Una Boda, Blues, y otro Pan de Azucar

About a day after swimming at Vegasol my right ear became infected and extremely painful; they do not chlorinate the pools here so it comes as no surprise. The pharmacist gave me some ear drops which cleared everything up within a few days. I am kind of a fan of this “skip the doctor and head to the pharmacy” thing for minor problems; this round only cost me $5. Tuesday night we headed to a bowling alley with some Venezuelans for a couple hours (~$1.5/hour/person). We bet on the second game and I proceeded to bowl the best game of my life and won 60 Bs. (~$3). Wednesday night there was a Venusa event where we learned how to make arepas.  They are made from corn and avena, which is some sort of oat-based thing that tastes like cream of wheat and has the consistency of oatmeal. Arepas are the Venezuelan equivalent of tortillas or pitas and are eaten for breakfast or dinner. Usually they will fill them with cheese, tuna, or meat. Cointa usually puts eggs in them, which makes for an extremely hardy, but very dry breakfast; we tend to lather on the hot sauce. Most Venezuelans use mayonnaise to alleviate the dryness, but Cointa it seems is not a huge fan of mayo. Thursday as I was heading into the Centro, a motorcycle slammed into the buseta I was taking. They tried to weave around another bus, which hit the bike and sent it flying toward our bus. Thankfully no one was hurt, but the bus drivers had plenty to say to the driver of the motorcycle. Friday I cut my hair and then we headed to la Culata to do some paintballing; I had never been before, but I had a good time. I was more interested in our surroundings; the temperature, fog, and foliage in the mountains above Mérida is something I could get used to. On the way home, we witnessed a fight break out on one of the main roads in town. Four people got out of two cars at a stoplight, started beating the crap out of each other and continued doing so for about two minutes until a cop rolled in and shot his gun in the air wild west style. Crazy man! Aside from this, I have not seen any violence here; a friend of mine got “mugged” on a main road the other day but the guy was too incompetent to take anything from him. Saturday was probably the best day I have had here so far. Early in the morning, Hiro led us up another Pan de Azucar, a hill about a twenty minute walk from our house with a trail that begins in somewhat of a barrio and winds its way into a pine forest. An awesome dog started following us pretty early on and stuck with our crew the whole way; once we reached the top, we gave him some food and then he took a nap. It was pretty sad when we had to get on a bus and leave him there. I am going to return Wednesday morning to run the path, which is exactly what I have been looking for: a nearby, uphill path with breathable air. An instructor told me that the run I did from Venusa to my apartment was probably equivalent to smoking about three cigarettes, so I have mostly been using Venusa’s gym and doing shorter runs in areas with little traffic. Later on in the day, we had the opportunity to attend a Venezuelan wedding. Our friend Martín’s brother Arturo was getting married and managed to get me and five other friends invited. Our plan was to hide out in the back, go unnoticed, and let them have their day, because who wants a bunch of random foreigners hanging out at one of the most important events of your life? However, that plan failed when we discovered that we constituted about 20% of the attendance at the wedding. The bride gave us a shout out, they insisted that we be in virtually all of the wedding pictures, and one of our friends even caught the bouquet despite her best efforts. The wedding was actually fairly similar to those that I have experienced, which is probably because Martín and his family are pretty criollo (descendants of Spanish colonists, “creoles”), and thus bring traditions with a more European twist. Criollos constitute most of the Venezuelan elite, which tends to be dominantly white-skinned. I guess his uncle is fairly high up in the state-owned oil company PDVSA and has met Chavez in person. The priest was easy to understand and even said chévere at one point; he was making the analogy that marriage is like driving around in a car and that sometimes you are driving along a nice highway, bien chévere... He also made the comment that 70% of Venezuelan homes are dysfunctional due to the man not assuming his role as the head of the household; the female, he argued, is the neck in the relationship.  Another interesting thing to note is that the bride got pretty worked up and spoke during the service, while the groom remained silent, in keeping with the machismo culture in which men tend not to display such emotions. It sounds like they are going to Disney World and Cape Canaveral for their honeymoon (I suppose it's possible to get bored of Margarita Island or Chichiriviche). Saturday evening we headed back to the Emu, the bar where we saw the live band last weekend, for a blues band. I cannot say I have been to many, but I think this was the best live blues show that I have ever seen; they had a guy jamming on the piano and harmonica, a pretty soulful vocalist, and an absolutely phenomenal guitarist in the style of Stevie Ray Vaughn. Today a group of about seven of us headed to a public pool for the afternoon and then up to la Culata, where we shared a bottle of homemade blackberry wine and watched the afternoon fog roll in. One of the downsides of hanging out in the mountains all the time is the gnat-sized bugs that plague your legs and arms, leaving volcano-like bites that itch like mad. But hey, I'm hanging out in the Andes, vale la pena. Before this adventure, Martín filled up the tank in his truck, which cost $.30 for 80 liters! It absolutely blows my mind that gas is cheaper than water. The people here consider the absurdly-low price as somewhat of an apology by the government for being so terrible, that and the free university education. This upcoming weekend there is a trip planned to Los Llanos, the area in central Venezuela that I noted earlier as the equivalent of the Wild West. 

