The Muddy-Pants Diaries

16 August 2005 (Tuesday) – Caracas, Venezuela

Mission ONE – Bolivian Embassy [ACCOMPLISHED]

YES!  I GOT MY BOLIVIAN VISA!!!!!

Wow, I am so glad I made the attempt! I actually never thought of trying again, and hence, never even thought of coming to Caracas but woah, yes, I am going to Bolivia!  I simply went to the bank, paid the fee, handed over my bank receipt, letter, photo, copy of my bank’s statement, and the lady glanced at everything and smilingly gave me the visa on the spot.  I did not even need to flash any Senator’s name card.  La la la…

Mission TWO – English Books [accomplished, I supposed]

Well, in this mission, there was a rather round-about hunt for either The American Bookshop or The English Bookshop. The America Bookshop was listed in my map, but it was moved to a new site. Having no one to turn to, I walked around town and came upon Centro Venezolano Americano and also, traced British Council and casually sashayed in, asking if they knew where these bookshops were. They gave me the place to find The American Bookshop and I found it.  Very resourceful, aren’t I?

I was looking for Latin American literature in English, but they only have a few books from Mario Vargas Llosa and no one else. And they were very expensive. Meanwhile, the dreaded classics were at half-price. OK, the classics then…

Well, I was a little careful with my expenditure at this point because I only had enough bolivares to last for a few days in Caracas. In other countries, I would have easily gone to an automatic machine to withdraw my money if I ran out. But, Venezuela has a very ‘different’ situation.

OK, 3 years ago, end-2002 to early-2003, there were massive political troubles in Venezuela. Actually, at that precise moment, I was in South America, somewhere in Chile and Argentina. I knew that Venezuela went crazy, but I did not know much else as I could not read the papers in Spanish. But a few months later, when I returned home, the Asian world, including Singapore, was going crazy about the strange respiratory disease called SARS and I naturally forgot about Venezuela.

So, now I learn this from Rafael. At that time, many Venezuelans started buying US dollars and many left the country. So, the government had to put a stop before the whole situation went out of control. A law was created such that only the government could buy US dollars.

If a Venezuelan wishes to travel, he has to show proof of his travels, like a visa and an air-ticket and stuff, before he is issued a letter from a ministry something which he can then take to a bank. The bank would then process this and he could buy up to US$400 and he would be issued a credit card which he has up to US$4000 to spend. In a way, Venezuelans can still buy US dollars but only for those who really need them, and only in this complicated way.

In turn, tourists can only change US dollars into bolivares in a bank (there were no more money changers) or withdraw bolivares against their accounts.  For these, the government uses a particular rate. But this rate is much lower than the rate that the people in this country are actually willing to change for. So, if you can find someone, anyone, willing to change your US dollars, you get a much better rate, up to 25% more.

And I was waiting for that someone.

15 August 2005 (Monday) – Caracas, Venezuela

Mission ONE – Bolivian Embassy

Three years ago, my visa application for entry into Bolivia was rejected, without explanations, after a 3.5 months’ wait. I had actually never planned on trying again, because, although I would really LOVE to visit Bolivia, why exasperate myself again for another 3 months or so, when to be honest, there are also loads of other places to visit?

But chatting with Jorge of the Amazon Jungle (hehee, my guide, actually) last week about my travels, this topic came up and the ex-politician-current-political-refugee was outraged. He whipped out his wallet and gave me a business card of a person who worked in the House of the Senators of the Bolivian Government. He told me, go to Caracas and show them this business card, watch them wither at the sight of the card and they will surely give you a visa. Wow, really??

Anyway, that was one of the reasons why I came to Caracas. While, apparently, in South America, it was very common to use side-doors as the favour for a friend of a friend and wield threats like ‘I know someone who knows someone…’ and all these complicated networking and bribes to get things done, I am not used to it. If the guy in the business card GAVE me the card, maybe I would use it. But this was given to me by ANOTHER person.

