The Joy of Supermarketing; or Oil, Oil, My Kingdom for Some Canola Oil !

A few weeks ago, in Valencia, one of our hosts offered to make us some cheese empanadas...dee-lish !  But when that evening came around, there were no empanadas to be seen, nor to be eaten.  Sorry, she apologized, there was no oil in the supermarket.

The following two mornings, she repeated the offer, and each evening, we found out that there was no oil to be had in Valencia, the third largest city in the country.  We never did get one of those homemade empanadas.

Who's to blame ?  I'm pretty sure Chavez.

We spent three months in Venezuela.  For three whole months, we had to endure Venezuela's anti-laissez-faire market politics in the supermarket.  I´m definitely not a proponent of 100 % laissez-faire, preferring a mix of let-it-be and slightly-tinker-with-it.  But in Venezuela, Chavez's plump hand wages a thumb war against the market's invisible hand and wins every time.

Any supermarket selling food at market level prices (gasp !) gets nationalized.  So in the end, you have a handful of nationalized chains that sell only the essentials, such as corn flour, rice, and...and...and to come to think of it, I can't remember anything else in those stores !  They sell those few products dirt cheap, and the poor wait in line for those basics for two hours.  Then you visit the other supermarkets, that aren't nationalized, and you find prices the same or higher than in Europe or the States (we're talking about a country with nearly 30% inflation).  So technically there is a choice : wait in line all day to buy the basics, or spend half your salary if you want your food to have any flavor.

But the one thing that's certain is that because of all of the price-fixing, many products that I consider more-or-less essential are conspicuously absent : could be milk this week, oil next week, and wheat flour the following week.  And forget about products deemed exotic !  You want couscous, go to Algeria !

So it was with great pleasure that we walked into our first supermarket upon returning to Colombia.  Its shelves were overflowing with reasonably-priced products from Colombia and beyond.  Normally I try to spend as little time as possible shopping, and grocery shopping is no exception.  But here, in post-Venezuela Colombia, everything's different...we take our time, we visit the same aisles over and over, we dream about the concoctions we could create in the kitchen.

And for the past week, we've been in the kitchen non-stop, preparing some of our favorite recipes, and learning a few new ones.  Believe me, they're so much tastier when you actually have spices and don't have to replace half of the main ingredients.

You Gotta Feel The Pepper !

The first time we met Claudio, it was at a seaside bar next to the marina.  Romano and Claudio prefered this bar because, unlike the others in the area, it had no metal bars covering the walls, doors, and windows.  In those other bars, I imagine, the view must have been quite similar to the vista seen by Alcatraz's inmates.

During the first half of our conversation, Claudio, with his intense bulging eyes, told me all the reasons for which I deserved the label gringo...and why I should be ashamed.  During the second half, he informed me that the American scientists had devised a method a rerouting hurricanes, generally in the direction of Haiti and Cuba.  We were sceptical, so he offered proof : the US had not been hit by a hurricane in more than three years.  Check mate, gringo !

Claudio is not Venezuelan, he's not even South American.  Claudio's an Italian in his 50's or 60's.  He has no hair on top, but more than enough for a gray ponytail on the back of his head.

Claudio, like our host Romano, lives alone on his boat.  He has done so for the past 15 years at least, and for nearly all of those years, he docked in Cartagena in Colombia.  But at the moment of our passage through Puerto la Cruz, Venezuela, he was living across the dock from Romano, and they had become friends.

Later that evening, we offered to make a meal, something simple...egg fried rice.  And so in Romano's tiny kitchen, with his tiny utensils and tiny pan, and on his tiny stove I prepared the dish.  On one burner the rice, the other some veggies frying.  Pauline and Romano were seated inside the cabin.  Claudio stood on the steps leading from the cabin to the upper deck.  I added a bit of salt and pepper to my vegetables.  And I was about to start frying the rice when Claudio suddenly said that he wouldn't be eating with us that evening, but he offered to cook an Italian meal the following day, and then he hastily left.

The next day, we walked across the plank to Claudio's immense sailboat where he was sweating profusely over the stove wearing only his sagging gray underwear.  He was preparing two dishes : one with fried zucchini, garlic, and fresh basil bathing in vinegar...and the other was a pasta dish with vegetables and fresh Italian cheeses.  Both were heavenly; I had thirds and could have eaten more, but I wanted to avoid being called a greedy or gluttonous gringo.