Muchos Deportes y un Fin de Semana Muy Relajante

For those who are interested in my health, the medicine I bought from la farmacia worked very well and everything is cleared up. It only cost me a dollar! I might bring some home for future sinus infections. After two days of school, the weekend had rolled around again, and I was glad that we did not really have any plans so we could just hang out in Mérida. Thursday afternoon, I headed over to El Mercado Sotorosa, a farmers’ market pretty close to school that runs Thursday-Saturday. I spent about $3 and bought three parchitas, two guayabas, three tamarindo chinos (starfruit?), an aguacate the size of an eggplant, a bag of flor de Jamaica tea, and a naranja roja. The naranja roja is essentially a grapefruit and is kind of a funny name since, like in English, the word for orange (naranja) resembles the color (anaranjado), so its name literally means “red orange.” I guess not all that funny, but kind of interesting. Thursday evening we chilled in the Plaza Bolívar three blocks from our house. We really lucked out in terms of the neighborhood we live in, since this plaza is the best in town in my opinion and is surrounded by a mall, restaurants, a church, and two licorerias, so it is always full of people. The tour company with which Bruce (see previous post) is associated offered us free rock climbing on Friday in what I assume was an attempt to draw us back since we had started to venture off to other tour agencies for our travels outside Mérida. Anyway, word must not have gotten out, so just seven of us hopped on a bus and traveled about twenty minutes into the mountains and then got off at a random curve in the road where there was a large rock with hooks for climbing. It looked pretty intimidating since none of us had climbed anything other than artificial indoor rock walls, but we became a little more confident watching our guide free climb the wall in order to attach the ropes to the top hook. I was number two to climb; it was surprisingly easy to keep moving up and before I knew it I was at the top. The terrifying part came as I had to lean back until perpendicular to the wall in order to start repelling. For those who haven’t tried, it is the most unnatural feeling putting all of your trust in a rope while looking down and thinking about falling fifty feet to your death. For someone who has almost weekly dreams about falling off of skyscrapers, falling out of church steeples etc., I think I stepped well out of my comfort zone. I climbed one more route and then called it quits. Another added bonus of the day was that Bruce left early, so we were able to talk directly to the tour guides. After a little bit of negotiating, we discovered that we did not need to go through a middle man (Bruce) and could save a bunch of money on our future trips. For example, there is a trip planned to los Llanos, the Venezuelan equivalent of the Wild West, which would have cost $150 and now costs $80. I definitely would not have gone if the price had not changed. We then had lunch at a Mexican place called El Tostano Mexicano. We had all been itching for some Mexican food since Venezuelans do not really use many spices or salsa of any kind. We chowed down on some nachos, tamales, and chimichangas. I spent $7 and had plenty of leftovers for Saturday’s lunch; not too bad in my opinion. Speaking of money, I am thinking about exchanging soon since the rate is now at about 23 to 1 due to the continued instability with Chavez and usual inflation. Inflation is so bad that a year ago or so they moved the decimal one place over on the bolívar since it had devalued so much. Regarding Chavez and the news of his return to Caracas, I am not sure what they’re saying in the US, but the dominant opinion here has been and continues to be that he is clearly dead and they are waiting to say so until the vice president has enough popularity