Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Room 114, Hotel Continental, Venezia
2356 EET

We had agreed to meet for breakfast at 0830 and sat on the patio on the canal to enjoy the view of the canal. I selected a large breakfast of eggs scrambled, bacon, briquette with nutella, juice, and peach. Fortified for the morning, we once again tackled the streets, venders, and shops of Venezia. In one of the shops we half found Dad’s request, stake knives at €96.00 [$129.5088] for a set of four. I say ‘half’ because they only had one set and Maserim the manufactures, do not ship individual sets so no purchase was made.

Venezia carnival masks.

Venezia buildings.

Venezia streets and tourists.

Shrine to Madonna and Child.

Almost where we got steak knives.

Like all Italiano churches, the churches of Venezia are very easy to admire and be impressed by the architecture. Two interesting things viewed in different churches, was on with pillars covered with brocade tapestry and another where a restorer was repainting a wooden pillar to resemble marble. We located Teatro San Gallo where we had hoped to view La Serenissima, a half hour fill about “the beauty of Venice within its historical context” but it was apparently at 1800 (I think they got it mixed up with Venice, the Show) and as that was cutting it close to our 2100 Opera Singers performance we decided not to attend the film.

Back of Santa Maria dei Miracoli.

Entrance of Santa Maria dei Miracoli.

Detail of Scuola Grande di San Marco.

On our way to Piazza San Marco once again, after queuing for some time which was even worse because I was grumpy. Entrance to Basilica Cattedrale Patrichale di San Marco was free and the sheer amount of gilded Byzantine mosaics of the entire ceiling is just incredulous. There was also Renaissance and baroque mosaics but the first dominated. While not gold gilded, even the floors were mosaics though geometric patterns and other things like peacocks dominated, while Biblical scenes and things, like Virgin Mary’s family tree were all on the roof and upper story walls. We all paid the entry fee to the museum and access to the balcony, €4.00 [$5.3962] each. The first bit of the museum was about mosaics and how, now they are repaired from behind which involves removing the wall from the outside of the mosaics. Creation of mosaics is also very specialised, with those different specialists working separately but under the direction of the person who designed the mosaic. The other big parts of the museum are the tapestries, which do have some duration given their age, and manuscripts. What I liked in particular were the choir books with later centuries’ erasures and additions.

Mom outside Basiclica di San Marco, framed by mosaic.

Mom on balcony of Basilica di San Marco, framed by Venezia Lion and St. George.

Balcony mosaic on Basilica di San Marco.

For lunch, we ate at le Café in Camp San Stefano and Mom and I split a prosciutto pizza and crêpe arlecchino, both of which were very tasty. Afterwards we split up as a group and Mom and I went to Chiesa di San Barnaba for Leonardo’s Machines exhibit. A fascinating exhibit about Leonardo’s inventions and a film on the artist and engineer’s life. And it didn’t quite register for me before, but Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Raphael were all contemporaries. Also, only a fifth of Leonard’s life long notebook collection remains and very divided up by men who split the text and drawings up by content to form new codices, not grouped as Leonardo had them. And, as I had heard, Leonardo wrote letters backwards and right to left. All in all, a very interesting exhibit. As we spent a great deal of time there, we hurried back to our room for our afternoon rest.

Chiesa di San Barnaba hosting Leonardo’s Machines exhibit

We departed our rooms at 1930 and began our way to Palazzo delle Prigiori where Opera Singers would perform. Along route, I was determined, having made a gift list for friends and souvenir list for myself, I would find and purchase a murrina earring and pendant set of silver metal having been warned that the gold metal seems to tarnish by Zia Michela and most importantly, I prefer silver coloured jewellery for myself. My limit was €20.00 [$26.981] and after seeing a dirt of what I was looking for compared to Monday afternoon and evening, I found my set in Gastaldi F. & C. S.N.C. Of sterling silver with blue, green, and white murrina set in clear glass, they are beauties. That goal met and after grabbing a slice of pizza for myself, we arrived at our destination five minutes before they opened and were second in line. Tickets were €25.00 [$33.7262] per person, but we were incredibly lucky to catch sight of a poster on our way to breakfast that advertised Hotel Conteinetal was able to sell tickets for €15.00 [$20.2357] to guests.

Venezia lion and moon at evening.

Opera Singers poster in Hotel Continental.

The room we were shown to was relatively small, holding only about one hundred chairs or less. As Opera Singers is “great singers performing the most opera arias with piano accompaniment” there was a grand piano in the room—a piano gifted to the Circalo Artistico di Venezia by A. Hitler in 1938. The first aria, Il Barbiere di Siviglia was a delight because of the man’s voice’s emotions and engaging body language, and the woman in Zia Michela’s words could “sing like a bird” and very good at high notes. In the end, for me with the front row seat and a perfect view of the piano and the man playing, he was the best part. He was just incredible and played for the hour non-stop, for the singers and the purely instrumental pieces. At the conclusion, we all gave a standing ovation. Simply incredible. [Mom bemoans the fact though, that if we had remained seated in the first seats we selected, front and center, not left and center for the better view of the pianist, it would have been my hand the male opera singer kissed when he preformed his first aria.]

Mom with piano gifted to the Circalo Artistico di Venezia by A. Hitler in 1938.

Pianist, singer, and singer of Opera Singers.

Things I found of interest related to the show was that Zio James and Zia Michela said operas were done in period costume but our three were simply more formally dressed, and the woman’s red shoes peaked out from her long back skirt on occasion. Also, Zia Michela says she as has a difficult time understanding arias even with them being sung in Italiano as the singing somehow changes the words. So I have a program and intend on investigating the arias that were preformed.

As we were at Piazza San Marco we boarded the ferry for Stazione Ferroviaria Santa Lucia, the closest ferry stop our hotel. But not after investigating a restaurant in the area for a snack for Mom and I, a meal for the zia and zio, but we deciding to move on to the ferry because of the prices, like €12.00 [$16.1886] for a banana split. The night view ride was very nice along the canal and I experimented with different camera settings, but ended up discarding most because of blurriness from the motion of the ferry. It was my second major experimentation, having done so earlier in the day by finally using a technique of a deviantART photographer—place the lens against the glass to eliminate reflections and glare.

Venezia at night from ferry on Canel Grande.

Venezia at night from ferry on Canel Grande.

So a very busy day, with the piano player being the highlight besides Venezia itself. After getting off the ferry, we tried another restaurant, Ristorante Roma, but it was even more pricier than the previous especially for Mom and I so we left Zio James and Zia Michela there and purchased four conical from Bar Ristoirante Ai Scalzi Dopo srl for €4.00 [$5.3962]. We retired to our room, set ourselves up with chairs and water in front of one of the open window sand enjoyed the sights and our pastries before bed.