Throughout the whole cooking process, he discussed all the rare herbs and quality ingredients of fine Italian cuisine...almost all of which were too expensive or unattainable in Venezuela.  At least for us.  For him, it was unthinkable to consume the fodder that 90% of Venezuelans eat every day, such as cornflour arepas, manioc, or the plethora of fried meals.  He told us that not only must you have the finest quality ingredients, you must also cook with feeling, and at this point he made some strange Italian gestures; while puckering his lips, all five of his fingers touched at a point where they could very well have been milking his aura's invisible teat.

It was here, while talking about feeling, that he pointed to me.  "I saw him, tossing in salt and pepper with no feeling."  So that was why he left in such a hurry !  His index finger on his left hand was now pulling down on his lower eyelid, his other index finger fixed firmly on me.  "I saw him," he repeated.  Then he said it again.  I didn't deny it.  For chrissake, it was egg fried rice !  I promised myself that the next time I cook in front of an Italian that I would sniff the salt, lick the pepper, listen to the curry...I would feel them all !

I was relieved to be leaving after only two days there, no matter how delicious his cooking was.  And part of me, only part of me, smiled when, one week later, Hurricane Irene blasted the East Coast...must be my shameful gringo heritage.

The Original Gringo

Being an American in South America seems to be a bit of a hassle.  Whenever I mention the nation of my childhood, education, accent, and family pets, I invariably hear the G word, within about three seconds.  Gringo.  The first time was cute and marginally unexpected.  After the thirtieth time, you stop bringing the USA up.

Anyway, sooner or later - often just after holding me responsible for the Hiroshima bombing or Salvador Allende´s death - they tell me just why I´m called gringo.  There are two variations, both stemming from the Mexican-American War, fought in the 19th century.  The first says that American and Irish soldiers sang a song called Green Grow the Lilacs, and that the first two words got smooshed together by the eavesdropping Mexicans.  The second says that the invading soldiers wore green uniforms and some Mexicans, unhappy being invaded, yelled at the Americans : Green, go (away)!...

The only problem with these folk etymologies is that the word existed nearly a century prior to the Mexican-American War, and it existed in Spain.  The most likely, but unprovable, origin for the word is griego, the Spanish word for Greek.  Similarly, in English we say that something "sounds Greek" when it sounds foreign or complicated.  Another possible root is peregrino, meaning traveler, pilgrim, foreigner.

So in South America, I travel around as a Swede, carrying around my blond hair, blue eyes, and most importantly, Swedish passport.  The Swedes never get blamed for their international legacies : dynamite, safety matches, TetraPak, and IKEA.  So you can see why I go by El Sueco down here.

Venezuela in Pictures

Pauline surrounded by rocks, frailejones, and clouds

High up on the trail

Nice photo-op in Merida

From a distance, the landscape is puke-green.  Up close, brilliant.

The middle of the country is dominted by the plains.

Pauline, in one of the many anti-pirate forts

Pauline, all covered up in the rainforest to avoid the mosquitos

The Orinoco Delta has amazing clouds and sunsets

Hiking in the hills near Maracay

One of the many amazing beaches in the country

Another great beach, at dawn

Chuao : colonial village known for its cacao

For more photos, check out these links :

The Andes

https://picasaweb.google.com/104214304380226102315/TachiraSanCristobalJul2011
https://picasaweb.google.com/104214304380226102315/MeridaMeridaLaCulataSierraNevadaElCaneyJul2011

The Llanos and the Delta

https://picasaweb.google.com/104214304380226102315/LosLlanosYAmazonasSanFernandoPuertoAyacucho
https://picasaweb.google.com/104214304380226102315/GuayanaCiudadGuayanaOrinocoDelta

The Coast

https://picasaweb.google.com/104214304380226102315/SucreYAnzoateguiGuacharoPariaCumanaMochimaPuertoLaCruz?authkey=Gv1sRgCK2Qz4zB4p-_iwE
https://picasaweb.google.com/104214304380226102315/AraguaMaracayCataChuao
https://picasaweb.google.com/104214304380226102315/CaraboboFalconZuliaValenciaCoroMaracaybo

Cum On Feel The Noize : In Haiku !

Here are five haiku, all of which try to convey that Venezuela is a loud country, perhaps the loudest.  Ever.

Reggaeton deafens
Salsa and Shakira must yell as well
''Huh?'' shouts the old man.

Plastic surgery :
fused to my palm, a plastic box,
jingled when I pawed it.

Sashaying to the store
to buy her feminine products.
A douche-bag honks.

Venezuela...
The painted bluebird blasts its horn.
Seven alarms wail.

Cacophony,
louder !, to avoid the silence,
to the eleven.