to win an election and continue the regime. Cointa was cooking us some beef the other day and asked us how we like it done. I replied medium well with very little red, and Cointa responded ”ahhhh las Chavistas” (in reference to the red). Friday afternoon I spent some quality time hanging out with Cointa and she showed me how she makes juices from fruits. We made a smoothie of parchita, guayaba, tamarindo chino, and naranja roja and she showed me how to sift out the seeds from the parchita. Friday night we hung out with our new friend Martín, who drove us around in the back of his truck (fully legal or extremely unenforced, not sure which), and showed us his favorite places in town. Saturday we played some basketball and soccer, both of which I am pretty terrible at, against a group of our Venezuelan friends. They tend to be pretty average at basketball, but extremely good at soccer since they play virtually since the day they are born. Although I clearly had a good time, I am perpetually reminded of my permanent status as the kid in right field dazing into the distance and picking at clovers. Later on, I made another smoothie on my own of lechoza (papaya), parchita, and tamarindo chino. Cointa later scolded me for not sifting out the seeds of the parchita, which apparently contain carcinogens? After I told her I kept the seeds of the lechoza in the mixture, she was relieved, saying that the good properties in those seeds would cancel out the bad in the others. I have been having a lot of fun with Cointa; she is fun to joke around with and her mannerisms and habits can be pretty hilarious. My friend Andrew and I have been talking about trying to record one of her rants or just her usual phrases so we can remember what it’s like to live with her. Every time we say gracias for a breakfast of cereal, she will joke “oh I was up all night making it,” without fail, every time. I’m really going to miss living with her when I have to leave; she has a very peaceful presence and a great perspective on life. I always laugh whenever she lectures us about how terrible Venezuelan women are. She is very protective of us and will tell us how all the Venezuelan woman only want our money and the men are all borrachos. I really cannot emphasize enough how much we lucked out living with Cointa. Saturday night we saw some live music for the first time, which was absolutely phenomenal. Not sure if anyone in the reading audience knows Umphrey’s McGee, but the vibes were similar; they were jammin pretty hard.  I had a good conversation with a long-haired Venezuelan hipster dude; this was the first venue where we came across a kind of Venezuelan “counterculture.” Before the band started, the bar was showing live Nirvana videos and had plenty of Stones and Zeppelin posters. Not sure how, but a couple weeks back we became connected with two Venezuelan brothers, Jiro and Freddie, with whom we have become pretty good friends. They are really great guys and put up with our terrible soccer game; they were the ones who keyed us in on the live show. Sunday we went to the largest waterpark in South America called Vegasol, and had a great time jumping off the diving boards, playing volleyball, and just hanging out. They did not let us go down the slide since we weren’t wearing speedos? I offered to pay some bolívares, but to no avail. I have really gotten used to living here, and I am loving it. Keep the comments coming; it is super interesting to hear everyone’s take on what is going on here. I am eternally grateful for the scholarships and support from my parents that have allowed me to go on this adventure; my worldview has already shifted quite a bit and my Spanish has improved dramatically. I am missing good old Minnesota quite a bit, especially Mom, Dad, Max and Ziggy, but I am really having the time of my life and am glad to be able to stay connected via the wonders of the interwebs.

