Surrounded by Armpits

I want to thank Venezuela Analysis for the invitation to share some of my thoughts through this website. I currently contribute columns regularly to Narco News and to 21st Century Socialism. What I would like to do here is share shorter reflections of an expatriate, looking in on Venezuela and looking out from here at the U.S. and the rest of the world.

What direction these thoughts will take, I have no idea. As Stephen King wrote about writers in his book, On Writing: "We are writers, and we never ask one another where we get out ideas; we know we don't know."

So let me start with some reflections from the Metro:

Surrounded By Armpits

The other morning I was riding the Metro during one of the early rush hours. It was full, although nothing in comparison to a Sao Paulo train where I thought my life would be ended by suffocation early one morning. On that day, I was finally able to squeeze my way out--three stations after where I wanted to get off.

While sometimes crowded, the Caracas Metro is much more civilized. But when the door closed the other day I looked around me and realized that I was surrounded by armpits! In every direction I looked, there were arms reaching to the ceiling or clinging to an overhead bar.

However, very interesting to me was the fact that I sensed no body odor. It was a reminder, again, of the almost mania the Venezuelan has for cleanliness. I doubt that if I were on a train in Europe or in the United States my experience would have been equal.

The Venezuelan is super-clean. Workmen always carry extra clothes with them to change before leaving their workplace. Someone commented that even men who are street dwellers shave every day. That comment may be an exaggeration-but not by much. There have been times when food consumption has gone down in Venezuela but the purchasing of personal hygiene products remained the same.

Imported Violins

Foreigners are quickly recognized in Venezuela by their offensive body odors. I remember a cartoon showing some naked indigenous people looking at arriving European explorers landing on a beach. One indigenous person asks another, "Do you think they couldn't find any water in the ocean?"

Someone having bad body odor here is said to have "violin." It is a code word. Just imagine a violinist playing his or her instrument and you can understand the symbolism.

Standing on the Corner

In my youth there was a song with the words, "Standing on the corner, watching all the girls go by." The same day I was observing armpits in the morning, I was watching pedestrians and automobiles near a busy intersection in the Altamira section of Caracas. The area is filled with five star hotels, elegant buildings, night clubs, and fine restaurants. It was close to 6 p.m. and people were leaving their places of work.

Walking past me on the sidewalk in the direction of the Metro were men and women who probably work as laborers, housekeeping personnel, bank clerks, receptionists, etc. The street, on the other hand, was filled with fine cars, most with windows closed and air-conditioners on.

A Chacao policeman was directing traffic. (If you lived in Caracas you would immediately have an image of the policeman in your mind. A former Miss Universe, Irene Saez, was once mayor of this district. As Bart Jones points out in !HUGO!, she "outfitted them with the kinds of white pith helmets she'd seen British bobbies wearing when she'd visited London...."

There was a great deal of congestion in the direction of the major highway and so as to prevent gridlock, the policeman was not permitting cars to proceed on the green light until there was room on the other side of the avenue they had to cross. The result: horns honking, honking, honking. The policeman was doing a good job. The owners or chauffeurs of the stylish cars didn't appreciate his efforts.

When I entered the subway, I encountered a different world. People were standing in line to board the trains when they came. No one was "honking." People seem to be respecting one another.

A man in an elegant restaurant once told a British columnist that there were not rich people and poor people in Venezuela. There were, he said, intelligent people and stupid people and the stupid people lived in the barrios and you could do all you wanted to do in the way of education and nothing was going to change that reality.

I guess "stupid" people respect others more than "intelligent" people.

Earrings, Noserings, My Rings, Your Rings

A teenager was standing near me in the Metro. He had a silver ring dangling from his nostril. A young woman looked at him with disdain and made a comment to the man accompanying her, who turned and looked at the teenager also.

Interestingly, the woman had two silver rings hanging from her earlobes. I wanted to make a comment to the teenager and to point him in the direction of the woman's earrings. I didn't.

This brings me back to the reality of being an expatriate in Venezuela. I get the feeling the U.S. government is always looking at other countries with distain and doesn't see the plank it has within its own eye.

The following is a recent quotation of Karen Hughes, undersecretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs taken from an article of the Religious News Service written by Marci Davis-Seale.

"We have a great deal of work to do and we face a lot of misunderstanding around the world. One of our biggest challenges is getting more concerned citizens in all parts of the world to speak out and make clear that extremists pervert religion when they bomb hospitals, universities, wedding parties, mosques, even groups of children. The time has come when people of all faiths must join together to make these acts of terror unacceptable."

It appears she is speaking about the United States, although she doesn't seem to be aware of it.

I wonder if she wears earrings.

I think I might have my nose pierced tomorrow.