Dining Out in Caracas

Ok - I feel a little weird writing about dining experiences in Caracas because my (truly) fabulous sister-in-law Erin is the Goddess of all things Food (and BTW has a blog about it - http://euonym-me.blogspot.com).

We have been to a few restaurants in Caracas, and, are getting used to the local customs. One of the very first things that I noticed was there was the lack of a children's menu at any restaurant we went to. That made me wonder, until I looked around, and realized there were no children at the restaurant. Except mine. There really weren't many people at the restaurant either, and it was 6:30 pm. This became a theme of almost every restaurant we have been to here.

Hmmm. Where are all the hungry children?

I did some investigation and found out that Venezuela basically has two social classes - those with money, usually lots and lots of money - who can afford to go to restaurants, and those without money - who stay home. A wealthy Venazlano with children has a live-in-nanny by default. Childcare is always available and never an issue. Our family lives on gringo time and we rarely eat dinner after 6:30 pm. Most Venezlano children are fed about the same time (by the nanny) and are put to bed at the usual time (by the nanny). Their parents, however, don't dine until at least 9pm and dinners can stretch well into the wee hours of the morning.

I have also learned to be patient when dining in Caracas. Everything takes much longer than you anticipated, especially for an American. Lunches routinely take 2 hours. Dinner is much longer. No one is in a hurry. Not the patrons, not the waiters, and certainly not the kitchen.

When you walk into a restaurant, you are greeted by a host or hostess who asks you if you would like fumar o no fumar. No fumar (smoking) please. You are seated immediately and asked for your drink of choice.

It is a dead giveaway that you are American when you ask for wine (one of the first Spanish phrases I learned - vino "vee-no"). True Venezlanos drink whiskey (pronounced whee-key).

At lunch or dinner, large bottles of Johnny Walker adorn the tables of most locals. Whiskey is served neat or over ice. Even the women drink it. Most restaurants also have a shrine in prominent display of Johnny Walker bottles that were never finished, each adorned with the card or name of the owner scrawled on a napkin and taped to the side of the bottle - awaiting the owner's return.

Your waiter will wait until you completely finish your first drink before attempting to approach your table again - and then, it is to ask you if you would like another drink. We have always had to tell the waiter we were ready to order - that is, if we could find him. It seems that the locals value their privacy.

Waiters do not wait near the table ready to be of service if needed - they congregate far away from the patrons and pass through the dining area every 30 minutes or so. Once we order, the food can take 25 - 45 mintues to arrive - even at lunch.

The food in Caracas is fabulous and worth the wait. The city is multi-ethnic has an extraordinary range of cuisines to offer. There are spanish, french, italian, mediterranean, japanese, and chinese resturants everywhere. The local specialities are mostly meat, meat and more meat with a few arepas thrown in.

An arepa is a bread made from corn that is unleavened, flat and round. It can be grilled, baked or fried. In Venezuela it is a stable to most meals, or can be sliced and filled with eggs and cheese for breakfast or sliced meat for lunch. It pushes the limit of sandwich construction as a stand-in for bread, but is a local favorite.

If you want a quick lunch (about an hour) there are plenty of Panaderias (bakeries) where you can order sandwiches on fresh baked bread or croissants. There are also stands and carts for quick meals (but I will not go near those).

All good things come to those who wait.

Buen Provencho!

Baby Talk

I am trying really hard to learn Spanish.

It is one of my goals I set for myself before I moved down here.

I was off to a great start. Chris and I had purchased Rosetta Stone in an effort to 'bone up' before we moved here. I started it, but kept getting sidetracked by the drama of the move so did not get very far. I have tried to continue it here - and it is going OK, but is is woefully insufficient in teaching me the things I needed to know as soon as I moved here.

Things like I Want, I Need, I Go....... forget conjugation, I just need to go and pick up my kids at school and go to the grocery store.

Once I mastered that, I started learning things around the house and kitchen to help me with the maid - cuarto (room), cama (bed), llavar (to wash), limpiar (to clean), and of course please and thank you.

Spanish is beautiful because there is no confusion in spelling like with English. Each vowel only has one sound - ahh, eh, ee, oh, oo. Thats it, really simple. No long and short vowels, no shwa. If you can roll your rrrrrrs then you can say anything in Spanish. You just have to remember that j = h as our maid is Julia (hoo - lee - ah), g = h like general (hen - ne - ral), h = is silent like hache (ah - chey), v = b like vendaje (ben - dah - hey), and z = s like zapatos (sah - pot - toes). Piece of cake.

