Tag: El Pao

When The World Was So New And All

Richard Barnes

There are days which are achingly crisp and clear. 

They are not restricted to a specific part of the earth. We’ve seen them “everywhere”. They are, however, restricted to certain days wherein precise weather conditions and time of day and season of the year on occasion cooperate in such a wonderful way as to gift us so marvelously. I am told that, in addition to outside factors, one’s own state of mind also contributes to how such days are beheld.

Invariably such moments remind me how new the world seems when we look back. And one is tempted to think that all was crisp and clear when one was a child. We know better, of course — or at least we ought to know better. However, if your childhood was blessed with a decent home — whether rich or poor or in between — you certainly should be grateful.

I recall visiting the El Morro fort in San Juan, Puerto Rico one late afternoon in 1978. It was one of those aforementioned, astonishingly clear days, about two hours or so before sunset. The beauty of the day was not due only to my personal inward peace; a television crew, which I later learned was from an advertising agency, was filming a lady on a horse. It must have been a shampoo commercial as her almost-waist-long hair reflected the sun’s rays as she rode her horse, with trees and fort and sparkling ocean in the background. Clearly the advertising agency knew this was a “perfect day” to shoot such a commercial in that spot.

(Lamentably, the trees are gone; my understanding is that they were removed in the early 90s to make the fort look “exactly” as it did in the 16th Century when it was built.)

But one need not be in an exotic location to enjoy such days. I’ve seen them as I worked on the property outside my home in Texas or as I drove grandchildren to a Puerto Rico mountain top or sitting on the low wall outside the camp club in El Pao. And you have seen such days also, I’m sure. We all have.

Invariably, such days tug me back to a vinyl record my father bought when I was not yet two years old. No, I don’t recall the day he bought it; as far as I am concerned, it had always been a part of my life; however, in writing this post I looked at the issue date: 1955.

It is Gary Moore’s The Elephant Child: Musical Adaptations based on Just So Stories For Little Children by Rudyard Kipling.

The second story in the album is “How The Camel Got Its Hump”. Like all such tales in Just So, “Camel” is an origin story. Moore delightfully channels Kipling as he unfolds the yarn about a world that is just beginning and has much work to be done. The horse, the ox, and the dog are doing their best to help the man; however, the camel just sits there in the desert doing nothing but saying “Humph!”

A recurring motif throughout the story is that “The world is so new and all” and this creature refuses to carry her weight. If you don’t know it, I’ll let you read the rest of the 2 or 3 pages; or look it up in Internet Archives and listen to Moore’s adaptation.

It’s the recurring refrain that comes to my mind on days of crispness and clarity: when the world was so new and all.

Robert Redford is quoted as saying, “Life is essentially sad.” I understand his meaning to be that happiness is a rare thing and when one encounters it one must grasp it for a moment, for it is too seldom seen. 

Mr. Redford’s is a sad philosophy of life, I am truly sorry to say. Yes, we may see much tribulation in life, as the apostle tells us. However, life can be joyful and its end, glorious and eternal, as per the Westminster Shorter Catechism.

I see the aforementioned days as reminders of God’s goodness. They are one of life’s gifts which cannot be explained with mere words; but are part of the joy unspeakable that is ours in Christ and in His Kingdom.

As for our childhood, yes, colors were bright then … but they are bright still, no? Sure they are.

We may have storms today … but we had them back then as well.

As we begin the new ecclesiastical year, celebrating this Advent Season, we could do worse than remember to be grateful for the days we have been given and to determine to make our remaining days worth the while.

So, in a sense, the world is as new and all today as it was in 1955.

Photo of El Morro Fort taken in 1977. Notice the trees along the driveway and to the right. These were cut down and removed in the early 90s.

Robert Redford (1936-2025). Photo taken in 2003

Birthday

Richard Barnes

“…No, it is impossible; it is impossible to convey the life-sensation of any given epoch of one’s existence — that which makes its truth, its meaning — its subtle and penetrating essence. It is impossible. We live, as we dream — alone …. Of course, in this you fellows see more than I could then. You see me, whom you know ….” – Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

A great challenge, which I have not conquered, is to accurately convey the life sensations of the epochs lived in El Pao. To describe the people who played life-long roles in shaping my character — the person who I was and who I became. In this, I agree with Conrad: it is impossible.

I do not pretend to be a literary genius — guffaw, guffaw! — nor anywhere near a master of a vocabulary which can precisely portray the people I so longingly miss and love. All I can do is write snippets and recall persons and events which had an influence on me. 

