by G.A. PeckMy first plane ride was quite an adventure—from Baltimore to Miami, from Miami to Caracas, from Caracas to some unnamed village outside of Puerto Ordaz, Venezuela. While it may seem an odd vacation destination for a child—I had just completed the fifth grade at the time—I was really just along for the ride.
My aunt and uncle had taken up residence in Puerto Ordaz, when my uncle had been charged with overseeing plant operations for a major aluminum manufacturer there. They’d been living there for a year or so by the time the rest of my family on my mother’s side—mostly just hicks (I say this with affection) from the small town of Frederick, Maryland—came calling. Most of my family hadn’t been on an airplane, either, let alone to another country.
We had a grand reunion with my aunt and uncle, and the family enjoyed a two-week vacation there, dodging the heavy summer rain and taking day trips to open-air markets and remote villages buried deep in jungle, accessible only by boat, where we would exchange American products, like blue jeans for handmade alpaca rugs and balsa-wood sculptures. Surprisingly, my family took it all in stride, and tolerated the less-than-luxurious lifestyle. Of course, they were no strangers to poverty and struggle, so it makes sense now, looking back, to see that we had that in common with many of the locals we encountered.
We thought we were living the high life when we boarded the ferry and ventured out to Margarita Island or Puerta La Cruz, the “resort town,” which, then, consisted of a few small hotels on the beach, surrounded by hills upon hills of tin shacks. Separated by a single road, the poor from the rich.
When it came time for the vacation to end, my family—my cousins, grandmother, and my own mother and father—boarded the plane home without me. I opted to stay behind in Venezuela. I’d fallen in love with the country, and an older man named Jesus, and I simply didn’t want to go home. My aunt and uncle graciously accepted me into the fold, and I stayed, for exactly how long, I cannot remember—long enough to learn to love the rain, to get by with my basic language skills, and to begin to feel a part of my new family and new community.
While my uncle worked, my aunt and I would busy ourselves with housework and cooking. She was a master at making something out of nothing in the kitchen—like the time she made the most incredible spaghetti dinner out of a box of noodles, a can of tomato paste and a handful of spices. She made the most delicious concoction she called “Mayonnaise Cake” out of flour, mayo, baking powder and powdered cocoa.
She’d also take me into town, where we’d do our shopping at one mom-and-pop shop after the next. Once a week we’d go into town and do the grocery shopping, which I always relished because they had an American-style diner where I could order my favorite, a taste of home: a cheeseburger, French fries and chocolate milkshake, which I proudly ordered in native tongue.
I suppose I was homesick—though I didn’t really want to return to the States—for I craved things that reminded me of home.
I remember finding an English-copy of Helter Skelter at a local bookstore, and thinking how glorious those familiar words were, as I read it cover to cover, despite the fact that it was about some rather brutal murders. I favored those nights when my Uncle would receive a care package from home. One night, he got a bootleg Betamax copy of “10” with Dudley Moore, and my adopted parents allowed me to watch it with them—even the sex scenes! I thought Bo Derek was the loveliest woman ever to walk the sands. I wished my hair was long and blonde so I could have it braided into cornrows.
I got the occasional care package from home, too. One of my friends sent me a recording of Cheap Trick’s “The Dream Police,” and I fell in love with the guitarist from his picture on the sleeve. During the day, I chased the bugs and other critters from our home, which was always crawling with things that I was not prepared to cohabitate with. I’d feed fruit to the toucan who took up residence in our lush backyard. And I adopted a skinny mutt, who I named “Blackie,” because he was black, whom I’d found cowering in an abandoned home down the street. And I wrote secretive love letters to that man, Jesus, who worked with my Uncle and occasionally dropped by the house for dinner.
Eventually, I would trade that crush for another more plausible one, an English boy who lived in a British trailer park slated for aluminum-plant workers from the British Isles. His name was Steve (or Barry or James or something). He was perfectly geeky and I fell for him when he offered to share a bag of salt-and-vinegar crisps with me at a teen party one night. I wanted him to kiss me, but he didn’t until my final night in Venezuela.
I got used to having our car pulled over by local militant-looking police, who were flagrantly guilty of racial profiling. If you looked American, you were targeted. I couldn’t count the number of times my Uncle had been stopped while driving, forced to get out of his car and show his “papers,” at gunpoint. It was such a frequent occurrence that it became more a tedious annoyance than a fearful experience to me.
Initially, I wasn’t a fan of the food I had in Venezuela. It was different, so foreign to me. I dreaded when we ventured out for dinner somewhere, wondering what I’d be able to stomach. I was happy when my aunt and uncle would choose a local German restaurant—“German” in that one of the items on the menu was bratwurst—where I’d order a bowl of tomato soup, a small loaf of fresh-baked bread, and be happy as a clam that they didn’t force me to eat anything spicy.
In time, my palette adapted, and I became more adventuresome. I learned to tolerate, if not enjoy, the heat. One of my favorite “dishes” was the national fast food, the arepa. We’d buy them in town, from street vendors, mostly—these little corn-pocketed bits of heaven. Though the shell of the arepa is fairly standard, the insides ranged from beef stews (check out tomorrow’s blog for the recipe and photos) to breakfast-style egg mixtures. My personal favorite was an arepa with salty, country-like ham, onions and cheese. Our local guy who sold them from a cooler on the street would always save one for me, because he knew how I preferred them to the other more exotic creations, like the ones with tongue, tripe or seafood.
Eventually, my time in country came to an end. I’d overstayed my visa, and my aunt and uncle feared that I may run into some trouble getting out. Their predictions turned out to be true, for when my visa was examined at the local air strip—by some beefy, machine-gun-toting hard-asses—I almost wasn’t allowed to board the plane, bound for Caracas. My aunt whispered in my ear, “Start to cry. Cry like someone is killing you, okay?”
I didn’t know why she wanted me to, but I cried on cue, and eventually I was allowed to get on the plane—I assume because my aunt knew the guards would just want to shut up the screaming kid. I cried when we took off, wondering if I’d ever return, missing my aunt and uncle already. In Caracas, some nice flight attendant helped me change planes. She tucked me into my seat on the huge winged beast, and off I went to Miami, bound for home.
All Rights Reserved, Simply Sibarita 2009
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