With the feast day of Saint Nicholas just passed, and Saint Lucia’s Day approaching – just to mention two December heavyweights – it seems an appropriate time for musing about the various European pagan festivals and their Christianised contemporary equivalent.

In France, it’s hard to turn a blind eye to Saint’s Days, as most calendars list the corresponding saint for every date.

In Italy, it seemed that I timed my visit to Venice with an alternate carnevale. Whilst I was sitting and enjoying a quiet aperitif, the dark, wood-panelled wine bar surrounds were invaded by purple hologram witches hats, face-painted ghouls and red-horned devils. They sang out “trick or treat” (well… the Italian equivalent) and hopped around in Halloween merriment.

The girl behind the bar gave them a tomato. They cracked some smoke bombs on the floor in disgust and with a whirl of colour and sound, they bustled out again.

I was also lucky enough to spend St. Martin’s Day with friends living in an Austrian village a few years ago. Also known as Martinmas, this holiday is the feast day of Martin of Tours, and its celebration is scattered through Western Europe. Typically, the festival involves a sumptuous supper of goose (with some sort of delectable orange sauce, if I recall correctly). Luckily, all traditions were not adhered to, and the following forty-day fast was conveniently cast aside!

From interesting article about French wine and the customary festivities accompanying the new wine of a season, I’ve learned that in medieval times the vineyard owners would rush to get their wine on the market first for a better price. The Fête de la Saint Martin in early November conveniently coincided with the wine releases, and this apparently coined the euphemism ‘the Saint Martin blues’ for a hangover.

Stuck for cheap accommodation in Venice (and frankly, who isn’t?). I’d just like to thrown in a quick word of recommendation for this gem, glimmering just off the main drag, a stone’s throw away from the train station.

It’s not listed in any guidebooks (although a welcoming sign in the foyer encourages you to feel free to mention it to your guidebook), but Archie’s House, run by the very amicable Dr. Arcadio Baghin, is an essential part of any Venetian visit.

The friendly atmosphere is openly encouraged by Archie from the beginning. If you are looking for more of an aloof, solitary or melancholic experience though – maybe look elsewhere. On check-in, Archie explains the history of Venice, shows her geographical position and explains the significance of the lagoon islands. On a free map photocopy, he suggests a two-day tour (all mapped out and numbered), with the first day being devoted to walking and the second to cruising on the vaporetti water buses. Before being allowed to retreat to your room, you get a thorough tour of the hostel – the kitchen (admire the new fridge), the hallway (complete with relaxing fish reading light), the bathroom, the balcony.

On a budget but want to eat something other than pizza? Archie has even compiled a list of “recommended restaurants”, so you have very little need for the new fridge! The first venue – “the favourite of Archie!” – deserves a bit of a word of warning… Even though Archie describes it as the “student’s canteen”, the Mensa D.L.F. Ferrovieri, is a little difficult to find, and a little bit confronting on first entry. You see, although anyone can eat there (and it depends on the cashier whether or not you get a student discount), its primary purpose is as the canteen for the train station employees. So if your eyes are at first greeted by a sea of uniforms, don’t panic!

To find Archie’s is less taxing. However street names, as you will find on your visit, are practically irrelevant. Just turn left on leaving the train station, put your nose to the ground and avoid all sweet temptation from ice-cream and hot chocolate vendors, cross the first bridge and then start looking for a corner marked out by a Japanese flag. You’ve reached Archie’s house and prepare for the making of fond memories.

I was lucky enough to catch the Venice Biennale in its closing weeks. With my apologies to the Doge’s Palace, I’m exuberantly glad that I did.

For over a century now, the Venice Biennale has promoted avant-garde artistic trends. This year marked the 52nd occasion of this biennial event, and was themed ‘Think with the Senses – Feel with the Mind.’

With my senses receptive to any possibility due to the number of sipped free espressos, I strolled through the national pavilions of the Giardini site. I felt like I was in an enormous Eurovision Expo – but this time on a global scale.

Irena Jůzová from the Czech-Slovak Pavilion with a lukopren cast of her body…

“Eight points… huit points”

Finland, Norway and Sweden’s use of humour in a dart board installation and Bagdad Travel Agency…

“Nine points… neuf points”

Great Britain with some distracted telephone doodlings from Tracey Emin of birds riding penises…

“Three points… trois points”.

