Thursday, June 19, 2008

A weekend in Venice

Jessica and I took a long train ride to Venice and were walking out of the Train Station when we ran into Natasha, my friend from high school who I still keep in touch with. She is backpacking with a friend as well and we didn't know we were both going to be in Venice. Jess and I were at a loss as to where to begin looking for our hostel and the curt information woman was no help at all! So when Tasha and Liz said they had a hostel and knew how to find it we quickly followed them. The hostel turned out to be full but they directed us to a woman, Anna Stefano, who lived nearby and had two bedrooms she rented out. They were perfect! Jess and I even had the forgotten luxury of a private bathroom! That fist day in Venice was also my birthday. I was reluctantly turning 23. I had this great idea that if I slowed the aging now when I'm 40 I'll only be 30. So I let the girls attending my birthday soiree know it was my 22nd birthday, again. We found a great Italian restaurant tucked away in the labyrinth of Venetian streets. Seeing Venice at night was such a special gift. It was so quiet and the streets were filled mainly with Venetians. San Marco Square, the largest square in Venice, was nearly empty in comparison to the dominating crowds the following day.

The next morning when Jess and I started off the streets were still relatively calm. We spent the morning wandering the touristier and well known areas and stopped for lunch at a restaurant suggested to us by a local. What started as a warm Italian welcome quickly turned cold when we declined to pay for bottled water and opted instead for our water bottles we had filled from our hostel tap. Asking for free water, or tap water, also seems to be passé but Jess and I were not deterred from saving the extra $5.00 at every meal. Despite the owner’s dislike of us, the pizza margherita was still amazing! We spent the afternoon wandering around the quieter local areas of Venice. At every turn, Jess and I would find which street had less people and we would walk down there. It led us to small streets and bridges filled with families returning from church or meeting for lunch. I loved everything about Venice except for the stares. I am in no way exaggerating when I say people stopped in their tracks to stare at me as I hobbled by on my crutches. I had unfortunately chosen that day to bare my battered legs for the first time since Greece. I thought the cuts had healed significantly, but apparently when pared with crutches I was a spectacle for tourists and Venetians alike. It put a damper on the otherwise perfect day.

In the evening, we met Tasha and Liz again for dinner then said our goodbyes and went to the station to catch our night train to Budapest. As we neared our sleeper cabin, we were approached by a family who wanted to switch cabins with us so they could all be closer together. We had no problem with this so the conductor took us 6 cars down to their cabin, which as luck would have it, turned out to be a first class private two bed room. It came complete with our very own sink, mirror, outlets, and fluffy comforters. We were in backpacker heaven. In our excitement we decided to video tape our train and cushy compartment. Jessica began recording when we heard, "Hallo, Hallo!" She turned around to find the conductor waving his arms disapprovingly. As you can hear on the tape, she replied, "None of that?" He ushered her into the compartment and made it clear that we were not to leave again, causing our elation to turn to fear as we realized we were prisoners in our own compartment. It was a first class compartment though so we didn't care. After several video recordings of our favorite new song, "The Strugglers", we went to sleep. Unfortunately, we never slept for long because we were woken up four different times that night, each time with a loud banging on the door followed by, "Polizia! Polizia! Open Up!" We'd done the border patrol passport drill before, but never 4 times in one night! Apparently, our scroungy backpacks and disheveled appearances aroused suspicion because several times they radioed in all of our personal info to the station. Luckily, we had decided to stop all of our drug smuggling activities the day before.

The trip came full circle as we left the train station and we walked to our hostel in Budapest, the one we had started in 3 weeks earlier. Despite our disappointment that it was Jessica's last day we tried to make the most of it and went to the baths, similar to the Turkish baths. They are large marble carved rooms with hot pools of water. At the end, we both got well deserved massages! The next morning we were pretty much on time for the airport (except for those few minutes lost from me falling back to sleep, oops) until we got off the metro and onto the airport bus. The driver told us the wrong place to get off and we ended up at the wrong terminal and very late. We threw our stuff in a cab and I quickly told the cabbie, "We need to get to terminal 1 VERY fast!” Apparently that was all he needed to hear to transform from a Budapest cab driver to 007. He was off and running as we averaged 100 miles/hr., weaving in and out of traffic the whole way. Jess made her plane though! I reluctantly said goodbye and I hobbled off alone to catch my flight to Berlin. I've been missing my Sherpa ever since! It's just not the same without her!

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