A Tale of Two Playas

Camping at Medina

It was the best of beaches, it was the worst of beaches.  Venezuela has the longest coastline of any Caribbean nation...and much of that is spanned by some of the most beautiful beaches in the world in places like Morrocoy, Mochima, Margarita, Los Roques, and Paria.  The most outstanding beach that we visited, though, was our very first beach of Venezuela.

It's called Playa Medina, on the peninsula of Paria; it's postcard picture perfect...it is actually the beach most seen in postcard photos in the country.  The sand's like white corn flour, the water like the sky above the endless Llanos.  It's hemmed in by impassable mountains and fringed by coconut palms, of course.  And during the week, the place is empty...all to yourself.  Well you can imagine.  Paradise.

Medina from above

Then there's the island of Zapara.  We were invited there for our last weekend in Venezuela, and after all the wonderful beaches we had seen, we couldn't refuse.  Upon first glance, my breath was taken away.  Aghast, I was.  I should have realized that the island lie where Lake Maracaibo's filthy cloaca deposits into the sea.  The water of Lake Maracaibo would be considered far too polluted for swimming for even a Ganges-bathing Indian.  Aghast, I say !

The beach was only half sandy.  The other half included non-sand items such as glass and plastic bottles, dead and rotting fish, dried cow and donkey shit, broken Barbies and other miscellaneous trash, and sea shells (not even the pretty ones, either).  The water, well, looked like it came out of a cloaca...I'll spare you the richer description.  You can imagine.  Not paradise.

And that was just my first impression.  Things got far worse.  First things first, we tried to put up the tent, but with 50km/h winds and soft sand mixture, the tent pegs absolutely refused to stay put.  One hour later, we were still at it, when one of the others in the group mentioned that they had an extra tent.  Yes, please !

Five minutes later, our new tent was up.  But comicly enough, the zippers were jammed, and so we were stuck with a gaping opening on one side like a giant frog's mouth .  There wasn't much we could do...so we had dinner : pita and veggies.  Remember the wind ?  Well carrots are whole lot crunchier when eaten in a sandstorm.  Pita bread, too.  Four days later, I'm still finding grains of sand in my teeth.

So we went back to the tent.  Remember the wind, again ?  Well, all evening the wind force fed our sad open-mouthed frog tent with sand like a sadistic Frenchman hoping to eat its liver.  And just then Pauline had the best idea ever, even better than either of us realized at the time.  She suggested that we take our old tarp-tent and drape it over the new gaping one.  Less than a minute and half later, the skies opened up and released one of the hardest and windiest and wettest and longest downpours that we've experienced since arriving in South America.  All night long, the tent jumped, shifted, leaned, and moaned.  Rainwater slowly filled its corners.  From the screams we heard in the night, we could only assume the other campers were a lot wetter than us.  From time to time, a tent-peg would come undone and the tent would flap and flail harder than usual, and we (usually Pauline) would have to go out and replant it.  And several times, our thoughts transcended from the mental to the verbal : I hate this fucking beach !

But of course, everything was better in the morning.  I woke up with the sunrise, my eyes bleary and encrusted with wet sand, but somehow I felt refreshed.  The wind had calmed down, and most of the group was also up.  We spent the morning swimming, eating sandless food, and chatting in the shade of a flotsam and concrete refuge.

I think in the end, like with all miserable moments, our memories of Zapara will stay vivid with us, provoking laughter whenever we tell the tale.  Whereas Playa Medina, with its perfect sand and azure water will fade and blend in among other countless beaches with the same description.  So if you ever go to Venezuela´s Caribbean coast, forget Los Roques, Mochima, Morrocoy, or even Medina.  Head over to Zapara, where sand is the main ingredient in every meal, and the only fish you'll see are the bloated remains next to your tent.

La Plaga !

Beware !

Beware !

Beware la plaga !

La plaga strikes at night. La plaga spares no one. The indigenous say they can't be touched by la plaga...but they flail their arms like madmen.

La plaga spreads through the air. The 11th plague of Egypt missed its connection and got stuck in Venezuela. You cannot avoid la plaga.

Once struck by la plaga, you will bleed from holes all over your body, your ears will hum and buzz, you will be driven to madness...and scratching.

The elderly ramble about a land without la plaga. Sanctuary ! Somewhere in the high Andes, they say. But no one believes them.

La plaga has an alias. It calls itself "Zancudo." But on its well-stamped and -traveled passport, one can clearly read the name "Mosquito."

Yes, in Venezuela, they use a word that for us Anglophones connotates the agonizing death of ¼ of some European populations caused by infestations of flea-infested rats.

