VENICE, LA SERENISSIMA

In mid-June of 2001, our little troop of travelers set out to leave the little town of Cantello outside of Varese in Northern Italy. Varese, and the Lake District around it, had proven to be a pleasant surprise not least because of the capacious rooms and the hospitality of the staff of our inn, the Albergo Madonnina.

As usual, because of the great amount of baggage that we were traveling with, our inexperience in stowing them efficiently, and our clumsiness wth the luggage straps that we had bought in France, it took us over an hour to get all of our luggage onto the van. By the time we were through, it was noontime and we were all ravenous.

If you really want to eat well in an unfamiliar place, always ask the locals, and that usually guarantees a good, reasonably-priced meal. So we asked the staff at the Albergo to recommend a restaurant on our way to Milan. The restaurant they recommended provided us with a good hearty Italian meal. Then it was on to our first stop – Milan.

I have never been particularly enamored of Milan. I have always found it too industrial and grimy, too large and forbidding, although I am told the shopping – especially for brand name clothes – and the eating are very good indeed. Perhaps I shall give it another try someday but, on this particular day, our sole agenda was to take in the Duomo and then move on to Venice.

I hadn’t been to Milan in at least 20 years and I was taken aback by what greeted me when we got to the Duomo – dozens of Filipinos who had taken over the piazza in much the same way they have taken over Statue Square in Hong Kong! The Filipino diaspora has certainly taken on worldwide proportions.

Since we all had different ideas on what we wanted to see around the Duomo and some of us were not properly dressed to enter the Cathedral (no shorts, no sleeveless shirts/blouses, no tank tops allowed), we all went our separate ways for an hour. I decided to go into the Galleria and check out the shopping.

The Galleria came into being when some genius dreamt up of roofing over the street between two buildings at a four-storey height. They then closed it off to vehicular traffic, thereby creating one of the first modern shopping malls ever. The mall is not too large but the classical architecture of the buildings and the quality of the shops make the whole experience very pleasant. After an hour of browsing and shopping, I went to pick up my eldest son, Rodrigo.

Rodrigo likes to sketch during his travels. He had taken up a spot at one end of the piazza with a great view of the Cathedral and was deeply engrossed in his drawing. While doing so, a man engaged him in conversation for a few minutes and then left. I met up with him a few minutes later. That’s when he discovered that his wallet was missing.

Apparently, the fellow who had talked to him was meant to distract him while an accomplice rifled through his backpack, taking his wallet and everything in it. This so spoiled our day that we decided not to linger a moment longer and left Milan immediately.

We drove to Venice in a decidedly negative mood but our mood lightened when we reached our hotel, the Villa Ducale. The villa is located in the town of Dolo, which is 23 kilometers west of Venice. The Villa Ducale is described in my reference guide as follows: "The Villa Ducale is, alas, next to a rather noisy road. But the building is majestic. The lobby has marvelous decorated ceilings and is very elegant. The rooms have beautiful period furniture, are very comfortable, air-conditioned and soundproof so traffic noise from the road is not a problem. The hotel provides quality round-the-clock service and has a fine restaurant. In this sublime setting you will feel like you are in a waking dream, especially if you are lucky and have a room with a terrace facing the grounds."

The Villa Ducale – as is apparent from its name (the ducal villa) – was the country home of a Venetian noble. The master of the house would invite friends for lengthy stays in his villa. In those days, no one of any social standing would travel without a retinue of servants and the villa was planned to accommodate them all.

How did we deduce all this? Well, all our rooms had separate compartments right beside the bedrooms. These compartments were meant for servants to sleep in so as to cater to their master’s needs at any time of night or day. Just like in that movie Gosford Park.

Naturally all this elegance (richly-variegated marble, Murano glass chandeliers, gilt mirrors, antiques, carved and frescoed ceilings, formal gardens with fountains and statuary) came at a price. Our stay at the Villa Ducale was the most expensive of our trip at US$124/day, breakfast included. Still, not a bad price considering the opulence of our surroundings and the cost of staying in a comparable hotel in Venice itself ($250 per night minimum).

