january 01 1997 - day six - venice, italy

this morning, i woke up on a train in venice. tonight, i'm going to go to sleep on a train in venice. this entire day, we were and are, at present, homeless we carried our packs with us all day, which, surprisingly, wasn't all that bad. except for geoff, who has somehow hurt his left ankle.
venice is absolutely wonderful. despite the fact that it is 9:40 pm right now and our train doesn't leave for another 3 hours: and the fact that we've been up since 6:30 this morning; and we are stuck in a freezing, wind tunnel of a train station...i really like it here. it is everything that i thought it would be. the canals, the architecture, everything.
we started this morning a little on the rough side. we tried to find a place to eat. tempers were very high and sleep was short. needless to say, we finally settled down and took the vaporetto, or water bus, to piazza san marco, and finally found some food. after we ate, we went into st. mark's basilica. much older and much different than the cathedrals and abbeys i'm sort of used to. it was built in the 11th century and is both extremely gaudy and extremely beautiful. in italy, it seems they used a lot more color than in other parts of western europe. but, again, what do i know. after we walked, in awe, through the basilica we walked around the piazza outside. i took a ton of pics, and i ran out of film. i didn't want to buy any on the street because i thought it was too expensive. i did anyway. i'm a sucker for convenience.

the canals in venice
st mark's basilica
later, i bought my first "me" souvenir: an authentic venetian carnival mask. i dig it. then we went on a gondola ride around the canals. it was very interesting. our gondolier was great. nice and informative. after the ride, we found out that he liked dave's hat, so dave sold it to him. i think dave's still a little pissed that he did, but he'll get over it. for dinner, we got screwed at a snooty restaurant. be careful in europe. the waiters are professionals. there's a whole system, that i just don't understand. but the food was great.

for the rest of the day, we just wandered around and took it in. i went off on my own for a bit, while brian and sara went to a picasso exhibit. we almost got lost coming back to the station. it was getting pretty dark and venice streets are like a labyrinth. it was straight out of an old movie. giant shadows on the walls. "are we being followed?" "this looks just like the last piazza." it was a bit freaky, but in a good way. we did make it after being acosted by a drunk man who, upon seeing we were americans, insisted on sharing with us all of the english cuss words he knew. and now we're here at the staion and there is a door that will NOT stay shut. the wind is whipping in through it and everytime we close it, someone walks through it. i'm trying to put the misery out of my mind, but it's cooold!
coldness and hysteria aside, there are 4 words, which i feel best describe venice. domes. bells. bridges. and water. okay, 5 words: pigeons...lot's of pigeons.
the evil doorway. the source of all that is cold in the world.

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