I had an interesting dream a few nights ago:

I was on a beach in a foreign country. Some of you know that it is my habit to look for shells on the beach, in order to make necklases or as souvenirs, so I was on the beach looking for shells. As I was looking I found something surprising - a HUUGE shell. I started to dig it up, and it was immence. I had never seen a shell like that before, it was the size of a dog. I thought the shell was wonderful, it was so beautiful and somehting I never expected to find, a total surprise. I began to think about how I could get it carried home (to Finland). But I realized that it would be incredibly difficult to get the shell to Finland. It wouldn´t fit into my suitcase and it would be impossible to carry, it was so heavy. So reluctantly I had to let go of the idea of bringing the shell with me.

To me it is pretty obvious what the shell refers to. I have found something here in Venzuela that I never expected to find, something valuable and beautiful, but it is extremely difficult - if not impossible - for me to bring what I´ve found here over to Finland.

Another thing: we have two new trainees here in Venezuela: a girl from Australia and a guy from Nigeria. The girl is right now in Caracas doing here training for Ruge and the guy arrived this morning in Maracaibo. I don´t have a lot of contact with the other trainees here in Maracaibo, except for Kasia cause I se her at work every day, but I think I might be seeing more of these two new ones. The Australian will be working with Kasia and me in Ruge and the Nigerian´s working place (the Wallstreet Institute) is really close to where I live. Nice!

This week I am supposed to let Ruge know whether I want to extend (correct?) my contract. So finally I had to I make up my mind, and I´ve decided to return to Finland in July. If I´d have all the time and money in the world I would stay. But I want to get a teacher´s certificate in Finland, in order to be a "qualified" teacher, and need to study didactics or (pedagogy or whatever it´s called) during one year to obtain that. So one more year studying full time at a uni in Finland, which means that I have to save some money.

In addition, the life I have here in Venezuela right now is kind of a temporary arrangement. What I mean is that I can´t imagine living a life like this for a longer period of time. One year is long, but still I knew from the beginning that it is one year, in other words a limited period of time. And when I say that I can´t imagine "living like this" for a longer period of time I mean: not having enough money to be independent. Don´t get me wrong, I am happy here, but my life is limited in a way that I don´t feel comfortable with. I don´t have enough money to meet people whenever I want to, or go to the movies or have coffee with friends etc. Of course I do meet friends, and see movies and have coffee, but very randomly and only if somebody is kind enough to offer me a ride. And most of the time that kind person is José.

So I´ll return to Finland in July, graduate, find a job, earn some money, study one more year and then see again where I want to go and what I want to do. Tell me please that I´m doing the right thing.

What should I write about. I have some new students and I passed from basico 3 to intermediate 1 in salsa...what else...I finally learned how to conjugate Spanish verbs in the present and discovered that Venezuela is a racist country after all.

One of the few things I read about Venezuela before coming here was that it is the most diverse country in the world, when it comes to the population. From the beginning of my stay here people have told me: here you have people of every color and everybody lives together in harmony, there is no discrimination based on skincolor. I didn´t quite swallow that since I didn´t have to say a word and people would classify me as American. I mean, people here say that there are Venezuelan blondes as well, and I actually met one girl in Caracas who is as blonde as me, but seriously speaking I am an odd bird here. In the street people (or "men", I should say) spak English to me and as I´ve said before, make jokes about dollars etc. So even if there are people of all colors in Venezuela still it is clear to me that blondes are regarded and treated as foreigners. Once some friends were going to the center to shop and said I couldn´t go with them cause then all the shopkeepers would put the prices higher. And it was not the first or last time I heard that.

About the racism: it exists. I mean, I think there is no country that would not be racist. Or help me define this. There are racists everywhere so I think everywhere is racist - including Venezuela. And last week I heard a story about racism in Venezuela: A black friend of mine was attending a kongress. In the evening a party was organized for the people attending the kongress in a famous night club. This friend of mine was not let in. First the bouncer said that it is a private party for people attending a congress. My friend showed her congress pass. Then the bouncer said that she is not dressed well enough. My friend went back to the hotel and changed (or something, to be honest I can´t remember her exact words) but was still not let in. And so on. Basically, it was clear that the bouncer was discriminating and that no matter what my friend did she was not going to be let in. And come on, this was not an individual telling a racist joke in a bar, this was the bouncer of a famous night club who was representing the policy of the night club, not his personal opinion. Racism - as far as I can tell.

We went to Cumana. So Kasia and I spent easter with the family of my room mate. We left Maracaibo on Wednesday evening. I went to the bus station at 4 to see if we could get tickets (Kasia and I went to the bus station a week before to ask for tickets and they told us we could buy tickets one hour before) and when I arrived to the counter the guy said that all buses are full. I explained that last week we asked and blablabla, he said that he has one ticket for me. I said I need two cause I am traveling with a friend. He had two. I asked for the price and he said 110 000, which was 20 000 more than what they said the week before. Well, none of this was really surprising. What was unexpected though was that I met two foreigners at the station. A girl from England who is workin in venezuela and was looking for a ticket to get back to the place where she is working the same evening. And then there was a German guy who had been working as a teacher in Colombia and was now traveling in South America before returning to Germany. It was kind of refreshing to just sit there and watch people. And wait, and wait and wait.

The busride to Cumana took 20 hours. In Cumana we were taken to the beach straight away. Ranmarys´s family has a weekendhouse at the beach and we spent all three nights there. One evening I went to church with Kasia and one night we went fishing (although fortunately we didn´t catch any fish).

So now we´re back in Maracaibo and there will be no more long weekends for us to travel. Sigh. I´m still undecided about what to do next fall. I think I´ll take Emily´s advice and concentrate on finishing my studies but...there are different ways to go about that as well. I´ll keep you informed.