The family is at the heart of Venezuelan life, and in an uncertain world, where things can get tough, it is the main support system. The definition of “family” here goes beyond the nuclear family concept of parents and children. It includes grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and even close family friends who might have a hand in helping to care for children.
Large extended families, especially poorer ones, often live together under one roof. Most young adults continue to live with their parents after their education is finished, and sometimes even after marriage, again for financial reasons. It is also typical for grandparents or elderly relatives to remain in the family house or be cared for by younger relatives rather than go to an old people’s home; this goes for rich families as well as poor.
Even living apart, people spend a great deal of time with the members of their extended family, often dropping in unannounced for coffee and a chat. There is a constant round of parties and celebrations to cement family bonds, such as birthdays, marriages, christenings, quinceañeras (the important fifteenth birthday parties for girls), and Christmas festivities.
Respect for the family and for elders is instilled at a young age. You will hear young children asking a parent, uncle, aunt, or godparent for a blessing and receiving one in return: “Bendición, Tío” (Blessing, Uncle), “Dios te bendiga, Hijo” (God bless you, Child). Venezuelans are also very physically affectionate within the family.
There is a sense that men are men and women are women in Venezuela, where the traditional concepts of gallantry and machismo have survived into the twenty-first century. An oft-quoted Venezuelan expression to describe gender roles in romance is: “El hombre propone y la mujer dispone” (The man suggests and the woman decides). This is reflected in courtship, where men are expected to make the first move, on dates, where men are expected to pay for everything, and at dances, where men lead.
In many households, this division is seen in the fact that boys are spoiled by their mothers and female relatives, who don’t expect them to cook or clean, while girls are expected to learn all the skills of running a home.
Things are changing, however. The traditional roles of men as sole providers of family income and women as stay-at-home housekeepers, cooks, and child caregivers are no longer sustainable in an economic situation where both partners have to work to make ends meet. Women have adapted rapidly to meet the changing demands of modern society, and this can be seen at the universities, where women make up 52 percent of the students, and at work, where they hold jobs on a par with men in nearly every profession apart from politics.
Men, meanwhile, continue to expect a traditional arrangement in the home, and have been slower to adapt. The practical result of this is that many women have to shoulder the burden of holding down a full-time job while still doing the majority of the cooking and cleaning and looking after the children.
The number of absentee fathers and the high murder rate among young men in the barrios means that many poorer households have to survive without a male provider.
Another element of machismo to survive into the twenty-first century is the slightly comic approach to the opposite sex by some men on the street, especially when in groups, who will compliment any and every good-looking or curvaceous woman who walks by.
It’s a cliché, but nearly everyone in Venezuela knows a man who has had children with multiple partners. The general view seems to be that it’s not the children’s fault if their dad is a rogue, and when a father doesn’t live up to expectations it is not uncommon for children to be brought up by aunts, grandparents, godmothers, or family friends.
However hard the government has been working over the last thirteen years to eliminate extreme poverty, the huge gulf that still exists between the very rich and the very poor in Venezuela is apparent from a quick scan of the Caracas skyline, where luxury apartment complexes set around swimming pools are interspersed with hillsides covered in shanties. Areas like the Country Club in the center of the city, with its gated mansions and exclusive golf club, are a world away from the concrete floors and zinc roofs of populous barrios such as Petare and Guarataro. Social class in the big cities is represented very physically by where you can afford to live as much as by what you have, and one of the first questions asked of new acquaintances is what part of town they come from.
Loveable Rogues
An English friend of mine once spent Christmas Eve with a Venezuelan girlfriend at her grandmother’s place, and was surprised to learn that a man who was dancing the night away with all the ladies had fathered six children with four women. Even more surprising was that all the women and children were present, and getting along famously. His eldest child was twenty-six, the youngest six months. His new girlfriend was younger than his eldest child.
A Venezuelan I knew was with her family at the bedside of her ninety-year-old grandfather, who was dying in a hospital. The old man called into the room a young woman with two small children, and asked the family to recognize the children as his, and to look after them. After the shock had worn off—and with some bemusement among the male relatives at how he had managed such a feat at his age—arrangements were made for the children to be cared for.
