My excuse for not writing last week is food poisoning. I'm not entirely sure what caused it, because I ate some pretty strange stuff that week, but the most likely things are the two hotdogs I had on Sunday evening. By the way, those were my first Venezuelan hotdogs. I thought that after a 11 month long training my stomache would finally be ready to deal with a classic (in a Venezuelan novel I've been reading, the main character eats hot dogs all the time) but no. As Nivy (the new Austrailan trainee) put it (as I was throwing up): "Elina, look with your hair color, you'll never be able to eat like a Venezuelan". I know she was trying to be supportive, but that was not exactly what I needed to hear at that particular moment. Obviously I'm never going to eat another hotdog as long as I live.

The foodpoisoning incident started on Tuesday. Jose took me to a hospital where they gave me an IV and made sure I stopped throwing up. I did not go to work the next day (a Venezuelan probably would have). On Thursday I felt a lot better and started eating three meals a day. On Friday was Kasia's farewellparty and even if I did not drink a drop (doctor's orders) I felt badly hangover the next day and did not go to work. This week I've been working normally, although I tried to cancel my morning class in Thursday, because of a bloody visa extension I've been trying to do since March.

So...the visa extension operation - or mission impossible as I like to call it - sarted the same week as my food poisoning. On Monday Jose and I went to Onidex (the visa place) and asked what I have to do in order to extend my visa, which expires in less than two weeks. The Onidex guy said I can extend it by one year, which costs 300 000, or not extend it at all (and work illegally the last three weeks). He also gave us a list of things I need in order to extend the visa: a paper saying that I am a student, a paper saying where I live, stamps worth 300 000 bolivares and...2 passport pictures. Bueno, the passport pictures I had since March, so that was no problem. Mayra at Ruge wrote me a piece of paper saying that I am doing an iternship at Ruge, which does not exactly mean that I am a student but kind of implies that. The problematic part was the piece of paper stating where I live. Without getting into too much detail I'll just say that it was a hassle and that the woman who was supposed to sign it refused cause she is crazy and doesn't like foreigners (this was what I was told). Well. On Thursday morning, the day my visa expired, Jose and I went to Onidex, presented the papers, stamps and pictures, and said that I'd like to extend my visa. Alright, said the Onidex guy (not the original but another), that'll take three months. WHAT!!!! Jose burst out in laughter. I was not very amused. Or...continued the guy, you can pay me 200 000 and I'll get it for you in 15 days. What choise did we have. I had to get back to work while Jose went to get money. My first experience with blatant corruption. I never want to experience that again.

I forgot to mention: maybe some of you have heard about the demonstrations going on here in Vzla. Well, Chavez decided to shut down an "opposition" TV station called RCTV and people are demonstrating cause they see the shutting down of RCTV as an act against the freedom of press. As far as I´ve understood, the shutting down of RCTV was not against the law, but still it is clear that the station was shut down only because it does not support Chavez so people are not too happy about that. There have been demonstrations in Caracas and Maracaibo. One evening our classes were canceled because of a demo. Mayra called from Ruge as Anna and I where walking out the door, saying that theer are no classes and that we have to stay indoors the rest of the evening cause it might be dangerous to go out. Nothing dramatic happened that evening and even though the students (the students seem to be the ones organizing all the demos) have continued demonstrating there has not been any more talk about the situation being dangerous.

Sorry for not writing last week. My cousin Anna is here so I´ve been kind of busy - which is a good thing. Today we went to the guajiro market (or one of them), the one where they sell crafts. Yesterday we went to the center and Lia Bermudez (art/cultural center) where there were two exibitions. Last week we went to Maczul, where here was another exibitions. One artsy thing per week might be enough. I´ve tried to do something with Anna every day and it´s so much easier to go places when I have someone to go with. Unfortunately Anna was sick last week for three days (I think it was the patacon we shared) so she couldn´t do anything. I think tomorrow we´ll go back to the Guajiro market to spend some more money and maybe on Saturday we´ll try to got to the gaita bars near my place in Santa Lucia.

On Monday and Tuesday we went to the cinema. on Monday we saw a movie called...The Next Victim (directly translated rom the Spanish title "la Proxima Victima). Bon Jovi is in it. The other film we saw was a French one called The Russian Puppets (directly tanslated from the Spanish "Las Muñecas Russas). It was great! If you saw "una casa de Locos" /L'auberge Espagnol and liked it you´ll like this one. It was kind of like a sequel to "Una Casa de Locos".

Anna brought me some Finnish newspapers and I´ve been reading through them. Finland looks strange. "Normal" people look like activists and the whole atmosphere is so very different from my surroundings here in Vzla. Anna told me that I´ll have a HUGE culture chock when I go back to Finland. One evening we went to a birthdayparty and everybody was dancing merengue and salsa and nobudy was drunk. Anna said that the men here are sooo different from Finnish men.