices of pizza, with a thin crust and not much cheese, excellent.
Coffee and croissant – costs Euro 2.10, taken at the bar at our local. Expect to pay 3.40 if you want to have a table. But just a coffee at the Bar Americano at San Marco will set you back 2.00. It all depends on location – or maybe they think that Americans are loaded. You don't see people toting take away coffees, the cappucino grande, beloved of Hudsons or Starbucks. If you want a coffee to go, drink it at the bar quickly, unless you come from an adjacent shop or gondola, in which case take cup, saucer and all. I'd love to know if Starbucks ever attempted a coffee shop in Venice. It might have seen patronage from visitors, but Italians would never go there. A bar selling just coffee – coffee in buckets – and no alcohol would fail the morning it opened in Italy.

Eating out is not a killer. We ate well last night – a shared entree, plus two main courses (we both had the pork shank) plus a shared dessert and bottle of wine – 65 Euro, including service, bread, tablecloth. The same meal in Melbourne would cost AUD 120, so it seems good value. A five Euro tip seemed completely justified. However, I would recommend never to order the Ensalada Verde, the green salad. Grated carrot atop ordinary lettuce. Don't go there – it's a waste of money.

All in all, food is fun, as is buying it. Our favourite geeengrocer smiles and corrects Lou's pronunciation, and enquires whether the potatoes are for gnochi or not. On being told “not”, he directs us to the appropriate spuds, and there's an Italian lesson thrown in free gratis. The butcher wants to know if the mince is for ragu, and then points to the best. The whole process from recipe book to table is an adventure, creating relationships along the way.

Kavey

Just stumbled across your impressions; what an enjoyable read.
Eight weeks in Venice sounds just wonderful!

TracyLH

Oh, you are taking me back! (wistful look as I close my eyes!)

annhig

magnifico, pietro,

reading this is having to do service as today's italian lesson as a heavy cold has confined me to barracks.

so grazie mille.

as you are a collector of the curious, you may be interested in a little shop on the way to another supermarket [coop this time I seem to remember] round the back of san bartolomeo. it is [I think] easiest to get to if you exit campo san bartolomeo via the public toilets, and then follow the little streets east, over the rio d. fava, then turn north. what you are looking for is a shop selling hand-made shoes - my favourites were the gondolas and the feet! no prices - if you need to ask, you can't afford them.

looking forward so much to your next installment,

regards, ann

cathies

Hi Peter, there is a little shop somewhere near the Rialto Bridge (from memory) called Il Papiro, it is a gorgeous shop and the only reason I mention it is that they have another shop in de Greves Lane in Melbourne.

I first visited Il Papiro in Melbourne some years ago and stopped dead in my tracks last June when I stumbled across this gorgeous little shops in Venice.

They have very cute bookmarks with an assortment of little drawings at the top and the words "here I fell asleep" printed down the length of the bookmark. They are quite inexpensive if you are looking for little keepsakes or gifts to take home.

Apparently the main store is in Florence, but I've not come across it there.

cathies

Sorry, forgot to say that they also sell beautiful stationery and leather bound journals.

YvonneT

What a good read! Who have you chosen to play the parts of you and Lou, in the forthcoming movie? Hugh and Nicole??

This section tickled my fancy, but leads to a question:

"the operator's cabin telescopes down by a metre, allowing clearance under the bridges. I saw this happen this morning - ingenious"

Does the operator lie on the deck, or telescope also??

endswit

This is the best "report" ever! Can't wait for the next installment. Thanks!

bfrac

Peter, please buy 1 Santa Croce for Lou. There will be so much for you to write about during the renovation and we will all promise to read every word.

annhig

we might even chip in for the pleasure of keeping you writing to us!

JudyC

Enjoy the reading very much, thank you.

Peter_S_Aus

Here's anothe chunk. More dross from the end of my pen.
14.
We're not really doing the sights here, but we're spending time seeking out the strange and unusual, like the Corte del Teatro, site of the first screening of a movie in Venice, on 9th June, 1896. We've visited San Marco for Mass, the odd Palladian church, checked out the monster equestrian statue. We saw an exhibition of engravings from about 1700, scenes of Venice. A syndicate of engravers did them, the lead man doing the architectural details, and others putting in people, animals, boats and so on. The lead man was acknowledged as being not good at people, so subbed the work out. They were devised as a promotional set of about 30 sheets, to lure the tourists, so the Doge Palace, the equestrian statue of Colleoni, San Marco, the Torre dell Orologio all feature (including a view of the Piazza from said clock tower). The bell ringing would have been deafening while the sketches were being made.

