Nicole Heyermann 's story

Questo il racconto di Nicole Heyermann, nostra compagna di viaggio questo week-end a Venezia per la gara di ori.

My trip to Venice this past weekend started out pretty typically. I was late. My train was at 2PM. I had woken up much earlier, but was faffing around doing laundry, chatting with the roommates, when one of them looked at the clock and made a remark about the fact that wasn’t my train due to leave in about half an hour? Cazzo, damn! I was going to miss it!

Rang up Stevie frantically asking if he had bought tickets for myself and Alessandro. He hadn’t. It was my responsibility and I had dropped the ball. Hurriedly stuffing things in my backpack as I raced to the bus stop I prayed that I would get there on time.

Fighting my way to a machine, I managed to purchase two tickets and punch them in. Looking around frantically, I realized that Ale was nowhere to be found on the platform with 5 minutes to go before the Eurostar set off. I called him and he was already on the train with the rest of our group…. We were off with barely a minute to spare---and that’s where the fun begins. I was with a mixed English/Italian gang, and if you have ever sat in a confined space with a group of Italians who are good friends then you just may be able to imagine the kind of non-stop chatter and jokes that entails. You would think that we occupied the entire coach rather than just 8 seats. We even managed at one point to make one person move places in disgust (which reminds me of two things… when Nadine and I sit down in restaurants in Dubai and politely get asked to move, and being with my cousins in the Philippines).

Additionally, this was not just any ordinary group of people, but all of whom were suffused with a sense of adventure and anticipation, as we were off to run a race in Venice. And this wasn’t just any race, but an international meeting of over 3100 people to do something called ‘orienteering’.

Now, orienteering is something that you would think I would have heard of in outdoor-crazed California, but I had NEVER heard of this odd ‘sport’ before I moved to Italy. Let me explain…. Orienteering is a race with staggered starts. You run on a course, but you don’t know what it looks like until moments before you start the race and you are allowed to grab a map which corresponds to your category. In the woods, it’s topographical; in this case, a detailed map of Venice with no street names. You put your compass to it, figure out where you are and where you need to go, and you proceed to run a crazy circuit to various checkpoints in an order, which is signposted on your map. There are all different types of people of different abilities with different maps… kids, Swedes, fat people, skinny people, odd looking people, and usually if you are in Italy, some sort of assortment of Italians.

This was my first real race and I was just hoping not to have to hitch a ride on a gondola to get back. My start time was 10:48, and I moved up to the start line with the other people in my group. There was a low beeping and we all reached down to grab our maps out of their respective boxes. One loud beep and we were allowed to look. I grabbed my map, folded it so I could see the first point I had to get to and proceeded to tear down the street, dodging tourists and pigeons.

It’s very very hard to describe the race, but if you have an idea of what Venice is like - a quiet canal-crisscrossed place with tons and tons of tourists – and add to that an invasion of thousands of people stampeding up and down alleyways in all directions then you might come close to imagining what a complete hilarious mess it all is.

I was intent on following my map and determined not to get lost. I turned down little alleyways, under porticoes, along canals , popped into piazzas to see astonished tourists look up and tried to avoid the other orienteerers running the other directions… scusa mi, permesso permesso permesso permesso…. Mommy, what are they doing? A little boy asked his mother… ‘Can’t you see that there are other people on the street?!!!’ an old woman walking her dog yelled at one point.

I crossed the paths of some of the group I had come with, but they were serious orienteerers, intent on their maps. I was merely a jogger out to amuse myself.

And after an incredible amount of anxiety, sweat, fighting for space at checkpoints and a mad dash to the finish line, my race was over. I couldn’t stop grinning. I hadn’t gotten lost, not once… and in Venice! Using a map without street names, no less!

In the end the race was merely a side story to the rest of my time in Venice. Walking back to the train station, passing the bridge of sighs at sunset, and chatting with my companions, I couldn’t help but feel content (and a bit of muscle ache). The best part of the weekend, hands down were my companions. Not only are my new Italian friends the most welcoming people in the world, they are crazy, funny and all around ace individuals. Bad organization, can’t get into a restaurant, can’t find a train ticket home, uncomfortable, freezing, squeezed into a small bar with taciturn bartenders and not even notice that you are going through all of this? Take a trip with them and find yourself with a smile on your face for the next 3 days as well as some very fond memories.