Piazza San Marco | Venice: I am not making this up

sorry, but this is hilarious

May 6, 2022 17 Comments

The headline at the newsstand Wednesday: “Huge reviewing stand in Piazza (San Marco) Florian closed in protest.”

Some things deserve to be laughed at — laughter with a frisson of incredulity. Incredulity without the guffaws also works well. And Florian closing in protest is hilarious.

Florian is the jewel in the crown of the Piazza San Marco. Opened on December 29, 1720, it is certainly the oldest cafe extant in Venice, and in all of Italy; some sources claim it’s the oldest in the world, though Florian modestly denies it. It’s also extremely beautiful. History and elegance make such a lovely couple. Sipping your prosecco or Bellini or even a tiny cup containing three drops of espresso, a nibble of salmon, a delectable pastry, all brought to you on a silver salver, you can feel wonderfully, uniquely glamorous. Sitting in Venice! At Florian! Am I dreaming? Is this really me?

It is fabulous, there is no other way to put it.

Then the bill arrives, and you have to start planning that second mortgage on your house. Coffee at the bar: 3 euros ($3.17). Seated: 6.50 ($6.85). A little plate of six (6) cookies? 13 euros ($13.71). Is the atmosphere adorned by the enchanting music rippling from the instruments of the quartet on their platform outside? Your conto will request your payment of 6 euros per person, even if you didn’t actually order it. Yes, for a concert it’s extremely economical.

I could go on, but my point is not how expensive it is; Florian can charge any price it wants and nobody is forcing you to go there.

My point is that they closed for a day to protest the “invasion” of the gargantuan stage set up for massive ceremonies in the Piazza San Marco. (More on the ceremonies later.) Florian strongly objects to all this construction encroaching on their territory, primarily because they were not consulted weeks in advance. The city government disputes the accusation of no consultation.

To set the scene, Florian is the cream-colored awning on the left side of his image.

This is the view of the Piazza from the tables at Florian yesterday. The large blue reviewing stand is one thing, but the bleachers will be in front of the tables. Yet where else could you put them? Even though Florian objects to it, the marching always crosses the Piazza lengthwise. Geometry is heartless, as I discovered in 10th grade and Florian discovered this week. The Comune has conceded extra lateral space for the tables to compensate for the distress.

I could understand somebody protesting a situation that would dangerously and cruelly limit, if not eliminate, their income for a few days (April 29 – May 9, to be precise). But I don’t believe this is the case.

They complain that there is too much going on in the Piazza, and huge events such as Wednesday’s graduation ceremony for 800 students of the University of Venice, and the even huger rituals planned for today in honor of the Morosini naval school (details follow), are seriously invading their physical space and even their aura.

The occasion is the 60th anniversary of the school’s re-founding in 1961 (originally established in 1937, but interruptions such as war ensued). And while we’re all together, why not also conduct the requisite swearing-in ceremony by which the first-year class is rendered officially military. This year the second-year group will join in, as there was no oath-taking last year. There will be marching and saluting executed by the 150 cadets, undoubtedly abetted by detachments from other military branches. Did I mention that the president of the republic will also be there? Not to mention many past cadets, going back decades.

To return to the bur under Florian’s saddle, yes, there is an enormous reviewing stand, and yes, there will be big bleachers flanking it. It’s regrettable that these will degrade the scenery of the Piazza, to the detriment of the Florian fascination. But it occurs to me that even though this legendary cafe’, like all businesses that place tables outdoors, pays a tax for the public space they occupy, they don’t actually own that space. Which is to say that the Piazza San Marco doesn’t belong to them. In fact, you could make a good argument that Florian’s appeal does not lie principally in the Piazza, but in its own glorious rooms. If you take the Orient Express, are you really going to spend a lot of time looking out the window at the scenery?

People want glamour, people are willing to pay for glamour, and then they park their baby stroller in the aisle. Power bank recharging something, backpack stashed aboard. The invisible clients on the left could be sitting in the departure gate area of the Dubuque airport. Not saying travelers can’t have their stuff, just saying that the Florian aura is a very frangible thing. If somebody can come to Florian and do this, I seriously doubt that some bleachers outside are going to bother them. If Florian doesn’t mind the stroller parked amidships, I’m not sure why they’re complaining about the atmosphere of their operation outside.

