Travel insight: Venezuela vs. Colombia

Having traveled through Venezuela and Colombia, it was amazing to observe the similarities and at the same time the huge differences between those two neighboring countries (once even part of one country). The observations piled up and a decision to dedicate a short blog post to them was made.

Let's start with the main similarities between those two neighbors:

• Poor safety situation. Both countries are not perceived as safe and various warnings from locals are received on a daily basis. This issue deserves its own blog post which will hopefully come soon.
• Melting pot. Walking around Venezuela or Colombia, you meet an amazing mix of faces, colors, races - all heavily intermixed that it seems that racism is virtually impossible here (which has also been confirmed by a bunch of people)
• Extreme differences between rich and poor. There are probably few "better" places where you can observe high degree of poverty literally neighboring the greatest luxury.
• "Derecho". No matter whom, where or when you ask for direction, you always get the answer "derecho" (= straight ahead), sometimes complemented with some gestures somehow concretizing the real direction.
• Cousine with proximity to "regular European meals". There are some exceptions, such as eating platanos (a type of banana that needs to be cooked in order to taste good) and subsituting yuta for potatoes, but in general local meals are prepared in similar fashion and using similar ingredients as in many parts of Europe.
• Low level of tourism. Given their dramatic history (and sometimes even current events), it is rather uncommon to meet many (or any) tourists when strolling through Venezuela or Colombia. They all tend to concentrate to a few tourist destinations, which are then accordingly overpriced (and often unauthentic/lame).
• Solid percentage of beautiful girls. Although Venezuela has the highest number (5) of Miss World finalists, Colombian girls definitely stand up to their latin pride. (and are on average maybe even a bit better looking than Venezuelan). (funny observation: the fact that local girls are quite "overdeveloped" in upper body parts is reflected by figurines in some clothes shops, which sometimes reach really comical proportions)

Typical dish in the region

"Overdeveloped" figurines

And now to the main differences observed up to now:

• Socialism vs. capitalism. Everybody knows Chavez, Venezuela's "dictator", and almost everybody (with the exception of the poor) hates him. His socialistic state model ensures much higher living standards for the poor, who then in return keep him in power. In Venezuela, you barely see homeless people, beggars etc. - a rather frequent view across Colombia, which has on the contrary very rightist (and generally very popular) government. (to calm potential excitement about socialism, it has to be noted that Chavez is sitting on huge profits of state-controlled company PDV, which is in charge of the whole petrol trade of this powerful OPEC country)
• Bus transportation. Petrol is virtually free in Venezuela (around 0.5 USD for a full tank), therefore it seemed quite common for local people to commute around the country. Buses are usually funky, not very comfortable, very loud (in 99% of buses there is some salsa or reggaeton blaring out of a set of massive Pioneer speakers) and rather cheap. Colombian buses are the very opposite - about three times more expensive, with air conditioning, TV, reclining seats etc. Needless to say, freezing for a triple amount of money and usually half of the speed (try driving a luxury bus on a shitty road) is not the preferred way of transportation in the region. Main advantage to Venezuelan buses is the absence of omnipresent army road checks.
• Amount of salesmen in public transportation. Given the low prices of public transportation in Venezuela, buses are available to a large pool of people and thus became a kind of social and market place. It is not untypical to see 7-10 salesmen pass through your bus before departure and then even more during the ride. They can sell literally anything - from water and food over toothbrushes, glues to total random and unidentifiable things. Since long-distance buses in Colombia are more expensive and luxurious, salesmen are to large extent limited to intercity transportation.
  
• Cars. Watching traffic in Venezuela feels like jumping to the US in the 70's or 80's. Roads are channeled by a high number of extremely old American cars (which is rather ironic, given the hatred of the government against US), usually in a status that would hardly be considered acceptable outside Venezuela. Cars in Colombia are much closer to being regarded as "normal", from European perspective.
• Currency exchange. In Venezuela, the official (fixed) exchange rate is about 50% worse than the one you get on the black market (street money changers). Currency regime in Colombia is floating, so no problem getting money from ATMs, banks etc.
• Level of English. In Venezuela, there are not too many chances to meet locals with at least some knowledge of English, making conversations limited to Spanish. Experience in Colombia was dramatically different, with people approaching foreigners and trying to practice at least the few phrases they knew.

"With Chavez everything, without Chavez nothing."

Venezuelan cars make you feel like in the US in the 70's

Those observations are based on limited experience, so please feel free to comment! More observations to come soon.

May the Maya be with you! :)