The Merchant of Venice :)

by Learn x Travel, posted in Italy, Uncategorized

‘WOW!’ I screamed, ‘Hollywood setting!’ That was my impression when I saw the Basilica in Venice. Let’s rewind. 🙂

I arrived at Venice yesterday and met my roommate. We decided to hang out together today. She was quite tall, well, taller than I. When we chatted about our jobs, she told me she was an oversized model. I looked at her and then at myself. ‘Really? You are not too much fatter than I am!’ She told me she worked in Italy now. ‘You do look like an Italian.’ She laughed and she said maybe that’s why they liked her.

Several years later, I saw a few models dancing at a night club in Hong Kong. They looked like skeletons. I understood why Katherine was an oversized model.

Our hostel was on an island so every time we wanted to go out, we needed to take a ferry. Ferry was the only transportation in Venice. There was no bus or subway. That’s why I bought the pass yesterday. I remember now, the family stayed in Venice for one or two days longer that I did and they stayed on the main island. I hope they travelled to other islands. The colourful boats you can see on postcards and some websites are actually on Murano and Burano. These two places were highly recommended by my Japanese roommate in Rome.

When we arrived at the main island, I was so excited that I screamed, ‘Hollywood setting! It doesn’t look real at all!’ Katherine laughed. She was always very composed. I asked her if she was excited. She told me she came here yesterday so she had seen it. She was excited too yesterday but she was alone so she only screamed inside her head. I think I almost invited her to scream with me. 😀

I took a few pictures there and we headed to the smaller islands.

View from the island where my hostel was. It was San Marco on the main island.
View from the island where I stayed. It was St. Mark’s Square on the main island.
A building on the island where I stayed, I think. I think I was waiting for the ferry to the main island with Katherine.
What a complex boat route!
On the main island. St. Mark’s Square. Hollywood setting! It’s even more beautiful than that. Look at the intricate design on of the architecture!
St. Mark’s Square / Piazza San Marco
Venice, actually reminds me of The Merchant of Venice. 😛 Thanks to Shakespeare.
San Marco / St. Mark’s Basilica. It was under renovation.
Let’s take a closer look at the painting at the entrance. 🙂
One of the famous bridges in Venice.
One of the restaurants in Murano? Or Burano? I think we went to Murano first and then Burano. These two islands were kind of close together, if I remember correctly.
Murano glass is very famous.
The big Murano glass at the square
Murano
We were on the ferry leaving Murano, I think.
I think this is Burano…
This is a very interesting exterior.
The houses were very colourful. And the famous bridge again. This one was a wooden one.
Look at the glass above the door!
Yes, I was in Burano. The name of the street tells me that. And the houses were very colouful too. That’s one of the characteristics of Burano.
Another section of the island
Can you recognise this photo? Yes, it’s on my homepage. 🙂

We decided to have lunch at this restaurant. It was a reasonably priced set lunch. I was so full after that that I didn’t need dinner tonight. While we were waiting for our food, I took the above photo. It took me quite a long time to get the focus right. After all, I was taking a picture of the reflection of Katherine on the door of the restaurant and there was another customer sitting inside. After I finished, I saw the waiter with our food in his hands. He was patiently waiting for me to finish and so was Katherine. I apologized to the waiter. I was so focused that I didn’t realise he was there. After he put our food down (he was smiling all the time. That was so kind of him), I showed Katherine the photo that I took. She was amazed. She said she was wondering what I was taking with my camera. Then, she asked me if she could try to take one for me. Here it was:

I was pretending to be smiling and eating like what she did in the other photo.

Katherine wasn’t happy with the photo. It was actually a bit blur. So, she tried it again:

I continued to pretend to be smiling.

This time, we were both happy with the photo.

That’s how the photos of my homepage were born. I put the two photos together and added ‘Learn x Travel‘ in bold.

How can you not take photos of houses with clotheslines and washing hanging outside? It was not tempting. It was unavoidable. I took the reflection instead.
We took a few pictures like this together. 🙂

I bought a watch in Murano. I thought it was a good deal but I later found out that the watch was actually over priced (EUR20 more compared to other shops in Venice). 🙁

After the day trip, we went back to the main island.
Painting on the church
The evening light shone on the church.
I like miniature. This one looks so cute. 🙂
The gondola floating on the river in Venice
St. Mark’s Square / Piazza San Marco at night

When we went back to the main island, we walked around and I bought a pair of cuff links. The price was reasonable this time but I don’t know where I put them. I can’t find them at home now. 🙁

We went to Al Mercià for a drink (today was a day I ate most and spent most. 🙁 I decided to stop buying any more thing) and met a couple. We talked. They planned to go clubbing. We were not sure about the ferry schedule back to our island so we decided not to stay for too long. As we walked towards the pub, we ran into an opening of a sports wear shop. Free drinks. Yeah! The Italian owner introduced his future son in law to us. It was so funny. I could tell he was very happy and proud.

We stayed there until 8pm and then headed back to the hostel.

What a lovely day. 🙂

Outside our hostel at night. That’s why I said, I really liked my hostel. 🙂

At around this spot, we met another backpacker. He told us about a hostel he stayed at in Florence – it had an indoor swimming pool, a sauna, a Turkish bath and he only paid for EUR10! WOW! Florence was on my list. I immediately asked him for more info. But when I checked it online, EUR10 was the promo price. I couldn’t get it. I could only get it for EUR20 but that was a really gooooood deal!

11-12 March 2015

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