One engraving took our fancy – a view of a canal, the Rio del Mendicianti, hospital to east side, a boat repair yard, a squero, to the west. In 1700, the squero was a mud bank with boats drawn up. We found it, and the squero is still there, albeit concrete paved with a small slip. Boat builders mostly came from the alps, and I suppose the Venetians were better with stone and brick than with timber. The architecture of the squero reflects the alpine heritage, timber buildings, vertical timber cladding, where's Heidi the cowherd. The name “squero”, or rather the nick-name comes from the square, as in carpenter's square. There are many streets all over Venice named “squero” - it was a big industry here. Only a couple of squero remain now, and I've sought them out, as I've messed about in boats a bit.

A canal, the Rio del Santissimo di S Stefano, passes clean under the church of that name, and a kayak would be fun. There's a nice conjunction – the roof of the church is a “ships keel” roof, and most spectacular. It mirrors, in a way, the fact that a canal runs under the high altar, an upturned ships hull over the canal. We sought out the cloister of San Stefano, now occupied by a government department, Taxation, I believe, so accordingly fraught and tense. As was Pordeonone, who went about his work armed with a fistfull of paintbrushes and a sword when he painted a series of Biblical frescoes in the building. His bitter rival, and possibly the losing bidder for the Works, Titian, was in the habit of harassing him as he worked. I suppose this anticipated the Second Amendment, the right to bear arms, by a few centuries, and Pordeonone possibly wished for a nice little hand gun, a Beretta maybe, being a patriotic Italian.

San Stefano has clearly seen its share of angst. The Church has been de-consecrated five times, evidence of power strruggles between the Vatican and Venice, or perhaps just bad behaviour. And there has clearly been some innapropriate behaviour outside the church doors, too. The stone plaque, dated 20th June 1663 (I love the precision engraved into the stone tablet), advises that it is forbidden to gamble, set up stands, sell things or blaspheme in the vicinity. Transgressors risk banishment, the galleys, or a period in stir.

I've found the church of San' Antonin, but it's been de-consectrated and is closed. Morris records that, in 1819, an elephant, having escaped from a visiting managerie, took refuge in that church, and was “only despatched with a shot from a piece of ordnance”, according to contemporary records. The main doors open towards the Rio de San Agostino, no doubt allowing easy removal of the unfortunate animal. The Church is just around the corner from the Calle della Morte, not a dead end street, and probably not imortalising the death of the elephant. One wonders who died – maybe it was a plague thing. The church is close to the Arsenale, and so ordnance was conveniently to hand, even after Napoleon had looted the place. Hemingway records a duck shooting expedition on the lagoon, with a grumpy boatman smashing the ice to float decoys, but I doubt if even Ern, big game hunter as he was, came equipped with an elephant gun to Venice. Times change, and the elephant attraction has been replaced with a merry-go-round and set of dodgem cars on the Riva degli Schiavoni, just down the way from the Danieli, Ernest's preferred hotel.

There are other sights, micro sights. We witnessed the Fire Department at work, raising a sunken motor boat from a canal. Drag boat to surface, pump faster than water flows in until freeboard is obtained. I think this was more a public service than a favour to the unfortunate owner – a sunken boat may play havoc with navigation. Pity about the outboard motor – it'll need a trip to the nearby squerro.

Another sight is artisans at work, and one can linger at shop windows and workshops. Workers painting gondolas, which have to be slipped and cleaned and anti-fouled about once a month, as marine growth is fierce in the lagoon. Skilled restorers touching up antiques, including a four drawer chest, with fine inlaid pearl shell. We've watched the progression through the drawers, and now he is onto the carcasse. We passed his shop this morning and he was on the telephone, and I'm sure it was a bakelite job. His assistant is carefully restoring the paintwork on an old bench, being careful to preserve the patina.