In any case, the Piazza San Marco has been the site of mass confusionary events for centuries. The interminable procession on the feast of Corpus Domini, the week-long market for the feast of the Ascension — stalls everywhere selling everything! — bear-baiting to entertain the Crown Prince of Russia in a Piazza surrounded by yes, bleachers filled with thousands of spectators, and so on. If anything big is going to happen in Venice, it’s almost certainly going to happen in the Piazza San Marco. Did nobody think to tell Florian?

Well, not according to them. They say they got barely 24-hours notice before the scaffolding began to go up, at which I wonder what difference it would have made to have had even 240-hours notice. The scaffolding is going up, and it will be coming down. See: “Ownership of Piazza,” above.

So here is what strikes me as hilarious about all this: What possible difference does it make to anyone except Florian if it closes for a day? I understand the desire to protest, but saying you’re going to close for a day to show how mad you are is kind of like when I was three years old and threatened to hold my breath forever if I didn’t get what I wanted. My mother basically said “Go right ahead,” and I did, and when I regained consciousness on the kitchen floor she was still standing over there, washing dishes or cutting vegetables or whatever she was doing. So much for my protest.

So a day without Florian, even though you can make it sound like something terrible, doesn’t even register on the Apocalypt-o-Meter. I think most of us can say we have other things to worry about.

None of the three other other cafe’s on the Piazza have protested, and they too, as well as the museums, are going to have to close for the ceremonial day.

Acqua Alta

MOSE makes history

October 3, 2020 26 Comments

I’m not going to lie: I never thought I’d see this day. Either it would never come, or by the time it did, I’d have long since turned into tera de bocal (clay for making chamberpots, as they put it here). But here we are, or more specifically, there it was this morning — the Adriatic to the right, the lagoon 70 cm lower to the left, and the vaunted MOSE floodgates ensuring for the first time that the twain shall never meet.

Years, decades, lifetimes have been devoted to constructing (and paying for) this thing, and I had little (in ErlaSpeak that means “no”) expectation that the gates would ever function. But they did. Allow me to doff my chapeau and say I’m not only astounded, but slightly weirded out. Because hearing three signals on the warning siren at 8:00 AM put all my nerves on high alert, even though we’re not in danger till four signals warn us of the possibility of the tide’s exceeding our personal domestic ground-level safe limit of 150 cm. Instead: Nothing.

I think everybody’s nerves have been a little tense, after two days of forecasts predicting an acqua alta to peak today at 135 cm above mean sea level at 12:05 PM. But at 9:00 AM (and at a mere 70 cm of rising tide) it was instead the long-discussed, -doubted, -reviled floodgates that rose, and stopped the sea at whatever the watery analogy of “in its tracks” may be. At the measuring station at the Diga Sud of the Lido the tide was at 119 cm, but the water at the Punta della Salute — bacino of San Marco, basically — was at 69 cm. When the tide turned, just after noon, it had reached 129 cm, but in the city was only a paltry 73.

This graph clearly shows the track of the tide, from its lowest point at 6:00 AM to the moment when the gates began to rise. Game, as they say, over.

We went outside to look at our canal. The water wasn’t moving. A lost pear, fallen from the fruit/vegetable boat upstream, was bobbing tranquilly in one place when it ought long since to have been carried off by the rising (or, by then, falling) tide.

Even on a normal day, the water in the canal is almost always moving at some speed, in some direction; only briefly, twice a month, does the tide pause in what is called the morte de aqua (“death of the water”). But here it was, stock still. It might as well have been in the bathtub. And so it remained until some time after the Adriatic began to withdraw; I suppose that didn’t need to be said, but perhaps someone other than myself might have forgotten that you wouldn’t lower the barrier until the sea was at least even with the level of water in the lagoon.

I didn’t used to think of 135 cm as anything more than “God, this is annoying.” But I think it’s fair to say that the doomsday inundation of November 11-12, 2019 is still too screamingly fresh in everybody’s mind to allow the casual return of “Sure, this is Venice, what do you expect?” Any tide above normal now appears potentially apocalyptic. And if our nerves were slightly on edge, so were those of the hopeful travelers who had booked hotel rooms and then, having heard early mentions of the dreaded words “acqua alta,” quickly canceled the reservations.

That’s too bad, because they missed a verifiably historic moment. And I’m glad I was here to see that pear not going anywhere in our canal.

The breakwater at San Nicolo’ on the Lido was an excellent spot for watching this epic event. This clip gives a sense of the force of the wind, always a crucial player on Team Flood Venice. This morning it was up to 41 kph (25 mph).

