Tag: Venezuela

From Lawful Immigration To Darien Gap To Institutional Exploitation   

Richard Barnes

In 1975 our family worked with the United States embassy in Caracas to seek approval to bring into the United States a young girl who had in effect become a member of our family. We had her parents’ approval along with legal, notarized papers and other documents which had been requested of us.

However, the gatekeeper at the embassy was not cooperative, to put it charitably. She crossed her arms and summarily denied our request, without giving a reason. We therefore requested a tourist visa for a short period of time to allow the girl an opportunity to see us in our new environment before returning to Venezuela with, hopefully, a promise of a future visit.

This too was denied by the officious woman, who this time gave her reason: “Oh no! You will take her to the US and then you will hide her there and never return her to Venezuela.”

My father was justifiably angered and incredulous; however, there was not much he could do. After further pleadings, we resigned ourselves to the life-changing reality both for the girl as well as for us. 

About 10 years later, my father’s cousins from Cuba got hold of me in Kalamazoo, Michigan, requesting my assistance in helping them immigrate to the United States. I of course told them I’d be happy to help in any way possible. That story turned out happily and they eventually made their way to Florida where they were welcomed and became U.S. citizens.

Another 15 years and the catastrophe in Venezuela became known worldwide and, to date, we are told that about 8 Million Venezuelans, 20% of her population, have fled the country — legally and illegally; vetted and unvetted. 

We know that within that vast number are very many whom we definitely do not want here, such as Tren de Aragua. We also know that countless numbers have been trafficked here, particularly young girls and boys, many of whom survived the unbelievably harsh, forbidding, bandit-and-snake-infested Darien Gap and the less cruel yet still dangerous passageways through Central America and Mexico.

We don’t have the statistical breakdown for the numbers of people who have come to the United States from Venezuela because they were defrauded by Coyotes who took their money, horribly abused, and then abandoned their prey along the way or at the border; or how many came for the promise of meeting up with family once here; or how many were kidnapped and forced to come.

I personally do know that many who wanted to come were dissuaded once they began the legal processes and were discouraged by the cost and time required. In one case, my acquaintance desisted from seeking to come to the United States and decided to go to Argentina instead, where the process and related costs were much less. He and his family are now doing well and contributing to the Argentine economy and society, active in a good church there.

(Someone ought to expound on the paradox alluded to above: the many decent Venezuelans who admired the United States and wanted to come here; who would have contributed to our economy and to our society; but who were discouraged by what to them were insurmountable obstacles; and who ended up in another country and made their lives there, contributing positively to their new homeland.)

However difficult the long and excruciating journey to the United States has been, for countless numbers the arrival has been even worse.

Earlier this year, in early April to be precise, the Senate Judiciary Committee issued a press release calling attention to the Office of Inspector General report, issued in March, noting the utter failure of the United States Department of Homeland Security to fulfill its legally required duty to monitor the location and status of unaccompanied children who crossed our borders.

The Committee’s press release has links going back to the Obama administration in 2014; one link addresses the evidence noting that administration’s releasing minors into the custody of criminal cartels.

However, all past abuse and indifference pales when compared to the apocalyptic calamity that minors faced during the 2021-2024 years. 

One need not be a parent or grandparent to be angered by the actions or inactions of our elected officials and their bureaucracies concerning the legally-required protection of boys and girls who found themselves at our borders.

Once again, by the time these children arrived, many of their peers had already perished or disappeared at the hands of outlaws or beasts or acts of nature during the long journey. The children who arrived were true survivors, in many cases, of heinous, horrible acts of man. 

Can you imagine what they must have thought when they realized with horror that their ordeal was but a foretaste of what lay ahead of them?

Over 320,000 children were lost track of during the 2021 through 2024 years. Many were released to unvetted sponsors with no accountability whatsoever. To put it bluntly: these children went from the border to forced prostitution across our country and forced labor and unspeakable abuse.

Although many of these children were kidnapped to be trafficked up here, we must acknowledge that many were actually sent by their parents. Why? How can such a thing be? Perhaps they believed that their kids would make it easier for them to come later? That’s a wild guess. As a parent, I cannot imagine doing such a thing and am disposed to find any sort of reason to ameliorate my judgment of such fathers and/or mothers.

The concept of “open borders” is attractive to many well-meaning people. But do they for a moment pause to consider the real life consequences of such a concept? Do such people have children? Would they want this for their little ones?