It's wet, umbrella time, and I'm almost inclined to wear safety glasses. The combination of fur clad woman plus umbrella equals Peter might have to learn Braile. Children are the same the world over. Little girls chatter and carry pink umbrellas. Little boys jump in puddles. The thing that amazes me is how the kids can speak such good Italian. They are totally brilliant, dressed to kill. I can see how Italian women are so well dressed – they have been working at it since birth, if not conception. I don't think they would even own a polyester track suit, much less wear it in public.

Dorsoduro, where we live, is close to the Academe and sundry other University campuses (campii, maybe, to call up my poor schoolboy Latin. I remember amo, amas, amat, amamus, amartant, amant. The balance is lost in a haze of detentions and other punishments). We are surrounded by students, and they make for a lively environment, along with book shops to die for. Shops are shuttered at lunch time, and at night. I don't believe this is a crime prevention thing, it would seem the shutters are intended to provide a canvas for graffiti. There are more political slogans, “Bush = War', and less street art than in inner Melbourne, probably a higher class of graffitisti. “The medium is the message”, to quote Marshall McCluhan, and the medium is a closed shutter and spray can. Many closed shutters, but it still pains me to see graffiti on a 500 year old church – go find a blank shutter. I get the impression that people are more politically connected, and we witnessed a political rally with as many as say, oh, at least fifteen people in attendance. There was a hammer and sickle flag – talk about a blast from the past!


15.
Venice is reputed to be pretty much free of crime. Doubtless there's the odd pickpocket, and I could imagine the pickings are rich in Summer, when the crowds are dense. Maybe there's the occasional hand bag vendor out-sprinting the police, but the feeling is one of safety. Goods are left beside the canal for a few hours – pallet loads of product – cases of Johny Walker, barrels of Heineken, protected by no more than shrink wrap. I've taken a walk in the small hours, down twisting alleys and dead ends, and had no apprehension. At the Bridge of Breasts, so named because it was a place favoured by courtesans, there are no working girls to be seen. Even in the Rio Terra degli Assassini, there's no fear of a stilletto in the ribs. Fear of the stilletto in the instep is another thing – don't get me started on Italian women's shoes.

The names of streets and lanes are evocative. The Alley of the Curly Headed Woman, the Alley of the Love of Friends or of the Gypsies, The Filled In Canal of Thoughts, The Broad Alley of the Proverbs, The First Burnt Alley, the Street of the Monkey or of the Swords, the Alley of the Blind, The Bridge of the Honest Woman (perhaps a scarcity in Venice at the time?).

In the meantime, I've lost Lou, she's disappeared into an identity crisis of her own making, by enrolling in a short course of Italian. When you study a foreign language, you unearth your lack of knowledge of your own language, or at least your lack of formal knowledge of grammar. While Lou is not likely to utter the phrase “Doge Dandolo, he done gone invaded Constantinople”, the structure of irregular verbs and nouns are not her forte, and not mine either. And what tense is the phrase “Dandolo was later to discover that invading Constantinople was not such a smart trick”? Is it the past imperfect, the pluperfect, or what. I don't know. But Lou can now conjugate with the best of them, she's a champ. It's just that she might not know what the verb means.

She's lost so much of her identity that she's not able to mutter the phrase “Look, I'm paying for these bloody lessons, so SPEAK SLOWER, per favore.” Her teacher, despite a seemingly good knowledge of English, refuses to utter a single word in the language of that green and pleasant land, perfidious Albion.

Peter_S_Aus

I've started a couple of other threads.
Teenagers in Venice, and Sad Tale in Venice.
Just for interest.

Peter_S_Aus

Yet more dribble off my pen!
16.
The Lagoon.
“Sono, sei, siamo Veneziano” (sung to the tune “I am, you are, we are Australian”). But we went to Burano, and they'd never claim to be Venetian – they remain proudly Buranese. Burano is, of course, famous for lace, and the legend is that the women of Burano made lace in imitation of their men-folk who were making fishing nets. I find this a bit far-fetched – the intricacy of the lace makes your average purse sein or drift net look most basic. We saw a lace museum, lace made in Belgium in the 16th century, christening gowns, first communion dresses, Buranese lace. And there was an incomplete work, a sampler, showing the different knots used in Buranese lace – 16 different knots, from memory. Each lace maker specialises in only a couple of knots, and so a piece of work with many different knots will be passed from hand to hand, a community effort. It is not cheap – a fine piece, say A5 plus a bit, will cost about one thousand Euro. We saw such a piece being created, by a woman who must have been about 80, wearing glasses as thick as a milk bottle. The work is slow, and there must be hundreds of hours of work in that A5 piece, which possibly explains the quite hard sell that we experienced, having us in mind of the handbag (Gucci, guaranteed) sellers.

