Caracas Most Expensive for Renters
Overview of Caracas Venezuela
The Latin Business Chronicle reports that Caracas, Venezuela has replaced Sao Paulo as the most expensive rental market in Latin America for foreign executives.
Using New York as the base city, with a score of 100, Caracas got 68 points and ranks 18 worldwide. While less expensive than New York, that makes the Venezuelan capital more expensive than cities like Copenhagen and Guangzhou in China. In September, Caracas ranked 22.
Some other cities mentioned in the article, and ordered here from most to least expensive, are:
- Bogota, Colombia: Bogota’s score declined from 66.1 points in September to 58 points in February, but it’s still the most expensive city in Latin America for renters, and is more expensive than cities like Dublin, Madrid and Amsterdam.
- Sao Paulo, Brazil and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: Sao Paulo, formerly the most expensive city in Latin America, saw its score drop sharply from 76.1 points in September to 53.4 points. Similarly, Rio de Janeiro has dropped from 70.8 points to 49.4 points in February. Sao Paulo is more expensive than cities like Sydney, Athens and Tapei, while renting in Rio costs more than cities like Frankfurt, Brussels and Oslo.
- Mexico City, Mexico: Mexico City declined its score from 51.2 points to 37.5 points and fell to 49th place from its previous rank of 38. Mexico City is only more expensive than Johannesburg among the top 50 expat cities, but less so than cities like Toronto, Stockholm and Prague.
- Buenos Aires, Argentina: Argentina’s capital Buenos Aires kept its score of 42 points, but moved up from 47th to 42nd place on the ranking.
According to Marie-Laurence Sépède, senior associate and research manager at Mercer, much of the decline in the cost of living in Mexico and Brazil can be attributed to currency fluctuations that make Mexico and Brazil more affordable for expats with foreign currency. Currencies like the Brazilian real and Mexican peso have lost more than 30 percent in value against the dollar since September last year.
Beauty Vs. Brains in Venezuela?
The Venezuelan Miss Universe, Dayana Mendoza
Venezuela has no shortage of beautiful women. One proof of that statement is the fact that the current Miss Universe is the lovely Dayana Mendoza of Venezuela. Unfortunately Miss Mendoza has reinforced the stereotype of the beautiful airhead with some recent comments.
Here’s an excerpt from Hugo Rifkind’s funny piece for the Times Online:
“Dayana Mendoza of Venezuela to her friends – has just had a marvellous holiday. “It was a loooot of fun!” she wrote, on her Miss Universe blog. “I didn’t want to leave. It was such a relaxing place, so calm and beautiful.”
What paradise was this? Hawaii, perhaps? Koh Samui? The Bahamas? “The water in Guantánamo Bay,” she continued, “is soooo beautiful!” Oh.
“We had a wonderful time,” she adds. “This truly was a memorable trip! We also met the military dogs, and they did a very nice demonstration of their skills. We visited the detainees camps and we saw the jails, where they shower, how they recreate themselves with movies, classes of art, books. It was very interesting.” Later, they went to the beach, where Miss Universe bought a necklace made out of little bits of glass. It will remind her of Guantánamo, she sighs, for ever.”
Do read his piece, it’s hilarious. Ah, well. We don’t choose a Miss Universe for her overpowering IQ, in spite of the essay question.
Travel Blogs on TravBuddy.com
Casas de Antaño in Maracaibo, Venezuela
I recently came across TravBuddy.com, where people share travel advice. There was a long series of blog posts by a group that traveled all through Latin America. Unfortunately their stay in Venezuela was brief and there were only two posts from there. There are some nice photos, however. I couldn’t find the author’s name, but I have included links and written summaries of here:
Maracaibo, Venezuela, December 4 2007: A hectic town with loud talkers and generous people.
Caracas, Venezuela, December 6 2007: Just another big capital, with a historic center and a lot of Chavez propaganda.
Afro-Venezuelan Cultural Festival
Afro-Venezuelan musicians
Global Exchange is offering a three day tour to Venezuela to visit the Afro-Venezuelan Cultural Festival, to take place from June 20, 2009 – June 30, 2009.
From their website:
“Despite their overwhelming contribution to the everyday life and culture of Venezuela, coastal Afro-Venezuelan communities continue to face racial and economic divisions that prevail from the days of colonization… Travel to Venezuela with Global Exchange during the San Juan Festival — 3 days that celebrate San Juan, the patron saint of the descendents of freed slaves, and a time the African heritage of all Venezuelans is celebrated — and learn about the realities of Afro-Venezuelan communities on a delegation to Venezuela that is a blend of culture and politics, introducing you to a side of Venezuela rarely heard about in the United States.”
