Today I wore a blue t-shirt to work. I didn´t think about the significance of blue until I stepped out. Blue is for Rosales (Manuel Rosales, the governor of Zulia state, the presidental candidate challenging Chavez) and red is for Chavez. But I hoped that the fact that I was wearing red shoes and carrying a red backpack would kind of balance my bright blue t-shirt. Well, then I arrived to work and found out that at 3.00 there would be a demonstration for Rosales on the street right next to where Ruge is situated. I got more and more conscious of my blue shirt and was relieved to be able to pull a sweater over it - because of the airconditioning - at work. It didn´t even occur to me to wear a sweater outside, I would probably have gotten a heat stroke or something if I had done that.

Two of my three classes were cancelled, because the demo was bound to confuse the traffic near Ruge all afternoon, so I got to go home early. But I had a class util 4. As Kasia and I were waiting for our students (I teach the son, she the mother) we watched Rosales´ supportes gather with flags, whistles etc. most of them wearing blue t-shirts. After my class I stepped outside and started my walk home. There were no buses because of the demonstration. I tried to look like someone who is totally unaware of what she is wearing, but was prepared for comments from passersby. I got no comments. Not even when I passed a group of Chavistas (=Chavez supporteds) all wearing red t-shirts and I heard them shouting at Rosales´supporeters passing by. Of course, luckily for me, it says "Atreveté" on most Rosales´supporteds t-shirts, whereas the Chavistas´t-shirts are pure red (as far as I can tell). "Atreveté" means something like "dare" or "have the courage". I got home safe and sound and decided that I can wear neither my blue nor my red t-shirt for a while.

There is a worker at the supermarket I go to who always salutes me. He salutes me cause happened to be present when I had a misunderstanding with a cassier: When you pay with a card (credit or debit) you need to present you social security number, or in my case my passport number. The social security number in Spanish (or actually I don´t know what number it is, I think it must be some kind of social security number) is called "cedula". But, often the cassiers also ask you for your mobile number, for tax reasons, which is called "cellular". So, the cassier was asking for my cedula number and I kept giving him my cellular number. Well, eventually I understood what he wanted, but now there is this smartass worker who always salutes me with "cedula!". So, the cedula guy told me yesterday that I need to get a Venezuelan cedula so that I can vote for Chavez. I juts smiled and said, "I am foreign I can not vote here".

On Sunday we went to a mall (the special thing with this mall is that there is a skating rink there) and as we were going home by car (Kasia, two coordinators from work, and I) we were stuck in a traffic light. Or we could not drive because the cars coming in our direction juts ignored the lights (happens here all the time) and would not let us cross. I don´t really know what triggered it, but all of the sudden the two coordinators, who were sitting in the front, started yelling : Chaviosta, Chavista! to the men in a car passing by. The coordinators recognized the men as Chavistas casue they had Chavez stickers on the car. Kasia and I laughed in the backseat with tears in our eyes. It was juts so incredible, these two women, very well dressed and always acting proper and everything, going off like that screaming like crazy.

Yesterday I had a class with two teenage girls. A guy with a red t-shirt passed by the window and the girls started yelling: Chavista! Chavista!. Then they asked me if I was going to vote and I explained that I can´t vote here cause I´m not a Venezuelan citizen. The girls were eager to explain that they are all for Rosales and one of them gut up and wanted to write something on the white board. I gave her the marker, but as soon as I saw that she was writing a capital A I said; no politics in this room, and took the marker out of her hand. "I just wanted to write A3VT" (=Atreveté), the girl said. "No politics in this room", I said and imagined what a Chavista student passing by would think if s/he saw A3VT written on my board.

One last example of election fever in Venezuela: several people on my msn are presenting themselves are supporteds of Rosales. They write things such as A3VT on their signatures (or whatever they´re called, I am totally ignorant concerning this vocabulary) or AZUL AZULITO ("blue blue" or very blue, vrs. rojo rojito which means "red red" or very red). Sofar I have no one on my msn who openly declares being a Chavista, but I have some friends who I know are Chavistas. I haven´t discussed politics with them. I try to be as diplomatic as possible. I also have some friends who want to vote blank or who don´t want to vote al all. As far as I have understood the people who are backing Rosales do not all think that he is a wonderful candidate, but many are going to vote for him just becasue he is the strongest candidate against Chavez. I´ve heard negative things about Chavez as well as the opposition, but basically I am very uninformed about the political situation here.

Have a look at the link Emily gave in the comments of my last entry!