Other important status symbols are cars—particularly the extravagant models such as Hummers and other excessive four-by-four monsters. The number of new models on the city streets is a clear reminder of the level of wealth being generated by the oil industry, while the number of old cars that should have been scrapped years ago is a reminder of how cheap the subsidized oil is.
The fashion for showing off one’s wealth goes back to the 1970s, when for ten years the oil boom made Venezuelans the richest people per capita in South America, and the country got a reputation for excess and ostentation. As we have seen, the Venezuelans flying to Miami on weekend shopping trips were known as damedos, because of the phrase, “Esta barato, dame dos” (“That’s cheap, give me two”).
In recent years the Venezuelan moneyed elite have been joined by the members of a new class, described in the media as the Boliburguesia (Bolivarian bourgeoisie), or Boligarquia (Bolivarian oligarchs), who have benefited financially from the political and economic changes in the country. Rich kids who flaunt their status are known as sifrinos (snobs), while insults leveled at the poor are to call them marginales (marginals), a reference to the barrios as marginal communities, or monos (monkeys), a slur considered racist by most Venezuelans.
Venezuela is a mestizo (mixed-race) nation, born of the intermingling of Spanish settlers, the indigenous first inhabitants of the continent, and slaves brought from Africa. The result is every shade and hue of skin color from white to black, with the vast majority of the population an attractive shade of cafe con leche (coffee with milk).
In general, upper- and middle-class Venezuelans are lighter-skinned—a legacy of the Spanish conquest and later immigration by Europeans and North Americans—while the darkest skin tones are found along the central coast, to the south of Lake Maracaibo and other areas where African slaves were brought to work on the coffee, cocoa, and sugar plantations.
Ask most Venezuelans if there is racism in their country and they will say no, pointing to the fact that black, brown, white, and indigenous Venezuelans live together, work together, intermarry without problem, and are equal under the law. They will also point out that if a small amount of racism does exist it never comes close to the rhetoric of race hatred spouted by some groups in the USA or northern Europe.
This attitude of racial harmony was summed up by Simón Bolívar, who famously said, “We were all born of one mother America, though our fathers had different origins, and we all have differently colored skins.” Another popular quote is “Somos todos criollos” (We are all Creoles), meaning that we were all born here, and we are all equal.
However, skin color is linked to perceptions of social class, and there are examples of darker-skinned Venezuelans being refused entry to exclusive clubs and bars on the flimsiest of excuses. In the past it was rare to see dark skins in the media, with white-skinned, blue-eyed blondes on the covers of glossy magazines or hosting TV shows, but since President Chávez came to power there has been a shift toward a range of models and hosts who better reflect the reality of the general population.
The cult of beauty is almost a religion in Venezuela, and beauty pageants are a national obsession. People invest a lot of time and effort on their personal appearance, and women will spend hours at the hairdresser each week, having manicures, pedicures, and other treatments to enhance their god-given attributes and look as feminine as possible. Clothes are worn tight to show off curves—either natural or surgically enhanced—and short hems and long hair are the norm.
Plastic surgery is a normal part of growing up for girls who can afford it—and many who can’t. There is no embarrassment over it, and girls wear the bandages on their noses with pride after rhinoplasty. Banks even advertise loans specifically for breast implants.
Venezuelans are some of the largest per capita consumers of cosmetics, and a survey in 2000 found Venezuelans to be the vainest people in the world, with 65 percent of women who took part saying they thought about their looks all the time (only 27 percent of US women felt the same).
The desire to look good is reflected in high gym membership, the joggers doing early morning circuits of the parks, and the weekend hikers walking up and down the steep trail from Altamira to Sabas Nieves on the mountain of Ávila.
It is a huge source of national pride that Venezuela has won six Miss Universe titles, six Miss Worlds, six Miss Internationals, and a Miss Earth, placing it in the record books for the country with the most beauty queens.
In 2009, eighteen-year-old Stefania Fernandez made Miss Universe history when she was crowned by fellow Venezuelan Dayana Mendoza, the 2008 winner. It was the first time any country had had back-to-back victories in the contest.