But I do ask my readers to know that I love the people I grew up with in my childhood. I respect and honor them. Beginning with my father and mother and relatives such as aunts and uncles on both sides of my family. And friends — not only friends, but also their parents and grandparents. It is a great honor to be able to have called your father’s and mother’s friends your own.

Family bonds are critical, not only to the family, but to friends and acquaintances thereof.

These introductory thoughts are elicited by memories of one of my childhood birthdays. It may have been my fifth, but I can’t be sure….

Birthdays were pretty big deals in El Pao. 

I sat inside, on the living room window sill, watching my mother standing under the shade of the giant Araguaney, placing beans in a glass jar. I looked away, not because I didn’t want to win that contest, but because I was afraid someone might see me and call me a cheater.

I would not be able to explain my fear. I only sensed a profound need to not disappoint my father or mother and, in my mind, being publicly accused of cheating would have been a very great embarrassment to them and, so, to me also. I felt I represented my father and mother as much as they represented themselves and, therefore, I would second guess myself on occasions such as this, when I might be able to see my mother’s lips as she counted the beans or as she gave the total to Mrs. C. for recording.

I recalled, with sudden stomach turmoil, the Easter party earlier in the year when I had indeed seen Mrs. Y’s lips as she told Mrs. S, who then wrote the number down. I had closely observed the movement of the pencil in her fist as she wrote the number, confirming what I had read in the lips. I had repeated that number, 146, silently to myself throughout the following hour or so and when the guessing game began I astounded all when I loudly exclaimed, “One hundred and forty-six!”

No one had seemed to suspect me. On the contrary, they laughed and congratulated me on a perfect guess.

Sure. A perfect guess. But it hadn’t been a guess at all.

I soon apperceived guilt and wondered whether there were someone who had seen me looking and had guessed my dirty little trick. Anyways, I knew God had seen me. Except when my mind was on games and scrambling around, I was miserable the rest of that afternoon.

That was a feeling I did not want to entertain on this day.

So I looked at the balloons tied to tree limbs and overhangs and clothes lines, seeming to bounce against the breeze. I recalled watching my mother and Elena, their mouths forming embouchures, as they filled each balloon. I liked the colors: blue, yellow, orange, purple, red, and white.

Many were tied to the branches of the fustic just outside my bedroom and I remembered the yellow dye that seeped from any wounds on that particular tree. All these colors — blue, yellow, orange, red, and many whites — colors were the only differentiation between the numberless globes of cheer, which would be one of the memories of that day that would ever remain with me.

And these colors were perfectly limbate against the green. I loved the green of the massive Araguaney in our front yard and the dark green of the jungle around the mining camp where I was born five years before.

That green I could see from practically any point in the camp. Right now, I looked up a bit, a little beyond the balloons, and there it was. The green. The foliage painted the distant hills and mid-sized mountain green. To me, green was the color of freedom, of excitement and adventure, of danger, of a magnificent future, of poignant music and children’s laughter. It was a color which would forever remind me of not only this day but of all that comprised my entire childhood in El Pao.

Soon, children were scurrying and crawling over the birthday grounds as their mothers coordinated the various games which culminated with the striking of the Piñata.

Above photos are not of the party I recalled in today’s post. Am not sure where those photos are today.

Above was carnival and most of us wanted to be elsewhere.

La Sayona and La Llorona

Richard Barnes

Guest Post by Professor Cristóbal Lárez Velásquez

Mérida, Venezuela

Professor Lárez Velásquez was born in El Pao and currently works at the Polymer Group, Department of Chemistry, University of the Andes, in Venezuela. He has published numerous articles on chemistry and is also a full professor at the university.

Like myself, Dr. Lárez Velásquez is grateful for the nurture given him during his infancy and childhood in El Pao.

His post on his recollections about La Sayona and La Llorona is of a different kind. I do not recall ever hearing about La Sayona; however, I did hear about La Llorona from the maids and mining camp charwomen but was never interested in inquiring about her. 

Professor Lárez Velásquez does have a knowledge about the origins of the legends which I found entertaining as well as revealing about the superstitions which often grip folks of any land on this earth. 

Not to mention The Scarlet Letter nature of the origins of La Sayona.

Thank you, Dr. Lárez Velásquez!

Guest Post

In just about every town in Venezuela legends related to figures like La Sayona abound.

