Yes, you read the title correctly. This post is about an interesting thing I learned while visiting Venice! When on a walking tour of the city, the tour guide said Venice was a victim of self-cannibalism. What she meant was that, Venice’s booming tourism scene is actually driving out locals and slowly eradicating Venetian culture.
So because of the massive amounts of tourism, cost of living is becoming higher, thus, driving locals out onto the mainland.
Venice is a small Italian city with a lot of colourful history. A lot of the original buildings are still preserved, so you can definitely sense that you’re walking through a world heritage site. Because of its charm, Venice is very popular with tourists. Being such a small city, it’s easy for it to get overcrowded, especially during peak season. The owner of the Airbnb I was staying at referred to Venice as being like a can of sardines!
The majority of people you see on the streets are tourists. The local island population is very small, around 55,000. Most Venetians live on the mainland in an area called Mestre. Even my tour guide, who was born and raised in Venice, lived there. Living on the mainland is just a lot cheaper, not to mention more peaceful. So if you want to see how Venetians truly live, visit Mestre!
Tourism is Venice’s main source of income, however, the city can go a bit overboard with this. When I first arrived in Venice, one of the first things I saw was a kiosk selling souvenir ‘Venetian masks.’ Yes, I wanted to buy a mask from Venice, but I didn’t expect them to be found on every corner. The city caters so much to tourists that it’s become a caricature of itself. It’s almost as if it’s an amusement park of…itself.