In case the still photograph above doesn’t convey the dynamic of what’s happening, this video from Corriere della Sera (particularly at the beginning and end of the clip) gives a glimpse of the force of the tide, as seen against the barriers as they rise, one by one. Fun fact: It took one hour and 17 minutes to raise all 78 of the gates, so the process obviously needs to start in a timely manner and not wait till the last OMG minute.

But this is astonishingly beautiful: Noon today in the Piazza San Marco, the moment of the peak tide which ought to have covered the pavement with some 45 cm/17 inches of lagoon. The only water that dampened the stones here came from the clouds.

Note: Two videos, and all of the images with the exception of the water in the Piazza San Marco, were forwarded to me by friends via WhatsApp, so I am unable to give appropriate credit to their sources.

Events

Carnival, been and gone

February 26, 2020 15 Comments

These are certainly not the most elaborate costumes I saw, but the glowing parasols are the point.

Carnival (or Carnevale, if you prefer) isn’t something I gorge on every year; I tend to take a few little nibbles around the edges. And this year wouldn’t have been any different except that a former colleague from National Geographic, photographer Tomasz Tomaszewski, said he was coming with a friend to make pictures, and asked if I could give a logistical hand.

For three intense days (Thursday to Saturday) we wandered around — if you can call eight miles a day “wandering” — and it turned out to be surprisingly entertaining. This doesn’t mean I can’t wait till next year to do it all again, but either the quality of the costumes was higher than in some years past, or I’ve changed in some indefinable way, or something.

I hope you enjoy these snaps, because the story of Carnevale 2020 has not had a happy ending. Northern Italy (specifically the regions of Lombardia and Veneto) are in the tightening clutch of the COVID-19 epidemic. On Sunday there were only 20,000 revelers out of an expected 100,000.

In fact, the curtain fell on Carnevale two days early – Sunday nght at midnight, to be precise. I don’t know that this has ever happened, but missing the culmination of festivities on Tuesday (Martedi’ Grasso) has certainly made the scheduled participants unhappy. The 12 Marias are in tears because now we’ll never know who was the fairest of them all.

That’s just the beginning. The governor of the Veneto has decreed many decrees prohibiting events or places of any sort where people might gather in groups larger than (insert small number here). Until March 1 the schools, universities, and museums are closed. There will be no masses celebrated in church, even on Ash Wednesday, not even in the basilica of San Marco. Sporting events are all canceled.

But let me share a look back at a few sunny days when Carnival was fully fledged and nobody was worrying about anything more important than where to finally find a place to sit down.

Trailing clouds of glory, this couple proceeded at a stately pace beneath puffs and cherubs. The stately pace was more or less imposed by the weight of the costume (some of them went up to 26 pounds, or 12 kg), and walking slowly also made it easy for photographers to snap away. The most elaborate costumes made many stops on the stroll around the Piazza because almost all of this activity was undertaken precisely to be photographed. Just like the casinos want you to steal their ashtrays (I was told once…), people dress up here to be photographed. You can’t possibly offend them by asking. Or not asking and just going ahead, shooting away, which is more common.

Photographers were swarming like freaking locusts.

All it took was for one person to start shooting and there was a sudden rush from everywhere and the wild fluttering sound of camera shutters. It was like seagulls attacking a slice of pizza.

She was only pretending to play but it looked like she was having a grand time.

I give her credit for willingness to walk around with an entire fabric-store supply of material draped on and around her, but it makes me feel tired and slightly smothered just looking at her.

It seems slightly Zen to come all the way from Tokyo to sit by yourself, but perhaps her cavalier was out getting her cigarettes or something. Tomasz is immortalizing her and her cigarette holder; she told him that she had made the costume (or had it made; in any case, it wasn’t rented, as many people do to simplify matters).

There were far too many 18th-century-Mozart-Casanova-Marie-Antoinette costumes roaming around for my taste, but this French couple took it to a whole new level. They (or she) makes the costumes, and she told me that they changed their outfit every day — wigs and all. I secretly called her Melisande, but her real name is Charlotte and she comes from La Rochelle. She and her friends — two men were in tow — drove to Venice with their steamer trunks loaded with this glorious garb.

She was too perfect. Perhaps she was listening for the distant rumble of the tumbrels?

Speaking of French, this squadron was a sight to behold– three admirals, home from the fleet after a vigorous few months of bashing the English (I imagine).

These cafes are expensive, but if you can find a seat they’re the best place to give your costume a rest for a while.

