Lost in a strange city

Text 1: Astray in Venice, by Lucy Hartwell

An original travel writing written in a nineteenth-century voice; a period simulation, not an archival document.

I set out from the hotel after breakfast with Murray’s Handbook in one hand and a firm intention of reaching the church of the Frari, and within a quarter of an hour I was utterly lost. Venice is not a city but a puzzle invented by a malicious child. Every alley ends in a canal or a blank wall, every bridge looks like every other bridge, and the sun, my only guide, vanished behind the houses after the second turning.

For some time I was very cross, and a little frightened. Then I gave it up. I shut the Handbook and simply walked where the alleys took me, and I came upon a tiny square I have found in no book, with a well in the middle, washing strung from every window, and an old woman feeding a dozen cats. A boy who spoke no English at all saw my confusion, took me by the sleeve, and led me through six turnings to the church door, refusing every coin I offered.

I saw the Frari, and admired it dutifully. But the square with the cats is what I shall remember.

Text 2: Getting Lost on Purpose, by Nadia Rahimi

An original contemporary blog.

My phone died on my second morning in the old city of Fez, somewhere between a leather shop and a man selling live chickens. Without the blue dot on the map I had no idea where I was. The medina has nine thousand alleys, apparently, and they twist back on themselves like spaghetti. I tried to navigate by the minarets and lost sight of them immediately.

I spent the first hour in a quiet panic, getting crosser and hotter. The second hour was the best of the whole trip. I stopped trying to get anywhere and drifted, and found a courtyard with a fountain where men sat drinking mint tea, a workshop where a boy of about twelve was carving wood, a doorway that opened onto a garden full of orange trees. Eventually a girl in a school uniform who had no English and I had no Arabic simply pointed, then walked me most of the way back to my guesthouse and laughed when I tried to give her money.

I charged my phone that night. I have not used the map since.

Both writers describe getting lost in a foreign city.

What are the similarities between the writers’ experiences of being lost?

Draw on evidence from both texts to support your answer.