Caracas, June 12-20, 2010

My time in Caracas is coming to an end. Much of my time has been spent watching World Cup soccer, watching TV, sitting on the laptop, taking photos, and hoping for the motivation to work on my projects. It's been a nice break from work, and I'm not really looking forward returning to long, tedious days at work and to missing almost every soccer game on account of the time difference and needing to work.

I've noticed the population here is pretty homogenized in terms of ethnicities. Almost everyone has dark hair, dark eyes, darkish skin. Not to say that everyone looks the same, but many of the general features are shared by most people. And it was a little jarring when I would see someone with lighter hair and eyes. Driving here is also an entirely different animal. There are a lot of roads that are narrow and wind perilously around steep hillsides. Frequently, fairly major intersections will contain no traffic signs or lights and instead cars just sort of interleave themselves into quickly passing and merging traffic. It's a bit harrowing, but seems to work. I'm curious what the accident rate is compared to a passive-driver's paradise like Seattle.