Venetian-ness | Venice: I am not making this up

Overheard: Saint Anthony, the Queen of England and Cartolina

October 29, 2009 No Comments

One of the great things about learning the language of your location — or in my case, two languages, Italian and Venetian — is not that you will finally be able to explain to a local what the difference is between metaphysics and epistemology. Useful and entertaining though that might be.

I can never understand how people who see each other every day can have so much to talk about.

No, it’s to catch so many fleeting remarks that you hear people making in all kinds of unexpected or unlikely places. Quips, execrations, assorted badinage, comments that are like little flakes falling from the facade of what we regard as normality.

Yesterday morning I was in the church of S. Francesco di Paola in via Garibaldi. There were eight people there for the 9:00 mass; the usual smattering of nuns from the nearby convent, and a couple of other women, and a man or two. One of the men is someone who seems always to come to this service.

He is old but not ancient; neglected but not repellent; in his own little world, but not actually crazy. His hair is ragged and he always sits by himself, and he is always the first in line to take communion. In fact, he’s first before there is a line. This is obviously his self-appointed right and privilege. He makes sure he’s already in position before the priest has even finished the prayer of consecration.

As the faithful were leaving in peace, obeying the canonical and very precise command at the end of every mass, I noticed one nun pausing in front of a new statue of Saint Anthony of Padua. It was about her height, actually, or maybe slightly shorter, and he was holding the Christ Child in the crook of his left arm and a lily in his right hand, as always.

So she’s standing there looking at it, maybe wondering where it came from or why it’s there now, or whether it needs dusting, or maybe just thinking about the saint. Or not thinking at all.

Seeing her, the old guy abruptly changes course and walks toward her.

“It doesn’t look anything like him,” he announces. “St. Anthony had a very sharp, aquiline nose.” He sounds as certain as if he’d been his brother. The nun just looks at him.

“He didn’t look like this– he had a very aquiline nose,” he repeated.

She said nothing. He paused, then wandered off and that was that. I too walked away, but fighting the urge to stop him and say, “You actually knew him? Wow….”

What he said may have been completely true, though I’m not sure we can trust most of the depictions of St. Anthony, even those made in his own lifetime before he was even close to becoming a saint.

But let’s say it’s true. Let’s say the statue doesn’t look anything like St. Anthony. So what? Devotional images aren’t supposed to help the police identify you, like photos on driver’s licenses. Is some man with a tonsure and a habit (not to mention carrying a lily and the Baby Jesus) likely to be walking around via Garibaldi claiming to be Saint Anthony?

Answer: Not likely. At least in this neighborhood; saints are pretty thin on the ground. Though he might be mistaken for a relatively harmless tourist, or somebody left over from Carnival.

But now we know — or think we know — that Saint Anthony had a very aquiline nose. I’ll be on the lookout.

One of the great things about Venice is running into your friends on the street.

Then there was the family waiting for a relative or maybe just a friend at the vaporetto stop at the Giardini, all set for some outing. The ladies were past middle age but full of energy, their hair ferociously sprayed, and their men were hanging around the periphery while the women batted little comments back and forth.

As I walked toward the dock, I heard one woman say firmly to the others, “She looks just exactly like the Queen of England. All she’s missing is the tiara. Wait and see.” This was a statement, not an opinion.

“There she is — finally! Helloooo,” the woman spotted the lady, then turned back to her friends. “You see? Look at her hair. Even the way she walks. She could be the Queen of England, am I right?”

Naturally I looked. But I have to say that it was a bit of a stretch. If we start referring to every late middle-aged, short, heavily upholstered woman with neatly curled short white hair, whose skirt falls just below her knee, as the Queen of England, we’re going to be spending all day curtsying.

And there was the other morning, as I left the house early and there was almost nobody on the street yet. The sun was just getting itself up and out the door, the air was cool, the world looked ready for business.

