CARTE POSTALE #1 POST CARD #1
The story so far…After escaping the threat of Dogmatism in Moravia and losing my beloved parents, I escaped with my new Gypsy Family trekking through the Black Forest at night…we find our way to Venice. There we bade each other farewell. I was free to begin my life anew. I stood transfixed at the intense beauty and structural brilliance of this bizarre city surrounded by and floating on the sea. The sun was setting over the Canal Grande. The lights of Venice beckoned me, so I took the Vaporetti from La Guidecca across to Zattere Planca. I made my way past amazing structures like the Accademia Belle Arti and imagine what it would be like to study the Masters’ techniques and become a famous painter. I cross a bridge, La Ponte Accademia, and lose myself in the myriad laneways ..Shops of never imagined fantasy taunt me … I have no real currency to supply myself with exquisite Venetian objet d’artes. Romantic Restaurants caress my nostrils with mouth watering aromas of basil, garlic, tomatoes and fresh seafood…you can eat outside under candlelight…the air temperature like a soothing balm… Musicians perform in every campo (square) guitar classico or piano accordion the music adding to my intoxication with all things Venetian.
I stumble across the Teatro Goldoni where I am lured in by the unmistakable sounds of an Orchestra performing Mozart’s Requiem. I steal into a balcony seat and just as I was floating to the gods, a fire alarm goes off and we are ushered out into the campinello “Not again!” The Conductor cried… faulty wiring or just the cats after the rats causing havoc in the underbelly of the Grand Old Dame. I decide that Half a Requiem is better than a final one.
Now every corner I turn leads me deeper into the maze of narrower streets which are now crawling with night cats…at least they aren’t wearing masks – Carnivalle lie dormant… I enter Campiellos on every fourth turn, leave by another lane and end up back at Campo Uno (square One)! I get caught in a Corte (a blind Alley) the lane is called Calle Del Assassini .. here is where the ghosts of Venice appear before me…having read that Venice was a centre of political corruption and treachery with a commerce based on slavery and prostitution…Every where I look I see degenerate gothic banditti whose … ‘piercing eyes seem to penetrate, at a single glance, into the hearts of men, and to read their most secret thoughts; few persons could support their scrutiny, or even endure to meet them twice’ (The Italian, p. 35)… At once a voice from The Merchant of Venice bellows forth “Thou know’st that all my fortunes are at sea/ Neither have I money nor commodity/ To raise a present sum; therefore go forth/ Try what my credit in Venice can do…aha I add… “all that glitters is not gold” …I am left alone…It starts to rain cats and dogs so I dash for shelter in a doorway. A doorway? In Venice? There was no shelter for me … Just then the waters in the canal start to rise …I envisage myself drowning in the deep black of night or in a canal I might fall into accidentally. “Nina don’t get your feet wet!” …a voice whimpers from my amygdala (my lizard brain that strives to keep me alive…she’s such a feline)
I start to run in panic… I take a left turn and stumble through some open gates …I enter in to a magical garden where neon signs: “si la e eterna” light the garden wall.. I hear the yapping of small hounds from inside the house…the smell of green smoke, impassioned voices engaged in philosophical argument, glasses of absinthe and red wine pile up over small round tables, … a crackly recording of Django Reinhardt bubbles through the jollies…Artists work on large canvases with sticks and splashing paint from a can …then a man with a curious moustache calls ‘Peggy do you want me to feed Cappucino & Pegeen they are making such a racket…Or should I just eat them?”
I watch on in fascination as the party unfolds… I must be in the only real garden in Venice …I find shelter beneath an almond tree…I sleep … All too soon, first light beckons me …I don’t wish to leave this surreal floating world where Modern & Ancient architecture make fascinating water-bedfellows, where the Gothic Banditti only exist as Culture Vultures, slaves to Beauty, Art, Music, Theatre …I must find a ship to give me passage to my new life… Dedicated To Those I’ve Loved and Lost… Nina x �
