La Serenissima - The journey that began it all

                                                                         Caryn Kennedy

Our memories of seminal moments, those hours that have shifted a life, never leave us. These moments become imbedded in the soul and become a part of our story. This tale and the events in the telling, shifted a life.  

At 19 years old my family and I were traveling around Europe. Mom was giving a series of lectures on Anthropology at various European universities, and my older brother and cousin and I tagged along. On this leg of the trip, we spent a few days walking the fringes of the lush and weighty Zagreb in what was then known as Yugoslavia.  Mom’s lecture and touring accomplished, we boarded an evening train towards Italy.

Apparently, when traveling by train in Yugoslavia, the traveler must change trains at Trieste on the Italian border and board an Italian train to their destination. I must have been the only member of my family who was awake to hear the announcement to change trains, but I was definitely the only one who got off the train. Standing on the platform, I watched the Yugoslavian train bellow back towards its home.

As the train left the Venetian station, I searched for my companions, but my sleepy family did not get off that train. On this night, I was all alone at one in the morning, in a foreign country in which I didn’t speak the language. I was 19 years old and happy as a clam. The independence and adventure thrilled me deeply. Oh, and I had no Lire (this story predates the Euro).  I assumed I would meet up with them at the hotel so I began to venture on. When you walk out of the Venetian train station instead of seeing a sidewalk or a road, taxis or cars, there are ancient stone steps descending into the green waters of the canal. The canal being the road to take.  Their language was foreign to me but I managed to ask some men in the train station how one gets around in this city.  Chuckling, they directed me back towards the water and an awaiting vaporetto – Venice’s version of a floating bus. Eventually, the vaporetto puttered down the Grand Canal in the middle of the night with its three passengers aboard. Diesel fumes trailed the vessel igniting fond, childhood memories of London. It’s strange sometimes, the scents that waft around you and tug on a thread of the past.  Elegant Palazzi and softly lit Villa’s lined the lonely waterway, their amber lights sparkled on the glassy waters before us. I was completely entranced and even today can still feel the huge smile I was helpless to hide. I had never seen anything like this. The enigma of Venice.

It wasn’t long before the captain hollered something unintelligible, waving a dark and hairy arm towards land. The other passengers glared towards me, the American, I took the hint and stepped off the vaporetto onto a slippery, floating platform, much like balancing on a canoe. Pulling my little suitcase on wheels behind me, an itinerary in the other hand, I was completely lost and unafraid.  

There were five of them walking towards me, dressed in naval white with little white hats, walking the same narrow stone path and asked me where I was going. After telling the Italian sailors I was looking for my hotel, one of them took my suitcase, two of the others my itinerary and began arguing in Italian about where to find the hotel. Miss naivety and I followed them.  This could have gone so badly but these boys were products of the proverbial Italian grandmother and something told me I was in her hands now.

We walked through Venice together, the sailors good-natured arguing echoed off the cotta walls of the alley as the wheels of my suitcase clattered on the stone path, this moment becoming indelible.  In an instant, the passage opened onto a huge piazza, two football fields of luminous arched buildings of white marble and limestone reflecting shrouded white lights. I audibly gasped. The sailors stopped to see if all was well, smirked and nonchalantly walked on. Not a soul in sight, not even a pigeon, if I recall. In awe of the moment, I wondered if any modern traveler had ever seen it so forsaken and pure, much like it was over five hundred years ago.  The nonplussed sailors urged me on, I pulled my self together and caught up to them. We were walking down the middle of Piazza San Marco, trying to take in so much ethereal beauty, only my Italian sailors and I.

Ecco, they found my hotel!  Just one street off the grand piazza. They handed back to me my suitcase and itinerary, wished me well and went on their way. I have never forgotten them. 

The hotel was a small and narrow building long ago squeezed in between glass fronted shops and just around the corner from the touristic chaos. What was probably a family home four centuries ago was warm and charming, had only 1 or 2 bedrooms on each floor with hobbit sized doors, and a shared bathroom. It was run by an older Italian couple who were not interested in the goings-on outside their door, nor in the teenager appearing in the middle of the night. I certainly did not win any affection due to my untimely arrival.

Still no sign of the family, the next morning I awoke and ventured out onto the piazza.  Noisy tourists jostling for space where generations had strolled before. Those rushed sightseers blind to the gilded shadows and treasures, some now veiled by time and ignorance.