Burano is like a country town, tiny houses, painted brightly, so that fishermen could find their way home through the fog, so I am told, and not a fur clad woman to be seen. The dogs on Burano seem a tougher breed than their Venetian counterparts, as they go about their business without the benefit of coats in Burberry pattern. Lagoon sized fishing boats abound, fully kitted for dredging shellfish, an ingenious drum screen on board, electrically driven, to reject both oversized and undersized shell fish, which would explain why the clams that we buy are so regular in size. Fishing nets strung up, being dried and mended, floats, buoys, styrene boxes, rope, all the marine paraphanelia one could imagine. A “Service Station” beside the canal sells diesel fuel oil at 1.15 per litre, unleaded 1.18.

The inclination to the south on the San Martino Vescovo campanile rivals the tower at Pisa, and when it falls, it will surely put the adjacent soccer pitch out of action for months. One can only hope there is not a game in progress at the time. Doubtless Buranese mothers have been warning their sons of the danger of the falling campanile for several centuries. Buranese males, like Buranese dogs, being of an independent streak, will have been ignoring the warnings for the same period.

One could imagine that Venice hangs as a pendulum from the rail bridge, the Ponte della Liberta from Mestre, suspended in the lagoon, surrounded by Murano, the Lido and Giudecca, with Burano and Torcello away in the lower 40, and not much else. There are many other islands, some inhabited, others not. The ferry to Burano takes one close to Polviera, a tiny island, or two islands, one containing just a heap of bricks, the other a three story building, mostly ruined, that covers almost the entire island. None of the guide books I've found recounts its history, and one can't help but wonder what its story has been. Away off in the northern lagoon is Sant' Ariano, once a thriving community and suburb of Torcello, which in its day was bigger than Venice. It is now a bone house, an Osseria, as the bones from San' Michelle would be taken there once their allotted time was up, a practice dating from 1575 and finishing in the 1950's. I'm not all that keen to go there.

Erasmo and Vignole are just off the tip of Castello, Vignole barely two kilometres from San Marco, and both islands are market garden islands. The No 13 ferry will get you there, and the land area of the two islands is greater than Venice. The tranquil island of San Francisco del Deserte near Burano still contains a monastery of the Franciscan Order, and a church built in 1228. St Francis was shipwrecked here in 1219 for his troubles, returning from the East where he had been engaged in evangelizing Muslims, with minimal success, one imagines.

La Grazia, half a mile from Giudecca, used to be a hospice for pilgrims going to the Holy Land, in the days when the Venetians organised it most thoroughly like travel agents, as Islamic countries do the Haj to Mecca in these days. The Venetians had multi-lingual greeters at San Marco, directing the pilgrims to La Grazie, probably not mentioning that it lay right beside the Canal of the Orphans, and taking a kick back from the tour operators. Nothing changes in Venice – I heard the multi lingual waiter outside a restaurant near San Marco greet a party of Japanese with “Konichi-wa”. La Grazie had a Gothic Church, which Napoleon requisitioned as a powder magazine, and which was destroyed in the revolution of 1848 when someone lit a match inside.

Mazzorbo, just beside Burano and connected by footbridge, was big in its day. In Roman times, the site of a shrine to the god Belanus, and its name means “major urbis”, “big town”. The Mazzorbo customs controlled entry of trade from Germany, indeed most of Eastern Europe and there was a series of particularly flash convents and monasteries, five in all, particularly rich, inhabited by particularly racy nuns. Palaces lined the canal, and merchants made it comfortable. In the mid 1700's, eight campaniles still stood there, probably demolished since and the bricks recycled.

Malaria, silting of canals, and the rise of the Rialto exchange did for Mazzorbo, as it did for Torcello. By the eleventh century, the place was in decline, and the citizens mostly decided to emigrate. They took their houses with them, loaded into barges stone by stone, to Venice, where they were re-erected near the Rialto. One wonders if they were considered trailer trash by the Venetians. Mazzorbo now contains the cemetery for Burano, some modern housing in a style that could be called “functional-brutalist meets Victorian Ministry of Housing”, and not a great deal else. A few gardens, a little trattoria, that's it, a rather melancholy it, a thousand years after its greatness. There are many vacant houses, and you think “At some time, someone spent the night in that house, and nobody has slept there since”. It sends a slight shiver down the spine.