Carnaval y la Culata

Long weekend = long post; brace yourself. We spent most of Friday gathering supplies for our upcoming adventure; the Pico Bolívar plans had fallen through due to a lack of guides, so we would be going in two separate crews to El Parque Nacional Sierra la Culata. Our crew of four guys and three girls would be going without a guide for two nights, while the other crew of three dudes would be going with a guide for three nights with a side trip to some hot springs. In retrospect, I probably should have jumped onto that train, but we ended up saving a bunch of money and having a more memorable experience. Per the advice of Cesar, our Phonetics instructor, we went to la Plaza de Heroinas, where we met an awesome woman who could rent us equipment. Dressed in sundress and bandana, she had a mystique about her and spoke a pretty chévere brand of castellano. She rented us tents and sleeping bags at less than half the price of the “endorsed” travel agent Bruce, the guy who organized our first trip to the Páramo and the beach. Although he is fairly reliable, our relations have slowly turned sour as we discovered how much he is overcharging us. Our trip cost me about $5, while that of the other crew cost about $60. Around noon, we headed over to the Plaza de Toros to buy tickets for the next day’s bullfight. We waited in line in the hot sun for about an hour and did not move an inch due to a guy up front trying to buy all the tickets so he could resell them at a higher price. At this point, we decided it was not worth it to spend our whole afternoon waiting to buy tickets for a sport we were not all that keen on in the first place. Virtually every Merideño we had talked to said they were opposed to the bullfights, but that it is something you should do once, our main motivation. Most of our friends who went did not make it past the third bull (they kill at least six each match), and they told us plenty of horror stories of bulls goring horses to thunderous applause and one bull who apparently was not angry enough, so they killed it in back and sent out a new one that would provide more “entertainment.” We then made a trip to the Garzón to buy food before heading to church with Cointa for her birthday. Mass in Venezuela is less formal and much more focused on the fellowship aspect; the sign of peace was a good 5-10 minute affair complete with its own song, and the whole mass had plenty of clapping. I had to laugh when Cointa answered a phone call halfway through mass and proceeded to have a hushed five minute conversation. I was able to hang onto about 60-70% of the words during the service; hearing any language is difficult via a muffled microphone. Later that night, we wanted to head over to the area surrounding the Plaza de Toros to see what the Carnaval was all about, but were warned by about five different people that a group of gringos heading over there past 9PM is a guaranteed robbery, so we passed on that.  Saturday we got some last minute supplies, sat in the plaza by our place for a few hours watching pigeons’ mating rituals, and ate cake with a few Venezolanos at a café. All the Americans were surprised when the cake came virtually waterlogged; I guess traditional Venezuelan cake tends to be pretty soggy, who knew?

Sunday morning we awoke around 5:45AM to the usual cacophony of car horns and car alarms. I imagine Venezuelan driving school must go something like this: Approaching intersection? Horn. Need to run red light without stopping? Horn. Pedestrian? Horn. Not moving? Horn. The car alarms are equally as incessant, going off at the slightest stimulus, especially fireworks, which create an obnoxious chain reaction of car alarms. Cointa is used to it obviously, but none of us can sleep in past about 8AM due to the noise. Rant over. There was a heavy fog covering the whole city reminiscent of the one in the 1980's film (free of zombie pirates, however), which made me a little bit nervous. Cesar had said “cuando se baja la neblina, pueden  perderse.” Nonetheless, we hopped on the 8AM bus to la Culata and arrived at about nine, delayed by an interesting costume parade in one of the small towns along the way. Due to some bad advice, we spent about two hours trudging through farm fields before finding the real trailhead. In an effort to be helpful, Venezuelans will give you directions even if they don’t know the way, which is something I will be more careful of in the future. Although I had a map, we did not know exactly where we got dropped off, so a compass reading would have been useless. For the next couple hours, we slowly transitioned from farmland to the mountain Páramo ecosystem, which I have learned is a general term for a particular subset of alpine tundra climate characterized by the giant rosette plants which you can see in most of my pictures. After a brief lunch on a mountain pass we walked through Valle el Muerto, and then trudged up a pretty steep incline, at which point the fog which we had been outrunning all day caught up with us and visibility was limited to about twenty feet. I kept thinking, “Wow, Mom would love this fog!” We followed a path next to a river until about 3PM when we decided it would be best to set up camp since we could not really see anything. The rain started falling as soon as we stopped and things started to get interesting. We had banked on our ability to make fire in order to cook