Venezuela - U.S.A
I am living in two very different countries. I am phisically in the U.S.A but my mind is always wandering around the streets of Caracas. I drink a coffe "en la panaderia" and eat a "cachito de jamon". In my mind I can see the Avila every morning, I can smell the mountain.
The sound of Caracas is inside my skin. The noise, the traffic the laughter.
I wake up every day and I get amazed by the change of the seasons. I get frustrated by my lack of understanding and adaptation to the winter.The pace is stablished by the ever changing weather, and justifies precaution and planning of every activity. Every thing is quiet. I feel safe.
Safety. It is a strange feeling specially when you start readding about the political situation of the world. No one is safe, no where is safe. In third world countries like my beloved Venezuela life does not worth too much. There are about four crimes every day in Caracas (30-40 every week), almost every one has been robbed at least once. Poverty, corruption, poor education, human exploitation, lack of ambition, lack of inmagination, selfishness, no social or communal sense, short sightness and... I could keep writing many more componets to our latin, third world south american recipe for a miserable living conditions.
Now, today we have Chavez. He is just one more chapter of the sameness that we have suffered in our glorious life as a nation.
The U.S.A. I have always admired the United States of America way of life. When I was a kid, may be eight yrs. old, I came for the first time to Miami . I stayed at the Ronney Plaza Hotel with may parents, I enjoyed the experience. When I was fourteen, I stayed for a month traveling from New Orleans to Canada and from Canada to Miami, it was fun an educational. Later I came to school in Louisiana and graduated there. I made many friends and I am grateful for the good time and great friends. The U.S.A was a country of freedom and respect. It has always been an imperial power but within its borders there was respect for the individual.( This idea is a little bit tricky; there has been respect for the individual but at the same time there has been a lot of racism and seggregation. I am only talking about my experience and how I felt).
Twenty yrs latter I am back in the U.S.A. There is no respect for individuals. Fraude is legal. The president and officials can lie to the population without shame or any other consecuence. War can be declared to any one just because some one in the goberment feels that a given country was or is a threat. A nation that was made by inmigrants and welcomed the opresed from all over the world, now is building fences and kicking the opressed out. It is sad!
Now we have Bush. I feel that he and Chavez are made of the same materials, they are alike. They called each otherHittler. It makes me wonder... ( when I say Bush I include the Bush administration officials and when I talk about Chavez I talk about Chavez' officials as well).
In Venezuela journalist are being harrased, prossecuted and jailed by the state. They goberment says that it is not the state, but private citizens that are suing the journalist because they published false information about them. Ok,lets say I believe that. The state has a duty "noticia criminis" to investigate about the veracity of the information published by the newspaper, and to my knowledge the state has not done its job. The incompetence and negligence of the state result in: First, that if the citizen that has been faulsly accused by the newsperson will never clear his reputation. Second, that the newspeople feel that they can not communicate the news effectively so they censored them self to be safe. The result is no good for no one, and a coupe against the free press.Chavez knows about coups.
In the U.S.A some official dares to compare Bush with Hittler and a lot of people wants to have his head.It is his point of view, he expressed that opinion out of his work enviroment. Does it means that no one can dissent or no one can say anything about Bush without been called a terrorist? Isn't this a way of terrorism? I feel, and I have to say this is only a feeling, that Bush and Chavez are made from the same clay.
I am living in two very different countries. I am phisically in the U.S.A but my mind is always wandering around the streets of Caracas. I drink a coffe "en la panaderia" and eat a "cachito de jamon". In my mind I can see the Avila every morning, I can smell the mountain.
The sound of Caracas is inside my skin. The noise, the traffic the laughter.
I wake up every day and I get amazed by the change of the seasons. I get frustrated by my lack of understanding and adaptation to the winter.The pace is stablished by the ever changing weather, and justifies precaution and planning of every activity. Every thing is quiet. I feel safe.
Safety. It is a strange feeling specially when you start readding about the political situation of the world. No one is safe, no where is safe. In third world countries like my beloved Venezuela life does not worth too much. There are about four crimes every day in Caracas (30-40 every week), almost every one has been robbed at least once. Poverty, corruption, poor education, human exploitation, lack of ambition, lack of inmagination, selfishness, no social or communal sense, short sightness and... I could keep writing many more componets to our latin, third world south american recipe for a miserable living conditions.
Now, today we have Chavez. He is just one more chapter of the sameness that we have suffered in our glorious life as a nation.
The U.S.A. I have always admired the United States of America way of life. When I was a kid, may be eight yrs. old, I came for the first time to Miami . I stayed at the Ronney Plaza Hotel with may parents, I enjoyed the experience. When I was fourteen, I stayed for a month traveling from New Orleans to Canada and from Canada to Miami, it was fun an educational. Later I came to school in Louisiana and graduated there. I made many friends and I am grateful for the good time and great friends. The U.S.A was a country of freedom and respect. It has always been an imperial power but within its borders there was respect for the individual.( This idea is a little bit tricky; there has been respect for the individual but at the same time there has been a lot of racism and seggregation. I am only talking about my experience and how I felt).
Twenty yrs latter I am back in the U.S.A. There is no respect for individuals. Fraude is legal. The president and officials can lie to the population without shame or any other consecuence. War can be declared to any one just because some one in the goberment feels that a given country was or is a threat. A nation that was made by inmigrants and welcomed the opresed from all over the world, now is building fences and kicking the opressed out. It is sad!
Now we have Bush. I feel that he and Chavez are made of the same materials, they are alike. They called each otherHittler. It makes me wonder... ( when I say Bush I include the Bush administration officials and when I talk about Chavez I talk about Chavez' officials as well).
In Venezuela journalist are being harrased, prossecuted and jailed by the state. They goberment says that it is not the state, but private citizens that are suing the journalist because they published false information about them. Ok,lets say I believe that. The state has a duty "noticia criminis" to investigate about the veracity of the information published by the newspaper, and to my knowledge the state has not done its job. The incompetence and negligence of the state result in: First, that if the citizen that has been faulsly accused by the newsperson will never clear his reputation. Second, that the newspeople feel that they can not communicate the news effectively so they censored them self to be safe. The result is no good for no one, and a coupe against the free press.Chavez knows about coups.
In the U.S.A some official dares to compare Bush with Hittler and a lot of people wants to have his head.It is his point of view, he expressed that opinion out of his work enviroment. Does it means that no one can dissent or no one can say anything about Bush without been called a terrorist? Isn't this a way of terrorism? I feel, and I have to say this is only a feeling, that Bush and Chavez are made from the same clay.
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