Shopping list...

Well, I know it has been an awful long time since I have written anything on here, so I’ll be surprised if anyone really sees this, but for those of you who do, let me try to quell your frustration at my inattention to this blog by a fun activity about shopping in Venezuela.

It’s really difficult to exchange money in Venezuela, sometimes… especially since Chavez blocked all of the websites that let you know what the parallel rate of the dollar is… so I got down pretty low in cash recently, to about 60 BsF (or roughly $8) earlier this week.

So when my friend wrote to me and said that as soon as I got home he would change money for me, I decided to go all out and spend about 7 of the 8 dollars, leaving me enough money to get to and from work on the bus… so what did I buy?

First I decided that I would buy avocados. I spent about 75 cents and got (1/2/4) avocados (circle the correct response). I kept walking, and decided that I would like to buy a gift for a friend as well, I found some lovely, bright red coconut shell earrings and made a grand purchase of one pair of earrings for approximately ($1/$1.50/$2). I continued on my way, and saw a sign for tomatoes, 10 BsF, so I bought a bag. I did not have any idea how many tomatoes there were until I got home and counted them. For about $1.50, I had purchased (16/21/29) tomatoes. I continued on and saw bags of onions, peppers, and all kinds of other things. I purchased two 5 BsF (about 75 cents) bags—of (3/5/8) onions and (3/5/8) peppers. Finally, as I continued walking I decided that the last thing I was to purchase was going to be mangoes. So I found a $1.50 bag of mangoes, and loaded it all on the bus. At home I realized the bag had (10/16/21) mangoes in it.

So check your answers. With my $7, I bought…
- 2 avocados
- 1 pair of earrings ($1.50)
- 29 tomatoes
- 8 onions
- 3 green peppers
- 21 mangoes

Now things are not always this cheap. In fact, though it doesn’t appear to be true from the story I just told here, food can be really expensive in Venezuela. For example.
- 1 apple -- $1.50-$2
- 1 pear -- $2
- 1 two-person pizza -- $10-12
- Can of soda -- $1.50
- Sugar – priceless, because you can never find it
- Oil – priceless, because you can never find it

And the list of priceless things can go on and on. That is the other thing about shopping in Venezuela… Many things just don’t exist. The first time that I bought sugar in Venezuela was about a month ago, simply because it was the first time that I had ever seen it for sale. Some weeks there is no milk, some weeks no flour of any kind, sometimes no candles, sometimes no meat…

The problem in Venezuela is perhaps more that wages are extraordinarily low and do not keep up with inflation, than the fact that food is extraordinarily expensive. There are two national subsidized food programs in Venezuela, Mercal and PDVAL. While most people would agree that these programs are good, they undoubtedly have their problems. For example, a few months ago when I was visiting Maracaibo, there was a line that wrapped all the way around the block. This is not unusual – bank lines, government office lines, and other lines often wrap around three sides of a block here. But this line was to purchase federally subsidized food from the Mercal program. I went and asked people how long they had been in line, “We spent all night here,” was their answer. And at the same time, the other week in Venezuela, 22,000 tons of federally subsidized food were found spoiled. That’s a perfect example of the problems with the Venezuelan “socialist” system-- People starving and waiting in line for 24 hours for food that is sitting in storage containers spoiling.

So what have I been doing for the last several months, I’m sure you are wondering…? I guess my best answer would be just living life. It is amazing how much of a life you can create for yourself in a new place in just a few months. I know so many people here, have seen so many places, have so many things to do… just like living a life anywhere. Of course it’s slightly more dangerous, more colorful, there’s more music, and it’s all in another language, but for the most part things have sort of normalized. I’ll be coming home on August 18th (the question that everyone asks…), though I leave Venezuela on July 17th. I will be traveling for a month with a friend through Ecuador and Peru before returning home… and what’s in store when I get home…? WHO KNOWS!?! Love you, and see you soon!