Ponte della Libertà, the space-time portal

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• Italiano

Last morning I was stopped by a nice couple of tourists, that could not properly use the automatic machines to buy their train ticket. Now it is a fairly frequent ritual of my mornings and I must say that I am becoming more and more skilled in helping them and also in identifying in the crowd those of vacationers will encounter the same problem. To tell you the thruth I understand them. The digital interface provides a fairly long sequence of questions, but with a little patience and selecting a known language it is possible to successfully pass the questionnaire. The difficulty lies in the error messages when the machine is not able to return the rest or dexterously inserting the banknotes in the right position so that they can be eaten by the automatic system.

 

Rediscover the city
as if it were the first look

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In this way sometimes some interesting talks on the beauty of Venice start. (Argument that, you known, I find very engaging!). Thanks to these guys and their questions (later I discovered they came from Amsterdam), I realized how us Venetians (indigenous or by choice) often take for granted the surprising and particular aspects of our city. We are so lucky that we can usually go to see Mrs. Laguna, that we forget to be in a place described on the UNESCO site with these words:

[…] The Lagoon of Venice is one of the most ancient and complex example of the relationships between human activities and natural dynamics, hosting the highest concentration of material cultural goods and artistic expressions, accumulated over centuries.
The Site can be considered as a “cultural landscape” wich illustrates the combined work of man and nature over time, under the influence of physical constraints and environmental, social, economic and cultural opportunities.[Note 1]

After buying the ticket, I finally get on the train and the conversation continues.
“Is this the right stop?”
“No, in 4 stops.”
“Is this the right stop?”
“No, not yet. You will know when we arrive in Venice because you will see the lagoon on both sides of the train.” This last response causes a perplexed expression in my traveling companions.
“Ah, here we are!”
“No, that’s just a channel. When we’ll be in Venice you ll see a lot more water … “I do not have time to say these words that the amazement of a child attracts everyone’s attention. “Mom! Mom! we float on the water! “We have arrived!

The voice of that child reminded me of the wonder I had experienced the first few times I reached Venice by train. Crossing the Ponte della Libertà is truly a fantastic experience. Suddenly the earth, the houses, the trees disappear from view, and our Lady Laguna peeks out from the windows and fills the landscape and decides what color the city will be on that specific day. Blue, white, golden, pink … impossible to say until you cross the space-time gap, through which you leave the earthly problems and start to float on the waves. The traffic noise is replaced by the lapping of the water and from the rest of the world you enter Venice!

 
 

 
 

Venetian Glamour insights

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NOTES

[1] Unesco Offical Web site”Venezia e la sua laguna” http://www.veniceandlagoon.net/web/sito_unesco/
 
 
IMAGES

All the photographs on this page have been taken by Maddalena Mometti.