Many words with the same meaning are spelled exactly the same as english - but sound completely different in spanish.

For example, take the word universal - easy right - it is spelled the same, but here is sounds like oo-KNEE-bear-sal. Now if you are a native Venezlano you will say it in less than .3 seconds and drop the last syllable.

You hear a word. oo-KNEE-bear-sal. You tilt your head to the side, squench up your nose, and let your mind roll the syllables around like your first taste of Far Niete on the palate. You detect notes of familiarity, start to make a mental connection, and then, "I've got it!" Universal. However, by the time you realize what they have said is a word that you know, they have moved onto the next paragraph.

Right when we first moved here I was bursting with my exuberence to practice my spanish, in an attempt to tell my maid that my "hair was falling out on the floor" I said, "mi pellotas en el piso." She blinked a few times, smiled, and walked away. That translates to "my balls are in the floor" - so I got pelo (hair) and pelotas (balls) mixed up. Whatever.

My friend R said to ask people to speak to you in spanish as if you were two years old. Hmmm. That is about where my vocabulary is, so it makes sense. I'll have to try it.

Adios.

Girl's Trip

My consulting business is going well and I have carte blanche to spend my earnings on whatever I would like.

It took me no time at all to figure out what I wanted to do with it.

Designer Jeans? — No. Purse? — No. Shoes - no no no. I honestly have all of the material things that I really want.

Last summer I took my girls on a cross country road trip while Chris was hard at work in Venezuela. I adored every minute I spent with those girls and think it was one of the greatest things I have ever done in my life. I realize that I have this bubble of time when they still like me and crave my company - AND are old enough to remember the journey as "the best of times." Travel is always my splurge on myself or my family.

So, another trip is in order. When I thought about where to take them, I realized that I have a much smaller window of time than I did last year. We are going to Hawaii for Chris' mother's 70th birthday as soon as we arrive back in the states, and Katherine starts Camp Mystic in July. We went west last summer — so why not east this time. Way east — like Florida.

I want to take them to Disney World. Again.

I know that most adults cringe at the thought of a trip to Disney World and ONLY go when so that their kids can have the memory. After battling heat, crowds, and long lines, they check it off of their lists, pat themselves on the back for being good parents, and swear never again.

Not me.

I LOVE IT. I love every minute of it. I love it as much (if not more) than my kids. I love the rides. I love the food. I love the hotels. We are staying at a very nice hotel on the monorail and to me it is worth every penny for the convenience. I understand that it is not for everyone, and that most sane people would rather spend their money elsewhere on a more relaxing vacation.

I just cannot help it. When I am there, I am happy the entire time. I feel like I worked hard for the privilege and have earned every minute. My kids are giddy, cooperative, and sleep like the dead every night. I love love love to watch their faces light up at the spectacular sites. We do it up and do it right. We see the shows, eat at the fabulous restaurants, watch the fireworks and ride their favorite rides over and over. We sit down with the maps and plot out our attack of the parks — making sure we hit whatever attractions interest them.

And, for at least a month before we leave, I am guaranteed perfect behavior under threat of the trip being cancelled.

So June 23 - 27 we are heading to Orlando for the greatest vacation on earth. Call me crazy.

My Favorite Photo Ever

That plate, in the middle, is me.

Good to be loved.

Boom Boom Pow

I remember thinking, just a day or two ago, "Wow, life is good here, so much easier than I thought. I hardly have anything interesting to talk about." Yeah, right.

It was time for my semi-annual neck-throwing-out party. My first tennis lesson was Thursday. I met a bunch of ladies from the British and International Group (BIG) at a recreation area called La Cinta near our kids school. I have never had a formal tennis lesson in my life and had never even tried to volley before. I started hitting balls with some ladies and was impressed by my innate athletic abilities. I was actually hitting the balls with the raquet and making it over the net. Never mind that it did not land in the right square or anything. The coach arrived after about an hour of hitting around with the ladies. I was feeling pretty good - I couldn't wait to impress him with my newly discovered skill.

Two of my friends shared the lesson with me. Both had had lessons and played some before. We started with grips, how to hold a raquet, and then, the backhand. He had us get in a line and would hit the balls to us and critique us on our backhand. R would hit, "Good!" he would say, and then she would move back for C who would hit, "Good!" he would say, and then she would move back for me. I would hit, "OK" he would say, hands on hips, "We need to talk" and then lecture me on how I was facing the wrong direction, holding the racquet wrong, hitting the ball incorrectly, etc... "Good", "Good", "OK - lets talk" went on for 30 brutal minutes of backhand. When it would be my turn to hit, I was a wreck, sweating, heart pounding, trying to remember all of the instructions I had been given. Bend my knees, front foot at a 45 degree angle, arm out - but not too far, hit gently (don't whack it - that will come later), make it look easy.... Yeah, RIGHT. Then there was some comment about looking good does not mean you actually do well. Story of my life, dude. I was not expecting to get life lessons as well as tennis.