Briefly, La Sayona is supposedly a ghost or specter that arose when a very jealous woman named Casilda murdered her mother and husband suspecting they were having an affair. Her mother, in the agony of death, cursed her and henceforth, her tormented soul wanders without rest or peace, pursuing unfaithful men to conquer them and then murder them. 

Another legend is La Llorona (The Crying Woman). She is another mythical creature who haunts rivers, lakes, and lonely roads; she comes out at night, searching for her children who drowned. 

Such legends existed in El Pao and surrounding areas of my childhood, and persist to this day. 

Interestingly, many tales about some of these fabled beings were often narrated at wakes as late as the 1960s and into the 1970s. I learned several of them when we accompanied our parents to some of these events. It should be remembered that there was no electricity in the surroundings of El Pao at the time, so the lighting was quite eerie and, as the reader can imagine, the stories told at some wakes had a powerful, long lasting impact on many of those who attended — especially on the children.

One of these narratives told of a woman on fire who would emerge on black nights on the curve just above Vuelta de Correa, up the road leading to El Pao, near the entrance where the Navarro family lived. This woman would chase anyone who ventured alone there. Many people were afraid to walk there; even drivers in their vehicles hesitated to drive through alone on dark nights. 

My grandparents, Juan Velásquez and Gumersinda Rivas de Veláquez, had their grocery store near this site, in front of Mr. Mario Picarone’s old gas pump and a little further down from the bus stop. 

Whenever an incident related to this dreaded ghostly apparition occurred, the episode was recounted again and again in their grocery store. Obviously, the versions expanded with added color to some aspects as they were recounted by different narrators, some of whom felt so strongly about their yarns that it seemed as if they had experienced them personally.

For many years, it was also said in the area that on the San-Félix-El Pao highway, at the entrance to the Macagua dam, a very beautiful woman would appear inside the vehicles passing by. Nothing would happen if the driver, who was likely very frightened, treated her courteously. However, she would become terrifying to those who tried to seduce her. 

The fear was so great, according to the stories, that many fainted or went crazy for a few days. It was believed that these apparitions were meant to punish and discipline unfaithful men, because nothing would happen to those who behaved courteously and gentlemanly. In those cases, the woman would disappear as mysteriously as she had boarded the automobile. 

Many jokers (called “jodedores” in the “guayanés lexicon”), who fortunately have always been abundant in the area, even in the worst of times, said that these stories were told by the drivers to persuade their wives to forgive them for traveling in that area, which was known to be in the vicinity of several places of ill repute.

Unsurprisingly, in the wake of these stories, it was also common for some “brave” men to loudly express their desire for this woman to appear to them, to show them who was in charge, so they said. So, soon enough other places in the region were regaled by women appearing to lone drivers. For example, the place called Guayabal, on the El Pao-Upata highway.

As for El Pao itself, there is a story about its early years that seems difficult to imagine and paints a different picture as to the origins of the La Sayona legend. I knew this story first hand because one of the protagonists related it to me all the while assuring me it was true.

It is about a very tall being, dressed in a hat and a long white suit, who, midst the darkness and fog, which was quite thick in El Pao at that time, supposedly came down from Rankin High, around the back of the church, crossed the school road, and skirted the place known as “el bajo”, behind the houses where the telegraph and post offices later operated. 

If it sensed someone approaching, it [like Marley’s ghost] would drag chains that produced a terrific and chilling sound and continue walking quickly toward Las Casillas. There, it would wait to make sure it could ascend without incident to the front of Pasaje Bolívar, from whence it would pass to the back of the houses on Apure Street, and then walk quickly, dragging the chains again. 

It would reach the hospital steps, climb halfway up, and then descend through the center of what was, or later was, a playground with swings, reaching to the hospital road, crossing it and the road to the now disappeared Labor Office. Then it continued behind the houses on the Guardia Street until, finally, it reached the bachelors buildings and the police headquarters that were in those parts at that time.

There, it disappeared for a long time. Afterwards, the ghostly creature would reappear and return along the same path, always in darkness and under heavy fog, sometimes in a persistent drizzle.

The legend had been circulating in the camp for some time, supposedly told by some drunks whom no one believed, although later told by people who were going to work the night shift and had to pass near some of the aforementioned places along the way. And, it seems, a competition arose among some young people to follow the mysterious entity, which they began to call “La Sayona”, and if possible, to catch it.

One of these groups of young men, who were around 17 or 20 years old and drank liquor “encapillados (drank in secret)” in some of the many places in El Pao where they did so (without causing much of a fuss because otherwise people would complain and the Guardia would come), set out to catch La Sayona. 