As I crossed the bridge to the fondamenta on the other side, “Cartolina” was walking by from his home way over in the Quintavalle neighborhood toward via Garibaldi.

“Cartolina” means “postcard” (somebody surely knows his real name, but that’s the only way Lino knows him and can’t tell me why he got this nickname) is a small, chunky, old man who is just a bubble off plumb but still full of energy, some of which he expends on what I call his little litany as he walks along, a sotto voce recital of how bad he feels and how old he is, directed at nobody in particular. It’s a pretty limited repertoire, usually assorted murmurings to himself and anybody in earshot: “Aiuto. Aiutami mamma. Aiuto. Povero vecio. Aiuto.” (Help. Help me mama. Help. Poor old guy. Help.)

Evidently there's no more to be said, at least not at the moment.

I would never belittle his pain, which might be serious, for all I know. Lino told me that he used to work as a porter at the Bacino Orseolo near the Piazza San Marco, on call from any nearby hotel or office which needed somebody to shlep luggage or anything else heavy and cumbersome by means of an equally heavy handtruck, undoubtedly over many bridges. Years of that will mark you, but not many people orchestrate their own chorus of sympathy and then sing it themselves.

So the other morning he passes me on the bridge and I hear this: “Aiuto. Aiuto. Go 120 anni. No, 106. Go sbaglia’.” (Help. Help. I’m 120 years old. No, 106. I made a mistake.).

Then there was the morning (he seems to be a matutinal creature — I don’t believe I’ve ever seen him after 11:00 AM) we were having the first real fog of the fall. He was coming out of the bread bakery with a small sack, muttering: “Aiuto. Mamma mia. Ancuo magno pan e caligo.” (Help. Mamma mia. Today I’m eating bread and fog.)

This morning, I saw him coming as I was heading toward the Quintavalle bridge. He began in the classic way: “Mamma mia. Aiuto. Aiuto.” Then he said, “Vogio ‘na bela casseta. Vado via. So stufo.” (Mamma mia. Help. Help. I want a really beautiful casket. I’m out of here. I’m fed up.)

I love this guy! Not only can he make a joke about how bad he feels, he’ll make it to himself. Or to however many personalities are living in there.

Boatworld, Events, Venetian-ness, Water

Regata Storica, my version

September 12, 2009 3 Comments

My earlier post about Race Day as a whole didn’t say anything about what I was doing while the world was ending for some of the racers.

I can tell you what I wasn’t doing: Screaming my lungs out for the Vignottini, which would have been ridiculous considering that they were already five car-lengths in the lead. No danger of anything rear-ending them last Sunday if they’d come to a sudden stop. I felt cheated, somehow. I fully intended to be screaming. Never mind. Life will probably provide another opportunity for screamage.

What the Storica means for us at the club — and it’s more or less like this every year except this year it was even better than usual — is the following:

Saturday morning: Whoever is free comes to titivate their boat. There was a small chain gang working on the caorlina, and an even smaller one (including me) working on the gondolone. We had to sandpaper and polish all the brass, including the big ornamental ferri of the prow and the bow. Lino and Lucio worked at nailing and screwing down various bits that had gone adrift over the months, and then there was varnishing the whole thing. She is now a dazzling vision of delight, and will remain so for, oh, maybe a month. It depends on the weather how fast the brass will lose its luster.

Our caorlina heading toward Venice, off to the races.

At 2:00 we dressed in our club best — blue and white tank top and white skirt (women), white pants for the men. Lino was dressed in his judge’s outfit, as he was on duty for two of the four races.

We rowed across the lagoon with some breeze but not too much. We crossed the Bacino of San Marco (waves, as always, but not as bad as usual because the traffic is limited this afternoon) and dropped Lino near San Marco, where he went to join the rest of his merry band of judges at the Tourism Office (regata division).