food, which became infinitely more difficult once the already-sparse wood became soaked. With the effort of all seven of us, we managed to maintain a fire with the dry undersides of the giant rosette plants just long enough to cook some pasta. We were probably a little irresponsible in our choice of group members as some people did not bring rain jackets and became pretty miserable following the rain. After dinner, everyone jumped into the tents to stay dry. The fog had lifted and I still had quite a bit of energy so I climbed a nearby ridge and explored for about two hours. I was in awe of the overwhelming silence, punctuated by drops of rain here and there. I had just started thinking about how great it would be if the rain stopped so I could take some pictures when sure enough, providence gave me about fifteen minutes of clear skies to do so. Throughout this entire journey, I have become more conscious of my time spent in and out of the moment. Standing on top of the ridge humbled by the harsh peaks above, I felt more “in the moment” than I have in a long time. Something I learned later on is that due to the geography of the area, all the cloud systems in the valley will eventually work their way up to la Culata, hit the ridge we were camping next to, and turn into rain every day at about 3PM. Now we know. We spent the rest of the night in tents playing cards and then had a pretty miserable night of restless “sleep” since we were packed into small tents. We had been told we were renting a five-man tent, and I had my two-man tent with me, so we figured we could sleep comfortably. However, the five-man turned out to be more of a three-man, so two other dudes and I packed like sardines into my tiny tent. At about 7AM, the girls had had enough and were itching to head home, so we cleaned up our camp and then split into two groups. It was sunny and warm, so my friend Andrew and I decided to go a little further to the base of Pan de Azucar, the peak we had hoped to climb and probably would have except for our two-hour detour at the beginning of the day. The magnitude of our failure was made more painful and embarrassing upon hearing that the other group with the guide had summited Pan de Azucar.  Still, I think our group needed a weekend to do our own thing without a tour guide; I suppose this was more a practice round.  Despite some discomfort, our small crew got to know each other really well, and I learned that a stove and dining fly are a necessity. One of the guys from the other crew said he would easily be able to reproduce the trip they did this weekend without a guide, so I think in a few weeks we will assemble a hardy group of backpackers and do that trip, or a variation on the one we just did. When I got home yesterday, I slept for about 15-16 hours. For the past week, my glands have been pretty swollen, I have been having some ear pain, and my nose has been running pretty steadily. I had attributed two of those symptoms to the constant elevation changes and my allergies, but yesterday I was having trouble swallowing and was kind of feverish, so I went to the farmacia, and they recommended some medicine to take for what I assume is a sinus infection. According to Cointa, I would have had to go to the emergency room to get medical attention since everywhere else is closed due to las Ferias, but she said the pharmacist would say the same thing a doctor would anyway. If nothing changes within the next couple days, I will go to a clinic and get better advice. This weekend was not at all what I expected, but I had a great time anyway! Tonight we played a little basketball at a court near our place. Cointa has been listening to this station that seems to play only cheesy covers of late 70’s and early 80’s classic rock, and they just finally played the original of Huey Lewis' “The Power of Love,” so I’m in a good mood. 

La Tercera Semana

The past week has been fairly uneventful since the beach, but here are a few thoughts. I have been making many adventures al Centro as well as some other spots in town in an attempt to get to know the city, which has been pretty successful. I have gotten to know the bus system pretty well and it´s actually kind of fun. Instead of a few buses that run on fixed routes and go down main streets at fixed times, there are infinitely more smaller buses that run on pretty much every street except the most side of side streets. They belong to about five different companies rather than just the one transit company that most US cities contract with, so they have some of that good ol' capitalistic competition going on. Although there are official stops, you can usually jump on at an intersection or wherever the bus is stopped. When you want to get off you yell “la parada por favor” (stop please) or “donde pueda” (where you can) if you are not at an official stop and then pay 2.5 Bs. or about $.17. They usually play some pretty good tunes so it´s a very entertaining ride. There is a young couple that rides the buses and plays tunes on the cuatro so it's always exciting when you get on those buses. I thoroughly enjoy going around town via the buses, shopping for fruit or vegetables, and using my Spanish skills.  