Damsel in distress (Day 38)

The first part of my day was spent locked in the apartment. I had a day off and was preparing to venture out and see some exhibitions I hadn’t managed to get to yet. The doorbell rang and it was my landlady, who lives upstairs. Her key wasn’t working, so I ran down to the door to let her in, but the door wouldn’t open. I could pull the latch but the bolt stayed firmly lodged in the wall. So I was locked in, and Dora, my landlady, was locked out. I can look back and laugh now but at the time, trying to speak through a door, with an old Italian lady in a stressful situation is not my idea of a pleasant start to the day.

She went off and got various locals to come and try to open the door. I watched the scene unfold from the kitchen window that overlooks the alley and the front door. She stood back and chain smoked, occasionally looking up at me and pulling faces, while a trail of metalworkers, shop owners and waiters tried to get the door open. Eventually she gave up and rang the fire brigade. Here they are coming to my rescue.

Thud, thud, thud. Dora pounded up the stairs, came into our apartment and proceeded to try and blame us for the door lock sticking. Apparently it was because we didn’t take our keys out of the lock carefully enough, or maybe that we turned the key the wrong way. No Dora, it’s because you have and old door, an old lock, and it’s finally broken. If anyone should be getting in a grump it’s me! Anyway, I let her speculate as to what we could have possibly done to break her unbreakable lock, and tell me how we must be more careful in future. Well that told me! I didn’t want to mention that she was the last person to use it when she went out and that I’d be in bed all morning, which is in an entirely different room to her precious lock. Let this be a lesson to us all – although Venetian locks have been around for hundreds of years, the slightest giggle in the wrong direction can completely knacker the sensitive little things!

 
So rant over, I set out to make the most of my afternoon. I found what is probably the oldest piece of graffiti in the world. It’s a rat with a long tail carved into a column at the end of Calle del Traghetto opposite the San Felice church in Canareggio. The roman numerals inscribed above it read 1644. So someone was out and about graffiti-ing rats way before Banksy, the copycat (or copy-rat, sorry rubbish joke).

 

A rat scuttled across my foot a few weeks ago when I was wearing flip flops. I was attempting a poorly thought out and prosecco fuelled crossing of a narrow ledge over a canal at the time (trying to take a short cut by Rialto) and nearly fell in.

I then headed to the Arsenale again to see the James Turrell piece I had missed before as the queue was too long.

The only other notable thing that happened today was that I bought a pen that looks like a pencil. I was pretty chuffed with myself and I think Sam and Rhian were very jealous when I showed them my purchase upon my return. You know it’s time to go home when one of the most interesting things about your day in Venice is a pen.