We rowed around the Bacino for a little while until it was time for the corteo, or boat procession, to form up. There is no real Italian way to express the concept of “forming up,” as the concept doesn’t exist. I’m not sure there is even anything close that you could compare it to, in order to explain to someone here what it might involve, or why it might matter. They’d just give you that “Well you’re perfectly welcome to try it if you want to but don’t get me involved” look.

Boats milling around waiting for the corteo to start.

Each boat has a number on its bow which indicates its order in the lineup. The number’s only discernible use is to help the speaker on the reviewing stand (the “Machina,” MAH-keen-ah) to identify the particular organization the boat belongs to as it drifts past. That part actually works pretty well.

We had number 11 and were probably two-thirds of the way back when the thing got going. You ask why we were so far back? Because the corteo wranglers had given absolutely no signal of any kind to indicate the imminent departure of said corteo. Evidently order isn’t foremost on their list of concerns either.

So we rowed in a slow and stately way up the Grand Canal (sometimes I surprise myself, at how normal doing something like that has come to be — then I suddenly snap to and think, Holy Crap! This is incredible!). The first regatas that might correspond somewhat to the current “regata storica” were arguably the series of races organized in January 1315 by doge Giovanni Soranzo. (In the 19th century it was called the “regata reale,” or royal regata). The corteo was added to the program much, much later, to evoke the arrival in Venice in 1489 of Caterina Cornaro, a Venetian noblewoman who was briefly also queen of Cyprus. It’s as good an excuse as any to add just that much more glamour — or glitter or marabou or whatever looks good — to the event.

A homemade version of the alzaremi -- the crews are giving the traditional raised-oar salute in response to the blessing of their caorlinas before a race in December.

At certain points along the route we perform an alzaremi, or oar-raising, the classic Venetian waterborne ceremonial salute which looks thrilling. Too bad it’s been done to death by now. Lino thinks it should be limited to very few and very important moments, and I agree. But on this occasion, there are clumps of people all along the way who yell “alzaremi” at every boat just so they can snap a picture. It’s just one of the many, many ways in which a person here begins to be made to feel like a walk-on in somebody else’s entertainment.

But the sun is shining, there is music playing over lots of loudspeakers, people are leaning out of palace windows everywhere taking it all in, and it’s all just too splendid for words.

Then we turn around — I remember when we used to go as far as the train station, but every year people tend to break ranks and turn around sooner. There are some reasons for this, one of which, I think, has to do with resisting the idea of being compelled to perform for other people’s entertainment. That’s my theory. At least I resist that idea.

So we find a good place to park, as close to the finish line near the San Toma’ vaporetto stop as we can manage (on the shady, not the sunny side), and we tie up the boat. We pull out the vittles — cookies, tiny pizzas, peanuts, squares of homemade cake, fruit, etc. — and beverages, which are wine, water, and fruit juice. Very important, beverages. The heat can trick you and the one thing you don’t want to be in a boat is thirsty.

There’s another thing you don’t want to be in a boat, and we bring a small bucket for that. Nobody has ever had to use it.

This event used to have a dramatically different aspect. For decades, Lino would come early in the afternoon in his own little boat — as most people did — find a good place to tie up, and then eat and drink all afternoon, sharing with his neighbors, clambering over boats to go visit friends, and so on — much like the Redentore, but with races instead of fireworks.

In those days, the corteo consisted only of the bissone, or fancy ceremonial barges, and a long procession of black gondolas carrying every authority figure within reach — mayor, councilors, presidents of things, even the President of Italy on occasion. Then came the year when the Italian Prime Minister, Amintore Fanfani, had the misfortune of being rowed up the Grand Canal to the jeering shouts of a doggerel rhyme that works very well in Venetian (Fanfani! Fanfani! Ti ga i morti cani!). This is one of the absolutely worst insults in the Venetian universe and it basically means that your deceased relatives are dogs. I don’t think you have to speak Venetian to understand that it’s not your day.

This happened about 1976, as Lino recalls. Not long thereafter, the political party in power shifted to the Communist party and that sort of thing wasn’t tolerated at all. To make sure it didn’t happen by mistake, they just stopped sending their authority figures.