The next day, upon the recommendation of the Villa Ducale staff, we took the bus to Venice. We were all quite excited because, with the exception of my wife, none of us had ever seen Venice before.

Venice is built on 100 islands in the middle of a swampy lagoon and takes its name from the Veneti, a pre-Roman tribe. Venice was born when the people of the Veneto (the mainland adjacent to Venice and the northernmost sector of Italy) fled from the Gothic invaders of the crumbling Roman Empire. They hid in the marshy uninhabited islands of the coast and built villages that became the cornerstone of La Serenissima (as the Venetians like to call their city). Eventually, its easily defensible location along the Adriatic Sea and the natural trade links of its maritime position helped create an empire with power and influence along the Eastern Mediterranean. Venice also enjoyed a well-ordered administration headed by a doge, an elected leader whose powers were carefully defined by a constitution. The confluence of all these factors created a truly unique city whose treasures are a testament to man’s capacity to bedazzle.

The tourist’s first glimpse of this jewel of the Adriatic is invariably from a vaporetto (ferry) wending its way down the Grand Canal. The latter is, to put it extremely mundanely, Venice’s EDSA. The Grand Canal meanders right through the heart of the city and culminates in the Piazza San Marco. It is spanned by three bridges: the Scalzi, the Rialto and the Accademia.

Along the way the tourist is treated to a parade of palazzi built in a riot of varying architectural styles ranging from the Gothic, neo-Gothic, Baroque, Classical and Veneto-Byzantine. As one guidebook puts it: "Historically it is like a roll-call of the old Venetian aristocracy, with almost every palazzo bearing the name of a once grand family. Bright frescoes may have faded, precious marbles worn, and foundations frayed with the tide, but the Grand Canal is still, to quote Charles VIII of France’s ambassador in 1495, the most beautiful street in the world."

Being the tourists that we were, we headed straight to the Piazza San Marco and were confronted with the reality of mass tourism’s impact: huge crowds blotting out all open space, long lines and endless waiting, extremely aggressive hawkers selling kitsch, out-of-this-world prices and nowhere to rest one’s weary feet. Venice at the height of the tourist season is just like Disneyland and the implications are too frightening to contemplate.

We got to the piazza at just about lunchtime and after an hour of walking around to take it all in, we decided to eat in a restaurant located in the alleyways adjacent to Piazza San Marco. It is easy to get lost in these labyrinthine passages. It is made a lot harder by all the hawkers literally dragging you to eat in their restaurant and try their tourist menus. When we finally got to the one we wanted to eat in, I decided to sample the local fish and ordered one. When we finished eating and the bill came, I almost passed out. My fish dish cost almost $80! I had misread the menu; what I thought was the price of the dish turned to be the price per gram of fish. My entire family had a field day ribbing me about my absent-mindedness and had a good time at my expense, literally. All this and a massive case of indigestion, too.

After lunch, we all decided to split up and regroup after two hours. I took Rodrigo with me as he was having a hard time walking due to a foot injury. Due to all the crowds, we managed to take in only the Campanile (a bell tower which had a commanding view of the city, the lagoon, the Lido and even the Alps) and the Basilica San Marco.

The Basilica San Marco has always intrigued me. It is a Byzantine church built on a Greek cross plan and is more of an oriental extravaganza than your regular Italian church. Unfortunately, the basilica is badly in need of sprucing up. The interior is quite dim and it is hard to make out the fabulous gold mosaics adorning its domes and ceilings. Millions of pilgrims, churchgoers and tourists have worn out its floor and sections have been cordoned off to protect them from total disintegration. Nevertheless, the treasures amassed over 500 years of trade, conquest and empire are on dislay within the basilica, the most interesting of which were taken from Venice’s conquest of Constantinople in the 13th century.