Whether or not you agree with Global Exchange’s politics, it sounds like an interesting opportunity. The cost is $1550 not including airfare, and includes accomodations, meals and travel to activities within Venezuela.
Oh, Sweet Venezuela
A lake house at Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela
Vicky seems to do a whole lot of traveling, from India to Nepal to Australia and New Zealand, to China to Latin America, and other countries I have not named. Wow… wish I could afford to travel like that… She takes photos and writes about her travels, and has an honest voice that dissects aspects of every day life in her travels. Vicky did a series of posts about Caracas and about the mountain town of Merida, Venezuela. Here are links to her posts and brief descriptions:
Oh, Sweet Venezuela: Vicky visits Merida, Venezuela, a supposed “hip and artistic” university town, but is not terribly impressed.
Death in the City: a student is killed in a protest in Merida.
Trading One Storm for Another: Vicky takes a side trip to Lake Maracaibo, the largest Lake in South America.
Touch and Go: a short post in which Vicky admires Caracas’ “beautiful slums.”
Some of these posts have a good number of photos, though the image quality is not terribly high. Thanks for your observations, Vicky.
Life in Venezuela: the Torres family in Caracas
Venezuelan woman in Caracas shantytown
Rory Carroll recently published an interesting piece at Guardian.co.uk in which he took a look at the lives of families from seven cities around the world. Here’s his report on the Torres family of Venezuela:
It has been a tough few weeks for the Torres family, with two setbacks conspiring to remind them that life is not easy when you live in a Venezuelan shantytown.
There was another mudslide. Days of tropical downpours softened the earth of the hills that make up Petare, a vast warren of shacks and houses east of the capital, Caracas. On a recent morning, a chunk of the road just 30m from the Torres’ front door collapsed, sending concrete, boulders and debris cascading down on to the road below it. It was the same section of road that collapsed last October after another deluge. The authorities had done nothing about it, leaving a gaping 20m-long crater, but there was still just enough space for a car to edge through. The latest mudslide has narrowed the road even more, so not even a Mini could pass, let alone one of the squat, ageing Jeeps that serve as buses.
For the Torres family this is a bitter addition to the grind of daily life. Raiza, 35, must walk her three-year-old daughter, Veronica, down the steep, winding hill to put her in daycare before catching a bus into town for work.
Raiza’s 55-year-old mother, Marisol, is left feeling isolated because her legs cannot take her all the way down the hill to the shops and back up again, and she refuses to take one of the ubiquitous motorbike taxis. “I’m too scared,” she says. The “mototaxis”, mostly young men with no helmets who slalom madly through traffic, have a deserved reputation for landing themselves and passengers in the hospital or morgue.
For Raiza’s father, Ricardo, 55, the mudslide means a long detour to get to and from work, which adds an extra hour and a half to his daily battle with the congestion. “I have to leave before 6am, and if I’m coming back around 6pm the traffic just doesn’t move.”
Motorists staged a noisy protest outside the mayor’s office to demand the road be fixed, as well as better security: even in daylight, armed gangs stop and rob vehicles with impunity.
Then there is the second setback: Ricardo’s battered Ford, which just a few months ago he and a mechanic nursed back to life after great effort and expense, has again conked out. One morning it refused to start and Ricardo, a courier for a steel company, has no clue why.
Which means that Ricardo is forced to use his company scooter – the same one he was thrown from in an accident several months ago – and take his chances along with the mototaxis. Finding £2,000 to buy a semi-decent used car is out of the question, but he hopes to scrape enough bolivares together to get the Ford fixed.
Ricardo would not be Ricardo, however, if he allowed worries to dampen his ebullience. “Forget the car and the road,” he says, “and check out these CDs.” He rifles through his latest purchases, all pirated copies, and puts on a Cuban salsa classic.
“Not bad, eh?” he shouts, above the music. He grabs two capachos, Cuban-style gourds filled with the hard seeds of the capacho flower, and shakes them to the rhythm.
Marisol, ensconced in her favourite armchair, rolls her eyes. “Look at the music professor,” she teases. She is smiling. No matter the daily grind, the man she married all those years ago still has a youthful brio.