After backhand he launched into a discussion on how he became a tennis coach, how he had lived in Boston, then Paris and had actually attended the Sorbonne. Don't get me wrong, he was a really nice guy, but somehow life had lead him from one of the best universities in the world to a hot, small, public tennis court in Caracas where he was teaching oil executive wives how to hit balls. C'est la vie.

On Friday my good friend K, who lives in the apartment complex directly above mine told me that her complex had been robbed the night before. A group of men pulled up in a van and held a gun to the vigelante's head and told him to let people in as usual. As the owners came home, they were met by gunman and then brought up to their apartments and robbed of jewelry and money. This happened for about three hours. Three apartments were robbed and their inhabitants tied up and locked in the concierge's apartment. No one was seriously hurt. My friend K was home when this happened and had no idea what was going on. Her building only has 12 apartments. The incident has definitely had us thinking about what we would do if/when this happens to us. We have alarm systems - but the police are just not equipt to deal with robberies. Crime here is rampant and getting worse. Luckily - the robbers in this case seemed to be 'professionals' and were not interested in hurting people - but did threaten with guns. GULP. We have two safes in our house. Both are broken and will not open. Imagine me trying to explain that to an angry Chavista in Spanglish without getting killed. Gulp, gulp. About the time she told me this, my neck started throbbing and I realized I had pinched another nerve - likely from tennis.

Saturday was miserable for me, my neck was killing me and I could hardly turned my head. We had promised the kids we would take them to the Saturday morning sports at the school. Most of the families at ECA live in apartments and very few are fortunate enough to have a pool or any kind of grounds to play on. This has led to many parents taking their kids back to ECA on Saturday morning to play soccer, swim, or just hang out and let the kids play. I tried to swim a few laps with the kids, but the whole 'can't turn my head thing' was getting in the way. My pain was getting much worse, and the kids were tired and hungry. We stopped off for lunch on the way home and go to the apartment around 1:30. I took a bunch of Celebrex and headed off for a nap. Madeline snuggled up with me.

At around 3:30 I was awakenend by a terrible noise. A storm was whipping through Caracas. As we are located on a high hill above Caracas, this storm happened to be eye level with my apartment. Thunder and lightening were my new neighbors and the wind was howling through my windows. It was almost like when you are flying next to a storm on an airplane. Two walls of my bedroom are windows - so I felt like we were part of nature. Madeline woke up from the noise and we held each other and watched the show. As storms do here, it moved very quickly and the whole thing was over in under an hour. When things quieted down, Madeline hopped off of the bed in search of her sister. I curled up with a book, unable to go back to sleep. Suddenly, I felt the bed shaking.

Earthquake.

It only took me a second or two to figure out what I was feeling. Oh My God. It. Is. An. EARTHQUAKE.

I am Cajun and I am no stranger to natural disasters. I spent 90% of my life living within 50 miles of the Gulf of Mexico - so I know all about the wrath of nature. Whisper the word hurricane, and most Cajuns smile and mentally go through their refrigerators and try to remember if they have enough beer, cream cheese, Pick-a-Peppa, and fixins for a big gumbo. Since we have the lazy luxury of an early warning system, most natural disasters start with a party, and are a great way to catch up with family you have not seen in a while. We spend the evenings watching the weather channel, playing bouree, and telling stories of hurricanes past. Even if your entire house is wiped out, you at least have a good story to go with it.

That being said, I am completely freaked out by earthquakes. When I figured out what it was, I sprang into action, neck pain forgotten, screaming for Chris. He was calmly explaining to the girls what was happening while directing them to a safe location while I was running willy-nilly throughout the house. Growing up outside of San Franciso, he is a pro at earthquakes. We went outside and met lots of our neighbors - luckily we did not have any major damage or loose power and the whole thing was over in seconds.

Not so Mayberry anymore.

Stepford, Venezuela

My kids are thriving here.

They have settled in her almost too well. We are having the same ups and downs we would have in any school in the U.S., and they are extremely happy.

Even though Madeline is one of the only kids in her class who speaks English as her first language, even though Katherine is repeating the third grade, they are extremely happy. They can't wait to go to school, love riding the bus, and relish homework. They both take it SO seriously.