According to my source, they were on the verge of success several times, but something always happened that saved her. The most common cause of her escapes seems to have been the fear that paralyzed all the young men with terror when La Sayona stopped, and began to rattle her chains. 

However, one day, when they were under the heavy effects of alcohol, two of them managed to catch and subdue her. And, finally, the secret of La Sayona of El Pao was revealed. 

The two “brave” ones negotiated with her and promised to keep the secret, for which they received a small, monthly gift from her. However, because these two “brave” men, true to blackmail in general, increasingly increased their demands, La Sayona decided to move out of the camp.

According to the story told to me by the man who supposedly caught La Sayona, she was a beautiful, married woman, unfaithful to her husband, who under cover of the El Pao darkness and fog would betray her husband in adultery.

Unfortunately for this story — or perhaps not — my source never revealed the identity of La Sayona of El Pao.

El Pao plaza in the memorable, dark fog. Photo provided by Profesor Lárez Velásquez, courtesy Alfredo Sánchez FB

Postscript To If It Belongs To All….

Richard Barnes

If It Belongs To All….

In my research for the second to last post, I saw some comments online which, unfortunately, I failed to source. Nevertheless, I believe the reader will appreciate them and if anyone knows the source, please advise and I’ll give due credit. 

They are not my words, but they encapsule my memories as well as my gratitude. I’ve linked to prior posts which expand on the subject or comment, as necessary. I’ve made no changes or edits to the comments, other than grammatical corrections for ease of reading.

Comments Online

El Pao has a very cool tropical jungle climate with rainy periods from April to November each year. Minimum temperatures reach 19º C [66° F] and maximum temperatures reach 31º C [88° F], with an average of 24º C [75° F].

The Betlehem Steel corporation carried out explorations on the El Florero hills, discovering large iron deposits in this area. Eduardo Boccardo transferred the mining rights to Bethlehem Steel, which began to develop the project for exploitation, creating the subsidiary company Iron Mines Of Venezuela. In 1940, the project to build a road and a railway to the port of Palúa on the right bank of the Orinoco River began, but these were delayed by the events of the Second World War, and exploitation actually began in 1950.

The El Pao camp, as it was known, was divided into three urban groups: “Rankin High” where most of the teachers and nurses lived [my Madrina lived there with her mother], and the Catholic Church was also located there; “San José Obrero” where the workers lived [known to us as “el Otro Campo“], there was a primary school, a commissary, a hospital, an evangelical church, police, a national guard, a hotel, and a workers’ social club; and “El Florero” where the administrative staff, doctors and engineers lived, mostly North Americans in the 50s, 60s and 70s. They had an American primary school and a social club (with a swimming pool, tennis court and bowling alley).

El Pao, a magical place in permanent contact with nature, where every day at 3 in the afternoon we were shaken by the explosives that exploded in search of iron, and the train with its slow and heavy step was the sound of progress, work, and hope. 

Thus, a modest but comfortable [mining and] urban center was built, where the first inhabitants, apart from the peasants from the region, were the immigrant employees who were in charge of carrying out the work of the mine, one of the most significant in all of Venezuela, from which, until 1996, at least 111 million tons of mineral were extracted.

In 1974, the management of the mine passed into the hands of the Venezuelan state, and in 1975 the company, Ferro-minera Orinoco, belonging to the Venezuelan Corporation of Guayana, joined the exploitation works.

Reply from a reader of the above comments:

Greetings from Caracas. Reading this whole story takes me back many years because I was born and raised in El Pao, exactly on Bolivar Street. 

My mother worked at the hospital when the [Americans] left. She had 30 years of service. 

Those were unforgettable times. If God asked me what I would like to repeat in my life, I would tell him to return to El Pao as I lived it, its streets, its green grass, the streets full of mangoes, me going to the commissary, the school — by the way, the best in the state of Bolivar — the best hospital, ufff, everything first class, the pool…. 

Well, friend, I congratulate you for all that I have read, without being able to contain my eyes from clouding with tears when I read or see something from my dear and beloved El Pao, remembered forever. 

I am a Paoense in soul and heart. Greetings.

Paoense. I don’t remember having heard or read that word before. But I fully relate.

View from the administrative camp towards the warehouse and mine, circa 1965

If It Belongs To All ….

Richard Barnes

After college graduation in 1975, my visits to El Pao were rather irregular yet not infrequent, with visits in 1978 and several times in the ensuing decades when I was able to swing by during business trips. My last visit was in 2005, which, although memorable, had its harrowing moments whose details will have to await retelling.

