The Memories That Never Go Away
I will never forget the longest plane ride of my life. Traveling across the Atlantic Ocean going faster than any human could ever run. Our first stop was an airport in France, one of the biggest airports in the world. I was personally ready to explore, but not remembering I was in a different country. As soon as I got off the plane I began to notice that everything in the airport was a different language. My mother grabbed me by the hand and made me follow her in a group with the other mutes that could not speak French. The leader of the group spoke English and directed us to our next flight, which flew us to our next destination. Venice, Italy. Our first mission was to find the hotel my mom and I were staying at. Things can get a little difficult when the streets are made of water. Our entire luggage was loaded onto a water taxi and the man that could speak very little English told us “Just give me da name of yor hotl and I will delivver yor luggage in an hor.” Barley able to understand the Italian man, my mother recited the name of our hotel slowly.
The next mission was finding where the hotel was located, by ourselves. My mom grabbed my hand and made me follow her to a water taxi. The strange man tried speaking to us in Italian. As my mother tried communicating through gestures that we did not speak Italian, she told him the name of our hotel. The Italian man nodded his head and told us to come on the boat with the wave of his hand. The boat ride was cold and my noes turned so red a little Italian girl would probably have mistaken me for Rudolf. As the man docked the boat, he said that would be 15 euros. We were not prepared to pay in Euros, so my mom tried to explain how there was an atm inside the hotel she could use. He did not understand and would not let us off the boat. “Call the hotel mommy and ask someone to translate for you.” I said in my childish voice at the time. “I had to turn my cell phone off otherwise I would get a huge phone bill.” My mom explained looking at me. Then a teenage boy walked by and heard the water taxi driver and my mom arguing. He walked over and translated for us. The taxi driver understood and allowed my mom to go inside and get Euros from the front desk. She paid the man and even gave him a big tip.
The ladies at the front desk spoke English and I asked them what there favorite part of Venice was? She said, “Why Saint Mark Square seems to be a fun place to visit, you should check it out.” She gave us a map and the directions to the square. Our journey had just begun and a water taxi wasn’t needed to get to our destination. We walked across bridges as boats made their way under us. The streets full of water were so pretty, better than the plain old cement streets back at home. Seeing Saint Mark Square was better than seeing fireworks at night or being hungry and fixing yourself a huge meal. Birds, birds, and more birds. Pigeons were everywhere landing on my shoulders and flying away again. There was a corn stand, where you could buy little bags of corn to feed the pigeons. I insisted on buying one, being the brat I was. My mom bought me a little bag of corn and as soon as the bag reached my hand pigeons swarmed me. Flying on my head, standing on my arms, stepping on my feet. This was the best experience I had ever known. The bag of corn disappeared from my hand in less then a minute. And once the bag of corn was gone I grabbed 3 Euros from the purse, that could get me all the toys and food in the world. And ran over to the corn man to buy some more. He handed me the bag and the process started all over again. I didn’t want to leave what I believed was heaven. I cried when my mom told me we had to go. And from being 9 years old to being 17 that is still a memory that will never go away.
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