visione doppia

For a sensitive and imaginative man who, like I, has lived for a long time but can still imagine and feel, the world and its things become in a certain sense double. He will see a tower or the countryside with his eyes, his ears will hear the sound of the bell, and at the same time he will see, with his imagination, another tower, another countryside, and hear another sound. In this second seeing lies all the beauty and pleasure of things. - Giacomo Leopardi, Zibaldone (1828)

I knew our train ride was almost over when I saw a villa that seemed to float precariously in the middle of the ocean. Sea gulls flew above it, while before it a gondolier, wearing a black hat and a black-and-white striped shirt, carefully paddled his boat while perched on its prow.

Why isn't that palace sinking? Why doesn't the gondola topple over?

It was that picture of apparent defiance of the laws of physics- the illusion of effortless grace- that made me understand why Venezia has come to be known as La Serenissima, the Most Serene.

Even in the field of government, the Republic of Venice seemed to have maintained two faces for most of its thousand year history: one gracious and diplomatic, the other secretive and potentially cruel. Hence, my appreciation of the beauty of the original quadriga or the softly glowing altar containing the remains of St. Mark, for example, was tempered by the knowledge that these relics arrived in the basilica through war and wile. In many ways, the unique culture of the ancient Venetians mirrors our contemporary Philippine Republic, from the confusing jumble of narrow streets and the dependence on the bounties of the sea to the "consensual" government that oscillates at various times between an autocracy and a democracy.

At sunset, I rode a vaporetto down the Canal Grande. For a moment, I was transported back to Bangkok where I spent New Year's Eve in 2004 with my high school classmate Jill Clarke and her dad Bob. Jill's friend told us then that the water of the Chao Phraya looked just like the water in the canals of Venice; now I could compare their respective reflections for myself.

"Scusi, would you like some fruits?" I thought I heard someone ask me in Italian. I stopped taking pictures of the green and pink water and looked to my right: I saw a beautiful woman in the winter of her life with a bright smile and a bag of peaches and nectarines in her hands. "Are you a student?"

In Madrid, I was Ramon, the abogado; in Paris, the writer Voltaire. Now, I perceived that this kind stranger saw perhaps a facet of me, perhaps a university student who she met during her travels in summer or spring. And so I smiled back and replied, "Si Signora. Mi chiamo Santi. Un studente."

I accepted her gift of sweet Italian sunshine- my supper- as she got off the water ferry with her niece. She seemed happy to receive the treasure I gave her in exchange: the knowledge that this student would never be able to repay her kindness, as my journey as she described it was still long, whereas hers was already about to end.