During my 1978 trip, for which I will be forever grateful, an old family friend and her older children engaged me in lively conversation over coffee and pastries in her home when, pausing and looking at me, which caused me to remain silent, she said, “Nosotros jamás pensamos que el campamento se pondría peor [We never thought the camp would get worse]”.

That was the elephant in the room: surely I had noticed the unkempt open spaces, which as late as 1975 looked like golf course greens but now were overgrown; or the swimming pool which looked like it needed cleaning and maintenance; or the bowling lanes which had clearly seen better days; or the houses, including my family’s, in which we had lived until a few short years prior but which now were almost jungle invaded and “occupied” by surly squatters.

I had noticed, of course; however, I also knew that there was no need to needlessly offend. Prior to and during the “nacionalización” María had been a loud voice extolling the virtues of “public” ownership versus the evils of “Gringo” ownership.

But now she was sincerely looking for a response from someone whom she knew had not been a fan of the jingoistic justifications for theft. Of course, those appeals had been disguised by distortions asserting that the Bethlehem Steel and all such steel and petroleum companies had “stolen” the minerals of Venezuela, had exploited the people of Venezuela, had imposed inhumane conditions on the working class of Venezuela, ad nauseam. 

Carefully, for she sincerely wanted to hear my opinion, I replied, “Bueno, María [not her name], a way to help us understand what we are seeing is to ask a simple question: if something belongs to ‘everyone’, then who, really, is the owner? In other words, who will take the risk to care for the object that is ‘owned’ by all?”

She just nodded, signifying that she understood.

Our conversation rushed back to my mind when, in the late 80s, I visited the even more deteriorated camp. On that visit, I took a photo of the last classroom I attended before leaving for the States (photo below). The ranch style schoolhouse still stood and gave promise of a still bright future if only someone actually owned it. But no one did. María, and many more, had abandoned the camp by then and more recent photos show the pool to be an empty, cracking husk.

A few years after Venezuelan nationalization, Communist Zimbabwe (Rhodesia ceased to exist in 1979) had the presence of mind to keep their elephant preserves in private hands and thereby saved them from ruination for decades. Interestingly, they did not allow their ideological blinders to blind them to the benefit of having their treasured preserves cared for by the actual owners. And they were rewarded with excellent results. Unfortunately, Venezuela opted for the conventional Socialist route with the typical depressing results now well known throughout the world.

María is long gone now but our discussion remains vivid in my mind. 

I had forgotten about that photo until a few days ago when my brother-in-law pulled some envelopes stashed in some corner and old papers and photos, including that of the abandoned classroom, tumbled to the tile below.

And I was reminded that the Bethlehem Steel had built river port facilities about 180 miles from the mouth of the Orinoco River plus about 35 miles of railroad tracks and road inland from there to the site of the ore deposits. Three self-sustaining camps were built: one, Palúa, on the river, the other, El Pao, at the mining site, and a third, Puerto de Hierro, on the Atlantic coast to provide a deep water port for shipment up north. By March, 1951, close to 3,000,000 tons of ore were being mined annually, with most shipped to Sparrows Point, Maryland for processing, with a considerable amount of tonnage stockpiled in Palúa.

In summary, the Bethlehem Steel operations in Venezuela were somewhat complex from a transportation standpoint. Ore was mined and transported from El Pao by rail to Palúa on the Orinoco; then 180 miles down the mighty river by four or five 6,000-ton river steamers, built by a company subsidiary, to Puerto de Hierro on the Atlantic Ocean, from where the ore was transferred to much larger company ships for the 2,000-mile journey to Maryland.

By 1964 US Steel had dredged a 32-foot deep canal down the Orinoco for which other companies, including Bethlehem Steel, paid usage tolls. This allowed deep water shipments directly from Palúa, so Bethlehem shut down the Puerto de Hierro operations and ceded the ports and the camp to the Venezuelan government. All families were transferred to the other two camps.

As the reader can imagine, the capital investment implied in the above cursory descriptions is gargantuan. And that is only one company. In the first half of the 20th Century Venezuela received such investments from many such enterprises in the oil and ore industries.

At the close of 1974, the Venezuelan government nationalized all foreign owned ore properties, agreeing to pay book value, not market value.

And a mere four years later, my friend, María, asked why the camp had deteriorated….

My old classroom. Photo taken circa 1987

Photos of recently-built El Pao mining camp, circa 1953