‘Everyday Life’ Archives
Venezuela’s Beauty Queen Factory
Caracas -- Inside Venezuela's Beauty Queen Machine By Ted Rabinowitz for Asylum.com Last month, we brought you Alamut, the Secret (and very real, if very crumbly) City of the Assassins. This month, we move from implied violence to implied sex. We're going to ... the Secret City of Official Hotness. Not L.A. Not Paris. Not even Rio. No, only [...]
Beautiful Photos of Venezuela’s Páramo Highlands
The páramo are the Andean highlands of Venezuela. This ecosystem is found in the high elevations, between the upper forest line at 3,000 meters elevation and the permanent snow line at 5,000 meters. The páramo is cold, with animals uniquely adapted to the temperatures, such as the woolly donkey pictured below. These areas consist mostly of [...]
Torre Confinanza, Venezuela’s Squatter Skyscraper
By Will Grant BBC News, Caracas 18 December 2010 The views from the 20th floor of the Confinanza Tower are among the most spectacular in Caracas, reminiscent of those from an expensive penthouse apartment. But the homes being built in this high-rise building, which actually goes up another 22 floors, are not expensive apartments. They are [...]
Fear and Paranoia in Caracas
I thought this was a very thoughtful post about how our fear and paranoia can close us off to meeting new people and getting the most out of our travels. It comes from Jake and Caitlin's Letters to Gringolandia blog. Caitlin wrote this post when she had only been in Venezuela for a few weeks. I wonder if her interactions with Venezuelans [...]
Missing the special things about Venezuela
Erin, a North American who lives in Venezuela and writes a blog called Adventures in Places I Don't Belong, recently wrote about a stomach bug she's trying to beat, and the music from next door, and the things about Venezuela that she'll miss if she has to move, and... this isn't making much sense, is it? I'll let her tell it, but I just wanted [...]
Life in Caracas: lavish malls and BMW dealerships, amid poverty and crime
I enjoy reading the San Francisco Chronicle, but I recently discovered an Alternative Daily called "BeyondChron" that bills itself as "The voice of the rest." Eli Rosenberg, a writer for BeyondChron, wrote a piece back in 2006 that described in precise terms the constant diverging realities of Caracas, Venezuela. He wrote about the haphazardly [...]
Kidnapping in Venezuela is out of control
The guardian.co.uk published a recent article by Roy Carrol titled, "Fear grips Venezuela as even the poor are seized by kidnap gangs." The article says that "pensioners, students and children are grabbed in streets and shopping malls." This kidnapping plague seems to be spreading all through Latin America. In Mexico of course it has been out [...]
Dating Venezuelan Girls
I was just browsing today and came across this website called Road Junkie Travel. It's got blog posts by travelers from many countries, including Venezuela. You can see the Venezuela page here: http://www.roadjunky.com/article?c=Venezuela There was a funny post by a guy named Seb Kennedy about dating Venezuelan girls. Apparently there are [...]
A New Life for At-Risk Kids in Venezuela, and Music Too!
By Humberto Márquez Source: IPSNews.net CARACAS, Aug 24 (IPS) - On tour in Germany after performing to rave reviews at the BBC Promenade Concerts in London, the members of Venezuela’s Simón Bolívar Youth Symphony Orchestra and its wild-haired conductor, Gustavo Dudamel, have made a remarkable journey from their less than [...]
Recipe for Arepas (Venezuelan Flatbreads)
In a recent post I mentioned a common Venezuelan treat, arepas. Arepas are traditional Venezuelan flatbread sandwiches made with maize flour and cheese. Often meat is added. Variations such as avocado or sour cream are quite tasty as well. Here is a typical arepas recipe: Arepas (Venezuelan Flatbreads) Ingredients: 300 grams maize [...]
