reminiscing: venezia

for our first field trip as a study abroad group, we left roma behind for a few days and said ciao to northern italian life in venice (or a venezia). at the time, most of us were less than impressed by venice. the trip definitely had its moments, but for some reason we became underwhelmed for the most part. i'm not really sure why either. perhaps it was the fact that most narrow streets looked eerily identical and led to dead ends or walking in complete circles (but i actually love getting lost in new places, shh). or it could be the fact that venice is one of the most visited cities in italy and tourists were just teeming the streets and restaurants and piazze (or campiello as they're called in venice)... actually, you may know that venice is barely populated by actual venetians today because it became too expensive to live there and it was smarter to rent out your home to tourists.

looking back now, i'm really fond of venice and i think we made really great memories there. i had the best sangria of my life thanks to this smoothie stand by day/bar by night place conveniently located next to our hotel. relaxing night walks on the rialto bridge. hunting for the best mask store in venice (there are so many!). drooling everytime we found ourselves in the great shopping areas (oh, the glorious, glorious shoes...). eating cuttlefish ink spaghetti for the first (and second!) time in my life! the weird, yet invigorating feeling i remember having knowing that we could explore venice without truly getting lost because we were on this island no matter what. i loved seeing our group (of thirty!)  crammed into tiny venetian restaurants. hilarious. and i think what i loved most was how much it felt like a vacation. i know, i know studying abroad itself is a vacation! but we studied a lot in rome, and for four days in venice it was all just relaxing, drinking, and eating sans studies - a true vacation in my eyes.

well, that was venice in a tiny, tiny hazelnut shell. maybe i'll post the crazy awesome graffiti art i saw in venice - just so many surprising gems of art (:

pictures above: (left) me in one of the many narrow corridors in venice; (right) a photo snapped by a friend while walking through one of the busier streets.