Monday, February 05, 2007
What I've been up to
Today, April 3rd, when I arrived at my apartment building, the landlord told me that we finally have internet! So here I am, writing anew. Pardon the absence, and I do hope you enjoy the pics. Today, May 9th, it turns out that my landlord hasn't been able to get the damn machine to work still, so I'm finishing up this tardy entry at CEVAZ, where I work.
The Yupa Boys (December)
I took a trip in December to the Sierra Perija mountains to the South of Maracaibo with a group of entomologists from the University of Zulia. Finally, I got to go to the woods with people who are even more into bugs than I am. At night, I went into the lush woods to catch scorpions and gigantic, poisonous spiders. During the day, we spent time in a village of a tribe of people called Yupa indians. These people learn Spanish as a second language, so only some adult and teenage men could communicate with us. These kids mostly just looked at us and played with the soccer ball we brought them in the field that can be seen in the background. The field had about 4 types of feces on it: horse, dog, pig, and chicken.
The entomologists (December)
These young scientists are discouraged from drinking on excursions by their faculty mentors, so instead they did all sorts of fun activities at night. On this evening, we sat in a circle had a tertulia where each person was allowed to ask someone else one question and they had to answer it. Most of the talk was about love, sex, and heartbreak. The one question rule was invariably violated and I ended up relating a fairly detailed personal history to a bunch of Maracuchos that I barely knew. This trip was just three months into my time here in Venezuela, so my Spanish was challenged and hugely expanded in these four days of uninterrupted immersion.
Curacao, Part 2 (January)
My friend Rosie and his family came down to the island of Curacao to visit me. Curacao is about 30 miles off of the Venezuelan coast, so it was a quick 45 minute plane ride from Maracaibo. Unfortunately, I left my camera on a cab during the trip, so lost all of the pics of our time together on the island. I went to the USA directly from Curacao, bought a camera, and then spent one more night in Curacao on my return leg of the trip. In my one day, I walked around the island for several hours. I snapped this shot in an abandoned lot. Tropical climates sure are good for flowers.
AISEC Promotional Photo (February)
Can you pick out the foreigners in this picture? These are my friends from the international exchange program AISEC. They needed to take some promotional photos for AISEC Venezuela, so they asked me to come. If you'll notice, I'm wearing a yarmulke. We took this pic at the Paseo del Lago, a big circular park located just beside Lake Maracaibo. At the Paseo, there are go-carts, a water park, ball fields, and sandwich joints. The police patrol here day and night, so it's a good place to go for an evening or early morning run. In the background of this shot, you can see a broken down, artificial waterfall.
Melting Monsters (March)
My friend Adam came to visit me a couple of months back during his spring break from grad school. He's the only person to actually make it to mainland Venezuela for a visit. As soon as he arrived, we took a series of buses to the city of Tucacas, by Morrocoy national park, home of Los Cayos (The Keys). Los Cayos are a series of tiny desert islands covered in mangroves and surrounded by torquoise water. We took a boat tour and saw a colony of frigatebirds - giant, agressive raptors that are famous for stealing food from eachother in midair. We stayed overnight on the biggest island called Cayo Sombrero. There, we met Miguela, who was staying there for a girls weekend with her mom and aunts. They fed us sausage, salad, yuca, rum, and wine. We ended up staying up until 3 AM, looking at the stars in the completely clear sky. At one point, Miguela, who spoke stunningly good English though she had never taken a course of any sort, told us to act like melting monsters for a picture. This is what emerged.
The Enormous Bladder Stone of Major General Rafaul Urdaneta (March)
In my continuing series on inflamed body parts, here we see the actual bladder stone taken from the corpse of General Rafael Urdaneta, liberator of Zulia, Venezuela. He was famous for decapitating his enemies in battle. General Urdaneta was an excellent soldier and statesman who fought beside Simon Bolivar, The Liberator, in the wars for the independence of Gran Colombia from Spain in the 1800's. Like many old soldiers whose bodies were worn down by the brutality of battle and long marches, Urdaneta suffered from many health problems. This stone, made largely of crystallized uric acid and calcium salts, weighs more than a 1/4 of a pound and is about the size of a coke can. It finally killed the old general when he was 73 years old. Interestingly, Urdaneta lived long enough to be captured in a dageurrotype image on his deathbed.
The Yupa Boys (December)
I took a trip in December to the Sierra Perija mountains to the South of Maracaibo with a group of entomologists from the University of Zulia. Finally, I got to go to the woods with people who are even more into bugs than I am. At night, I went into the lush woods to catch scorpions and gigantic, poisonous spiders. During the day, we spent time in a village of a tribe of people called Yupa indians. These people learn Spanish as a second language, so only some adult and teenage men could communicate with us. These kids mostly just looked at us and played with the soccer ball we brought them in the field that can be seen in the background. The field had about 4 types of feces on it: horse, dog, pig, and chicken.