At the same time, after the first Vogalonga in 1975, there was a boom in new boat clubs, so the corteo began to be generally populated by boats like ours. civilians from rowing clubs who may also be tempted to shout rude things at each other, but it doesn’t make any difference when they do it. Since I’ve been here I’ve never seen a gondola with an official or notable aboard — just tourists, or paid costumed walk-ons.

Furthermore, for most of the “Storica”‘s history there was only one race: The gondolini. The races for women, boys, and men on the caorlinas were added gradually over the same mid-Seventies period. If you had to do triage and get rid of any races, I can tell you the only one they’d try to save would be the gondolini. Although the other ones are very nice.

The boys on a boat called a pupparino are nearing the line.

The red caorlina in the home stretch, ready for the red pennant for first place. The man rowing astern piloted me and three others on a small sandolo in my first Venetian race. We also won.

The most serious change in the past 20, or even 15, years is the steady decline in spectator boats. As I mentioned, Lino could climb over boats from hither to farther than yon all afternoon, but each year fewer Venetians come in boats to witness what was once one of their central events of the year. Even I have noticed the diminution of number of boats watching. There are many reasons for this but one of the primary ones is that the regata, on the whole, has been reshaped for tourists, either on land or watching TV, and therefore (for reasons I’ll spare you) it’s less interesting to be a participant. And the increase in motorboats has fatally weakened what was once a common language and connection with boats that are rowed.

This is one view of how the Grand Canal used to look when there was a regata, seen in an undated archival photograph.

From being a crucial element of daily life for everyone, rowing has become a sort of boutique activity whose appeal is probably stronger as a picturesque curiosity to non-Venetians than to most locals, especially the younger ones.

Back to us. So we spend the afternoon hanging around watching the races and screaming if we should feel the need to for whoever our favorite racer(s) might be — and there have been times I have screamed so hard that I probably blew out some synapses, mine as well as the people nearest to me. I know the racers can’t hear me, but I also know they would notice if my voice weren’t in there somewhere. I know this. It’s a mystic racing thing.

As soon as the gondolini have crossed the finish line, everybody starts to leave. Instantly. Imagine everybody after the game trying to get out of the stadium parking lot at the same time. Lots of motors (not everybody who comes rows here anymore, unfortunately), and lots of motor-revving and choking exhaust fumes from these lovers of the oar.

Our trusty caorlina pulls over for some refreshments.

Now comes almost the best part of all, which is the row back to the club. This takes about an hour because we’re not in a hurry; the sun is setting — it’s after 7:00 PM now — and the lagoon is calm and everyone is feeling happy and relaxed and it’s just one of the loveliest rowing interludes in the entire year.

We always stop, not far from the club, to open a bottle of wine (okay, two) and just sit and savor the moment out in the water all by ourselves. This year it was even sweeter than usual. The caorlina was not far behind us, and so we waited and then we tied the two boats together and just let the day and the moment and the sunset and the calm seep all the way through us.

Flavia and Roberto absorbing the sunset.

The moon, enormous and shining and orange, rose slowly above the treetops on the Lido. It was so beautiful it verged on the preposterous; Italians say that something like this, the final perfect touch, is the “cherry on the cake.” It was actually the moon on the cake. I’m sticking with that, at least I know what I mean.

The corteo is very nice, of course. But it’s something thousands of people (80,000 this year, by police estimates) can see, and anything that imitates something that once was genuine can hardly compare with something that is completely genuine right now. The corteo was a sort of imitation, but this was really ours. There were very, very few people who saw the lagoon as we did in the twilight with evening breath drifting around us and the moon’s radiance blooming out of the sky.

It all belonged to us and it needed no spectators or commentators. What a beautiful thing that is in this world, and how rare.

History, Problems, Tourism, Venetian-ness

Crybabies?