The rest of the day was a blur as I was still reeling from the deep hole in my pocket caused by a ravenous fish.

The next day, since we were in the late afternoon for San Gemignano, I decided to check out of the Villa Ducale early, load all of our luggage onto the van and drive to Venice.

Any motorist driving to Venice will have to park in an enormous parking building on an island at the end of the causeway connecting the mainland to the city. As soon as we parked, an attendant came to us and suggested that we take a special vaporetto that would take us directly to Piazza San Marco. My sister, niece and younger son decided to walk all the way to San Marco but my wife insisted that we take the vaporetto since Rodrigo was still having a hard time walking.

When I saw the vaporetto, I knew we were making a mistake. I can spot a colorum vehicle anywhere waterborne or otherwise, and this was definitely one. We were loaded onto the boat like the bunch of illegal immigrants that we must have seemed to any passersby. Still smarting from the fish that ate up Venice and my pocketbook, I almost had a seizure when I was told that the fare would be $20 per person. Then it dawned on me that the parking attendant and the colorum operator were in it together, ready to bilk any pathetic tourist that they could con. And I was one of them. I had planned this trip for months and carefully chose our hotels to keep within budget and here I was frittering all the money we saved on a piranha and an illegal ferry!

My impression of Italians had sunk to a new low but I really cursed to the high heavens when, as the boat rounded a bend, I saw a great new boat terminal where all the legitimate vaporetti were waiting right behind the parking building.

Blinded by fury and hobbled by an injured son, I was in no mood to deal with the hordes that were trampling over every single tourist attraction in the city. Rodrigo and I decided to escape all the madness and go to the Lido while my wife met up with my sister to go shopping. Fortunately the Lido, which is a sandbank forming a natural barrier between Venice and the Adriatic, provided us with a welcome respite from the heat, the noise and the crowds spread out over Venice like a pestilence. The Lido is the only island in the Venetian lagoon with roads that one can drive on. It is also a residential suburb and a beach resort. Finally, a place where we could relax!

When we got back to the Piazza San Marco, my wife and sister helped relieve the pain in my pocket by taking me to a shop, which was selling a lamp I had been eyeing in Manila. This particular lamp was on sale in Manila for $400, which of course made me hesitate. Well, after some very hard bargaining, I bought the very same lamp for $80! Ironically, I had fallen into a situation of spending money in order to save money, something I have scolded my wife about very frequently. Such are the ways of the world.

There is an elegiac tone to Venice, which cannot escape the observant traveler. Each time a wave laps at the buildings along the canals, one can see that the very foundations of the city are crumbling. Many of the buildings are in a state of disrepair. Many of them are dark at night because of absentee owners; the locals cannot afford to live in Venice itself. The Adriatic Sea – which has been the protector of Venice for centuries – threatens now to engulf it. The trillion footsteps of the millions of tourists who constitute the main source of the city’s income threaten to eventually destroy the very treasures that drew them to the city in the first place. The population of the city has dwindled to 68,500 in 1997 from 150,000 in 1950. The average age of a Venetian is 50 and I have read that the city’s schools and maternity wards are closing for lack of use. As a result, there is a marked lack of children everywhere. Indeed the past has more meaning to this improbable city than the present – and it shows.

Despite every mishap I suffered in Venice, I intend to return to it one day. I have barely seen all the treasures it has to offer. I will have to do it soon. It may be that the only way to save the city would be to put it under glass. If this ever comes to pass, we may only be able to see the city from the outside looking in and never experience it, touch it, feel it. And we will surely be impoverished by the loss.

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Villa Ducale rooms: 11 with airconditioning and soundproofing, telephone, bath or shower, WC, satellite TV, safe and minibar. Price: Double US$124/night. Meals: Breakfast included (buffet). Restaurant Specialties: Seafood. Facilities: Parking. Nearby: Riviera del Brenta and Paladian villas between Padua and Venice, Ca’ della Nave golf course (18 hole) in Martellago. Open: All year.