I will eventually be organizing a Gallery page, but meanwhile here are a few additional views of the water-on-the-ground of yesterday. They are not intended to be sensational, but instructive. There is an important difference in the two concepts, especially where issues involving Venice are concerned.
As you see, the streets of Venice are neither perfectly flat, nor a uniform height above sea level. Therefore reports of Venice being FLOODED are not very helpful. Is this street flooded?The immediate point of pumping is not to empty your place of water; it's to keep the level from increasing while the tide is still rising. (Then you pump to get it all out.) One theory of what is making the liquid white is that it is detergent. The theory of my nose leads me to suspect something more primeval.
Sorry, your prescription isn't going to be ready till the pharmacists finish bailing out the store.
No special drama here, they keep the vegetables up off the floor all the time anyway.
Now here's a solution: Get your stuff up off the floor before the water comes in. Simple, cheap, effective. I welcome explanations of why so many merchants prefer to beg for sympathy as well as handouts from the city to pay for damage. Why should there be damage in the first place? And by the way, the city doesn't own your shop, you do.
What often contributes to high water occurring is an insistent southeast wind, as you see blowing across the water here.
High-water etiquette requires you to slow down when approaching and passing anyone with knee-high boots. If you are sloshing along you will splash them, and they are already desperately trying to keep their clothes dry.
A very humble but crucial side effect of high water is that it makes it impossible to pass under most normal bridges. Gondolas, taxis, and especially barges have to either find an alternate route or just wait till the tide falls. Even some vaporetto lines are sent up the Grand Canal because they can't pass under the bridge near Piazzale Roma.
Oh gosh -- we couldn't get to work on time because there was acqua alta. Here are some men who are looking desperately concerned and distressed by this. I imagine at least one of them is trying to think of the nearest cafe that is on dry ground.
Or maybe it's a guy thing and not related to having boots at all, the need to stop in groups to analyze, compare, contrast, discuss, and otherwise dissect the moment.
I am fascinated by the problem-solving approach taken by the man on the left. His knee-high socks were drenched (see wet footprints) and he is rolling up his trousers. I'm hoping he had the sense at least to have taken off his shoes before he stepped into the water. But why didn't he take off his socks as well?
One has heard of a bridge to nowhere. I offer the passarella, or walkway, to -- well, not exactly nowhere. Right to the water from which it has been placed to defend you. Maybe they ran out of boards.
