Mr. Music

Owen has always liked music, but now he REALLY likes music. He likes to have his Mozart Magic Cube playing in the background when he’s playing with other toys. When it shuts off at the end of a song, he pauses and whacks it again, restarting the music. He also loves the music from his Leapfrog Baby Counting Pal, and will drag his parents across the room by 1 finger to get help pushing the buttons and making the music play. To show his appreciation for music, Owen now claps and does his own version of dancing, which looks like a cross between directing an orchestra and flapping wings. It’s pretty cute, especially if you’re one of his parents.

Owen's Book Club

Our little dude loves to ‘read’. He turns the pages and has definite favorite books, that have changed over time.

His first favorite book was ‘Baby Says Peekaboo’ which has flaps that he can lift to see the baby hiding behind a towel, under a hat, etc. The last page has a mirror, which is especially pleasing to Owen as he loves to look at himself in the mirror.

He still enjoys BSP but his next true love was ‘Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?’, which Travis has previously written about. I have no idea why he likes this book so much. It has no plot and just stops with no conclusion. Fortunately, we no longer have to read it 8 times a day, but he still smiles and turns the pages with a single reading.

The next new great love of O’s literary life was ‘Dog’ which is a book of dog pictures with moving parts (like tails, legs, heads). We currently read Dog about 4 times a day and he’s loving it to pieces, literally. We’ve had to do some tape repairs to reattach one of the dog heads and a leg that was pulled loose (and maybe chewed on).

Eventually, 'Dog' was replaced, first by 'Tails', which is very similar to 'Dog', and then by '123' - a book I found at Joann's - the fabric and crafts store. It has parts that slide up and down or rotate, and this is O's current fave. His cousin Lili also enjoyed the book when she visited.

O welcomes new suggestions for his book club any time.

What to do in a traffic jam

The answer if you’re on the interstate (or Venezuelan equivalent) is….. go shopping! I witnessed this firsthand. When the traffic slows to a crawl, locals stand in the middle of the interstate (not in the median, not the shoulder, but between the two lanes of traffic) and sell things.
You can buy:
1. Food - cakes, cookies, chips, mangoes, other unidentifiable rainforest fruit
2. Household items - pillows (for sleeping in the car?), kites
3. cell phone car chargers (useful),
4. DVDs including Hancock and Wall-E (clearly pirated unless I missed some straight-to-DVD special deal for Venezuela)
5. Beer. Not kidding, when there’s traffic, people sell beer to the motorists.

When one spends hours a day sitting in traffic, one has plenty of time to peruse billboards in Caracas and other parts of Venezuela.

Most common billboards I saw in Venezuela:

1. Johnny Walker whisky – not just billboards, but buses, the side of a hotel or two. The most popular whisky in Venezuela.

2. Other whiskeys and scotches – my goodness these people love their whisky and scotch.

3. Beauty products, including ads for plastic surgery – there’ve been a lot of Miss Universe and Miss Worlds from Venezuela. Beauty is very, very popular.

4. Ham – They eat a lot of ham. Breakfast, lunch, dinner, snack.

5. Hugo Chavez – political ads (state and local elections are in a few months). Chavez smiling and standing next to a mayoral candidate. Chavez smiling and reminding everyone of the great things he’s done for a particular neighborhood. Chavez smiling next to an ad for one of the social programs.

Harrowing

It’s not a word I use particularly often, but it’s a good descriptor of traffic/vehicular transport in Caracas. It has the worst traffic I’ve ever seen, but when there’s no traffic, people drive as fast as they can. We’re talking 120 mph. Speed limit signs are very sparse and I never saw anyone pulled over getting a traffic ticket.

The first night I arrived, we had to take a detour because of a car wreck. I got a brief glimpse and it was the worst car wreck I’ve ever seen. At least I think the hunk of metal in the tunnel was car parts and judging from the view, the occupants didn’t fare any better than their car.

Everyone seems to have a car and people drive everywhere. There is a subway in Caracas, but it didn’t sound to safe, so I expect it’s not terribly busy.

Things I saw while riding in cars in Caracas:

1. Staying in your lane seems to be optional. When there’s traffic, it’s perfectly appropriate to use the shoulder, or to take a 3 lane road and make a 4th lane (somehow).

2. If the traffic is really bad, it’s ok to drive on the sidewalk. Even if there are people on it. I saw this in Valencia one evening, during a traffic jam. Things were very slow, so cars started popping the curb and driving on the sidewalk. Right by the entrance to McDonalds. Then more cars made a 2nd lane of traffic on the sidewalk. So 3 lane road with 4 lanes of traffic + 2 lanes of sidewalk traffic. Then buses started using the sidewalk to get around the rest of the cars. I wish I had a photo of a particular bus ‘rejoining’ the traffic, nosing in from the front of McDonalds at a 45 degree angle, blocking 1 sidewalk lane and 2 lanes of regular traffic. It was pretty impressive.

3. Stopping (or staying stopped) at a red light is also optional. Stop signs are also optional. One cab driver told me that it’s not safe to sit at a red light at night in Caracas, but this doesn’t explain all the daytime light – runners. Traffic lights are also optional if the traffic is bad. People just look for a hole and go. Everyone else will stop, right? At one point, there were enough cars trying to drive straight through an intersection (from all 4 directions) and turn left (from all 4 directions), that I could reach out the window and touch multiple cars (I didn’t).

4. Honking is extremely popular, as this is how I woke up most mornings. One Sunday morning I awoke to extra honking at 0730 to discover the traffic offender was a fun run, causing the road to be temporarily closed.

5. Parking anywhere is also ok. One lunch, we parked about 5 feet from the entrance of the restaurant, on the sidewalk, right by a pile of papayas.