My favorite new fruits are parchitas and guayabas, which are both pretty citrusy. Supposedly you can find them in the states, but I have never come across them. Unfortunately you need to wash all fresh produce with hot water and vinegar to get rid of parasites. The other day I was feeling low on veggies, so I bought a couple broccolis at the Mercado Principal and have been eating those and some cashews for lunch. The lunches at VENUSA are pretty good and only cost about $3 a piece, but I like to switch it up. We ate lunch at McDonalds the other day, so I have been apologizing to my body ever since. The McDonalds sandwiches actually resemble the advertisements, which caught me off guard. It was about as expensive as in the states, even with the good exchange rate, meaning it is extremely expensive for the locals. Last night we went to an heladeria (ice cream store) known for its hundreds of flavors, including salmon, tuna, and viagra. They usually only have about ten on display at any given time. I was not feeling like whiskey, rum, or coconut, so I opted for the old standbys coffee and chocolate. I´ll be more adventurous next time. The ice cream here tends to be grainy and less creamy, but still tastes great. For this weekend, we had been thinking about making a trip to Parque Nacional Sierra la Culata, one of two national parks close to Mérida. We went to the other one, Parque Nacional Sierra Nevada a couple weeks ago (see Páramo post), but only really spent a few hours there. Since this would be our first trip without a guide, I wanted to get a map that I could use with the compass I brought. I went to about four different places without success, but finally had some luck yesterday at la oficina de INparques (Instituto Nacional de las Parques). I think in an attempt to boost their tourist industry and the money that goes to guides, they do not make maps as readily available as in the states. They told me to come back at 9AM this morning, which I did and got a very detailed map for $3! It took about five minutes into the conversation for them to ask, “¿De dónde eres?” which is my new record. However, last night one of our group members decided this would be a good weekend to climb Pico Bolívar, the tallest mountain in Venezuela (16,300 feet) since it is about a four day trip and we have next Monday and Tuesday off of school for Carnaval / Ferias del Sol and would not really have another chance. Most of us agreed, me included, so that trip might be happening this weekend. We are still waiting to hear back about guides. It would only be about a two day trip if we could use the teleférico, the longest and highest in the world. However, about six years ago, a support pole broke and many tourists and locals alike died in the accident. They are still working on fixing it, but I am not trying to get near it anytime soon. Anyway, we´ll see what happens this weekend. If we don´t climb the mountain, we´ll spend a couple days trying to get the best out of Carnaval (basically a five day weekend of bull fights and drinking), and then head up to la Culata on Sunday and do some camping. Either way, I´m excited!

La Playa

This past weekend we took an amazing trip to Chichiriviche, a lazy tourist town on the northern coast of Venezuela. We left late Thursday evening and were thankfully able to sleep for a good chunk of the twelve-hour bus ride. Around 10AM on Friday we arrived at our Posada, a small hotel run by an old Italian couple and headed out for a tour pretty soon after, during which we explored a couple different caves and saw a sunken ship. Afterward, they brought us to an island off the coast that is part of El Parque Nacional de Morrocoy. There we jumped around in the waves and tried fruitlessly to body surf. At one point we had an old log pushed pretty far out and were attempting some logrolling. We explored a little further down the beach and discovered the heaps of trash brought in by the waves. Venezuela is a beautiful country, but has some pretty serious problems with trash. We spent most of the day there tossing around a frisbee (which cost us $27 back in Mérida!), and then headed back to Chichiriviche, where we ate a simple dinner and then headed out to an outdoor market with handmade goods (geared towards tourists). Saturday we got up pretty early and headed out to Cayo Sombrero, where we did some snorkeling near a reef and saw some puffer fish, sea stars, plenty of coral, some small jellyfish, and schools of other tropical fish. It was a pretty amazing and peaceful experience, something I'll probably never forget. Later on we explored Cayo Sombrero, Cayo Muerto, and a few other spots. The beaches were absolutely indescribable; picture your typical postcard tropical beach and then multiply by ten. I bought a pretty cool hat, which cost me 50 Bs. or a little over $3. We also ran into a guy from the states who is playing baseball in Venezuela and lives with his wife and young daughter. It was pretty interesting to hear his story about moving permanently to Venezuela. Sunday morning, we pretty much just ate breakfast and got back on the bus. At about 4PM, we were driving down some mountain roads and stumbled upon a long line of cars, at the front of which was a tree blocking the road. We got out for about an hour and watched some locals clear it away with a chainsaw and manpower (we obviously would have liked to help, but the machismo Venezuelan culture already provided plenty of eager men). This weekend was honestly something out of a dream; I've always known beautiful places like this existed, but seeing them with my own eyes is something I'll always remember.