I don't have a lot of time. The internet connection is not working at my place right now so I haven't been able to write for a while. Right now I'm visiting Kasia and taking advantage of her internet.

I went back to work on Wednesday. I feel still a bit out of sync, its a funny feeling to have been lying in bed for one week doing nothing and then being back to work. I can't drink alcohol for 15 days, which should not be too hard to accomplish, and take it easy in general.

Friday I was on the radio in Marcaibo. One of my students, who works in the radio invited me. I said something in Spanish about the weather being hot and blablabla and everything I said went probably somehow wrong but it was kind of cool.

Nothing too much happening right now, we're mostly planning our Christmas holidays.

I'll write more when I get the opportunity.

Just to let you know: I've been down with dengue for a week now. That's why I haven't been writing too much lately.

Dengue is a disease transmited by mosquitoes.
I got ill on Sunday. First I thought it is a normal hangover but then I realized that I have fever and when I had a fever of 39 I got a bit worried and went to see a doctor. And then I had a fever for some more days and went to see another doctor and blood test were taken etc and he diagnosed the dengue.

I'm doing much better now. The fever is gone and so is the itchy rash that kept me from sleeping well. Now I just have to rest. I am staying at Kasia's and she is taking good care of me. Something like this was bound to happen.

One of these days someone mentioned again that Venezuela is a third world country. Well, I have to admit that I have seen just such a small part of it that most of the time time I am totally ignorant to the fact. I mean, what is the definition of a third world country? Poverty, illiteracy, malnutrition, corruption...what else. Well, the fact of the matter is that I meet only more or less well off people. I hardly see any of the poverty. The people I hang out with are all well educated and (surprisingly) many speak excellent English. There are not too many beggars in the streets and the criminalty that people keep talking about has not presented its ugly face sofar. Don´t get me wrong. I know that the criminalty exists and poverty and illiteracy etc. but I really am not confronted with this reality every day. It is not like I have to pass begging children in the streets or close my eyes from the misery around. Sometimes I feel bad about the fact that I know so little about the reality here. But there is no way that I could just go and venture out in the neigborhood and start talking to the people in the street.

During the Aiesec seminar in Caracas I took part in a discussion on why Venezuela, with all its oil and natural resources, is a third world country. Some think the reason is in the culture, or the mentality of the masses. Venezuela is a country where you don't have to fight for survu¡val. It is warm and there is enough food and space for everybody, I´ve been told. This is why people simply don't feel the need to be ambitious, to look for ways of improving their lives.

I can't help but remember reading what would happen the global ecology if everybody would own a car etc. In some ways I think that it is impossible for everybody to have the standars of living that we have in the so called western world. But then again, here I live very much in the same fashion as I have lived in Europe and in the States. My standard of living is on the same level as it has always been. So what am I learning about living in third world country? Well, sofar I have learned that it is possible to maintain a good standard of life here and to function more or less normally. But then again, I haven't been confronted with any of the criminalty or corruption and I know that many people are frustrated about that.

So, little by little I am creating my picture of what Venezuela is. Some days I feel at home, some days I feel that I know so very little about my surroundings. Some days I feel happy here and some days I feel frustrated cause I still haven't figured out the culture and I still have false expectations. And the I am disappointed when things don´t work out the way I have expected. And I blame myself cause I should understand by now that it is impossible to plan anything here and one has to be prepared for anything etc. As foreigner - as someone who still does not understand the logic of the Venezuelan way of life. Basta.

I had a roach situation in my room yesterday. I really do hate those creatures. Well, when I noticed the roach running on the floor I calmly sprinted to the kitchen to get the poisonspray to kill it. I went back to my room and started the hunt. The roach tried to hide in the piles of clopthing etc. that I had left on the floor (and will try never to leave again) and in the end it sprinted to my bed. I was disgusted. It started to climb the wall behind the bed and I was there with my spray. Then it jumped on my bed. And that is when things got really disgusting. I had to take out all my bedlinen and I kept hoping that it would turn out and at the same time I was extremely disgusted. Finally I found a dead roach under my ..bedlinen? (what is the least layer called?) and had to go and get some newespapers to get it out of there. I hope and pray that it was the same roach and that I haven´t been sleeping on a disgusting dead roach for a long time. I did not sleep very well last night cause I kept thinknig about how many eggs there must be in the bed now and what will happen when the eggs are ready and the new baibes will hatch. Yuk.

