so after a long boring flight where sleep composed of short 2 hour kips. and various transfers that i was sure would be missed or somehow would not work out as smoothely as they did i arrived in humid hot caracas. it took a while to find jim mcclloy who i was meeting and i started to wonder if my luck had finaly run out. but as my tired brain scanned the airport and taxi drivers tried to get me in their cabs and military men tried to sell me currency i spotted him. 2 hectic bus rides later going up over the mountains that seperate the coast and the airport from caracas proper we arrived at the hotel. i had to pay 80bols for the first night as i was the last brigadista to arrive and no one was there to try and sort out shifting rooms. but i did get a single room and a double bed to rest my travel weary head. although that didnt wind up happening until after midnight. but thats way in the future and im still talking about the past so dont jump too far ahead there mate. and i apologise for the lack of certain symbols as i have not managed to fin them on the keyboard. but youre all smart people and should be able to figure things out. after having the rude realisation that in fact i could not change into shorts as its not the done thing we headed out into the humid caracas day to meet the rest of the brigade in plaza bolivar. there are 30 of us in total mostly with limited to no spanish. and in a totally spanish speaking country and where little to no one speaks english this makes things interesting. they have an extremely efficient metro system here but if they didnt then the trains would be completely unmanageble. they come every 2 minutes and if there was a longer interval the sheer numbers of people using it would overwhelm the system. i have been taking notes and keeping a journal kind of since i arrived as if i didnt i would surely forget and confuse the happenings of my time here. it has been a bit of a sensory and political feast here. music blares from every nook and cranny. the smells are both pleasant and repugnant at the same time. the diet we are eating leaves something to be desired. meat and cheese and bread is the staple. veges you ask? what are they they ask. so a bit of internal blockage is on its way methinks...
so after arriving in caracas jetlagged as anything we met the other brigadistas and for me started the first day of the brigade. they had already had 2 days of the brigade. for those of you who dont know. this brigade is organized by the australia venezuela solidarity network. its about seeing the real revolutionary processes that are going on in venezuela at the moment under both the government of hugo chavez and by the mass organizing of ordinary people in venezuela. with this brigade it gives us a chance to see for oursleves what is really going on without the bias of our esteemed western liberal media. who for the most part have nothing worthwhile or valuable to say about the revolutionary process going on here. again and again we meet people here who are amazed that we have come all this way to see what they the ordinary people of venezuela are doign to improve their lives through community organizing and participative democracy. but they also say that it is so important for people all over the world to know what is going to help counter the negative views that are continuously being fed to the world by the western media. it really is extraordinary whats going on here. and while chavez is the public face of the revolution it is the people on the ground and in the barrios who are doign so much work to push the revolution forward. so enough vaguearies and now into specifics...
our first visit was to the fabricio ojeda nucleo de endogeno. a collective which included a shoe factory, a textiel factory, a medical clinic. a school, an organic permaculture garden, construction coopeoperative, sports facilities, and many other functions. this collective helps the community by providing jobs, teaching valuable skills, improving the health of the community, subsidizing food so that it is 30 to 40% cheaper than the supermarkets. and its not just the poor who can buy food here. anyone can, even the wealthy elite if they saw fit. the day we visited there were not that many workers there as many were helping set u0p the polling booths and assist in the elections. imagine that if in nz or whereever. you could request time off work to help build socialism...
and with that i might have to leave it for now as i am out of time and need to go back to the hotel and debrief about the elections. you will hear about that it is not good.