September 1, 2009 1 Comment

It seems like Venice is always under some kind of cloud, even if only figuratively speaking.

The daily cri di coeur (that would make a great newspaper name) comes via the Gazzettino from Paolo Lanapoppi, a Venetian and former president of an association called Pax in Aqua, about which much more some other time.

Lanapoppi felt compelled to write to the Gazzettino, even as the wind whistled through the windmills toward which he was spurring his horse, so to speak, to take issue with the latest jab which mayor Massimo Cacciari had made to the few remaining morons who insist on living in his city and dare to criticize its administration.

A day or so earlier, Mr. Cacciari had brushed aside a discouraging word from some constituent with the brusque observation that Venetians are “piangnoni” (crybabies, kvetchers, whiners) and Mr. Lanapoppi sees it quite differently. I’m translating his missive here not because I want to spoil your day, as I know you have problems of your own to think about, but because it summarizes very eloquently some basic points which deserve to be criticized here, and why.

Venetians are crybabies? Who has governed the city since 1993? We need a new governing class (August 27, 2009)

It seems incredible. As the number of residents continues to fall and the city is clogging up with vacation rooms for rent, trash in the shop windows, tourist launches, day-trippers, the mayor is declaring that the city needs to free itself from the monoculture of tourism. He even goes so far as to say that Venetians have to stop being crybabies.

But who governed the city from 1993 to 2000? Cacciari. And from 2000 to 2005? Paolo Costa, elected with the support of Cacciari. And from 2005 till today? Cacciari again, naturally.

It isn't always like this. But there's nothing stopping it, either.

So who is supposed to be battling the monoculture of tourism? The opposition? Or the elderly in their nursing homes? Or we members of a thousand organizations which fight every day to have a little space in the newspapers to denounce an unsustainable situation, and that find ourselves at thousands of conferences and round tables being snubbed by the administrators?

So to the damage they’re now adding mockery: we’re being accused of being snivelers. Instead, there’s Cacciari fighting the tourism monoculture, inaugurating new museums as if they were for the 60,000 residents, who inaugurates new piers as if they were nursery schools for the Venetians, who sets up a brand-new dock for the tourist launches in the Riva dei Sette Martiri, who ignores and lets languish an area of tremendous potential like the waterfront in Marghera, who has not succeeded in many years to create even one great center for research or for work, who goes to the Biennale and the Film Festival to do “culture,” who sells the facades of the palaces under restoration for publicity.

One sees the desire to get out of the tourism monoculture, one sees it clearly. All you have to do is look at what the Cacciari government is doing.

Then, on the same day, the vice-mayor, Michele Vianello, comes out with an incredible quip: To put an end to the motondoso in the Bacino of San Marco, what we need is a single authority. That he would have the courage to say so after five years of the commissioner (N.B.: against motondoso, as well as mayor) Costa would be amazing if it weren’t offensive to the intelligence of his listeners. Because there’s something else that is needed: What’s needed are people in power who have the capacity and the will to make changes. Venice — and notable people such as Riccardo Calimani, Francesco Giavazzi, Gherardo Ortalli, have said it unanimously and in public — has not been capable of producing a class of governors worthy of its history and its potential.

It has been, at the most, a springboard for launching people who are seeking national notoriety; meanwhile, the city is crumbling under the suction of the propellors (another reference to motondoso) and is being transformed by the pressure of 20 million voracious grasshoppers (tourists) a year. As for the future, one hears predictions of 40 million in another 20 years. We’re already preparing the hotels of the future Tessera City (the village near the airport) and the under-lagoon subway to facilitate their arrival.

Nice way to get out of the monoculture of tourism.

img_5218-clouds-6-comp — But you can still see why people want to come here.

Venetian Curiosities, Venetian-ness

Seeking a new viewpoint

August 25, 2009 2 Comments

The location of Rosa Salva's cafe makes an excellent outdoor perch for resting and ingesting many marvelous calories in the form of pastry and ice cream. — The location of Rosa Salva's cafe makes an excellent outdoor perch for resting and ingesting many first-class calories in the form of pastry and ice cream.

