Does everyone remember the gondola loaded with cut-up gondolas that was parked in our canal in the opening fervor of the Biennale?
The opening of the Biennale is, as I’m sure I’ve mentioned, more like starling-swarming or the wildebeest migration than anything else. Dramatic for a short sharp moment, then it’s over and people forget about it.
By now the process is complete. The swarms began to depart the evening of June 2, and although fluttering shreds of tourists remain, the sort who seem to have come actually to look at the art and not each other (shocking, I know), life on the whole is back to its incomprehensible normality.
As everyone knows, the gondola assemblage was art. A week has passed, and this creation has been demoted to Private First Class, downgraded to Economy, put back a grade, however you want to put it.
Having fulfilled its purpose — whatever it was — the object has been removed from its watery pedestal, and taken far away. Not so far in geographic terms, but extremely far in terms of appreciation. You may have heard of “value added”? This is an example of “value subtracted.”
It is now resting quietly in the devastated territory of our rowing club. Evidently the squero here nearby that confected it didn’t want it back soon (or ever); anyway, I was told that in exchange for painting one of our boats, we agreed to let them stash it here.
It pains me to write this, but I hope that doing so will serve some useful purpose.
Gondoliers are arguably the symbol of Venice, and as such could be expected to evince a sense of the importance of same. That’s just my opinion.
What is not opinion, but fact, is that they are independent, masters of their own boats, lords of their lives, and — yes — of their money. I mean, of your money.
I know a good number of gondoliers and can attest that many are fine, professional people and first-rate ambassadors for their amazing city. Among other things, they’re often the first to fish tourists out of the canals when the said tourists have misjudged the slipperiness of the algae on that stone step, or to have miscalculated other maneuvers.
You can see the required card impaled by the small flag on the prow. Seeing does not mean reading.
Then there are the others. There are some that easily inspire apprehension, who resemble inmates out on a work-release program, with boats to match. But don’t be distracted by the externals, because how a gondolier behaves depends on many and easily shifting factors apart from his housekeeping and personal care, and you don’t want to find yourself in the middle when the shifting is going on.
I wouldn’t bring it up at all, but there has been a recent situation here, amply reported in the Gazzettino, in which a gondolier charged a Russian couple 400 euros ($496) for a spin in his gondola that took less than an hour. You could probably justify that price if you included a bottle of the Shipwrecked 1907 Heidsieck champagne poured into Baccarat flutes while the gondolier rowed you to Trieste singing the “Improvviso” from Andrea Chenier.
Then again, he could skip all that and just ask for the dough. Which he did.
As you see by the rates standardized by the Ente Gondola, the gondoliers’ sort-of governing body, he should have asked 80 euros, or 100 euros, depending on the time of day.
But no.
People tend to be intimidated by gondoliers. People need to get past that. The Ente Gondola has tried to help, by insisting that the gondoliers exhibit the price scale. Most gondoliers have done so, by attaching a piece of plastificated paper 5 1/2 inches square to the prow of their boat — a place a potential passenger isn’t likely to approach, even if armed with the necessary magnifying glass to read the type.
This card measures 5 1/2 inches square.
And it’s printed on both sides, so you’d have to turn it over to get the complete information.
Let’s move on to the happy ending: The Russian couple registered a complaint and got their money back, with a promise from the Ente Gondola of a free ride next time. To which I’m pretty sure they replied “There’s not going to be a next time.” It doesn’t sound better in Russian.
So here’s the simplest solution. Let’s say that you and a gondolier have begun to converse. Whether you approached him or vice versa, you’re talking about money.
He mentions a figure that doesn’t sound like what is printed on the Ente Gondola’s site. So you say, “Would you please show me the rates printed on the card on your gondola?”
If he doesn’t have the card on his gondola, you move on. If he has it but can’t explain why the rate he quoted you doesn’t match what’s printed, you move on. No need for complicated discussions or heated words. It’s a big world, and there will always be another gondolier.
I have been very lax in updating our assorted adventures in assorted boats, and I apologize, but adventuring does take so much time and energy.
But I promise to give you a full account sometime next week — not long after our return from our next adventure.
Hint: Both adventures involve going to Turkey with two gondolas. And rowing them there, obviously. With four Turkish men (not so obviously, but the world is an amazing place and anyway, the Turks had just as many galleys as Venice did, in the old days, which by itself means they also had rowers, even if a lot of them were Christian slaves. Sorry, but there it is).
Both adventures require a huge shout-out to His Excellency Gianpaolo Scarante, the Italian Ambassador to Turkey, and his wife, Barbara, who raises the concept of “indefatigable” beyond any known scale of measurement. They are the reason we’re there, so I want to do my very best.
In late May, we went to a city named Eskesehir, which I discovered is a very important place indeed, not least for its being the homeland of meerschaum. (I’d never given much thought to meerschaum mines, but they’re all around that part of Turkey.) We rowed our two gondolas on the Porsuk river in a pair of races with the Turkish rowers.
In Eskesehir, the first race mixed the crews, as you can immediately detect here. The second race pitted a Venetian crew against a Turkish crew. A good time was had by all.
Now we’re headed to Istanbul, to row our gondolas across the Bosphorus. (I love saying that — it’s like saying “I’ll walk across the parking lot to the dry cleaner.”) We’ll be gone till the 19th; the event itself is on July 17, and is part of a very large and important amateur open-water swimming race called the “Bosphorus Cross-Continental Competition.” The swimmers start from the Asiatic side of the Bosphorus and finish on the European side. So will we, but an hour earlier.
We’re due to form up, as we did in May, with two Turks and two Venetians per boat (I’m operating under a Venetian alias, as you know), and race 2000 meters across the mythical strait between Kuleli and Kurucesme. I’m acting as if I know what that means; even though I’ve located them on the map, the scope of all this still hasn’t really reached me.
I do know that the fact that this is the first year of gondola participation, with Turkish rowers, has created no little enthusiasm — they are planning to install GPS’s on the gondolas so the race can be broadcast live on national Turkish television.
So there will be silence in BlogWorld here until I get back. Probably followed by a tremendous racket.