The entomologists (December)
These young scientists are discouraged from drinking on excursions by their faculty mentors, so instead they did all sorts of fun activities at night. On this evening, we sat in a circle had a tertulia where each person was allowed to ask someone else one question and they had to answer it. Most of the talk was about love, sex, and heartbreak. The one question rule was invariably violated and I ended up relating a fairly detailed personal history to a bunch of Maracuchos that I barely knew. This trip was just three months into my time here in Venezuela, so my Spanish was challenged and hugely expanded in these four days of uninterrupted immersion.
View of Los Nevados and environs (December)
My fellow Fulbright friend, Elvin, and I took a 6-hour hike from the beautiful mountain town of Merida to the tiny pueblo of Los Nevados, elevation 8000 feet. First, we took a cablecar ride from Merida, elevation 5200 feet up to the top of a mountain called Pico El Aguila, 16000 feet. We then hiked down through stunning, rough landscapes for an entire afternoon, discussing geography and biology, and stopping frequently to fill our air-deprived lungs with air and to pass gas, as I suffer from high altitude flatulence. We finally rounded a corner to see this tiny town nestled amidst giant mountains.
A night scene (December)
In the town of Los Nevados, Elvin and I found a nice inn where you get a room, dinner, and breakfast for $6.50/night. We walked out to the square and met some college kids from Merida, with whom we played dominos and drank a nasty, warm, licorice-flavored liquor called Aguardiente. We were sitting inside a small bar, playing, when we heard music outside. There was a parade! Actually, it was just these three guys playing instruments and some other dudes shooting off bottle rockets, but it was a nice spectacle.
Curacao, Part 2 (January)My friend Rosie and his family came down to the island of Curacao to visit me. Curacao is about 30 miles off of the Venezuelan coast, so it was a quick 45 minute plane ride from Maracaibo. Unfortunately, I left my camera on a cab during the trip, so lost all of the pics of our time together on the island. I went to the USA directly from Curacao, bought a camera, and then spent one more night in Curacao on my return leg of the trip. In my one day, I walked around the island for several hours. I snapped this shot in an abandoned lot. Tropical climates sure are good for flowers.
AISEC Promotional Photo (February)
Can you pick out the foreigners in this picture? These are my friends from the international exchange program AISEC. They needed to take some promotional photos for AISEC Venezuela, so they asked me to come. If you'll notice, I'm wearing a yarmulke. We took this pic at the Paseo del Lago, a big circular park located just beside Lake Maracaibo. At the Paseo, there are go-carts, a water park, ball fields, and sandwich joints. The police patrol here day and night, so it's a good place to go for an evening or early morning run. In the background of this shot, you can see a broken down, artificial waterfall.
Melting Monsters (March)
My friend Adam came to visit me a couple of months back during his spring break from grad school. He's the only person to actually make it to mainland Venezuela for a visit. As soon as he arrived, we took a series of buses to the city of Tucacas, by Morrocoy national park, home of Los Cayos (The Keys). Los Cayos are a series of tiny desert islands covered in mangroves and surrounded by torquoise water. We took a boat tour and saw a colony of frigatebirds - giant, agressive raptors that are famous for stealing food from eachother in midair. We stayed overnight on the biggest island called Cayo Sombrero. There, we met Miguela, who was staying there for a girls weekend with her mom and aunts. They fed us sausage, salad, yuca, rum, and wine. We ended up staying up until 3 AM, looking at the stars in the completely clear sky. At one point, Miguela, who spoke stunningly good English though she had never taken a course of any sort, told us to act like melting monsters for a picture. This is what emerged.
The Enormous Bladder Stone of Major General Rafaul Urdaneta (March)In my continuing series on inflamed body parts, here we see the actual bladder stone taken from the corpse of General Rafael Urdaneta, liberator of Zulia, Venezuela. He was famous for decapitating his enemies in battle. General Urdaneta was an excellent soldier and statesman who fought beside Simon Bolivar, The Liberator, in the wars for the independence of Gran Colombia from Spain in the 1800's. Like many old soldiers whose bodies were worn down by the brutality of battle and long marches, Urdaneta suffered from many health problems. This stone, made largely of crystallized uric acid and calcium salts, weighs more than a 1/4 of a pound and is about the size of a coke can. It finally killed the old general when he was 73 years old. Interestingly, Urdaneta lived long enough to be captured in a dageurrotype image on his deathbed.
