Stress or Lack Thereof?

My work in Cumaná entails an English Teaching Assistantship at the Universidad del Oriente, known by locals as La Udo. Two weeks have passed since my arrival, and I have spent my time getting acquainted with the teachers in the Department of Modern Languages, observing different classes and tutoring students. I have witnessed a sampling of inefficiencies that hamper the smooth function of the university — a hoo-ha here, a hullabaloo there. Yet people at the university maintain a low- or no-stress attitude and a care-free air. This is a counterintuitive curiosity to me.


In this last week alone, I have encountered a plethora of schedule blips and logistic snags that extend beyond the occasional tardy teacher or broken light bulb. For example, three classes that I was to observe – including one scheduled to commence at 7:00 am – never happened. No one showed up. Then there is the issue of electricity, which is something that is especially easy to take for granted. On Thursday, the school’s power went out on and off for about three hours. Lights go out, teachers´ technology dependent lessons are foiled, and air conditioning ceases to exist in the midst of 90˚ F heat. A professor told me that President Chavez claims the nation’s rolling blackouts to be the result of conspiracy from the political opposition; many see the blackouts simply as a symptom of overwhelming inefficiency and shoddy maintenance. All the while teachers and students shrug there shoulders and go outside to wait.

People continue to exude an unflappable and tranquil attitude, and that is exactly what most calls my attention.

Generally, most institutions in the United States run smoothly. Business obligations and classes tend to move along in a timely fashion, and public utilities deliver water, electricity and other resources expectedly and efficiently. And who would kvetch about the more temperate weather? Nonetheless, many people are excessively stressed-out in the United States. True, not everyone is on the brink of mental collapse at the exact same time, nor can I express quantitatively the degree to which people stress themselves out in the U.S. However, the relative absence of anxiety and tension here in the Caribbean city of Cumaná is so obvious, qualitatively speaking. Though the U.S. might be a haven for mental health professionals that specialize in stress disorders, Americans can still learn something in this area: a cultural norm to decrease stress.

Thus the age-old chicken-and-egg hypothesis comes into play: which came first, the logistical inefficiency or the low stress attitudes? In other words, do the inefficiencies in the country contribute to a decreased urgency, or does a relaxed lifestyle cause inefficiency? At the same time, I do not wish to glorify and romanticize the infrastructure problems that contribute to electricity failures and other public utility shortcomings. The black outs raise other pressing questions too. For example: to what extent do power failures have an impact on the quality of education in Venezuela? Moreover, must efficiency and a lifestyle characterized by low-stress be mutually exclusive?

Readers, please let me know if you think of any other questions worth asking Venezuelans. If you happen to be a Venezuelan reading this, then please do not hesitate to criticize my points. Perhaps only time, some casual investigation and a few more black outs will allow me to craft a more informed speculation.

Venezuelan Odyssey Adventure Number #1: Survival tactics in tropical climes

As my occasional use of Yiddish words might imply, I have a vivid and sincere respect for my eastern European heritage. My family roots go back centuries to a tiny shtetl in Poland, and I have read of the dire poverty and frigid weather that often struck similarly isolated towns.

Under these conditions the Ashkenazi Jews adapted ever since they first settled in that part of the world. But what happens when your fair-skinned Ashkenazi boychick, designed to brave cold winters and store precious body heat, is transplanted to tropical climes? Put simply: he begins to lose consciousness and starts to shvitz until a medium-sized Venezuelan city begins to flood. And if he doesn´t take a glass of water and Tylenol, he gets a headache by five o´ clock. I should be so lucky.

This brings me to the city of Cumaná, a medium-sized city on the Caribbean coast in eastern Venezuela. I will call it home for the next ten months, and it has been good to me so far. For starters, people go out of their way to help me settle down and feel at home. Cumaná has a much slower and laid back pace than Caracas, and a trip to a nice beach only requires a fifteen-minute car ride. However, it is hot. Oy vey, is it hot. On average, the daily temperature hits about 90° F. Some buildings have air conditioning, but this provides no respite from the heat when the power goes out. By the way, it goes out. A day´s worth of this heat sucks the energy out of any human being.

Venezuelans have invented an excellent mechanism to mitigate the mild case of heat exhaustion: the two-hour lunch break. Unaccustomed to this ritual, it took me about four days of late afternoon headaches and fatigue to learn the value of lunch plus a thirty-minute nap. Holding an electric fan less than a foot away from my head helps too. As I learn to adapt to the weather, I´m able to forsake the excessive nostalgia for “the old country.” But I didn´t want to get caught unprepared; I can always flip through my copy of Leo Rosten´s The Joys of Yiddish, which is probably the only one on the Caribbean coast. You never know when an emergency might pop up.

My plane hit the tarmac at approximately 5:15 am in Maiquetía Airport, and I had only slept about two or three hours since leaving San Francisco. Fortunately, the frigid yet smooth encounters with Venezuelan immigration and customs officials never fully registered because of my drowsy state. Bumper to bumper traffic and one and a half hours later (“¡At 5:45 in the morning!”), I arrive at the hotel. Not much exploring happened despite the fact that nothing was scheduled. Tropical urban jungle would be the first words that come to mind when describing Caracas. Yet adventures dodging maniacal drivers and standing out seemed like the agenda item for another day; sleep and down time had more appeal.

Thus I do not have any colorful vignettes to tell, nor much scenery to describe besides the concrete gray skyscrapers that I can see from my sixth floor hotel room. However, as I study the Caracas Yellow Pages and listen to salsa music on the radio station, I offer a few motley observations from the phone book that begin to affect my impression of Venezuela:

• Che Guevara has his special place in the Paginas Amarillas. The very first page of the yellow pages advertises “7 inaugurated companies of social property.” At the bottom of the advertisement, the Bolivarian Government of Venezuela asserts “¡Fatherland, socialism or death! … ¡We will triumph!”


• What do yoga studios, beauty salons and aesthetic medicine have in common? You can find them all in the fourteen-page section of yellow pages that bears the title “Aesthetic and Beauty Guide.” Venezuela is world renowned for its winning track record at beauty pageants, and its beauty-related industry is big business.


• How much do you know about Caracas? One advertisement in the phone book highlights the virtues of the plant for which the Venezuelan capital city was named. According to this extremely informative text, the Caracas plant can treat cases of diarrhea, fever, sore throat, dysentery, intestinal hemorrhages, excessive menstruation and parasites. Its leaves contain more vitamin A and Vitamin C than an orange, and provide various beneficial minerals. Fortunate for Venezuelans, the national production of flour, tea, pasta and crackers features this illustrious plant.

Language aside, could this plethora of information ever exist in a North American yellow pages guide? If the phone book is any indication, I have a hunch that my next ten months here will be pretty exciting and educational.