Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Lido Market

Every Tuesday on the Lido, there is an outdoor market. If I had to guess, I would say its close to a mile long and pretty much offers you everything you could think of.

You can buy clothes and shoes (yeah!) and housewares and miscellaneous items as well as fruits, vegetables, cheese and cooked meals.

In general, the items are priced much cheaper than anything you would find on Venice. Dont expect the highest quality of product but its better than 'dollar store' quality. I bought some warm pajamas there and a few household items so I have no problem recommending the place.

Unfortunately, there was a food incident there a few weeks ago. One of the vendors sold some cicchetti (snacks) that had salmonella. I have been in awe since my arrival here--I just havent heard anything about food poisoning and with all the food sitting out in shops all day, its amazing. Turns out 7 people ended up in the hospital, one on dialysis and many others with basic food poisoning symptoms.

So yesterday as I perused the market, it was obvious to me what vendor had the incident. There they were, surrounded by hundreds and hundreds of people shopping and buying and no one was at their counter. What a stigma that must be in a place like this where everyone knows everything about everyone.

I hear every other day about some food poisoning scenario and food recall in the US--almost to the point of becoming immune to importance of it. Because it seems to be so rare here, I imagine it can really have a community effect. The funny thing is that this vendor is now probably the safest one there after 2 weeks being closed and a check by inspectors. I do hope they recover. Time will tell.

1 comment:

tangobaby said...

Scary, but you're right. These things can happen anywhere. I'm glad that it didn't affect more people and hope that those who were will recover with no lasting effects.

Please take pictures of the shoes! Happy shopping.

;-)