Are you wondering who I am? You are asking yourself the wrong question. What’s the point of asking someone who they are? All of us are only what we have done in our lives. To really know someone you need to know their past and the story of their life. You don’t know mine, at least not yet. The right question to ask is, “What do I expect to find in the story that I'm about to read?” I will answer you in the only way I know how - clearly and honestly. I don't like wasting time because I’m used to not knowing how long I have to live. On these pages, you will find a story about real life. This is not a story about imaginary adventures with witches, wizards, spells and sorcery, nor is it one about mythological heroes with supernatural powers whose victories are guaranteed without suffering or the real risk of being defeated. I will show you how everything can change quickly in life, like when a man of war who only seeks peace, crosses paths with a young woman and meeting her sends him back, yet again, to a way of life he had hoped that he had left behind. If you have the curiosity and perseverance to follow me, I shall unveil my world to you and allow you to enter this place filled with simple truth, justice, sacrifice and love. I will take you to my homeland, Venice, known as the La Serenissima (The Most Serene), with her boundless beauty, her history spanning millennia and her grand civilization. A place that even William Shakespeare himself put at the centre of his most famous and important works. However, Shakespeare wasn’t Venetian. He was not born in this land like me and my ancestors. He couldn't know, understand or truly see what has always been before my eyes, inside my heart and in my veins every day of my life. I will guide you through my city and show you places that no longer exist. I will tell you about our laws, rights, duties, ways, traditions and festivities. I will tell you about our people, how they dressed, how they lived, the flavour of the food they ate and the taste of the wines they drank. I will tell you about their strengths and weaknesses and I will let you see into their souls and their spirit, the spirito Veneziano, the Venetian spirit. I will reveal to you what Venice was like and how most Venetians were: smart, cunning merchants and industrious, hard-working people. Whether nobility or commoner, rich or poor, churchgoer or disbeliever, man or woman - everyone always had a joke at the ready and never held back a witty comment or clever retort that might just elicit a laugh. This was so pervasive and irrepressible a practice that it would even span social class. Venetian humour was always playful, spontaneous and irrepressible almost as if it were a need. Perhaps it was due to the geographically small, physical space of the city itself and the close confines in which Venetians had to live with one another which often left them with only two ways of cohabitating: to joke and laugh or else, to quarrel and fight. Fortunately, they usually - though not always - chose to joke and laugh. Like the time a nobleman thought he would play a joke on a newly married gondolier he knew who was tying up his gondola nearby. “You have horns.” was the way of telling someone that their spouse was cheating on them, so in order to tease the gondolier, the nobleman leaned out over the balcony of his palace and surreptitiously dropped a goat horn onto the young man’s boat thus implying that he was already a cuckold. The gondolier picked it up and without missing a beat, looked up at the nobleman and said, “Your Excellency! Do be more careful when combing your hair lest you lose the other one!” This is just one of the many examples of the quick-witted Venetian spirit, the spirito Veneziano, that permeated life in Venice. Lively, dry, playful humour - often filled with irony, but never malevolence - was by far one of the best parts of the character of the citizenry and was present in every social class and situation both private and public, so much so that one could say that it was cemented not only into the Venetian character, but into the same mortar and stones with which Venice was built. This wry spirit would emerge even during the most difficult or serious of situations like when the great friar Paolo Sarpi was nearing the end of his life. Paolo Sarpi was one of the greatest Venetians to have lived during Venice’s thousand-year-plus history. He was a man whom even the great Galileo Galilei deeply esteemed and respected. When he was on his deathbed surrounded by a group of friars tending to him and in despair over his looming and now inevitable demise, he famously quipped, “I have always comforted you all as much as I could, so now it would be your turn to keep me amused.” One could feel the spirito Veneziano even in the rhythm and cadence of their nimble speech. The Venetian language was like lively music. Sometimes it would be gentle and sweet and at other times, vivacious and friendly. For example, to say, “Yes, Sir.” or “No, Sir.”, a Venetian would say, “Siór si.” or “Siór no.” with particular emphasis on the last vowel. When speaking to one’s employer or landlord, a person would say, “Siór Patrón” (for a man) or “Sióra Patróna” (for a woman), with the word, Patrón, meaning “owner”. What is more difficult to translate is the degree of respect these terms denoted in the mind of the Venetian using them. The word, “Patróna” in fact, was also a word commonly used by noblewomen to greet each other and was accompanied by a little curtsy. It imbued a greeting with a hint of reverence but also sometimes with a touch of dry humour as if to gently make fun of the other person. Another common way to say hello to someone was to say, “s'ciao” which was the abbreviated form of “so s’ciao” which meant, “Your slave.” It could be further abbreviated to simply, “Ciao”. Children usually addressed their father as “Siór Pàre” and their mother as “Sióra Màre”. Despite the spirito Veneziano permeating every aspect of life in the city, we must not forget that Venice was not just the place for Carnival celebrations and other forms of entertainment - far from it. Here, there was order, exact rules, efficient justice and great precision in every aspect of social and working life. Everyone had their part to play in this system. They had rights and specific duties. They had freedom but within certain boundaries. If someone made a mistake, it mattered little whether he was a commoner or nobleman because he would pay for any transgression. While it is true that over the course of history and life, things are inevitably subject to change, worrying signs of societal decline and weakness have begun to make their way into every aspect of life in my beloved Venice. This is my country, the place I was born, the place where I live and the place I am ready to defend to the death. It is my homeland, my life and it is to this place that I will transport you. Come aboard. Capitàn Carena