We travelled across the lagoon as calm as glass, channel markers standing like old sentinels. A strange, melancholy feel to the whole environment.

I found the saddest story carved on the facade of the Doge palace. Count six columns (not including the corner column) along the Piazzetta, and on the octagonal capitol to the column there is a tale in eight parts, the first part facing the Piazzetta, and proceeding clockwise.

A girl greets a man from her window, Romeo and Juiet in stone.
They meet
She professes her love of him
They are wed.
They are seen in bed.
A baby is born, a son.
He is seen standing between his proud parents.
The last scene shows them burying him.

I can't help but think the mason was telling his own story, it is so touching. It is a story five hundred years old, and still can move one today.

The figures are less than a hand span high, just the right size for such an intimate account, and yet such a universal tragedy.




17.
You will see “Ticket Restaurant” on doors. This means that the establishment has been forced to subscribe to a system that must make the Mafia green with envy. Here's how it works.
A company, say Mister Tickets, prints booklets of vouchers, with a face value of say five Euro per voucher.
Employer buys vouchers from Mister Tickets, probably for the face value less a discount.
Employer gives vouchers to employees as part of their salary – but it won't be taxed.
Employee hands over a voucher instead of cash at Ticket Restaurant when buying lunch – or at Billa when buying groceries.
Restaurant collates tickets into a say 5000 Euro package and then claims money back from Mister Ticket.
Mister Ticket pays restaurant after 90 days – less a whacking discount, say 12.5% for one restaurant that we know. Billa would be on a lesser discount, but I don't know how much.
Winners - the employer, the employee, and Mister Ticket.
Loser – the restaurant, by 12.5%, and taxation revenues.
It is a licence to print money, but the restaurant has no choice but to go along and accept the tickets - otherwise they lose significant patronage. There is a bit of a scandal in Italy about this system – there are many millions of tickets being presented each day. Someone's printing money.

However, one would not dare to present a ticket at the Rialto Market.
This morning we were up early, for us, at 6:30, and headed off to the Rialto market to watch the fish being unloaded – we should have been earlier, there is so much action. Such a variety, shark, shellfish, trout which looked farmed, as they were all of a size, crabs, tuna, sardines, flounder, squid, scampi, octopus and very few oysters, which I suspect are very expensive. Even when fish were in their styrene boxes, they looked beautifully arranged, and no frozen fish.

Cruised the butchers shops. There's a butcher who does horse. Horse meat, horse carpachio, horse salami. Vicious thought – take horse salami sandwiches next time you are rostered onto canteen duty at Pony Club. Ouch. I've not seen horse on a Venetian menu, but someone must be buying it, and it's not cheap.

23 January, and we have had a morning taking us from the sublime to the ridiculous. I'll start with the sublime – the Frari Church.
If you only visit one church in all of Venice, the church of Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, aka “the Frari” is it. While the Basilicca is Byzantine, the Frari is pure, soaring, spiritual, take your breath away, Gothic. You walk in the front door, and the whole 100 metre long nave is laid out before you, a visual procession. There is a monument to the sculptor, Canova, which is the most achingly beautiful work of art I have seen anywhere. It was created by Canova's pupils, to a design created by Canova, but intended as a monument to Titian. It is simplicity in itself, the figures at human scale, the bronze door into the sepulchure where Canova's heart rests in an urn is invitingly ajar. The angel and lion of Venice are both mourning, and the funeral procession leads to the bronze doors, representing the gap, the space, the ultimate divide between living and dead. You could study the face of the woman carrying the urn for hours. It brings a lump to my throat, a tingle up the spine.

The monument to Titian stands opposite, and shows in bas-relief the painting by Titian, the Assumption of the Virgin, that stands over the altar. Titian died of the plague, and always wished to buried in the Frari. At the time, authorities had decreed that plague victims were to be buried in mass graves. A rare exception was made for Titian, and he's buried in the Frari, as a genius ought be.