Worthy of special mention: France. In ‘Prenez soin de vous’ Sophie Calle appealed to the jilted lovers of the world by asking 107 women to interpret an email of rupture that she had received from her partner. The earth-quaking note ended on a rather distant “Take care of yourself” and that was exactly what Calle undertook through the amazing exhibit. Chosen due to their diverse professional backgrounds (an opera singer, ballet dancer, clown, linguist, moral philosopher, journalist, criminologist, head-hunter, ikebana master, just to name a handful), the women analysed, commented on, danced and sung the letter. As Calle puts it, “It was a way of taking the time to break up. A way of taking care of myself.”

Worthy of ignoble mention: The USA, who seemed to be inadvertently issuing homage to waste of all sorts. On entering the pavilion one was greeted by numerous blazing and heat-emitting light globes. We all know you haven’t signed the Kyoto Protocol; you don’t have to rub it in our faces. Bigger and better, everyone could have candy and free posters, which were then stuffed into faces and littered around the entire expanse of the Giardini. Look, I know that the USA doesn’t trash the Biennale, Biennale festival-goers trash the biennale, but really, it’s time to accept culpability for providing the means to this end.

It can all be read more deeply, I’m sure you can infer the parallels.

A little humour went a long way. The aforementioned Scandinavians achieved this in every one of their exhibits, but my favourite – the red, white and blue ‘Liberté, Equalité, Fraternité’ Parisian public toilets – even caused further humour as confused patrons tried to insert money into the slot and open the doors, I don’t know, but I’d say it was in an attempt to relieve themselves. Lucky I was far enough so they couldn’t hear my hoots of laughter.

Never, ever, have a French breakfast in Italy. I learned this lesson the hard way. After having stuck by muesli and juice for my entire time in France, I decided to switch to a petit déjeuner of hot chocolate and chocolate biscuits in Venice. Half an hour later, I felt decidedly ill, as my heartbeat accelerated and I began to jitter.

When the Italians serve hot chocolate, they really serve hot liquid chocolate. None of this extraneous “milk” stuff.

I recovered swiftly, you’ll all be glad to know, without the faintest trace of a post-sugar comedown, and re-launched my week of culinary epicureanism.

Venice provided me with an outlet for fancies forbidden in France. Ice-cream (we don’t have a freezer), cappuccinos (the French murder a coffee in any attempt to add milk), polenta-based dishes (I can’t think of any real reason this wouldn’t be available in France, I just haven’t looked) and lots of baked goods in a vibrant shade of pistachio-green (I guess it just hasn’t caught on, the French seem to go for more classical colours, softer hues, and lashings of cream). There was also a lot of red wine to be had by all, particularly the older men, at all hours of the day.

I was particularly intrigued by all the things one could add to prosecco, a northern Italian dry sparkling white wine. For starters, Venice’s famed Bellini cocktail combines prosecco with white peach puree. I had a few of those, but felt decidedly like a tourist. A less incongruous sight in Venice, especially from the early aperitif hours onwards, is the bright red mix of prosecco with sparking water and either Aperol or Campari. This drink is called spritz, and is one of the most popular in Venice. Not for this little black sheep, however. I had to try my best to keep a straight face as I downed the last of my Aperol spritz like it was a bitter medicine.

The Campari one must be really awful then, because when I asked the bartender which was better, she screwed up her face at the mention of the Campari, and wholeheartedly recommended the Aperol. I just stuck to vino rosso after that!

I had my doubts, I must admit, after being kicked off my first train to Venice for not having paid the correct fare supplement. For once in my life, it was an honest fare evasion mistake. I had to wait in some middle-of-nowhere darkness between Milan and Verona for my correct train – yes, the “slow” train. This was somewhere in the sixth hour after leaving Paris, and I cursed myself with 20/20 hindsight for having bought a plane ticket to Milan, and not just straight to Venice.

Plans fall through, and new opportunities presented themselves. Venice it was.

The chaos of Milan’s central train station reminded me something of China or Russia, but I think this impression was enhanced by hoards of cigarette smokers framed by fascist era architecture.

