Abuelo

Its safe to assume everyone knows where Venezuela is situated. However, if you are unsure just watch the movie UP.

The movies depiction of a far away land, filled with unforeseen creatures and treasures is a marvelous and very generous perception.

However, for the 30 million people currently living there, I doubt they see it this way any longer.

As a Venezuelan myself, I grew up in a fortunate family. Compared to those living on hillsides, without electrical appliances, security, and scarce resources of food, you would be able to say my family had abundance. Though this seems like a fortunate thing to have, the government created a stigma that the economically affluent were evil.

The majority of the people in my birth country live in poverty.

 

Photo Credits: Javier Chauran

As depicted in the picture above, "Ranchos”, or Slums engulfed the Andean mountains long ago and to this day dominate the country. Because most people live in this situation, rather than something similar to mine, the government found a way to hypnotize the masses with talk of wealth, security, and better living conditions for them. Their dreams of wealth and fortune caused their shift in political views which later lead to the selection of Hugo Chavez as president of Venezuela.

Hugo Chavez promised the needy to put them above all others. Though it seems like such a grandiose deed, his intentions had an essence of corruption. Of course, because they were the majority, their vote would stimulate the win of his political party into office and if that dream of his came true, he promised to strip the fortunate of their bounties and spread them around to the freeloaders, making people such as my family seem greedy.

Once voted into office, he kept his promise to the people. He conjured up a military force to fight the countries own citizens. This armed force, had orders to barge into the homes of innocent people Chavez deemed unworthy of their belongings and deprive them of any decency they owned.

At this point, my family like many other became a target of this injustice from the government.

As the lower classes took over the economy, targeted citizens were deprived of several other aspects of life. Identification cards were distributed throughout the country which specify who has the right to medical care, food, and other opportunities. Those from the opposition, are turned away at almost any door.

 Years after Hugo Chavez died, his successor, and current president, Nicholas Maduro kept his reign of terror alive.

Their delusions of making the poor wealthy, allowed for the printing of money to become a meaningless process. Consequently, el Bolivar, the Venezuelan dollar, began to lose value–leading to an extreme state of inflation.

Chavez attained his dreams of leveling the playing field for all people, now that money became a worthless attribute, no one could be considered rich nor poor.

This leads to the cause of my grandfather’s death.

Having been diagnosed with prostate cancer, my grandfather had a necessity to seek medical attention. It was caught early enough to give him plenty more years of life if treated. However, because our family was deemed unworthy of medical care, we were unable to provide it for him. By the time inflation reached a point of no return, any amount of money we had became worthless which hindered our ability to pay for his staggering medical bills.

Though we have 3 medical practitioners in our family, without advanced technology his conditioned would not get any better, in fact it was gradually deteriorating.

A year of calm passed as we tended to his most obvious symptoms, however, we knew it was a matter of time before the cancer spread throughout his entire body causing his involuntary functions to cease.

October 3, 2015 he lost his battle, and my family was finally stripped of all our decency–hope. His death, though biologically inevitable, could have been delayed for many more years.

The story of my grandfather’s situation is one of millions in Venezuela. People are struggling to keep up with this torturous situation. Due to many more added regulations by the government, people are unable to flee, unable to bring money in from the outside, and therefore unable to survive.

It would have been my great pleasure to provide you all with possible ways your efforts could help my country rise from the pits of hell it’s in, or to promote a story of hopefulness, however Venezuela is a lost cause and the only people able to improve its condition are its citizens.

My advice to you, is to be grateful of this wonderful country and all the things it offers, from justice, to equality, to freedom.

Always be willing to lend a helping hand, no matter the person, because beyond their appearance is a concealed world.  

Perform your civic duty to vote, and constantly be engaged with current events so people like Chavez and Maduro have no possibility of hypnotizing the people of the U.S.

And always remember…

Just because it isn’t happening here does not mean it isn’t happening.