Sad, but Thankful.
SourceGreetings, Steemians.
I meant to write this post last week. I even started it, but I felt I would not be able to think straight until I heard from my son, José Andrés. Today, I heard from him. After an exhausting and nerve wrecking eight-day bus journey from Cumaná, Venezuela, he has made it safely to Lima, Perú. My son has joined the millions of Venezuelans who have been forced to leave our country, afraid they may fall victims of: starvation, lack of medicine, crime, or government persecution (whatever gets you first).
SourceMy son, like those who had left before him, like those who plan to leave as we speak, got tired of deferring his dreams. Like the speaker in Langston Hughes’s poem, he felt he was going to either rot...
Source
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Sourceor explode.
SourceWe have counted in the hundreds the number of youth who have been killed in anti-government protests; thousands have been arrested, their reputations ruined under farfetched accusations of terrorism. He did not think he had the guts to join those statistics. He has a son to answer to.
SourceHe got tired of working his ass off to make just enough money for one or two items every 15 days. He got tired of the endless lines to buy food a bit cheaper, at the cost of his dignity.
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Source|He got tired of saying no to my grandson, Jose Miguel, every time the kid asked for or needed something (from the simplest things like a candy, to more urgent matters, such as medicines, food, or clothes). He got tired of being emasculated, not being able to provide for his family, or prove his worth as the talented young man he is.
SourceHe got tired of the government that denied his generation a future.
SourceAlmost three weeks ago, my son told me that finally, after a 17-month-wait he had a clear chance to leave the country. An opportunity had presented itself to travel with a cousin of his, who would share his traveling money with him. He needed to get at least $50, though.
17 months ago, I had been able to get him $100. For different reasons, he could not travel and all that money was spent on food. 13,000% inflation later, to get just $50 meant to borrow a whole year's worth of my college professor salary. That’s how bad things are in Venezuela now. I was paralyzed at the prospect of my son loosing his best chance to leave this nightmare, just because I was not be able to help him out. And that’s when @curie upvoted my post: https://steemit.com/english/@hlezama/subverting-the-scriptural-tradition-part-iii. As you can imagine, it was a rush of mixed feeling: happiness and excitement for a reward to my efforts, mixed with the intimidation of being up to the reputation that came with it; but more importantly, happiness for seeing an economic reward bigger than any salary compensation I had received so far. As a matter of fact, the 37+ SBDs that ended up being my author’s reward, amounted to more money my university owes to fellow faculties who retired last year, after 25-30 years of service. That’s how bad things got here.
SourceI felt happy and sad at the same time: I was able to tell my son confidently that he was going to leave; that we would not stop at anything then; that he could start making plans. I was able to borrow all the money he needed for supplies for the journey and the so coveted and hard to get American dollars. This would obviously leave me back where I was before the @curie upvote, but knowing that my son was free from these shackles was more than worthy! Loosing my son saddened me, though. I know things can get very tough for immigrants. He would be alone for a while and sooner or later it will hit him.
Yet, I wanted to thank @curie and all those who, by supporting @curie, make it possible for them to operate this kind of magic. I will continue writing the kind of post @curie judged worthy of their support. To know that there is in Steemit a demanding audience that values hard work and dedication to scholarship is stimulating. Regardless of the future support my posts may get (I am by now fully aware of how @curie works), I will continue providing this platform with some of what I find valuable for human beings to know and read about. The joy @curie gave me by helping me liberate my son from this hell is the best compensation any father can get, let alone a scholar.
SourceI am confident my son will succeed and hopefully come back to this land of his, when things change and we wake up from this nightmare. I hope he can enjoy again the blueness of this dry land he loves so much. The blue our dear poet, Cruz Salmerón Acosta, immortalized in his poetry:
Azul que del azul cielo emana,
y azul de este gran mar que me consuela,
mientras diviso en él la ilusión vana
de la visión del ala de una vela.
[Blue that emanates from the blue sky,
and blue of this big sea that consoles me,
while I discern in it the futile illusion
of the vision of a sail's wing.]
Thanks for your visit.
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One of my very first interactions on steemit was with a fellow Venezuelan such as yourself and the horrors he was facing. I wish your son the best and you yourself the best also. It is truly heartbreaking what is happening there. I wish you the best.