We started after school activities this week - Katherine is doing swimming and Community Choir and Madeline is doing swimming and dance. They both swim very well - but have never learned formal strokes yet. It is good to see them with coaches being taught proper technique.

I have a busy week as well. Monday was the British and International Group (BIG) coffee at the British Ambassador's Residence. Very very posh. I wore my best "wife of the oil man" dress and snuck in a camera. The house was gorgeous, but I felt a little gauche trying to get a picture of me with the portrait of the Queen.

This morning we took the kids to the school for the informal "sports morning" that is organized by the kids. Katherine ran all over the soccer field with her friends, while Madeline and Hana (her best buddy, seatmate on schoolbus, and neighbor) swam in the pool. After we left school, we went and had lunch at the El Tolon Mall in Las Mercedes, then went home for a nap.

This all sounds very Mayberry - but it is the truth.

Life is good here.

Oh - and I figured out how to make S'More's in the oven. Martha Stewart - here I come.

Feliz Cumpleanos

So I was warned.

Venezlano birthday parties are over the top. Incredible. The stuff movies are made of.

We got our first invitation shortly after school started. The invitation was "My Little Pony" - one of the kinds we find at Wal-Mart and fill in the blanks. I thought that the caliber of the invitations would be an indication of the caliber of the party. I mean, come on, I had survived many a Seigel Fest - how elaborate could it be?

The party was posted to start at 3:00 - school ends at 2:00 on Wednesdays. I was also warned by ALL of my American friends that the start time is relative. DO NOT get there until at least an hour has past. Why would you put the start time at 3:00 when you really will not start until 4:00? This practice makes me itchy and scratchy. My husband and I are routinely the losers that show up on time (maybe even 5 minutes early for any occasion - in fact, I have even made him drive around the block because I was sick of being the first person there AGAIN). We left as late as I could stand it - 3:20 and headed out to parts unknown. Of course, we got lost. My wonderful and patient driver, Eric, asked many people for directions, called the hostess and even called Chevron and no one could find the place. The directions we were given was the name of the neighborhood and the name of the apartment building - no one really uses street names and God forbid an address here.

In desperation, I called my personal savior, Karen Mazur (my brilliant and excellent ex-pat friend who has lived here for over 4 years and is fluent and knows absolutely everything) who was able to direct Eric to the party. This had us arrive a fashionable 1 hour late. My pulse was racing and I thought I was going to have a heart attack, but arrived in style.

We walked up the stairs to the apartment building. It was huge, beautiful and set into a large hill in Valle Arriba. From the street level I could see a large, blow up slide/bouncy thing and knew we had found the party. The vigelante let us in as we were well dressed and holding a present. As we made our way up the stairs, I began to see how the party was unfolding. Most of the nice apartment buildings in Caracas have "Party Rooms" on the first floor - no one will live there due to security so they find other uses for the space. In front of the party room was a green space and we could see that not only was there a bouncy castle/slide, but a tequeno maker, popcorn machine, face painters, slide, swings, and ice cream cart. I was greeted by a tuxedo-uniformed server (I am NOT kidding) who offered me an assortment of hors devours. Madeline immediately took off to join the melee of kids, and Katherine and I slunk off to find a quiet space to do some homework. The mother's of the kids were all sitting at a table together speaking Spanish. The DJ started and the music got loud, so I released Katherine to play with the other kids as the noise was too great to do anything productive school-work wise.

The other mothers invited me to the table and I did meet some very nice ladies. I also got to meet K - who is from the US and super nice and fun. We admired the extensive decorations in the party room - tables draped in pink and purple and chairs in the contrasting fabrics with bows in the back. Six foot tall felt flowers adorned the cake table and ballon arrangements dotted the room. K assured me that "this was nothing" compared to the other parties she had seen in pre-school the year before. Soon after our conversation the magician arrived to entertain the children for an hour. After he was done the face painters became party MC's and led the children into party games and the pinata. By the time the pinata was ruptured - candy and toys spilling out into the lawn - I had to call my children home. Julia was cooking her first dinner, and we still had to pick up Chris from the office. We picked up our party favor on the way out - hand decorated crown and wings combo for Madeline - worth at least three times than the gift we brought.

On the way home, full of candy, ice cream, and exhausted, Katherine remarked, "Mom, we could NEVER have afforded a party like that." "You are absolutely right," I replied. The birthday girl was precious, and her parents genuinely nice people. We were very lucky to have been invited.

Katherine's Birthday Party Video