Venezia

ahhhh

the home of antonio and shylocke


i always wanted to see venice
esp since mdm tan
my braggart of a chinese teacher in pri sch told us abt it
showed off abt her son
some scholar dude who went to cambridge
and the class had only 3 pple
only for the brightest pple....

how she go europe to visit him
and he brought her ard
and all the places she's seen


venice
the land without roads
where vaporetto and gondolas reign
and glass is king
not to mention masks and floods!!!

yeah

we stayed at this place called
agli agoli artisti
or so i think
(lazy to check it out now lah.
ever)

jst one street away from the train station
which is pretty cool
but as their roads are not prominently labelled
it cld be quite tricky

that's why we found a place near the station
shld be more touristy and well labelled

trinita was our first choice when the bitch was ard
cos it houses 3 for 50 Euro
AAA cost 40 for 2
and no breakie somemore!!!

but trinita is in ulu pandan
but we had to take it that time cos no other 3 bedders

waste our time....


anyhow
venice was super pretty
but i wasn't as awed by it as i imagined
not so quaint
nor special
but ok lah

perhaps i've travelled a wee bit too much by now

but it's still gd lah

first day
we went to murano
cos we tot better to kill far away stuff first
so 2nd day nonid to rush

we spent 2 days 1 nite in Venezia

murano was more like a shopping trip
tho we din plan for it

cos glass wares galore!!!
but i suspect we got ripped
and bot from the low qlty ones
hi qlty ones wld hv cost gazillion buckeroos
not that we paid cheap for our stuff

anyway
it was ok lah
we din do much but shop and shop

at least we got to see an apprentice at work
pulling a horse out of molten glass
yeah

besides that?
zilch

we got the rolling Venice card
that gives us 24hour from validation
which was cool

the vaporetto ride was like 1 hr man...

and it was pretty tough to find directions

i realise each number got 2 stops on the same side of the canal
and u hv to be at the rt stop
or risk being deport back the other way

headache headache

the 2nd day
we took the vaporetto down the Grand Canal st to Piazza San Marco
here we see the San Marco Basilica where Mark is supposed to be buried
quite cool lah

imagine
the body of this great dude
in person
except dead

it was interesting that this piazza (square) is always flooded
i dun understand too

interesting to note also that only San Marco can be called "Piazza"
all the other squares are called "Campo"


oh
everybody, including kent's, advice was to buy a map when i reach Venice
due to it's notorious small alleys and bag signage
but amazingly
kerbie and i had no such problem
(tho we did hv a map from the hotel
FOC!!!)
it was gd enuff for us to navigate ard a bit

perhaps also cos we din go to our ulu-er parts
like arsenale....

we chanced upon Vivaldi's thingy tho
mebbe it was his home
but i think it's jst a museum
abt the history of violin

but apparently
he was from Venice.

Vivaldi
Venice
chance? ;)
lol

food was ex and sucky
and i dun like italian service
bad bad bad
yeah

i had the worst pizza in my life in italy!!!!
can u imagine anythg worse?
perhaps that is thn the authentic pizza
but it sure was crummy
poooey

also
they like to charge "cover charge" and "service charge"
dunno what the hell they're for
Emilie warned us abt it liao
said somethg abt hvg to pay for using their cutlery... *-)

anyhow
at this stage
i was quite very willing to splurge liao
1) bitch is no longer ard
2) we're going back earlier so let's live happier i guess

so we ate well
and lived well
at least we tried to


we wanted to try fragolino the first nite but to no avail
and when the chance came on the 2nd day
we jumped at it

kerbie had a meringue and i had a glass of fragolino (strawberry wine)
they were good
caffe del doge

the only thing is
1 glass = 4 Euro
1 bottle = 7.5 Euro
poot

i think the service be pretty ex

well
i read
once u sit down
the prices skyrocket
but we were tired
and jst wanted a place to sit and chill out too
and warm up too. lol

aieee
i am all over the shop
this event too place on the return leg to Santa Lucia
where we were supposed to lve for Roma


okok
Piazza San Marco
what was there?
oh!
the Carnavale was ard the corner
in fact it starts the day aft we lve!!!
and the piazza was flooded w face painters
trying to create an atmosphere

this particular one was jst dogged
her: "face painting for u sir?"
me: "no thanks" *walks away*
her: *springs along* "u noe u want it"
her: *springs along* "u noe u want it"
her: *springs along* "u noe u want it"
her: *springs along* "u noe u want it"
her: *springs along* "u noe u want it"

me: *diown*

but no
i nv cave in
no such money to spend lah

i'm tired

laterz