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When I listen to the news, here's what I want to know. Why this story matters? Who's at the center of it? And how the reporters uncovered it. And as a journalist, I want to make sure that's what you get too.
I'm Eva Heizadi, co-host of the podcast Post Reports. Every weekday, my colleagues and I at the Washington Post give you the context you need on the biggest stories. Healthcare, tariffs, artificial intelligence. We've got you covered. Look for post reports wherever you listen to podcasts.
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Sometimes the two actually intersect. We read about a fellow named Michael Raffino in Southern California who spent more than a decade rowing. Gondola. Mike, how did you get started as a gondolier? And tell us a bit about the gondola cruises that you offer.
Yeah, I had to get trained. You know, there's kind of a way to the style of rowing that you have to kind of figure out the physics of it and kind of the rhythm of it. Generally, what happens, and this happened with me as well. Is you go out on the water your first time, you try to row, and you just spin in a circle going nowhere, getting really frustrated. the power and the steering comes from the same side of the boat.
So you really have to learn to control going like hard left, slowly back to the right, hard left, slowly back to the right, hard left, slowly back to the right, and you get that rhythm down, and eventually you can go straight. Yeah, it's a little bit frustrating when you first learn. And then you have your, you know, you get trained for a while. you have your kind of like gondolier tests, you know, like one of the things we had to do is we had to like go under this bridge that has this opening that's not that not like we go under the the pylons of the bridge and you know, you have to be able to dock well and And it's tough. I mean, there are still some things that happened.
Uh, last fall, we had a newer gondolier that was out with a crew, and the wind picked up so bad that he just couldn't row the boat back. And so some of us more seasoned gondoliers had to row out get him and row the boat back for him. It does take a little bit of getting used to and training, but And the people that we have out, you know, people celebrating special occasions, birthdays, maybe a date, we do a lot of engagements. Like I've seen a lot of people get engaged on my boat and which is really cool to see 'cause usually it's something that no one has like a front row seat for. Uh and even sometimes we get to be involved in the actual process itself like we'll do a message in a bottle thing Where it's like, you know, ahead of time, the groom will write out a little message and give it to us, and we'll prepare a bottle.
And later in the cruise, she'll see this bottle in the water, and she'll pull the bottle out of the water. Lo and behold, there's a note. As she's reading the note, he drops down on one knee. Boom, there's a ring. It's really cool.
Where were you for me when I was engaged? Mine was so lame compared to that. Oh my goodness, where were you when I needed you? It's it you know it's it's funny like it sounds like a cool idea, but there's some there it doesn't always go smoothly. Let me tell you.
There was this one guy. I couldn't believe this. I never had anything like this happen before, but we're supposed to do a message in the bottle. We're waiting to do the thing. At some point the guy turns back, 'cause you know, we do it like they don't really know when we're gonna do the message and model thing.
We do it uh, you know, at a certain point in the cruise where there's spots in the harbor where there's not too much tide and not too much wind.
So we're rowing to this spot, and he turns around and looks at me. He goes, Do you have it? And I go Yes. And then she goes, have what? And he goes, nothing.
We go later in the cruise and we do the message in a bottle thing. She gets the message in a bottle. Of course, she says yes. They're all happy. And then, like, five minutes later, he looks back at me and he goes.
Did I ruin it? And she looks back, and I'm like, What do you have me to say, ma'am? Like, do you think. Do you think she's like so simple that you know that she would buy the Do you have what? Oh, nothing?
Well, obviously, it's something if I know what he's talking about, and I responded to it. And there's been a couple times where the bottle ended up in the water, and like I have to make a couple of attempts to go get it. They don't always grab it out of the water right away. And man, I had one person, one girl, I was like, oh, it looks like there might be a message in that bottle right there. Would you mind grabbing it?
And she goes, I'm not touching that, it's garbage. And the guy looks back at me and I'm like, tell her, like, oh, just grab it. It's okay. It's not garbage. Yeah, I'm out of here now.
It's up to you, buddy. Did anyone ever, did any woman ever say no? You know, I have not had any nose but uh some other gondoliers have. The last thing you would want if the person ended up saying no would be to spend another half an hour sitting right next to them on a boat that there is no escape from. It's a long way back to the dock.
Yeah, exactly.
So I haven't had it happen, but I've heard it's just. I mean, it's just miserable for everyone, including the gondolier. Including the gondolier.
