I just finished a crazy week here in Caracas. Tonight I am going to meet the other members of the human rights delegation. Im both excited and nervous.
This past week I have been staying with a friend in a barrio called Catia. Its been really good to get to know the barrio life and Ive met amazing people. They have taught me a lot about politics and about life. I went to one of the centers where Chavez has been creating jobs and building hospitals and schools. I then realized that I will be returning to that same spot with the delegation but oh well. I spent a lot of time in the downtown area seeing museums (which were rather awful) and parks. My friends from Belgium met up with me and we went to a socialist party branch. The party is like a union that organizes workers in a socialist fashion. I had to be the interpreter and it was really hard. The guy talked really fast and had very complicated things to communicate. It all worked out in the end and he invited us to his friends house to drink beers. Everyone got pretty silly which was nice after an entire afternoon of intense conversation. We all danced and ate food (I ate way too much meat and now I feel sick) until some assholes started circling the house on their motorcycles. Alan, my friend, said that they had spotted my belgian friends and wanted to rob them. One of the socialist comrades threw a bottle at them for no apparent reason and they came back with a gun. Then the cops showed up and we had to hide out in the house for a while. Everything turned out fine but I was surprised that it happened. Now I am off to the delegation.
besos
posted Saturday July 2007