Travels to Táchira and Mérida

I finally went on a trip! It was really exciting to get out of Caracas, navigate the bus system, and see other things. I left Tuesday November 24th, and awoke the 25th in the morning on the coldest bus ever (I was warned that the buses here are over-air conditioned, but despite my pants, knee high socks, long sleeves, sweater and scarf I still froze! They keep them at less than 60 degrees, which here is quite cold) in the Andes, to see lots of cows outside the bus window. See exhibit a to left. I guess you have all seen cows, and Venezuelan cows are no different than other cows. Anyways...


I arrived to San Cristobal, in the state of Táchira, to be whisked away by taxi to the town of Michelena, where I was to meet up with other music professors and get to teach lessons. The taxista stopped and took me to his favorite road-side empanada place for breakfast-I was very hungry upon arrival.

Michelena is where Marcos Perez Jimenez is from, a Venezuelan president (dictator, depending on who you ask, from 1952-58), there are statues of him, and this cultural center was his former house:


This is Marco, a professor and colleague who teaches with me in San Antonio conducting the woodwinds. I arrived, and was immediately put to work fixing reeds and adjusting oboes. I got to give an oboe lesson to the oboist in the center-these kids had all been playing only a few months, and were doing excellently.

We then went to San Juan de Colon, another small Andean town, where an orchestral nucleo is run in a school. Here there were many more kids, and huge classes of them were practicing recorder; most students of El Sistema play recorder, sing in choir and learn basic music theory before starting an instrument.



The next day I went to a nucleo in a theological seminary in Palmira. The school was all boys, of course, and offered elementary through university studies. With music, the school seeks to offer a more integral education-as we know, kids who have access to music are more successful in other life areas too. Here they offered choir and traditional Venezuelan music-there were ensembles playing quatro and guitar, and different percussion instruments.


I then traveled to the city of Mérida, about a 4 hour bus ride through the Andes from San Cristobal. I spent a really fun weekend with Zach, another Fulbrighter here-he´s in Mérida, researching agricultural reform at the Universidad de los Andes, or the ULA. Mérida is a university town, and is perched among some beautiful hills. Here are a few pictures from a hike we took. Blogspot is being difficult, I'm sorry there aren't more pictures. There are a few more on facebook, and I may add more later...

The view from where we hiked, up outside of Merida


Here is a picture of the central market. There are artisanal wares, typical "fast foods"-arepas, empanadas, and tizana (a fruit coctail with all the local fruits you could think of, and an upstairs restaurant area, where we had breakfast. We also ate ice cream at Heladeria Coromoto, which has gotten into the Guiness Book of World Records for most ice cream flavors. I had avocado and plantain (2 different flavors), which was only mildly adventurous. We also went to dinner at a vegetarian restaurant (there is more than one in Merida, too!), went for drinks with some orchestral musician at a quirky little bar in the middle of a power outage, (electricity rationing is really common in Venezuela, and is starting to happen in Caracas too, see below) and walked around a lot. I realized that all the walking I do in Caracas is between my house and the metro, really. It's probably one of the safest cities in Venezuela, and it was really enjoyable to be able to walk around outside at night, even late. It's also one of the coldest cities (at around 1700meters), but was still sleeveless weather during the day, and a light sweater at night.

I was really glad I left Caracas and got to experience other things, but upon return, I realize that Caracas too is beginning to feel like home, despite all its difficulties and shortcomings. We've had a lot of water rationing lately (for a while I had water 3 times a day for an hour-better get up early to shower!) and electricity shortages, which is frustrating, but I have my collection of 5 liter jugs of water (both for bathing and drinking), and candles and matches in distinct strategic parts of my apartment.

I will spend my next week or so (I go to Germany for Christmas on the 21st!!) finishing up some music related things, hopefully scheduling some interviews, and maybe going to the beach. I hope everyone is doing well with their December activities!