So you're a gondolier, or do you sing? Yes. Does the guy say, hey, I need this song? Start singing, you know, Love Me Do, or I Will Always Love You, or Back That Thing Up, or whatever they ask you to sing. You know, so it's kind of an interesting thing.
There are some gondola kind of standards that we sing, but we really have to kind of be careful with music licensing. You know, we can't sing everything, you know.
So I actually sing original songs that I wrote a long time ago and then translated into Italian. And that's mostly what I sing just to kind of like keep myself covered from. that kind of stuff. I mean and I like them and I get really good feedback on the songs and it's Italian so no one knows what I'm saying anyway. But, you know, we sing like Ol Sola Mio and some of the kind of standards, but mostly I personally sing originals.
For them.
Well, that's great. And let's talk about now ultimately a competitive strain in this comes out. It turns out gondoliers compete, and there is such a thing as gondola competitions. Talk about how you got into that and how many people are doing this around the country. The number of people around the country that do it kind of varies depending on where we're having it.
We're trying to have like every different gondola company host some year, so it's kind of been bouncing around a little bit. And three years ago it was in Stillwater, Minnesota. And there's a little bit less of a turnout there. Last year it was in Providence and there was a huge turnout. The year before that it was in Huntington and there was a big turnout.
So it just kind of depends on who's hosting it and who all can make the trip. But it originally started Actually, in Providence, the idea being in Venice, they actually have gone to the races all the time. And we would like to grow the sport here to the point where the Italians invite us to compete in their competitions. maybe in our lifetimes it could get to the Olympic level. Which would be really cool.
You know, in my lifetime, both dragon boat racing and curling have become Olympic events. Supposedly, that beanbag game is on the way.
So, if that can do it, I feel like Gondola can make it to the nationals or to the Olympics. But first, we need to have international competitions.
So, the Providence people started it, I think, like eight years ago. And the first one was over there. I didn't go to that one. The next one was in Huntington, and I did compete in that one. And I got one medal.
It was a bronze for the single distance. And that really kind of put fuel in me. Like, I'm an athlete, like, I coach uh boot camp classes and I'm a yoga teacher and when we started doing these competitions I just really, really come to love the competitive aspect of it. Like we're all friends, we all know each other, but just the you know, mostly what I do are the longer races. And I really like kind of the mental aspect of what goes into endurance racing.
It's not like go as quick as you can and then it's done and then just relax and catch your breath. It's like you're gonna be doing this for so long that you're gonna get to the point where you feel miserable and you have to keep going, where you wanna quit and you have to keep going, or it's gonna really hurt and you have to keep going. And I like that. I like being in that headspace of like, you know, they have this phrase that we say, forte a la morte, which means strong till death. And it's like, look, you're gonna row.
And you're either gonna win or you're gonna die from rowing. our distance races end up being anything from 20 minutes to 45 minutes of just rowing and rowing and rowing and I've started to love it more and more as we've had the competitions. I love forte till morte. I'm going to start using it myself. People can ask me what it means and I can tell them of my heavy Italian dialect.
Half of my family heritage comes from Sicily. Oh, that's yeah, our our uh mine too.
Well, that's fantastic. And so t for anybody who's endeavoring to do this and and giving it uh giving it a shot, what do you urge them to do and and except to just go out and try it and have some fun? Yeah, I mean definitely go out and try and have some fun. Like I would say start with just learning the finesse of just regular rowing before race rowing. Like you're really gonna fall, you know, what's gonna make you really fall in love with it is like the first time you see people get engaged on the boat in front of you and you're like, I'm a footnote.
Well, you can go your whole life and like your best friends, your family, you may not ever really see that moment. But when they're doing it like right in front of you, like three feet away from you, you're hearing every word, you're seeing every expression. It's like a beautiful thing. You know, it's like a privilege to behold something like that. And as you get into the racing part of it, you know, as part of the the physical aspect of it, most rowing you're using like a lot of back muscles, a little bit of leg, but mostly you're sitting.
You're standing upright for this, and because the oar never leaves the water, It's really a full body workout like nothing I've ever experienced before. I mean, I've done all kinds of different races and obstacle courses and Spartan runs and something like that, and there's nothing quite like. This. And there is nothing quite like it, and we've had very few interviews quite like this either. And you've been listening to Michael Raffino.
And he's a gondola guy, a professional, and also a competitor. And you can find Mike online by searching for Run Wild Mike. And learn more about the U.S. Gondola Nationals at USGondolanationals.com. Michael Ruffino's story here on Our American Story.
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