One Sunday afternoon as I was toiling along toward the Fondamente Nove on my way to Burano, I stopped for refreshment (coffee and use of the bathroom) at the elegant cafe/bar Rosa Salva in Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo.

Let me note right here that although travel writers seem to love propagating “Zanipolo,” the ancient Venetian name for this trusty duet of saints, I myself have never heard any Venetian use that word, even by mistake. That era, whenever it was, is long, long gone. (I have seen it written, occasionally, on local boats or bars.) I just wanted to point that out.

Anyway, it was a miserable day. When it rains like that the entire world goes sodden, nothing escapes. Your skin isn’t just wet, it’s saturated. The air, your clothes, your brain. A day like this makes you want to just stay in bed, with the (sodden) covers pulled over your (sodden) head.

Not surprisingly, there were no other customers in the cafe. A dark-haired girl and a young man wearing glasses were standing behind the bar. I smiled and gave that whaddya-gonna-do shrug toward the weather and the world.

I said, “Why are we here?”

They smiled. He said, “Good question. There’s nobody around — nobody. And there’s five of us here to work today. Some days even with five we’re working like crazy, but look at this. There’s nothing to do.”

Helpful little Anglo-Saxon, no-minute-left-unexploited me, bounces right in: “You could read a book,” I offered. “Write some letters. Do needlepoint. Write the story of your life. Not the stuff that happened, but the stuff you wish had happened. Your dreams.”

Did someone say dreams? He was ready. “My dream was to become a captain of a vaporetto with the ACTV [the local transport company],” he replied.

“Good grief!” I said (or rather, its Venetian equivalent). “If you’re going to dream, dream big! Captain of a vaporetto? Why not make it captain of a cruise ship? After all, it’s just dreams. Go for it!”

“Well, no,” he replied, unruffled. “It would be enough for me. It’s a secure position, you work your seven hours and then you go home.” (This the classic philosophy of a certain sort of person here: I need to work but don’t let it disturb my life.) “Besides, my father was captain of a cruise ship and he was gone for weeks at a time.” Oops. I was aiming at the wrong dream.

“Well, that changes things,” I said. “You know what you’re talking about. So fine. Why don’t you apply to the ACTV?”

“I did.” He gestured toward his glasses. “You can’t make it if you wear glasses.”

I didn’t want to give in. “So have the operation!”

“I could do that” — he had obviously been serious about this dream, small as it might have seemed to me. “It would correct the near-sightedness, but not the astigmatism.” (Or the other way around, I can’t remember.)

“I wouldn’t have minded being a train driver,” he went on, “but it’s the same problem about the eyes. ”

“Subway driver?” (Somewhere else, obviously, not here.) Nope — anyone who wants to work at something that’s part of the autotramvieri union, it’s the same story. He was stuck.

He had sort of made his peace with it, but he was still young enough to feel the empty space where what he wanted to be his life was supposed to have been put. Meanwhile he’s making do with carrying overpriced cappuccinos to exhausted tourists. Or not, as is the case today.

“Well,” I said, still trying to be helpful but drastically changing tack, “just think, anyway you’ve still got your eyes. How many people could say they wish they had your problems?” Not the best contribution, being repulsively banal, but true, which is something, anyway.

He agreed. Well, what else could he do? Evidently he had long since reached that conclusion, the idea that things could have been, or be, worse. But meanwhile the rain is pouring down, and the motor has pretty much stalled in his life, so to speak. Whether he simply needs more fuel, or new spark plugs, or some part that’s more expensive and hard to find (“…we’ll have to order it…”…”it will be two months…” …”everybody’s closed for Christmas/New Year’s/summer vacation”…) I hope he finds it and gets his life moving again. He’s too young to stay stalled in the breakdown lane of life like this.