During the aforementioned years, unvetted sponsors were OK’d, by telephone(!!!) to take many children with them at a time. Young girls were pimped by such sponsors, many of whom actually were criminals with rap sheets.

If you have the stomach, read the release and the report; they tell how our compassionate bureaucrats and experts ignored pleas for help against adult men who assaulted little ones as they slept; how a whistleblower told about handing children to known criminals; how NGO’s got rich with taxpayer dollars funneled to them by the billions only to use them to get rich and to hire criminals to care for these little ones. 

In those years, over $10 Billion were granted to nonprofits, including religious enablers such as Catholic Charities and Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service. Have they never read what our Lord said about this? Do they not remember that Jesus Himself said it would be “better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea”?

People can criticize President Trump all they want. Have at it. But are they aware of the aforementioned catastrophe? Are they aware that he has put a stop to it and that over 60,000 of those missing children have been found in 2025 alone? Is that not something we can be grateful for? 

I am grateful for it; however, my sadness overall persists.

It persists because we as a people have lost our way. We need to find the way back. 

Let us purpose to consider these things during this Advent and Christmas Season. Not to overwhelm our joys. No. 

Let us purpose to commit ourselves to honor the King of Kings by living in obedience to Him and His law. Let us determine to demand righteousness from our elected officials. 

And especially to require that religious denominations be held to account.

Crossing the Darien Gap (2021-2024)

Cartel de los Soles

Richard Barnes

A good friend recently asked for my thoughts on the military buildup in the Caribbean.

This post is my reply to him.

Hello G____:

I believe the relevant information can be summarized in my Bands of Robbers post earlier this year. 

I agree with the administration in that Venezuela is indeed a criminal enterprise which has wreaked — and continue to wreak — havoc not only on the Venezuelan people but on the land itself — the Orinoco Mining Arc is truly a disaster zone. And the drug market has enriched and continues to enrich the Communists in charge of the chaos, while the poor and what’s left of the middle class, suffer. 

According to several estimates, about 20%, or more, of the country’s population has emigrated since Chavez in the late 1990’s. That’s about 8 Million souls.

So if the current people in charge recognize the 2024 elections, which they lost in a landslide, AND peacefully transfer power to the legitimate victors, that would be a positive development but no panacea.

My concern is that, for generations, since well before my birth, Venezuelans have been taught that Democracy is good and that it is in essence the same as Socialism. They don’t declare it quite so bluntly, but that is what it is. In other words, our deep troubles did not begin with Chavez. Nor would the hope in the Venezuelan military, a hope shared by many, including dear friends, ever be realized, because, historically, the military was and is as left wing as the political leadership. Even more so.

Once again, we can credit Simón Bolívar, whose idolization of the French Revolution did so much harm to South America. His overwhelming influence determined the course of Venezuelan public and private education, which for the entire 20th Century was based on the French model, including centralization and, in essence, rule by “experts” — meaning left wing.

So, again, if the administration’s actions, successfully pressure the current leadership to recognize the true 2024 victors, so much the better. However, if the victors are not recognized and the current despotism simply abdicates and leaves a vacuum, we or the administration, would be truly naive to expect something good to fill it. 

As for the 2024 victors, their political platform is encouraging on the economic side, including free-market principles and deregulation. I understand Machado appreciates Ludwig Von Mises and Milton Freedman over Douglas Bravo and Karl Marx. Unfortunately, on the social issues, she is not as conservative. However, on balance, if I had my druthers, I would prefer her over the current mafia in charge. Hence my desire that the current president and his followers truly and cleanly transfer power to them.

But we have no guarantee of that — at least at the moment. 

As for military action — as opposed to offshore pressure — I am not in favor. History has shown that wars’ results are unpredictable and this is especially true in the case of Venezuela. She is a very large country and the Castro-Chavez-Maduro triumvirate has hundreds if not thousands of its own ideologically aligned minions ensconced in positions of leadership throughout the country. It has also armed its own to the teeth. This would be a very bloody enterprise which can expect highly unpredictable results for both Venezuela and the United States.

No matter what, we can take comfort in God’s overruling Providence, regardless of the actions taken.

Be well, G____.

Your friend,

Richard

Chigüire

Richard Barnes

This post is mostly fact — the description of the Chigüire and the Tragavenado — and some imagination — the scene of the snake trapping the rodent. With a true bit of Alexander von Humboldt thrown in for good measure.

