Mining the Diaries 82: Italy 2011
988 Calle Larga Nani, Venice, 7th October 2011
Six-thirty: clamorous clanging of church bells; cloudy outside and starting to rain, first a few drops and the heavily. Breakfast. We read and play canasta until noon. The rain stops and we walk down to Billa for food. Puddles; cold; people trudging about in disposable blue plastic macs like huge polythene bags. A scratch lunch of sausage, cheese, tomato, cucumber and bread.
After lunch Vaporetto 1 down to Giardini. Now bright and sunny with dramatic cloudy sky and chilly wind. We buy tickets for the Biennale later in the week.
Walk back towards San Marco, quiet, a few strollers. Cross the Rio dei Greci and into a scrum of tourists. How many really know why they are here? How many have seen much more of Venice? At café tables they have the air of people waiting, of killing the hour of free time they have been given. They swarm around San Marco.
Jaded with Venice. Who’d have thought it?