DON'T CRY FOR ME, VENEZUELA

I had the pleasure last night of dining with an 80 year old lady who had just arrived from Caracas to visit her daughter who is married to a Trinidadian and lives here. Naturally, the conversation turned to what was happening in her unfortunate country and, more importantly, how was she surviving? I also wanted to know how the poor people were managing.


Here is some of what she told me:
- the black market exchange rate today is 400 bolivars to US$1. Nobody pays attention to the official exchange rate ... not even the banks. In any case, unless you have very high government connections it is impossible to buy US dollars at the official exchange rate; everything is priced at the reigning black market rate which climbs higher every day;
- everybody has lost weight ... except those in Government. This is because food is scarce. She herself has lost 5 kilos over the last 12 months;
- scarcities in everything are common. Meat is like gold and just as scarce and just as expensive;
- because of the scarcities people are hoarding. If you see an item in the grocery today you buy it, even if you don't need it, because it won't be there tomorrow;
- items like soap and shampoo are either not available or are of extremely poor quality. No luxury brands (e.g., Pantene) are available;
- the minimum wage is 1,800 b's a month. Put another way, the minimum wage is the equivalent of US$4.50 a month. No wonder that people are starving and crime is so high;
- public transport has collapsed and private taxis (like our PH taxis) charge whatever they like. My old lady friend has an ironer who comes in once a week for about 2 hours every time. The ironer charges her 100 b's for her time plus 55 b's for her taxi fare. When the ironer leaves she walks to another job;
- Caracas is now filthy dirty. The roads are full of potholes. The malls are empty and many businesses are closing or have closed.
- inflation is running at close to one million percent a year! Prices of goods in the shops change literally every day!


And you wonder why somewhere close to 10 percent of Venezuela's population has fled the country! Me? I blame President Maburro (and yes, the misspelling is deliberate), his sidekick Vice President Diodadas Cabello, who is the head of the infamous Cartel de los Soles, and who is probably the most dangerous Drug Lord in the Hemisphere, and the Cubans who have created a security apparatus that makes a coup most unlikely.  But it doesn't matter, does it? Maburro gets fatter, Cabello and his cronies get richer, the Cubans get their oil and the poor starve. Then neighbouring countries Like Trinidad & Tobago faced with an influx of refugees fleeing the tyranny, show no sympathy or empathy for these suffering people but instead complain that they are coming over here by the thousands. Of course, there is NO criticism of the tyrannical regime that has forced them to flee. Neither is there any consideration of how desperate  man or woman has to be to flee from his/her home and go to a strange land where they have no family, no friends and don't even speak the language! And the TT government sits down with these monsters, breaks bread with them and makes deals which are kept secret from the rest of us!


And nobody sees anything wrong with this!!
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