Thank you very much!
No problem at all. I resteemed it also because I think this is the kind of story that needs to be out there for people to see.
Wow. I am truly honored. On my son's behalf (becasue this is his story), thanks a lot. I think that had the Venezuelan government not made it so difficult to get the most basic documentation, such as birth certificates, diplomas certifications, or passports, more than half of the 30+ million Venezuelans would have left the country by now.
It's a very scary thought to think of a country run my madmen, abandoned by most if its best people (the ones with degrees, with money or with some skills), who are going to contribute their talent and effort to the development of other countries. In the meantime, the international community continues deferring vital decisions in the name of diplomacy.
People die every minute nothing is done, and politicians schedule meeting after meeting, months apart; that is, dozens of dead people apart.
Not to get to political here but this is why I believe in our second amendment here in America. It is a way for us to defend ourselves against a tyranical government if we should ever be put in the same situation. You guys are basicly defenseless and at the mercy of the madmen. Does that make sense or am i a tinfoil hat wearing crazy man?
You are absolutely right in that respect. One of the things you hear people in our streets talk about is the impossibility of the average citizen to do anything about it. If the government controls the military, it controls everything, given that no regular people are allowed by law to bear arms. Then, the government creates a militia and additional shock troops made up of common criminals, you go figure...
As you rightly put it, we are defenseless. My university stopped protesting years ago when we had to face armed brutes only with our posters and ideas. And, we were labeled terrorists, anyway.
I wish people in America could understand this. They are continually trying to take our rights away. If we learn nothing from history we are doomed to repeat the mistakes. Disarmament is always the step taken before mass genocide. It is terrifying to know that so many people do not understand this.
Jodido pero contento, esa era una expresión muy usada en otras épocas para referirse al valor y a la satisfacción por el esfuerzo empeñado para conseguir algún logro. Venezuela vive una tragedia extraordinaria que a fuerza de cotidiana se camufla y se hace nimia. Me identifico con tu sentir,@hlezama.Mi hijo mayor, llegó hace unos días a Uruguay después de 15 días de viaje, un suspiro expresa el alivio que sentimos al saber que había arribado sano y salvo. Es bueno que se sepa en el mundo de esta tragedia, gracias por escribir al respecto.
Fucked but happy, that was an expression very used in other times to refer to the value and satisfaction for the effort to achieve some achievement. Venezuela is living an extraordinary tragedy that by day is camouflaged and becomes insignificant. I identify with your feeling, @hlezama.My eldest son, arrived a few days ago to Uruguay after 15 days of travel, a sigh expresses the relief we felt knowing that he had arrived safely. It is good that you know in the world of this tragedy, thank you for writing about it.
Mis mejores deseos de éxito, salud y prosperidad para su hijo, @ramonochoag. Ciertamente a estas historias hay que ponerle rostros y nombres. Son muchas las cosas que se dicen, especialmente cuando algún venezolano mete la pata, y luego por uno pagan todos. Son tantos los casos, tantas las historias, y sobre todo tanto el talento que se nos ha ido y que ahora van a contribuir a otras culturas (por supuesto, recibirán de esas culturas lo que le fue negado en su país). Esas contribuciones, cualquiera sean, deberían ser documentadas para orgullo de todos. Gracias por comentar.
My best wishes of success, health and prosperity to your son, @ramonochoag. Certainly, these stories should be given names and faces. So much is said, especially when one of us screws up abroad, and then everybody pays the consequences. There are so many cases, so many different stories, and especially, so much talent that is leaving our country; talents that are now going to contribute to other cultures (of course, they´ll get from those cultures what was denied to them in their own country). These contributions, whatever they are, should be documented for the sake of our national pride.
Thanks for commenting
@hlezama - So many tragedies in Venuzuela now, and for what? For ego and ideology.
Thank you for telling us your story, and that of your son. I hope things change soon.
Good luck, and God bless!
I resteemed this post for you.
Thank you very much. You summarized it nicely: Ego and ideology, a failed one at that. We can also add resentment. That is a driving force in many Venezuelan government officials. Some of them are crazy enough to enjoy people's suffering.