Yeah, they can be pretty annoying here.

[This article should be read aloud with a Hungarian accent.]

You're a lousy cook !

In France, I considered myself a decent cook. No. Better than better than average. As a vegetarian, I had learned dozens and dozens of recipes from here and there around the globe. They were good enough to make even the most ardent carnivores salivate. And Pauline cooks much better than I do.

Upon our arrival in South America, I was brimming with kitchen confidence. For our first host we planned on making risotto. So we visited the nearest supermercado in search of the ingredients….hmmm, mushrooms cost twice as much as back home, cooking white wine doesn‘t exist, and veggie broth has yet to be invented on this continent. Plan B : uh, how about a Greek salad ? Black olives cost two arms and a leg, feta is non-existent, and olive oil…we’re a long way from Italy. Plan C : Goddammit, pasta and vegetables, that we can do !

And it's not just the main ingredients. For quite a few Colombians and Venezuelans, when you say “spice,” they think “salt” or perhaps "pepper." And the spice rack here is limited to those two, and if you’re lucky, maybe cinnamon.

This scene was repeated over and over again in countless homes and supermarkets in countless cities...suddenly all my confidence collapsed like a deflated cholocate mousse. My list of recipes was decimated. And those that I could do, I couldn't do !

For a while it seemed like nothing would work. The pans would stick, the oven cooked too hot. One time, I woke up early to prepare some pancakes for our host…simple pancakes...but the damn things kept sticking to the pan. More butter, more oil, changing the pan…in the end I succeeded in making 3 or 4 things that resembled pancakes with multiple malignant tumors. And I went back to bed, in frustration. Our host, Clara, later asked Pauline if American pancakes are supposed to be that way, amoeboid-shaped, almost burnt on the outside, and uncooked inside.

So now I stick to the one recipe that always works and always makes the South Americans (read : carnivores) smile : my veggie burgers.

Closed for Business !

Soon after arriving in Venezuela, up in the Andes, we met Eduardo, who bakes pies and sells them on the street to earn a bit of extra cash.  Inspired by Eduardo, the high prices in the supermarket, and Venezuela’s terrible exchange rates, we decided to take a slice of the pie industry ourselves.  With Eduardo’s secret recipe and borrowed ovens and pie forms, we started our little venture in a small village in the mountains to resounding success.  We sold whole pies in as little as 25 minutes…and in the worst case, perhaps an hour and 25 minutes.  Over a four-day period we sold about 5 or 6 pies, plus my Swedish negerbollar.  We envisioned ourselves traipsing across country selling pies to the overweight middle-aged Venezuelan ladies.

But over the next three weeks, we never had the opportunity to bake for various reasons - staying with people who didn’t have an oven, camping in our tent, volunteering at a camp - and so our Bolivares quickly disappeared.

A quick note about Venezuelan currency :
If you exchange $100 in a Venezuelan bank, they’ll give you 450 BsF (Bolivares Fuertes).  If you exchange on the Mercado Negro, you’ll get a whopping 800 BsF !  Because of this difference, we decided at the beginning of our trip to slyly transfer a large sum through someone who has accounts in Venezuela and the US.  But this kind of transaction is not always possible when you’re traveling and don’t have contacts. 

So we arrived in Maracay with only 400 BsF left - that’s about 50 bucks, or enough money to leave Venezuela immediately.  But we were feeling lucky, Vegas-style, so we took half of our cash and went to the supermarket.  We filled our cart with flour, sugar, eggs, lemons, pumpkin, bananas, and a whole bunch of sweet sweet condensed milk.

And we made pies.  Big pies.  Two or three per day.   And we walked up and down the streets of Maracay, “Tortas, tortas !!!  …Tortas de limon, tortas de auyama, tortas de cambur !!!   …10 Bolivares !!!,” for hours on end in the brutal heat.  But by golly, we sold them all.  At the end of the first day, we were still in the red.  By day two, we broke even.  Days three, four, and five were profit days.  We made enough to survive for another few days, and more importantly, we bought ourselves the needed time to find someone with an account is the States.  So for now, we’ve decided to quit making pies and get money the easy way - from our bank accounts !

Overall, it was a great experience; we met heaps of other locals venders selling socks and batteries and Tupperware and flashing keychains, you name it.  Before we started selling, I was always wondering how they earned enough to get by.  After selling for a few days, I am now dumbfounded.  Because, honestly, cakes sell a whole lot faster than flashing key chains.

So, we’ve hung up our wooden spoons for now, but the next time we’re in a fiscal bind or just have the urge, we’ll be ready.