...and they emerged with an armful of anaconda...

In November, I sort of had this vision that I would spend almost all of my December holiday in Valera. Because what else was I going to do for 4 weeks? This was sort of appealing— spending time with all of my favorite people here, going out all the time, meeting families, etc... But somehow my December and January just turned out differently. It was definitely more eventful than that, much more full of adventure and excitement than I think my original plan would have been, though I guess I will never know. When I got back from the beach, it was a big surprise to hear that although my boss had told me we went back to class January 4th, we didn’t actually go back until the 11th. So, having the patas calientes (hot feet—a nickname my friend gave me) that I do, I decided to hop on a trip to Los Llanos that my American counterparts had planned from Merida.

I met a friend at the terminal who was also headed for Merida and we hopped a carrito together. We spent the whole trip chatting, laughing at the way the bag of plantain chips I had bought puffed up like an overinflated balloon and how my water bottle exploded in my face as we climbed in altitude up the mountains. In Merida, we were greeted at the terminal by the wonderfully familiar faces of my American Fulbright friends…

In Merida the next day we went to a destination that I have been meaning to check out for a while, the zoo! It was really nice, but I think there were probably less than 10 animals in the whole zoo that I recognized. Some of them were vaguely familiar, others completely absurd looking. I felt the same way about the people walking through the zoo—there were two large events happening simultaneously in Merida—a paragliding competition and a motorcycle rally. Put together eccentric Venezuelans, parachutes, motorcycles and exotic zoo animals, and let me tell you, the people-watching is arguably better than the animal watching… even at the zoo.

After a lovely afternoon in the park, and drinking a very thick, elmer’s-glue-white, vaguely alcoholic and very sweet concoction called, “vitamina,” we returned back to Emma’s (Fulbrighter) apartment. We made an American feast for dinner (including chocolate chip cookies!). Several of Emma’s friends arrived to say hello. As soon as one of her friends walked in, I was really sure that I knew him, but couldn’t figure out from where. “This is Edwin…” Hm, he seemed vaguely familiar…

Edwin was quite the character. Very giggly, talkative, energetic, hilarious, exaggerated, and OBSESSED with Emma. I think in a single night he must have recounted at least 80% of the total time they had spent together … in detail. She had warned us that he might be a little much, but it very quickly became evident that maybe she felt that way because he was so obsessed with her. I remembered that I had met him several months earlier in a bar/café in Merida. We had a great night together in the apartment. As per usual there was no electricity, so we stayed in, listened to music from the battery powered laptop and had our own little private dance party instead of venturing out to the disco that surely would have had no electricity. As the night progressed, a suggestion was made that Edwin should come on our trip. Immediately after he said yes, that he wanted to, Emma made the throat slitting gesture. “No, Edwin you can’t come we planned this trip a long time ago and it’s too late to make a reservation…” Lies, but it was clear that she didn’t want him to come and that he picked up on the not-so-subtle hints she was giving. No flamboyant, excited, energetic, silly, overly affectionate Edwin on the trip. No debate.

The next morning we woke up early and went to the tour company. The first surprise was that our tour guide was not going to be the gentle, kind, young man who had been affectionately nicknamed the “Cherub” by those who had met him, but rather a young, large, somewhat stoic Scottish man. The second surprise was we were going to have others join us on our tour. And the last, but CERTAINLY not the least surprising, was when, with open arms, and a goofy grin on his face, in walked Edwin, dropping his duffle bag on the floor. “SURRRPPP--- RRRISEEE!!!!” he exclaimed, making a wide sweeping gesture with his arms. Believe it or not, he made his own arrangements to join our tour. Needless to say, all of our jaws dropped and we burst out in giggles. “This is NOT good but SO hilarious...” I thought… We would all spend the next 4 days randomly and uncontrollably bursting out in laughter just remembering the moment…

The nine hour drive to los llanos was full of music, photo shoots, snack breaks, and good company. We arrived at our camp in good spirits, said good night to the caimans and crocodiles in the river next to our camp, and hopped in our hammocks. The next day we went on a boat tour to see wildlife--- mainly a variety of incredible birds, turtles, amphibians, capybaras, caimans, and the famous PINK FRESHWATER DOLPHINS! That’s right, pink dolphins… I must admit, when I first heard of the pink dolphins I thought it was a joke. But they are real. They are not THAT pink, but they are definitely pink, really big, and very dolphin-y. Incredible, really. The highlight of the boat trip, though, had to be when our guide, who was poking a long stick along the bottom of the river suddenly appeared to have fallen into the pirhana-, caiman-, and crocodile-infested river. We watched dumbfounded, as he batted away piranhas and dove headfirst into the muddy water. I was sure that our guide was a gonner, when he emerged with the nastiest, weirdest, worst smelling turtle that I have ever seen. It was like a creature from another planet. We helped him, and his newfound turtle back in the boat and breathed/giggled a sigh/laugh of relief. And plugged our noses.

After an afternoon siesta, we went out anaconda- and capybara-searching. For those of you who don’t know what a capybara is, it is the largest rodent on earth. It looks kind of like a hugely overgrown gopher, and not only do they swim, they leap through the water in little packs. They’re really pretty undeniably cute, though I hear that they are pretty aggressive. After seeing a lot of capybaras, our fearless Scotsman really focused in on the goal: find an anaconda for the tourists. Anaconda searching was a lot like searching for the smelly turtle. It just involved walking through the caiman-infested swamp poking around with a stick until you found one. Needless to say, I stayed on the sidelines, appreciating the experience from a distance.