Never before have fatigue and a bad mood so quickly dissipated as when I stepped out of Venice’s Santa Lucia station to behold the Grand Canal. It was all worth it. Venice is something amazing for me, and I don’t just say that because I’m a sentimental sucker. I first laid eyes on the jewel of La Serenissima (the Serene Republic) at eight years old, and bedazzled by the glitter of masks, I was captivated. It was the same on my return at eighteen years old, despite some very cynical travelling companions. The magic captured in childhood is still there – and not even diminished by the fact I had inconveniently chosen the busiest long weekend (All Saints’ Day) before the cold, damp of the low season.

Here was a city that devoted the spoils of a thousand years of mercantilism to the beautification of their surrounds – in grand style. Venice today is an archipelago of 117 islands, with 150 canals traversed by 400 bridges, and the echoes of Othello, Desdemona and Shylock throughout the sestieri (districts).

I’m going to Milan today. France is having two weeks of school holidays, and I’m preparing myself for double shifts next week by fleeing the country for this week.

This will be my first trip to Milan, despite some well intentioned blunders in previous years. I’m also going back to Venice because I’ve recently read Joseph Brodsky’s meditative portrayal with winter-time Venice in Watermark. Venice as an Italian Petersburg – this I need to see afresh.

But this has got me thinking about famous Milanese and Venetians, which somehow progressed into an administrative panic… what would Marco Polo do in modern-day France?

For, you seen, the French are somewhat obsessed with lieu de naissance or place of birth. You need to include this on any formal document you fill out, and quite often on seemingly informal documents too. Why I worry for this long-deceased 13th-century Venetian trader and explorer is the controversy over his birthplace. Established historiography considers him a ‘citizen of the City of Venice’, but the Croatian Tourist Board maintains that he was born on the Adriatic island of Curzola, then part of the Venetian Republic, but nowadays the Croatian island of Korčula. It’s all a bit of an impasse really, with two such authoritative heavyweights battling it out…

I had first heard of this multiple birthplace theory when I was in Korčula. So, like the football team one barracks for as a child, I’m gunning for this stunning island’s claim to authenticity. Venice has too many attractions and too many tourists anyway, why not let Korčula have this one?

At last the day came, the end of a 30-day tourist visa visit to Russia by my boyfriend and my brother. After a month of St. Petersburg and Moscow it was time for them to catch the bus to Estonia, and for me to head north to the Khibiny Mountains, then south to the Caucasus Mountains and then east with the end-goal of Japan.

This anticipated trip far from my mind at the time, I was just bustling to get the boys and the bags to the bus stop. We were staying with friends near the Mariinsky Theatre, which seemed perfect; there was a direct bus from there to the Ligovsky Prospekt bus terminal. Not long after boarding the bus however, the conductor announced that the bus would be waiting for half an hour before leaving, and all other passengers were promptly refunded their fares and they made alternate travel arrangements. All… except us. I spent half an hour arguing fruitlessly with the conductor, as we were already cutting it fine for time, but no double-fare refund for us and our baggage. In between snarling and pleading, I reflected grumpily that we should have just got an “unofficial taxi” (ie. hailing any car from the street), cursed my stupidity and debated whether or not to cut our losses, disembark and just take a car regardless.

To make matters worse, when the bus started again, the conductor announced a change of route. We could only go as far at Ploshchad Vosstaniya metro station. Argghhhh! At this stage, a whole lot of frustration and sorrow built up and I sobbed for the whole journey, dreading the impending farewell though desperately hoping that they wouldn’t miss their international bus.

With all the sweetness of a serpent the conductor told us when it was our stop.

“I know… thank you… for nothing”, I hissed through a fake smile of grated teeth.

A car quickly stopped for my outstretched hand on Nevsky Prospekt.

“Ligovsky Prospekt. 50 roubles”. I instructed with a puffy, tear-bloated face. I thought the price was going to be too low for three foreigners, with bags, but I was pissed off, so I thought I’d try it anyway.

“I’m not from SPb” the driver began, “so I don’t know where that is…”

“I do”, I replied. “I can show you if you want. It’s not far. 50 roubles?”

He agreed, rather amicably, saying if that’s what I thought was a good price, then that was fine by him. With my hostility dissipating, my powers of observation returned. I realised we were in quite possibly the nicest car I’d ever ridden in, and that the driver was quite young, blonde, fine-featured and good-looking.

