Barrio 23 de Enero

Late this morning Justin, Daniel, myself, and two Venezuelan friends of ours met up with Ohel at Agua Salud metro station, on the edge of the 23 de Enero Barrio. Ohel took us in a taxi to a neighborhood that was holding elections for representatives for their new Consejo Comunale (community council). This council would represent a section of the hill we looked up at from the road, as the new regulations require each council to only include 200 to 400 families. The brick houses covered every inch of land on the hill, many were two stories, and separated by walkways, mostly simply stairs.
The area where the voting took place was a small parking lot, with a tent set up over a table and a few chairs. On a wall on the opposite side of the small parking lot type area, were the postings of the various positions that people were running for, with the candidates names and pictures below. The elections began at 8am, and the results were announced around 4pm. There was a group of people who there for the entire time just observing to ensure a transparent and legitimate process. Many people, some from other communities, hung out most of the day, the area was always busy, and the music played loudly the entire time. A few women were running the operation, explaining what they were doing and the rules with a microphone.
A woman who was running for the position of women’s committee (committee del mujer) invited us to her house for lunch. We climbed a few narrow stair cases that separated the clay brick walls of the houses that blended one into another. Her house was two levels, nicely tiled and furnished on the first floor and the second floor was an open space with a railing that looked over the barrio on two sides and a thin metal roof. We ate fried chicken and french-fries, until we were called to return to the voting area where the votes were being counted. Later we learned that the women who fed us had won the election.
Ohel then took us and a few other’s who were from other communities but volunteer to help out other communities form consejo comunales. Ohel asked a bus driver who was parked nearby to take us all to another part of 23 de Enero. Here we there was a group gathering for their first meeting, to begin creating their consejo, which was for one large fourteen story building and two smaller buildings. We spoke with Ohel about the laws and regulations of the consejos. And as more people showed up for the meeting we spoke with them about why they were forming a consejo, what they hoped to do.
When the meeting began, Ohel led the meeting, standing in the middle of the large group that sat along the stone wall that separated the walkway/plaza area from a garden and then a parking lot. He explained the different positions that would need to be filled, asked people what they would like to run for, and they made plans to deliver invitations and post flyers for the next meeting. They also began choosing a name for their consejo, besides their officially given number title. They began calling out names and voting by raising their hands in favor or not, but then a man spoke up and proposed that the proposed names could all be put on the ballot so the whole community could decide.
After the meeting we were ready to go, but Ohel insisted that we go up to one of the apartments in the large building and have some soup. We followed him up ten flights of stairs, to a nice apartment where we eventually ate mondongo (cow stomach) soup and bread. There were at least three generations of women who lived in the apartment, I couldn’t figure out if it was four or not. There were men there too, but I didn’t know if they were friends or partners. After drinking little cups of sweet black coffee, and chatting with one of the women who lived there and a neighbor women who was there organizing paperwork from the meeting, we walked back to the metro in the dark, accompanied by Ohel and four others. The lights of the barrio were beautiful, and windows of the tall apartment buildings were light up brightly and wide open.
By that time it were all very sleepy, we had stayed up to around 2am the night before at a salsa club in Sabana Grande, where there had been live music. While there we also met a woman from the states who has been living in Caracas for a few months. She is trying to put together a network for people who come down here to lean about Venezuela for long periods of time. We agreed to meet Tuesday, to share contacts.