After a half an hour or so of stick poking, it became clear that there had been an anaconda sighting. Suddenly our favorite Scotsman and the other guide went chasing after something. The Venezuelan guide suddenly plunged into the water (the same guide who got the turtle, mind you) and emerged with an armful of anaconda. They both threw their bodies at the anaconda, yanking as hard as they could, when they shouted out for help. Swearing a lot in Spanish, they yelled at everyone to come help. We all debated, looked at one another, and stayed put. As they continued to yell for help, Antoni (a fellow Fulbrighter) and Edwin took off to go help hank. The four of them got the snake under control and carried it over. The snake was 6 METERS LONG (ie about 20 feet) and it was SO HEAVY. They draped it over our necks, we took pictures and they released it. It slithered off into the water like nothing had happened. Impressive. We ate a celebratory cantaloupe, hopped back on top of the jeep, and held on tight like we were told to do (aggarense duro!) and sped off into the sunset.

The next day we woke up and went horseback riding. The horseback ride was surprisingly dull. We saw a deadly snake and a lot of trees, but several of the horses appeared to be half asleep they were so slow. Our destination was a little pirhana fishing hole along the river. I’m embarrassed to admit that after an hour or so of fishing I didn’t actually successfully catch a single piranha. Here’s the thing—they fish for piranhas with a line and hook by just yanking on the line when they feel a bite. Simple, right? Wrong. I got several piranhas out of the water, but it was nearly impossible to actually hook them, so they just flopped back into the water. Failure. Back in the camp, after eating all the pirhanas that we (by which I mean everyone else) caught, we casually walked out towards the river, where our guides casually grabbed a caiman out of the river in the pitch black. We touched it and stared deep into its menacing eyes. With a swift toss, it was back in the water and we were on our way back to camp, where we sang and danced the night away to all the latest Baliwood hits that Edwin naturally had saved in his cellphone.

The trip back was long. 9-10 hours back to Merida, 6 hours back to Valera… the thing about traveling in Venezuela is that although a trip might only take 3 hours normally, on a bad day you may sit in a traffic jam that doesn’t move for 6 hours, or occasionally indefinitely. This could be for a variety of reasons. Perhaps there was an accident, perhaps there was construction, perhaps some sort of integral piece of infrastructure suddenly collapsed, perhaps there are people protesting in the streets, perhaps there is a party, or perhaps there is no reasonable explanation at all. My favorite explanation so far for a traffic jam that lasted about an hour or so was that we couldn’t get through because they sold really good chicken in this place. ?? It did smell pretty divine, but I was not humored by the explanation at the time…

Life in Valera has re-commenced and is back in full swing. I have lots of classes again—two classes of level 2 English students at the university and I am continuing giving classes at the rural elementary schools with the Bibliomulas program. I also moved about a week and a half ago and am much happier with my new living arrangement. I am very grateful towards the family that I was living with before for treating me so well, but I really felt like I wanted to live more independently in a safer part of town. I am much happier living in a house that does not have other people renting rooms—I live with one other woman who is very intelligent and very passionate. I am also living right in front of the nicest park in town—and am able to go jogging or join in on the dance therapy classes there every day. In this house I am now buying all my own food, cooking for myself, and I have my own private room and bathroom (not to mention flat screen TV and cleaning lady haha) that are gorgeous. I also feel much freer to go out on the town—transportation is closer, it is safer to arrive after dark here, friends are closer… It has definitely been an upgrade in the living situation and location. Between my new classes, my new independent living situation, and the fact that I finally feel like I have friends, I am basically always really busy now. It’s a good feeling. It makes me realize why there are so many people with hired help here...

I make a concerted effort on this blog to not talk politics, but I just want to take a moment to calm any potentially worried minds. If you follow Venezuelan news, you probably have heard a few things in the last weeks, 1) That there are severe shortages of electricity and water in the country (directly related since nearly all the countries electricity comes from hydroelectric dams in the eastern part of the country), and which led the government to implement a schedule for rolling blackouts and turning off the water throughout the country, 2) That the government shut down a major opposition news channel, resulting in major protests in most Venezuelan cities, in which multiple people have died, 3) The vice president and his wife (also in a position of power) both stepped down from their offices last week for “personal reasons” which happened to coincide nearly exactly with the appointment of a Cuban militant to be in charge of fixing the infrastructure problems related to the lack of power.

So, all this and I can imagine what you’re thinking… but let me reassure you that while the situation here is complicated and dangerous, I am staying in safe environments. Last week I was only able to teach two days, given that the entire state shut down all schools from Wednesday-Monday because most of the roads in town were blocked off for traffic. Everything has mostly calmed down in Valera, but it remains like the wild wild west in other parts of the country. I spent the last several days in Caracas visiting with almost all of the other FUlbrighters, and when I arrived on Thursday morning, an 8 hour bus ride turned into a 13 hour bus ride because there were flocks of people dressed head to toe in red headed to Caracas from all over the country. In the city, all the roads were blocked off and groups of Chavistas were walking all over the streets- even through traffic on the interstate. Everything is really heated up right now, and it is unclear what will happen in the following months before the September legislative election… We shall see.

On another note, I was just in Peru! The Fulbright program organized a conference for us in Mexico! So naturally, our flight from Caracas to Mexico City went through Lima…? That’s the furthest south I have ever been, I believe. It seemed pretty normal. J

Well, I will keep you all posted on the situation here. Love you all.