“We do not have a flight back to Valencia until 11 tomorrow morning.”
These are not the words you want to hear on your way back from a one-day trip in another country on your birthday. I had planned a day trip to Venice for my twenty-third birthday, hoping a getaway would get me out of this depressive rut I have been in. I wanted to go to Germany, especially Munich to watch my Manchester City back in action in the Women’s Champions League for the first time in ten years as the English Champions. OktoberFest flight hikes had other plans however. So, I planned for the cheapest possible destination, which also had return tickets for the same day. I did not want to miss class on the following day.
The week preceeding my Venice trip was long. I had been volunteering at the WTA 125 Tennis Tournament here in Valencia, and the event had surprisingly taken a huge toll on me. I had received the news of my visa being rejected for an internship at the International Paralympic Committee during the week which didn’t help. I cried on the curb outside of the tennis club for a whole hour and the news has still proven hard to process. All I had planned for the whole year, was a summer internship at an institution I whole-heartedly wanted to work at, only for everything to dissipate in a moment, because of something out of my control. What a shame that my ancestors did not invade other countries!
I didn’t have much time to plan my itinerary for Venice. This was the first time I was travelling to another country as a tourist. All my previous experiences of flying were just when I flew from India to Valencia for this Master’s course. We didn’t travel much growing up. The only time I remember going on a non-school affiliated trip was when I was seventeen and angry at my parents. I had run off to a hill stop four hours away, for the day, without telling a single soul about my plan. I came back home in the evening, bringing a shawl for my mother as a ‘Please don’t be angry at me,’ smoother. She unexpectedly wasn’t.
In some ways, my trip in anger to that hill stop when I was seventeen turned out quite similar to my trip to Venice at twenty-three. I was hilariously underprepared for both trips. I had forgotten to bring an umbrella to that very rainy hill station, just as I had misinterpreted the weather in Venice. Even though I had looked up places to visit in Venice, I had not bothered to buy tickets to the main Basilica beforehand and saw them put up the tickets sold out sign right in front of my eyes. I had plenty other things to do in Venice, however. I roamed around the floating city both on foot and via their water board public bus service. I took a two way tour around the city on the bus which was the highlight of my day.
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The city was full of tourists with Germany being the most represented. My 90-day Duolingo streak unfortunately didn’t prove to be of much use, as I couldn’t understand even a single sentence. There were no roads to bike on and unsurprisingly I didn’t spot a single Dutch tourist. There were a significant number of Americans and Brits, although most were elderly couples. I flew in via the Treviso Airport and had to take a bus ride to the Venice City Centre both times. I am now used to the unpolluted air in Spain but with no roads in Venice, the air there was just so restorative.
Since coming to Valencia, I have grown on to like walking. It has been my favourite pass time activity and I try to go on walks every single day. Walking in Venice was slightly dissimilar with their zebra crossings being varying types of bridges. Not a welcome sight for my clumsy self who does not know how to swim. Venice had always been in the back of my mind; We studied Shakespeare’s the Merchant of Venice for two years in high school.
I had a croissant and a cappuccino for breakfast. To go, as always. Eating out in public is not a social convention I am subscribed to yet. After accidentally stumbling upon one of the quieter streets in the city, I sat on the curb to eat my meal. Having meandered around for a couple more hours, I took notice of the time and decided to head back in order to make it on time. I chose to walk back to the other side of the town. However, as it turns out Google Maps is not your best friend when roads offer you the chance to swim in them. And as I usually do, even on familiar concrete streets, I got lost. At that point, I still had time to spare, so I stopped for a quick bite. How could I leave Italy without trying their pizza! I got a whole pizza for myself, after mistakenly confusing it for a single slice.
Carrying my square box of freshly-baked Margherita pizza around the streets of Venice, I began to hurry back to the bus station. Time had caught up on me and I had no choice but to rush. The way back was bizarre to say the least and after losing at least twenty minutes on non-existent bridges, I finally made my way back to the bus station, where the last bus to the Treviso Airport was due to leave in fifteen or so minutes. As I gobbled down the pizza, sitting down on the street, in my birthday dress, feeling as dirty as I could possibly feel, I finally had my birthday meal. Here’s to Twenty Three Ishani!
Turns out a whole day of doing zilch was not enough of a present for me, as I prayed for the bus driver to magically fly the bus over the lines of traffic ahead of us. I had severely miscalculated actual road traffic in the return journey. Venice has that effect on people. Getting back in time for my flight was almost impossible. But even for an outspoken pessimist like myself, I somehow always end up expecting the better thing to happen. That never works, and I am typically left heart-broken. Just like that day. I had envisioned begging the officials to make an exception for me for my birthday but as I got to the boarding gate after sprinting for two kilometers, cursing at two dogs, hurrying up the security personnels who were just doing their jobs, I found no one in the whole room. There was no one there, not even someone from another airlines or any other airport staff. I had already cried on the bus, I did not have it in me to do so again.
Immediately, I called my friend back in Valencia who advised me on the next steps. I asked the airline’s service person, who informed me that they had no fights back before 11 the next day. Thankfully, there was an earlier flight with a different airlines but from an other airport. My friend booked the flight back home from the Marco Polo Airport in Venice. He completed all the official requirements. All I had to do was travel to the airport, stay the night and make sure I boarded that flight on time. And so I did. I took the whole bus journey back to Venice and spent the night at the airport. I scanned the whole airport in ways, which would not have been possible with people behind desks actually doing their jobs. Being underdressed for a chilly night in at the airport, while not having a charger meant that I was somewhat required to commit to these exertions. I did not get a minute of sleep in, and boarded the flight as soon as I could and made it back home the next morning. Somehow, not the worst birthday I have ever spent. Most tiring, sure.
Perhaps two failed excursions on my birth days in the last three years are the signs for me to give up on the need to discover the world on that very day. The first one was a couple years ago, when a one day trip to the nearest city ended up making me more miserable than before, and I came back home to watch Rodri tear his ACL. Maybe running away from everything I know is not a good omen. Not for me and apparently neither for my favourite football players. For someone who finds the concept of travel in these modern-day touristic times, a capitalistic cultural consumption, I did surely betray my beliefs for a sub-par day out. But what if, spiritually, I am a cat, and I have nine turns on a perfect birthday getaway. Two down, seven to go. Here’s hoping the next Ishani I bring along, is a bit more content in her being. A wee bit happy in her pursuit. And someone who travels to someplace where she can be a net positive for the people of that area.