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Chigüires (known as Capybaras in the US) are rarely seen alone. Their two principal enemies are the crocodile and the jaguar, followed closely by a third: the tragavenado (“deer swallower”), Venezuela’s version of a python or a boa constrictor. Despite these enemies, they reproduce with amazing rapidity.

The Chigüire thrives abundantly in Venezuela, living fifty or sixty together in troops on the banks of rivers, of which the principal is the grand Orinoco. They also congregate along the Apure and Caroní, other major rivers which happen to be tributaries of the Orinoco. These animals grow to about the size of pigs in Midwestern farms and even look a bit like them, but with yellowish-brown bristly fur. 

They swim better than they run, often gracelessly diving precipitately when feeling the least alarm, squealing sharply and loudly. Their eyes are large and protruding, a characteristic of nocturnal animals. They defend themselves only at the last extremity, by then usually too late, although, according to some naturalists, their grinding teeth, especially the rear ones, can tear the paw of a jaguar or even the leg of a horse.

In the colonial era, inland, Chigüires were considered appropriate food, including hams in time of lent. In this, the monks and the Indians were agreed. It is not clear what the monks’ reaction was when Chigüires were determined to be not swine, but the world’s largest rodents — serious, persistent biological study of these mammals did not occur until the twentieth century.

Humboldt, the great 19th and early 19th Century explorer and naturalist, tells of having captured two by simply outrunning them. When Chigüires run, their gait seems like a slight gallop (their hind legs being longer than their fore legs) and not very swift. When he brought them to his host out in the great llanos of Venezuela, expecting to have them slaughtered and roasted that night, the proprietor assured him that such “Indian game” was not food fit for “us white gentlemen”.  He, accordingly, offered his guests venison instead.

Their natural habitat is near the river. In fact, they can remain under the water for eight or ten minutes. However, during the rainy season, they might be seen up to 20 miles from the banks of the nearest major river, but that is rare. 

And this was a rare occasion. 

Five Chigüires had wandered off, rooting for herbs and wild weeds, deep into the jungles south of the Orinoco and east of the Caroní, rivers whose banks during the rainy season expand for many miles. And beyond those banks, the rains create expansive swamps, rivulets, creeks, lakes, and ponds … far, far beyond.

The Tragavenado may be found on the ground. However, it is primarily arboreal, spending most of its time wrapped around low hanging branches waiting for quarry to pass below. For good reason, she is known as an ambush predator. She can capture and eat animals exceeding three times the size of her head, making the young chiguire an ideal prey.

The Tragavenado does not consider herself to be in the company of white gentlemen. For her dinner, the Chigüire’s greasy meat is satisfactory. 

This Tragavenado was a large snake. Her body was coiled atop a thick, low hanging bough below which ran a small creek which appeared only during the rainy season. It was an hour before midnight; but that wasn’t an impediment since she recognized her prey by smell, not sight. She flicked her tongue in and out, picking up the Chiguire scent particles in the air, noting their approach. Chiguire flesh is possessed of a strong, musky smell, easily discernible to a predator such as the Tragavenado. Soon the nerve endings lodged in the scales around her mouth sensed the heat of the Chiguires, indicating her prey was near.

The Chigüires grazed under the large tropical oak tree overhanging the small creek. One of them was in the creek, directly beneath a large bough from which shot, at lightning speed, the head of the Tragavenado. She bit the top of the Chiguire’s neck with her sharp teeth and held on with her powerful jaws as she quickly dropped from the bough and wrapped her body entirely around the hapless Chiguire, whose companions had scattered off in different directions into the forest.

The Tragavenado has specialized scales, called scoots, on the belly to feel when the prey releases a breath, and then she squeezes tighter and tighter until her prey either suffocates or dies by cardiac arrest. The Chiguire soon stopped breathing and died and her conqueror began swallowing it whole, beginning with the head. Soon the dead Chiguire’s legs folded up and the carcass began going down smoothly into the body of the snake, whose muscles have wave-like contractions, sucking it even further and surging it downward with each bite.

She wouldn’t need to eat again for a very long time.

Chigüire, the world’s larges rodent. 

Tragavenado 

Alexander von Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland, circa 1799

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.

Uncle Max

Richard Barnes

Last week I was interviewed for hours regarding my Uncle’s and my father’s murders in 1968 and 1982, respectively. The discussion went far longer than anticipated because the interviewer wanted to understand how Massachussets, Pennsylvania, Florida, Cuba, and Venezuela all “connected” so extensively with our family. 