He started to talk. I wasn’t in that good a mood yet, so my answers were just grunts.

“You’re not from Russia?”

“No”

“Are you visiting or living here?”

“Living”

“Are you here for work?”

“Study”.

At this stage, I realised I was being rude, so I asked him in return if he was Russian, and what he was doing in SPb. It turns out that he was Ukrainian, in town for work, and that he was a dancer with the Kirov Opera Ballet.

That touched a nerve. I think I had been to almost every ballet in the Kirov’s repertoire performed at the Mariinsky Theatre – and despite myself (and my boyfriend in the pack seat, and my bloodshot eyes and tear-stained face), I found myself… FLIRTING!?!

“Oh really?” a character who was not myself asked, and then found my conversation again. We chatted all the way to the bus terminal, and were waiting for a car to pull out so we could park, but then I noticed something being waved in the hand of one of the two men arguing in the adjacent space.

He was waving a gun.

“Maybe we should park elsewhere”, I suggested.

The driver agreed whilst turning to face the boys in the back seat with a devilish grin “Welcome to Russia”, he announced in heavily-accented English.

We got out of the car, the three of us buzzing with excitement.

Simultaneously, we all gushed “I can’t believe that just happened!”

Amidst our laughter, I then elaborated, “I can’t believe we just met a Kirov dancer!”

The boys turned to me – “What are you talking about? We can’t believe we’ve just seen a gun in the parking lot!”

By this stage, I was already too cool for school. Metaphorically, of course, I wasn’t some sort of juvenile delinquent, but already I thought I was above the whole daggy holiday with the folks (how was I to know it was only the beginning!?!)

We visited Switzerland, Austria and Italy for a mixture of friends, family and the Romans, respectively. As it happened, I spent my eighth birthday in Venice, a place that even today holds picturesque and magical associations for me. Unfortunately, with a photographer father, the picturesque was much more documented than the magical, and quite often with a cheesy pose thrown in for good measure.

“So, Bettina, just stand on this bridge, over this canal, and hold up eight fingers to forever commemorate your eighth birthday.”

No way was I doing that (as I have mentioned, by this stage I had already quite developed my ‘cool radar’, and this was off the scale on the nerdy end). So I fought and argued and refused, and then, all of a sudden, I had a plan. I agreed to the awful pose, imagining that in the time it took him to press the button, I could have my hands down into a normal position, and it would just be me, on the bridge.

“Ok… and one, two, three…” CLICK!

The deed was done – my way! I gloated until we got the photos developed, and saw what had been recorded. My hands, captured mid-air, raised in front of me and moving at such a speed that they only registered as an eight-fingered blur, the cheeky grin on my face unmasked and obvious. It was hardly ideal for either party, and I think it’s one of my first and only recorded attempts of sabotage.

I felt a little guilty about it though, so when I went back to Venice a decade later, I decided to make amends. I found a canal, posed with eight fingers raised and posted the image home.

An obvious side-effect of a Eurocentric education is an inkling to set forth across the continent, mapping out places where events from history books took place in Technicolor and not just in fine-print packed into paragraphs and henceforth crammed into young heads. This curiosity more often than not develops into the more serious condition of wanderlust, and then, as I’m lead to believe, into dromomania, a passion or uncontrollable impulse to wander or travel, a malady (or blessing) by which I’m seriously afflicted.

The first time I went alone to Europe was when I was 18. Having finished high school and saved my pocket money, I was determined to somehow stretch this meagre amount to last for a whole year without working. Thanks to numerous relatives, generous students willing to share their dormitories, Eurolines and Eastern Europe, this was possible. I was also lucky enough to have well-travelled parents, with well-travelled friends, who had sent their teenage sons and daughters to stay at my parents’ house, and thus the doors of Europe where open for me.

My favourite places in Europe – what I think of as the majestic golden triangle of Vienna, Budapest and Prague; countries of the former Yugoslavia, the Baltic states and Scandinavia, anywhere in Southern Europe blessed by an ocean, and most definitely anywhere with either a picturesque mountain range or a comprehensive recycling system or bicycles as a recognised and supported form of public transport. Have I covered it all yet?