“Memory’s images, once they are fixed in words, are erased,” Polo said. “Perhaps I am afraid of losing Venice all at once, if I speak of it. Or perhaps, speaking of other cities, I have already lost it, little by little.”
-Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities
Jen and I arrived in Venice at dusk. The huge block of a train station was strangely empty despite the vast number of briskly moving people. The second week of January, it seemed, was a slow period for tourists. The people in the station carried small bags and moved with the unconscious confidence of a commuter following a path walked twice every day. These locals, with their intentional way of moving, were surely escaping the city and on their way home after work. They made the station feel empty; like a parking lot at Disneyland filled with only the cars of employees. Venice, whose lifeblood is tourists and travelers, was quiet and despite the cold rain falling from the dark sky, I was giddy – we had the amusement park to ourselves.
I had been to Venice before. In the final days of July 1995, I traveled to Europe for the first time. I was twenty years old and had both a lot of assumptions and a lot of questions about the world. For various reasons, my point of entry into Europe and the traveling life was Venice. The Montana to Venice route was a long one, and when I arrived there I had picked up a strong cold and a serious case of jet lag. My memories of those first few days have a dreamlike quality (no doubt aided by jet lag pills and cough syrup) that I have always associated with Venice.
My traveling companion and I walked aimlessly around the narrow streets of Venice for a couple of days. We avoided the crowds, museums, and cathedrals. Instead, we spent our days crossing over steep bridges, walking along murky and smelly canals, finding treasures here and there: fountains filled with hundreds of rich green turtles, languages we couldn’t identify, statues that we didn’t understand. We didn’t really have any plans or desires other than just to enjoy the city. It was hot and crowded and yet it was like nothing I had ever experienced. The city’s scents and flavors, streets, bridges, corners, and alleys exceeded anything I had dreamt about.
On this trip, I was interested in seeing how the Venice outside of the train station and the Venice of my memories compared. I had looked forward to visiting it the most out of anywhere in Europe and I was impatient to get out of the train station. Jen and I quickly procured a map from the tourist office – humbly backing out and waiting our turn after the clerk yelled at us that only one person at a time was allowed in the small office. We peered at our notes on how to reach the hostel, the Foresteria Valdese. After a short ride down the Grand Canal, we found ourselves partially lost in a dark, quiet street. Despite the rain, the dark, and our heavy packs, it was a joy to walk in narrow streets without automobiles. We eventually found the hostel, which was located in a decaying villa on the confluence of three canals.
We spent the next week strolling around the city in the cold January rain. Walking, even in frigid weather, is the perfect activity in Venice. We wandered and strolled for hours, often getting hopelessly lost in the floating city. The streets were quiet and off the main routes we encountered very few people. We enjoyed not knowing where we were in the city, consulting our map was always done with a slight hesitation and a feeling of sadness.
The other day I was going through some of my files and I found a post card I had mailed myself from the Venice train station. On the front is a picture of the Canal de la Conica, with a tall building on each side and a number of arched pedestrian bridges over the greenish water. In the background, the Bridge of Sighs is visible. On the back of the card, this is what I wrote:
Jen and I have walked for hours through the labyrinth-like streets of Venice.And still it is not enough.
Venice it the archetype dream of a city – there are always new corners to turn, bridges to cross, treasures to be found. Since we are here in winter, the back ways are often quiet, solitary passages and I long to find new ways to get to new places. We leave tomorrow, knowing that the time we spent here is not enough and that, perhaps, no amount is.
I suspect that every time I enter a new city, I judge it against the Venice that exists in my mind. Walking around the Inner Harbor and broad streets of the old part of Victoria this fall, I have found myself visiting the narrow streets of Venice in both my daydreams and night wanderings.