This morning I enjoyed coffee with an acquaintance who also asked how my grandfather, whose fathers had lived and died in Massachussets since the 17th Century, ended up in Cuba and then his offspring went to Venezuela. I was happy to give him the 60,000 foot overview.

The fact is that all families have interesting histories. The problem is that relatively few take the time to describe or narrate such to their children and grandchildren, who, if experience is any guide, would be positively delighted to know them and would never tire of hearing them. Who doesn’t remember seeing little ones wanting to know what their fathers or mothers did “when you were little”?

My father would often tell us about his brother, Uncle Max’s antics in Cuba. My father was an excellent baseball player, Uncle Max was an excellent swimmer. My father only beat him once: a marathon swim in Santiago Bay (if memory serves) where Uncle Max committed the cardinal sin of over worrying about another swimmer who was supposed to be his greatest competition. 

As Uncle Max kept looking over his shoulder to see where his “competition” was, my father pulled away and beat him. Everyone — especially my father! — knew that would be a once in a lifetime. And it was. But that didn’t stop my father from teasing Uncle Max about it for decades.

Uncle Max was a firecracker — full of energy and stamina. Retired in Miami, well into his 70s and into his 80s he swam 100 laps, and later, 50 laps every day. I am convinced that exercise regiment forestalled his succumbing to Parkinson’s Disease in 2007, his 91st year.

That energy and invincible good humor was on full display early one morning, again in Santiago Bay. Only this time my father and Uncle Max along with two other friends were in a boat fishing. Uncle Max’s line tensed suddenly and the boys realized he had caught something terribly big! He worked the fish, but eventually ran out of fishing line.

Yes, he jumped into the bay and kept working the fish! I laugh as I write this. I always think of Uncle Max when I see the beginning of The Lord of the Rings where Peter Jackson depicts Déagol, Sméagol’s cousin, hooking a large fish and jumping into the river after running out of line. It is there that he sees the One Ring to Rule Them All and … well, you know the rest of that story.

In Uncle Max’s case, his friends and my father rowed while yelling at Uncle Max to “Let it go!” They caught up with him and laughed until they cried. I believe it was a giant Grouper, but do not remember. This story was last told me many years ago.

My cousin Eileen once told me that when she understood that her father, Uncle Max, had fought in WWII in the Philippines, she climbed on his lap and asked him, “Did you die?” I was not there but can easily see my uncle laughing uproariously.

It’s not easy to choose one’s “favorite” Uncle Max story, but I suppose it would be the one where, again in Cuba, the boys, including my father and Uncle Max were swimming back and forth and jumping or diving in, just having the time of their lives.

They did not notice, or rather, they ignored a large yacht moored nearby. 

Soon a crewman, in bright whites, came to the dock where the boys were diving and swimming and called Uncle Max to him. 

“My boss would like to challenge you to a swim. Would you agree?”

“Yes! Yes! Tell him yes!” — It is difficult to convey Uncle Max’s energy and enthusiasm with mere words.

So the gentleman on the yacht approached in a dingy and introduced himself by name.

They agreed to the natural markers for their swim and dove in. Uncle Max won.

As they caught their breath and congratulated one another for a good swim, the gentleman again stretched out his hand and asked, “Do you know whom you just defeated?”

“No!”

“You just defeated the Jamaica Olympic champion. Congratulations!”

None of that ever went to Uncle Max’s head.

In 1984, at my wedding’s reception held in a military base in Puerto Rico, someone came to me and whispered, “You have a call.” 

A call? 

I followed the gentleman to an office and picked up the phone which was lying on a desktop. 

“Hello Ricky! Congratulations!” said the voice on the other end. It was a voice and a laugh I so easily recognized. It was Uncle Max and his wife, my Tía Carmencita.

May you rest in peace, Uncle Max.

Uncle Max, far left; my father, center. With cousins in Massachussets, circa 1920

Uncle Max and his sister, Aunt Sarah, circa 1975

Uncle Max and Tía Carmencita and Aunt Sarah and Uncle Luis (“Wichy”) came to see us at the gate at the Miami International Airport while we were on a layover on our way to Venezuela. Uncle Max is second from right. Circa 1989. 

Middle row, left to right, Cousin Sarita, eldest daughter to Uncle Max and Tía Carmencita, Tía Carmencita, Uncle Max. I am in the back; the rest are five of my children. Miami, Florida, circa 2002.