✦ Part of Italy Trip 2026

⌖ Venice, Italy

Ciao Paulo

On our strolls through the alleys of Venice we stumble upon this sprawling campo in the heart of Santa Croce. Bursting with life. An expansive courtyard dotted with towering platano trees and centuries-old cisterns. These wells, a reminder of how each campo was built to collect its own rain. Everything that falls here is kept.

It turns out to be where all of the schoolkids assemble at the end of their day — playing tag, chasing each other with water balloons; it’s where one of the handful of markets in the city seems to be; where couples meet for meals and drinks; where hipsters stroll with their cigarettes; where all manner and size of dogs are walked.

We see a tavern and decide to dine there. We sit there long enough to notice the ebb and flow of the courtyard’s energy. We order our food during one of the lulls. Not long after, a well-dressed but slightly disheveled older gentleman strolls up to the restaurant. Our waiter sees him and scampers over to greet him gently. They interact for a bit and then our waiter leaves him and goes about his business interacting with other customers.

A few minutes later, we notice that the man has wandered into the courtyard and has started rummaging through the trash. We haven’t seen a single other homeless person during our time here. We wonder if he is a vagrant, but notice that he hasn’t taken a single thing out of the trash. Our waiter scurries over to him, talks to him again. We try not to stare, but this level of care for a stranger—heck a neighbor—is unheard of in the states, we pretend to ignore the destitute in our country. Moments later the waiter gently brings him back to the restaurant, takes him to wash his hands, and gives him a pile of receipts to fumble with.

When we ask our waiter if he is okay, he responds that his name is Paulo and he is a long-time local, that he has Alzheimer’s, but has no family to take care of him. For a brief moment all three of our nervous systems sync up in sadness. I ask the waiter his name, Nikolai he responds, he says he is from Moldova but went to university in Venice and now he has Italian citizenship. I tell him—holding back my own tears—that we saw what he did, and that not many people back home would have done that, and that it mattered to us and to Paulo, even if he couldn’t say so. He gets overcome with emotion, and excuses himself.

As we eat our food, one and then two women walk through the courtyard and exclaim “Ciao Paulo!” He looks up briefly, energy in his eyes, and nods his head at them. It seems as though the town square has taken in Paulo as one of their own. We ask Nikolai if we can buy him a meal, and Nikolai assures us that Paulo has more food than he could ever need. Turns out Paulo used to own two shops in the town and even though he has no family to look after him, his neighbors in the town are already taking care of him.

After we finish eating, I take some time to reflect on what I saw in the courtyard. I realize this encounter, the way this old man was treated by his community is a microcosm for this trip, and what I’ve learned about Italian culture, and their genuine kindness. Beyond the generosity of so many of the people we interacted with on a day to day basis, I have been floored by how this country treats people it owes nothing to. Because it would be easy to look away. I reinjured my lower back on this trip, and went to the emergency room to be treated. I, an American tourist, walked out of that hospital having been charged less than two hundred dollars for the visit.11. including a CT scan and three different medications Our Airbnb host graciously offered us one of his rooms as many nights as we needed it and charged us a fraction of the cost, checking in daily to ask how I was doing, and if he could help in any way.

A few days earlier, from a letterpress printer a few blocks away, I’d learned that “ciao” isn’t Italian — it’s Venetian, and it started as a way of saying I am at your service. Giving new weight to what I’d heard shouted across the courtyard three times and what I’d been feeling ambiently all week without recognizing it: at the hospital, with that spare room.