If there’s anywhere the standard period costume really looks good (apart from the Caffe’ Florian, I mean), it’s in a gondola.

She needed a better position than a mere cafe table and she got it atop the balustrade of the entrance to the campanile.

I began to yearn for simplicity, the way you yearn for a pickle after a hot pastrami sandwich. These two Italian ladies were just what I needed.

Dotted nylons and sparkly sneakers — that’s her Carnevale outfit and I really like it.

Then this vision rose from the sea, a magical naiad combining fantasy, glamour, and dazzling simplicity. Even the pose was perfect.

This extraordinary headdress is all reef — coral, algae, shells.

The pictures were all of Venice and water. If we have to have acqua alta, could more of these creatures appear, please?

I forgot all about Melisande when I lost my heart to Ondine.

At the Rialto, another breath of non-18th-century air. Very few elements involved (not like the mountain of material with the white silk roses), but all the better for that. Finding a great hat that wasn’t a tricorn isn’t deeply difficult, but you have to realize that that’s really what your outfit needs.

I entertain myself by noticing reflections, and this one of the basilica’s facade was a nice change from the parade of people.

You can only look at so many costumes before your eyes seek something drastically different. Here’s a shop at the end of a long sunny street with people apparently walking through it. Photographer Tomaszewski, or his shadow, has paused at the right to look at something. Or nothing. His eyes might have been getting tired too.

Venetian Events

Wrapping Carnival

March 5, 2019 3 Comments

Today is Martedi’ Grasso (Mardi Gras) and Carnival is wrapping up. It wrapped up a few days ago in via Garibaldi, not with a bang, not with anything. On Giovedi’ Grasso, the stage, inflatable slide and trampolines were going full tilt, overrun by swarms of unchained children. The day after, nothing. Everything was just … gone.

There are still frittelle and galani on sale and the streets are still speckled with confetti, yet the revelers are nowhere to be seen. I think whoever’s still around has migrated to the Piazza San Marco, where the big closing events take place. I won’t be there. I’ll be sitting at home in the dark, like some addict, secretly eating the last of the galani.

Galani, the last batch. They are doomed and so am I.

Frittelle veneziane are somewhat difficult to find; lately everybody seems to want them filled with pastry cream or zabaglione. I stick with the traditional solid balls of fried dough. I bought this one not because I’m so crazy about frittelle, but because I couldn’t resist the chance to break off all those little stick-out bits. I’m so easy to entertain.

“Today there are mammaluchi.” Readers may remember that the Pasticceria Targa near the Rialto market is the only place I’ve found that offers a special Carnival sweet called “mammaluchi.” Not the knightly military caste drawn from the ranks of slave warriors (thanks, Wikipedia), but an equally dangerous pastry.

The Mamluks had a special sword, but I think this could have be just as effective in your average skirmish. It would just take a little longer for your adversary to collapse. The filling is dough, but of a moisture and density that make you take them seriously. Two is actually too many, but I didn’t let that stop me.

I receive absolutely no compensation for this mention, they don’t even know who I am. Just that wild-eyed foreigner who comes in every year asking if the mammaluchi are ready yet.

I didn’t go on a hunt for costumes to photograph, mainly because so many of them are so trite. I don’t judge, I know the people concealed within are having a wonderful time. I just feel embarrassed taking pictures that everybody else is taking, especially of something so unimaginative. Here, a group of massive costumes was disembarking from the #1 vaporetto.

I kind of liked these dudes, even if they had rented the garb. I was fascinated by the fact that all of them had 12 white dots. I have no idea how you play a game of dominos if all the tiles have the same number of dots, but at least they were being whimsical. I award points for whimsy.

And speaking of whimsy, this was the scene in via Garibaldi on Fat Thursday. The munchkins from the local nursery school are dressed up as either little pigs (the girls) or wolves (boys). The masks were handmade of the ever-reliable construction paper.

The pigs were especially adorable, not only because they were scarfing up frittelle and fruit juice but because they had to move their masks aside to make way for the food. The mask itself is a small masterpiece, held on by a circlet of pink construction paper.

This was an exceptional minimalist costume. The mask was a small cardboard carton just sitting on his shoulders, and he must have had fun making a sword that wants to be a Mamluk bread knife.

Seen at the Rialto market: A couple wearing chef’s toques, the father carrying their little girl on his back, disguised as a ….

…lobster. That’s what I always say, never leave home without a clean handkerchief and a lobster.

Yes, I know you want to stay out past dark, but it’s time to go home. Pack it up till next year.

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