I know that I should not be writing this, cause my Mom will be worried, but there is nothing else going on so I will risk it: One day last week, it was the day of the demonstration, I was taking the bus home during my lunchbrake. Well, at some point I noticed that I didn´t recognize the street we were on. I had missed my stop. It is also possible that the bus changed the route since there had been the demonstration - I don´t know. All I know is that I was somewhere I was not supposed to be. So I jumped off. I asked an old harmless looking man in the street for directions, mainly, where is Bella Vista, one of the main avenues. The man pointed me in the right direction and I started walking with a(n attempt of a) determined "don´t even try speaking to me" look on my face. Then, a woman started shouting and gesturing at me. I gestured back: "I don´t know" and continued walking. In a few minutes a car driove by. The old man and the woman were in the car and they gestured for me to come to their car. I had to make a decision: which is more dangerous, walking around in a strange neighborhood or taking a ride with those old people. I mean, I trusted the man enough to ask for directions and follow them, I might as well take a ride with him. So, I got into the car and the couple told me that they´d be happy to give me a ride to Bella Vista. They were very seweet but I sat the whole ride with my hand on the doorknob (or whatever it´s called) prepared ot jump out if things turn suspicious. They said that this is a dangerous neighbourhgood for a foreigner to be walking around in and I tried to explain that the bus changed its route etc. When we came to a street I recognized I tried to tell them to stop, but couldn´t remember the word "stop" in Spanish. Luckily the man was French (they told me) so I told him in French: Arretez s'il vous plait (please stop!) and they stopped and I got out saying thank you, thank you so much, thank you thank you. And walking home I thought again what amazing people there are here in Maracaibo, helping a total stranger like that.

On Saturday the Cristmas lights were turned on on Bella Vista. This means that the traffic on Bella Vista will be crazy until the end of December. Wonderful. Well, the same evening (Saturday) I was supposed to go with Kasia to Massive Halloween, a party of elecric music in the waterpark here in Maracaibo. Enrique, who is an English teacher at Ruge, is a DJ and he was going to play there and he had been talking to us about this event for weeks. Also my students (the DJ´s) where going and insisted that I ditch my Aiesec friends for one single evening and go to the party with them. Well, I promised to do my best to try to be there. My students warned me that the traffic would be crazy on Saturday and that I should get there early. Well, more easily said than done.

First of all, I was supposed to go to the illumination (turning on the X-mas lights). I could not get a ride there and tried to organize going together with a girl who lives near by. She told me to come over to her house at 8. I tried to tell her that I have no idea where she lives but she thought it should be very easy to get to her place. She talked about a gas station (I have never seen) and stuff like that. I decided that going with her would be the last thing on my list of desperate moves. So, I waited and hoped. In the end Cheché turned out to be the rescuing angel and said he´d (try to) go with me to Massive Halloween. We decided to skip the illumiation and aim for the free beer that was on offer from 9 to 11 p.m. However, because of the traffic gone crazy we arrived on the site at ca 11 and then we stood in line to enter for an hour or so. At the entrance they naturally asked everybody for their ID, which I had forgotten at home (how blonde can you get). However, I kept my cool and said to the bouncer (or guard or whoever): "look, I only have my Finnihs ID", and handed over my ISIC student card. The bouncer was nice enough to let me in. There were three different sites with changing DJ´s. I managed to find all three people I was supposed to in the crowd and hear Enrique spinning (not bad at all, I might add). At ca 2 we left and I was content.

I guess I might mention, cause several people have asked me about this, that there is a boyfriend figure around. I´m taking one day at a time and we´ll see what happens. So no need for anyone to be jumping into any conclusions (doesn´t sound right, does it? jump to conclusions?). Any tips on dating in South America are more than welcome, although I like to believe that this guy is not a tyical Latino (although he looks like one, god bless). For those of you unaware, Latinos are known cheaters and sweet talkers. But the stereotypes about Nordic women are not 100% flattering either (not to mention blondes) so I think we´re even.

Today there was a demonstration in Maracaibo. As I was finishing my morning class and was about to go home to have lunch I noticed that there would't be any buses for a while cause the street was blocked by a demonstration. The demonstration was for Manuel Rosales (I hope I got the name right this time), who is the governor here and also a presidental candidate.

I've heard that demonstrations here in Venezuela can be pretty scary, but this one was peaceful. My student, who was also stranded at Ruge, said that this is the worst that will happen even if Chavez wins the elections. Some people will have a demonstration but it is not like people are going to get aggressive or anything. Let's hope he is right.