The obsession with beauty queens extends to the country’s oil tankers, which are named after past winners, but the strangest accolade must go to the “Reina Pepiada” (the Curvy Queen), a popular arepa (see this page and this page) filling of shredded chicken, mashed avocado, mayonnaise, and peas, which was named in honor of Susana Dujim, Miss World 1955.
Since 1981, the man behind the Miss Venezuela organization has been Cuban émigré Osmel Sousa, who runs the Miss Venezuela School like a military boot camp, but with high heels. Under Sousa’s critical gaze, potential winners learn how to walk, talk, and act like a Miss, and if necessary go under the knife. One of the few girls to refuse surgery was Ivian Sarcos, who won Venezuela’s sixth Miss World title in 2011.
Brains and Beauty Overcome Adversity
Hollywood couldn’t come up with a more dramatic fairy tale than the story of Ivian Sarcos and the incredible drive, determination, and luck that saw her crowned Miss World on November 6, 2011, in front of a global TV audience of a billion people.
Combining a rare beauty with a fine brain, Ivian Sarcos is a human resources graduate who grew up a world away from the glitter and sparkle of the beauty industry. Born the youngest of thirteen children in the Llanos town of Guanare, she was orphaned at the age of eight. Taken in by nuns, she considered becoming a nun herself before deciding to follow a university career. She paid for her education by waiting tables in a fast-food restaurant and later working in a store in Caracas. It was there in 2009 that she was spotted by a friend of Osmel Sousa, the head of the Miss Venezuela organization.
Her story illustrates the incredible obstacles that many young Venezuelan women have to overcome and the drive that pushes them to improve their lives through hard work and study.
Venezuela has been a Catholic country since the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors, and more than 90 percent of Venezuelans identify themselves as Roman Catholic. For many Venezuelans, Catholicism is something they are born with rather than a devout calling. Church services don’t overflow on Sundays; people practice family planning, have children out of wedlock, and happily eat meat on Fridays. But belief in the power of religion is strong. Even Venezuelans who don’t go to church will carry images of saints and virgins for “protection,” or place a candle in front of a Catholic saint to say a prayer and ask a favor.
Catholic fiestas and the procession of saints, especially locally revered saints like the Chiquinquira Virgin in Maracaibo and the Virgin of the Valley in Margarita, attract huge crowds, and the visits by Pope John Paul II in 1985 and 1996 saw hundreds of thousands come out to see him pass by.
Baptists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Pentecostal groups minister to about 8 percent of the population, and are a growing presence. One evangelical group that has been growing fast, particularly in poor areas, is the Brazilian-based Pentecostal Church Pare de Sufrir, which uses TV ads to attract new worshipers and preaches that financial prosperity can be achieved through prayer.
There are small but significant Jewish communities in Caracas and other cities, and Muslims, mainly of Lebanese origin, are found in Caracas, Margarita, and Punto Fijo.
Some indigenous groups have converted to Christianity, but many, such as the Wayuu in Zulia State, the Pémon in the Gran Sabana, and the Yanomami in the Orinoco region conserve traditional beliefs and shamanistic rituals. The homegrown María Lionza cult, a syncretic religion sometimes described as Venezuelan voodoo, has followers all over the country but is focused on the mountain of Sorte, near Chivacoa, where rituals involving spirit possession take place in front of images of mythical and historical figures.
Venezuelans are intensely proud of their country and its national heroes, starting with the ultimate icon, Simón Bolívar, who appears on the highestdenomination bill, the 100 BsF. Bolívar’s teacher Simón Rodríguez (1769–1854) is on the 50 BsF; the independence heroine Luisa Cáceres de Arismendi (1799–1866), who was imprisoned in a fortress on Margarita Island, on the 20 BsF; Guaicaipuro (died 1568), the chief of the Teques Indians who fought the Spanish conquistadors in Caracas, on the 10 BsF; the black independence hero Pedro Camejo (1790–1821), also known as “Negro Primero,” who was killed at the Battle of Carabobo, on the 5 BsF; and the lover of Catherine the Great of Russia and independence hero Francisco de Miranda (1750–1816) on the 2 BsF. Another national hero is the politician and author Rómulo Gallegos (1884–1969).
