On Thursday evening we went to a celebration called a 'sagra', which as far as I can work out is a week of open-air parties for charity. Much to my surprise Bernie had a visitor – James Roscoe! He just walked right into the square and I had no idea he was in town. Good to see an Oxford face.
On Saturday was Festa del Redentore, a festival that takes place every year to celebrate the end of the plague of 1576 which wiped out 50,000 Venetians. They built a temporary bridge over the Giudecca canal just for the event. It's a pretty special evening with Venetians securing spots early on the fondamenta, decked out with food and drink. The highpoint of the evening was a spectacular firework display that went on for almost a whole hour. Luckily fellow interns have an apartment that looks directly out onto where the fireworks were let off so we watched them all from the window. Diana taught me another great German word, 'Schlussbouquet' ('Closing bouquet') which refers to the final crescendo of fireworks just before a display ends.
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