Titian painted a madonna for the Pesaro family in 1509, which hangs in the Frari. There are both Saints, and members of the Pesaro family in the painting. The faces are all turned to the Madonna, except St Peter, who is looking at Jacopo Pesaro, Titian's patron, who kneels to give thanks. And also, Lunardo Pesaro, who gazes outwards towards the viewer, almost in a way confronting the viewer, challenging the viewer. “Well, are you going to look at the Madonna, or are you going to look at me”. He inherited the family fortune, and looks as if he knows it is coming his way.

Another thing in the Frari Church is the Nativity. It is fascinating – an Italian village with animated figures, with the village coming to life, chooks being fed, a man fishing, knife grinder at work, plus sound effects. I liked it – little kids would be fascinated, and you enter the chapel by the side door closest to the campanile, which is presently having some seriously heavy restoration. The movement of the campanile is being tracked, with an accuracy of one hundredth of a millimetre. These buildings are being cherished.

Now the ridiculous – or at least the strange.
Riduculous / Strange No 1. In the Frari church, on the left hand side, past the Canova monument, past the monument with the four huge Negro gentlemen to a deceased doge, one Doge Giovanni Pessaro, 1669 (described in my Rough Guide as surely the most grotesque monument in the city, “a German sculptor called Melchiorre Barthel must take the blame”) there is a small unexploded bomb mounted on the wall. It fell in February 1918 on the Frari, and failed to detonate. I assume it's been disarmed.

Riduculous / Remarkable No. 2. Canova was honourary President of the Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts.

Ridiculous / Bizarre No 3. Canova's heart rests in the monument to him in the Frari, most of his body at Possagno, and his right hand is somehwere in the Academia.

Ridiculous / Riduculous No 4. Venice has suffered a small invasion, maybe a pre-carnivale thing, of German and Swiss brass bands. There is a distinct lack of spit and polish with these bands. Think a band dressed with masks in the shape of wolves heads, gents in dresses with cleavage that makes the Grand Canyon look like a suburban gutter, folk with the hairiest legs – thshe barely tanned hide of polyvinylchlorides, purple wigs, Neanderthals, Wassail, Viking horn hats, the whole insane get-up. They numbered about three hundred, and thumped, drummed and blew their way along the Riva Schiavoni, through the Piazza, as far as Campo San Maurizo. A fine show indeed – some of them looked like Hells Angels with trumpets and tambourines.

They did some excellent reggae music, and then gave a fine rendition of the March of the Corriedors from Carmen. One wonders what Bizet would have thought. One also wonders what the Korean tourists though of them – if I'd been asked, I'd have had to say that it was a traditional religious festival, instituted by Doge Pantaloon.

Venice has been divided on clan lines, the Nicolotti and the Castellani, for centuries, millenia. The Nicolletti are from Dorsoduro, San Polo and Santa Croce – I'm not a little proud to be a member, albeit a most temporary member, of the Nicolotti. The Castellani are from Cannaregio, San Marco and Castello, and, sad to say, must be regarded as a most inferior lot. I think this might re-open the matter of fist fights on the Ponte de Pugni, but there you go, can't be helped. No edged weapons or firearms, concealed carry or otherwise, commence on the last stroke at noon of the Santa Maria Carmini campanile. 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11, 12 and open hostilities. I mean, we Nicolotti have the Frari and the Venice prison. What have the poor Castellani got? San Marco and the Arsenale. I rest my case – there's no need to fight after all.

But there's a greater fault line running through all Italy, greater than the conflict between Communist and Christian Democrats, greater than Montagu vs Capulet,a fault line of geological proportions, making the San Andreas Fault in California look like a minor crack in the bitumen. I speak, of course, about the Campari / Aperol fault. One is either a Campari man, or an Aperol man. It is similar, for Australians, being a Fosters man, or a Tooheys man (God forbid). This raises a problem. I am a Campari man, and Lou has declared a liking for Aperol. I think our marriage can survive this schism, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed. For insurance, I put a slug of vodka in her Aperol - “In Vino, Veritas”.

dandj2

bless you peter s aus

You have made me very happy reading this post..

margo_oz

Go, Pete...

Passed your Burke and Wills yesterday - I was in Melbourne for a little bit of tennis, and Australia Day.

Talking of Mr Ticket - you haven't kidnapped Mr Cricket, have you? The one masquerading here is a very pale shadow.

Bloody hot here, though!