VENEZIA

venice. it's sinking. beautiful, but sinking. if you're not paying close attention the waves could come up over the edge and soak your feet. sometimes the tide comes up so high that there is over three feet of water- everywhere- and people have to walk on these raised sidewalk things. so if you haven't been to venice, GO! soon, because i don't believe it will be there too much longer.

i've heard venice called an adult's disney land. although the colors and talk of carnivale create an upbeat atmosphere, it is definitely a small town. we found ourselves not exactly out of things to do but definitely visiting the exact same glass shops over and over and over. we toured some interesting churches and schools of art but if i'm being totally honest i'm reaching my limit of renaissance art. never thought i'd say that. but there are only so many annunciations and pietas one can see before they all blend into one large biblical entity. i wasn't as stoked on the titians as i should have been. but art is art and i do love it. st. mark's basilica was cool. i love my biblical landmarks. but in terms of actual things to do in venice...we weren't overwhelmed.

a "street"

lots of people took the ferry over to morano to go watch glass blowing. which is cool. but we decided to check out gondola rides instead. so worth it. 60 euro for the four of us which isn't bad. 40 minute ride. our gondolier was tomasso, an older italian man with a voice straight out of a movie. we sang frank sinatra and a lil celine dion through the canals of venice. so much fun. the thing about venetian water is it's actually real contaminated. we had a friend who somehow or another fell in and he was super sick for the next two days. he had had a coin in his pocket and just from the thirty seconds he was in the water the coin completely rusted. the water is pretty to look at, but i wouldn't suggest trying to touch. it would be hard for some people in our program to go an entire weekend without going out, so the poor only bar in all of venice was stuffed with aifs students saturday night. which actually was pretty fun. very chill night.

tomasso!

the guggenheim! sunday we went to peggy guggenheim's modern art collection and man oh man i thought i was going to cry. i've been a bit modern art deprived and it was totally refreshing to catch up on some pollock and kandinsky. i appreciate renaissance art so much and will in no way diminish its brilliance but i'm a modern art girl when it comes down to it. i walked by myself in the museum for over two hours. and it's not a huge museum, it's just her house turned into a museum. but i was captivated. and i bought myself a kandinsky poster because he is one of my favs. definitely top five. and it was a beautiful day. venice really is lovely.

guggenheim