Carnivale in Venice!

This weekend was Carnivale in Venice! Carnival in Venice is an annual festival starts 58 days before Easter and ends on Fat Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday. People come from all over to partake in the festival, many of them in costume or wearing highly decorated masks. They tell you that you should book Carnivale way in advance, and we probably shouldn't have taken that advice so lightly. We weren't able to find a hostel for under 65 euros a night since we were trying to book two weeks in advance. Sarah ended up being amazing and finding an apartment for only 50 euros for both nights per person, and it was on the island. A lot of people in our group were stuck with places off the island having to take a one hour bus then a 30 minute water taxi to get to the island. Our apartment turned out to be really nice even though we were a little hesitant with the fact that it was located in the Jewish ghetto.

 It ended up being only a 5 minute walk from the train station and about a 20 minute walk to the main square, San Marco. Venice was a lot of fun, although it wasn't exactly what I expected. It was packed, that pack I expected, but I guess I thought there would be more of a night-life. We tried going out the first night we got there, but we didn't pass one night-club or bar. We found out, however, that this is normal. Apparently, you can't go out looking for a bar in Venice because you won't find one. We tried to meet up with everyone in San Marco Friday night, but we were a little late at the meeting point. We did end up seeing some of the group, but we ended up not being able to find anywhere to go out to. San Marco was a really cool setup though with everything going on. There was a big stage in the front with performances going on all night, such as dances and magician acts. It got pretty cold and so we decided to call it a night.

There were 8 of us staying in the 6 person hotel, so that we didn't have to pay as much. We decided to push 3 twins together and 5 of us girls slept together. I thought it was pretty funny oh we all fit, but I was comfortable both nights with plenty of room. Saturday, we woke up and set out on the town. Venice was a very beautiful island. It was completely surrounded by water, and all the buildings were almost Victorian style.

All the streets were lined with people, vendors, and all sorts of costumes. It was so much fun just getting lost in the streets with everything going on. It was a cross between halloween and mardi gra. The costumes ranged from little kids in tiger costumes to couples in elaborately decorated attires. Half of them couldn't even walk down the street because they stopped every 2 feet for people to take pictures of them.

Venice is a very easy city to get lost in, but it's fun when you're trying to get lost. There were tons of little random alleyways, one after the next. I got a really good kebab from one of the street vendors, and got a mask to wear in the streets. Venice isn't a really big tourist attraction city; there's not many things to necessarily see. We had a blast just walking in the streets, taking everything in, and going into all of the shops. The shops were filled with handmade masks, jewelery, and another thing Venice is famous for: hand-blown glass. Murano, which is an island near Venice, is where the glass is made. Unfortunately, most of the glass, well at least affordable glass, is going to be made in China. We met back at the apartment at 5:30pm and all went out to dinner. We were able to bride the guy to give us free bread and cocktails if we went there. They advertised a 3 course meal for only 13 euro. The first course (spaghetti and seafood) was delicious, but my second course was supposed to be salmon, but it definitely wasn't the salmon that we're used to. It was not pink and did not taste anything remotely like it. But I ate it, because one thing I've learned being in Europe, there's no reason at all to waste food. You eat what you get. Which is an especially good habit to get in for with Africa coming up. In Kenya, I'll most likely be eating beans and rice everyday. After dinner, we returned to the apartment, and all of us just hung out and partied there since we didn't want a repeat of failure like the first night. I had a lot of fun with everyone, and learned some new card games.

The next morning we decided to take the 11:50 pm train back to Lugano, so we just slept in until 9am and cleaned the apartment and packed to get ready to return to the Montarina. This week coming up is going to be a busy one: one presentation, a midterm, and a final. And on top of that planning for next weekend: which I'm about 90% sure is going to be Paris!