All these historical figures are a source of intense national pride, but Venezuelans are also proud of contemporary talents, such as the fashion designer Carolina Herrera, the supermodel and Hollywood actress Patricia Velásquez, and the actor Edgar Ramirez, who has played opposite Keira Knightley, Matt Damon, and Liam Neeson.
The conductor Gustavo Dudamel, and José Antonio Abreu, who founded a system of youth orchestras for thousands of Venezuela’s most disadvantaged children, are also highly esteemed.
The famed beauty of Venezuelan women and the country’s success in international beauty pageants are a tremendous source of pride, as are its geographical beauties, such as Salto Ángel, the highest waterfall in the world, and the Caribbean beaches of Margarita and Los Roques.
With a history of corruption at all levels of government and an endemic fear of authority figures, especially the police and the National Guard, Venezuelans see the law as something that does not always work as it should on paper and therefore hold the view that bending the rules is justified in some situations.
This relaxed attitude to rules and regulations is immediately apparent on the roads, where drivers will justify running red lights, especially at night, because of security concerns over carjackings. However, drunk driving, speaking on a cell phone in traffic, and throwing garbage out of the car window are common, even though everybody knows they are illegal.
There is an idea that you need to be vivo (sharp) and listo (clever) to get by, even if it means cutting corners, and only a gafo (idiot) would blindly follow the rules while everybody else is breaking them.
Venezuelans have a long history of welcoming foreigners to their shores, including the thousands of Italians and Spanish who came in search of a new life after the Second World War, and the US oil workers who came in droves in the 1950s and ’60s.
Venezuelans can be quite familiar when addressing foreigners, and on the street a number of terms are used to get your attention. Anybody foreign looking might be called gringo or gringa, even if they don’t come from the USA. Less common is musiu (mister), a Venezuelan pronunciation of monsieur that I was sometimes called if I pointed out I was European. Blonde or blue-eyed visitors may be called catire or catira.
No offense is intended by the use of these terms—unless the delivery is aggressive—it’s just that Venezuelans have a habit of giving everybody a nickname, a consequence of big families in the past with so many kids called María and José. Anybody carrying a few extra pounds might be called “gordo/a” (“fatty”) and those looking slim “flaco/a” (“skinny”).
Diminutives are often used to make the terms more appealing, but it can still be unsettling the first time you walk into a store and the assistant says: “Epale, gordito. En que te puedo ayudar?” (Hey, chunky. How can I help you?)
Many of those migrants married into Venezuelan families and stayed here, and their contribution was warmly welcomed. The Italians brought with them the Gaggia coffee machines that you find in every bakery; the Spanish opened seafood restaurants and tasca bars, serving beer and traditional Spanish savory snacks; the Portuguese set up corner stores called abastos; and US oil workers contributed to the language with a legacy of Spanglish words that are still used today.
The same hospitality greets modern visitors, who will find Venezuelans to be disarmingly direct and spontaneous, as willing to share a cold beer with a stranger as a member of the family.
The political discourse may have heated up in recent years between President Chávez and his US counterparts, but that has had very little effect on relations between ordinary Venezuelans and foreign visitors.
That’s not to say that Venezuelans are not sensitive to criticism, because they are. How you are treated in Venezuela depends very much on how you treat the people you meet. If you are prepared to join in with the group, try out some Spanish, and have a stab at dancing salsa rather than just insisting you can’t, you will get a much warmer welcome.
Life is precarious for many people, and at all levels of society Venezuelans are striving to improve their situation through hard work and education. Unemployment is high, and many people have to make ends meet in the informal economy, juggling two or more small jobs rather than a single well-paid one. It is typical for Venezuelans to have two jobs and study at the same time, putting themselves through night school to improve their job prospects.
Traffic problems can make commuting a nightmare, and many workers from the suburbs have to start their day extremely early to be at work on time. The traffic problems that plague the cities, especially Caracas, have led to a situation where timekeeping and punctuality have become fairly flexible concepts. Venezuelans rarely arrive exactly on time. It is in any case considered rude to turn up for a dinner invitation on the dot, because the hosts will still be getting ready.
If somebody does expect to start an event at an exact time they might specify hora británica (British time).
The attitude to timekeeping can be frustrating for northern Europeans, and can lead to misunderstandings.