Day 3

Today has been pretty eventful I guess.

I started off my day at ridiculous o’clock going to the Welcome Breakfast which was held on the terrace at the back of the Guggenheim looking out at the Grand Canal. The sun was still rising so we had a beautiful view and all of the early morning passengers of the vaporetti were taking pictures of us.

The breakfast was so so tasty! Lots of amazing brioche and croissants, fruit and coffee.

George, one of last month’s interns, was playing his ukele and singing his Guggenheim songs for us which were really funny but also added a nice feel to our brekkie.

My favourite song was his own version of Katy Perry’s ‘Teenage Dream’. (“You and Me. We worked this summer at P-G-C!)

He also had a song called ‘On a scale from 1-10 the PGC is zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero.....’

We met a lot more staff which was cute and they all welcomed us to the PGC family.

Then my day was

9:30-9:50 Dust the sculptures in TES and clean the glass cabinets

9:50- 11:00 I got to play with a people counter thing again but no one came in. I also heard “Zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero..” quite a bit which is why it is still in my head!

11-12 PC1 Where I had to shout “Scusi, si prega di non toccare!’ at everyone because they all insisted on leaning on Peggy’s very expensive and old table.

12-12:15 Break time. I ate a peach.

12:15- 1 PC2 Two taxis arrived and people kept taking photos of artworks so I got to shout “NO PHOTO!”

1-2 PC3 I have decided that PC3 is my least favourite room. It is full of pervy/disturbing surrealist artworks (Dali = bleugh) and nothing interesting happens in there. I don’t get to shout at anyone, play with a walkie-talkie or a clicky thing L I have invented a little game where I can only step on one colour on the patterned floor which keeps me entertained for a while and I get some strange looks.

2-3 Lunch with Ellen and Lola. I had Gnochetti which was pretty tasty but very filling.

3-5:30 I was on Office Rotation which means that I had free time but had to ask the office if they needed any help. Bad idea.

The Venice Regatta is taking place on Sunday and there are 200 people from the PGC’s sponsorships and governors coming to watch the parade/race from the rooftop terrace. Unfortunately the weather forecast is for rain and the rooftop terrace in very open to the elements.

So me, Abigail, Ellie and Katie were sent to pick up 100 umbrellas from IKEA (one of the sponsors) which was no easy task in 31 degrees muggy, pre-storm heat. Basically it was a bit of a disaster as my trolley’s wheel fell off on the way there which seemed to cause the other trolley’s to give up on life too. Also, Venice’s narrow roads were not designed to carry big umbrellas so not only did we trap ourselves in the alley’s but a few good Venetian citizens as well.

So after all of that excitement we were pretty pooped so we just went and collapsed in the student room until closing/PJ’s time.

Then we all went to the ‘Grom’ gelateria in the square of Chiesa di San Barnaba. I went for the boring Caramel flavour.

Then I had a quick shop in ‘Billa’ supermarket before returning home to cook my first meal in Italy!

I had pasta. Very original.

Most memorable visitors of the day:

The woman who took her shoes of - It was just really gross.

A woman who had really weird shoes which went around her toes – Freaked me out a bit, especially as it was in the surrealist room.

“You’re from the UK. Do you know how I know that? You talk funny.” – Why thank you old American guy. Do you know how I know you’re American? You’re wearing a bum bag, a bandana on your head and sunglasses indoors.

Oh and we had our second celebrity!! John C. Reilly (Chicago, Step Brothers and also in the new We Need to Talk About Kevin film which I’m really excited for!)

Our first celebrity was Paulo Picasso, obviously coming to see his father’s work.