Well, still, I made my way to the Bolivian Embassy to try my luck. To my utter disbelief, the consulate lady simply gave me a list of items to produce – a letter explaining my intention of travels, a letter from my employer (whoops), passport, bank statements, deposit slip of US$30 to the Bolivian Embassy’s bank account, fill up this form and include a photo.

Wow, either the rules for processing Singaporean tourists have changed in the last 3 years, or the Bolivian Embassy in Caracas is a gift from my Travel God this time! But, not so fast… I would be truly happy only when I actually GET the visa, I reminded myself. I still had to see if they would overlook the fact that I do not have an employer, and whether they would roll their eyeballs at the sight of the remaining money in my bank account.

Mission TWO – English books

The trashy novel ‘Destiny’ is still only half-way through but I was already beginning to worry about where my next book is going to be from. Being in a city now, is my chance to try and procure one. Lisandro, whom I met in Santa Elena, suggested that I go to Libreria Techniciencia at Centro Sambil. He assured me one could find English books there.

Centro Sambil… a massive mall, obviously very new and rather posh. Also, I was relieved to see that Venezuelan ladies dress much much much much much much better than many Brazilian women. Here, they dressed decently. Some trashy clothes here and there, but generally, their tastes are miles up there compared to many Brazilian women, especially those whom I saw in Salvador, Belem and Manaus. Phew! And finally, I see women with great figures wearing mid-riff-showing blouses or other sexy, somewhat revealing clothes. Now, that was more like it. These women had earned the right to wear these clothes. My stomach did not turn like how it did in Brazil.

Another thing I noticed very glaringly was the number of queues all over. Gosh, in the morning, people queue for buses in very, very long lines. And here in the mall, extremely long lines of people were waiting patiently for the chance to use the automatic machines or the chance to enter one of the telephone companies to complain something about their cellular phones.

Speaking of cellular phones… how things are different here in Venezuela now. Apparently, unlike in Brazil, it is very cheap to place phone calls to cellular phones, especially those within the same network. In Brazil, it was so expensive that many homes actually had a service that barred cellular phone numbers from being dialled from their home phones. And to call a cell phone from a public phone, you had to talk super fast!

And so, here in Venezuela, an amusing sight for me was that I had seen women sitting somewhere with 3 cell phones in front of them. They were renting these phones out to passers-by with a need to dial a friend. And depending on which network their friends are on, they would use the cell phone from the same network. Neat.

OKOK, back to the books. Only John Grisham and John Kellerman. No, I rather not buy books that I would throw away later. I prefer better books. The search continues…

That evening, Rafael and Rosa took me to his brother’s apartment for a birthday party celebration. In a way, it touched me a lot to note that here in South America, people do treat birthdays rather importantly, always or nearly always making it a point to celebrate it with close friends and family members.

Well, back home, Rosa very kindly helped me type out the letter stating my intention of travels to Bolivia. Wow, she typed a really impressive letter, the Spanish was way, way, way, way beyond me. OK, wish me luck, we shall see tomorrow…

13 August 2005 (Saturday) - 14 August 2005 (Sunday) - Santa Elena de Uairen to Caracas, Venezuela Santa Elena is tiny, but tiny. I could not afford to go on another tour, so I had a lot of time to kill ... [Continue reading this entry]

12 August 2005 (Friday) - Santa Elena de Uairen, Venezuela The tour company I went to last night charged 300,000 Bs per car. If there were 4 tourists, it would be 75,000 Bs each. But as there were only 3 in ... [Continue reading this entry]

11 August 2005 (Thursday) - Santa Elena de Uairen, Venezuela There were 3 Spanish guys - Paco, Jose and Antonio, 2 very young English boys - Max and Keith - and a Venezuelan family of very fat people on this rafting ... [Continue reading this entry]

10 August 2005 (Wednesday) - Boa Vista, Brazil to Santa Elena de Uairen, Venezuela At Boa Vista, early in the morning, I jumped off the bus and ran to buy the bus ticket to Santa Elena de Uairen. Piece of ... [Continue reading this entry]