I wandered the Piazza aimlessly on the first day, stopping for a caffe, listening to a 4-piece classical ensemble with a virtuosic and kinda sexy violinist.  By the end of the first day, I had developed a little crush on the Italian soloist. I bought a panini from Hemingway’s old haunt along with too many tourists, ate lunch at a bistro table and watched the young Italians flirting, appraising the tourists. We must be amusing to such an ancient culture, like a Momma spying on a toddler. I walked through the gilded Basilica San Marco, overwhelmed by the craft, opulence and the history of the gold horses; this church built on the backs of spices, and political mortar. The beauty of that divine church is truly a wonder yet, there is no savoring historical beauty while jostling for a place to stand. Heading back to the violinist and listening, an intoxicating peace I had never known was spilling over me. I felt a deep, physical connection to this place as if I was finally home.  Back at the hotel, there was a scolding from the maternal desk clerk and a frantic call from my Mother stranded in Yugoslavia and waiting for the next train. I assured her all was fine, but I was out of her reach.

The next day I managed to exchange what money I had for Lire and wandered all over the city. 

I deliberately got lost in the far reaches where tourists dare not tread. I stumbled upon the old Jewish Ghetto in the Dorsoduro district where they do not speak English, a district of leather masters working with a quality we do not see in New York. The beautiful leather bag I bought is still in perfect condition today. Throughout the day, I learned a few Italian words and found the shop keepers to be warm and inviting and so encouraging if I attempted to speak their language. I stepped onto a vaporetto, destination unknown and truly explored, still happy as a clam and thoroughly enjoying the day. The vaporetto puttered to the outer islands and I spent hours watching the glass blowers of Murano in the heat and speckled colors of their art.  A quick boat ride from Murano is the colorful island of Burano. There is not much to do there but watch the women make beautiful lace and fishing nets on the stoops of their pastel-colored homes. I was sure there was more fun to be had elsewhere so I headed back to the water. We drifted past tiny abandoned islands large enough for a stone ruin of a home and no more. How beautiful that a family once lived on that tiny island no larger than a bus. The cemetery island looked like a floating park and the Lido reminded me of charming beach towns on Martha’s Vineyard.

 I returned to my piazza and spent the evening with the violinist. He was offering music to the masses and I was daydreaming of how one lives a life in this place. Some young Italians who could speak a little English sat with me and we had some drinks in the warm evening air and laughed a lot. Italians love to laugh. By the end of that enchanted evening, I kissed a boy named Angelo.

I met Mom at the Venetian train station on the third day and my brother and cousin had traveled on to Florence. Her fear of water was not terribly compatible with this city, so I showed her the floating bus stations and how to board the vaporetti.  With the train delays and obfuscations, there was no more time for Mom to explore Venice as I had. We had another city to visit and another lecture to give so back at the hotel we packed up. Honestly heartbroken, we left that afternoon for Florence.  As the train pulled away from this ethereal place, I vowed quietly to myself to study Italian and return.

Two years later I was on a water taxi, stopped at a red traffic light on the Grand Canal of Venice. Yes, they have a traffic light on the water.  Fate and some pure determination had allowed me to return.  Only this time I could speak Italian quite well and was prepared to study the Renaissance masters. It was hard work getting to this place; studying Italian, qualifying for a place in the program, interviews in Italian, and changing my major to be a better candidate. I was beginning a study abroad program for a year, and as fate would have it, we spent the first 3 months in Venice.

Most of my classmates were terrified and tearful and I believe they thought I was a bit ridiculous for being so giddy, but they didn’t know about Venice and I.  After the intensive language program in Venice, the students were divided up and sent around Italy for the school year to Bologna, Parma, Florence, and Rome. A small group of students and I spent the school year at the University of Padova. Every day and for centuries now, the students walk the halls where Galileo taught. Since Padova is only 30 minutes from Venice, we visited the watery city with friends throughout the year and loved the chilly and foggy winter months the most. The damp city was deserted and quiet and bundled in wool and scarves we would walk the cobbled paths. Our voices echoing off the fog and stone, dodging rats the size of my cat and convinced we were players in a Fellini movie. The fog is so thick at times you cannot see the circuitous stone paths before you or the other side of the footbridge spanning a canal. We could have been strolling the city in any century of the past and it would have appeared the same. I imagined the fog rolling in from the lagoon was bringing a haunting life all its own as do the scirocco winds of summer.

Throughout my life, I have questioned whether it is possible to truly be in love with a place. This story took place 30 years ago and I have never stopped talking about Italy, just ask my family and friends. I have never stopped longing. But after all this time, I have answered my own question about being able to fall in love with a place because I’m older now and I know what love is.

My life is forever adorned with this connection I have to Italy as I again make plans to return and this time ….stay.