Maracay is one of the largest cities in Venezuela and is located in the central part of the country. In Maracay, it is very hot in the summer, the city seems to be trapped in dry hot air, it has always been like that, this is shown by the caricatures found in old newspapers.
There are many cars in the city, the unbearable heat is added to the exhaust fumes from the cars, and the concrete city becomes a polygon of dust and dirt thrown into the heated air. Although the heat and bad air are not the biggest problems here, summer only lasts for 3 months, but the hardship and hopelessness have settled here for many years. The father came home, irritated by poverty, who had been standing in a traffic jam for 2 hours on a full bus. He received a salary of 70000000 bolivars! half of which he spent before coming home, paying off his debts. If we count the second half of the salary for the 9-person Maldanado family by state standards, they are divided over 3 days, only for food. Dad took off his boots, which he has been wearing for the fourth year, and put them in a corner. The tired father found his wife and most of his children in the living room. They had rice porridge for dinner, which is traditionally 4 times a week because rice is one of the cheapest foods in the country.
“Guillermo turn on the TV” the father shouted to his youngest son, Guillermo got up and pressed the power button on the old, dusty TV. The TV didn’t turn on, then Guillermo hit his fist from above, once, twice, now it turned on. The national broadcasting company broadcasts news on TV, and the national bolivar has devalued again, the TV announcer began with a heavy voice, “There is a protest rally in the city center again,” the announcer continued, the country’s government is celebrating a successful year and creating a new national holiday, the day of national success!
Here the father ran out of patience and quickly jumped up and quickly turned off the half-broken black and white TV.
“Where is Miguel?” asked his father
“Miguel is at work, but he will come soon today because the employees of his company are on strike,” answered his wife.
“Come on… is he Che Guevara?” He doesn’t know that now is not the time for that and the bank owes the tax” his father shouted and clapped his hand on the table.
How is Gabriela? Is she still in the club of those idiotic young politicians?” asked his father in a hopeless tone.
“Yes, with his friends,” replied Guillermo.
“God, what did I do wrong? Why are all my children idle?” the father said in a low tone and suddenly started to bang loudly on the door.
“Who is it?” asked the father in a hoarse voice.
“We are from the opposition party’s National Movement Block! We conduct our general survey at the national level,” answered the woman from outside.
“I’m not interested,” replied the father.
“You don’t care about the future fate of your country?” shouted a woman from outside in a cynical tone.
“No!” replied the father and turned around.
“Come on, they are young people, they probably haven’t eaten today,” said the wife to her husband. Father nodded and went into the bedroom. The wife went to the door and opened it, outside she met three young men, two boys, and one girl, all three of them were wearing black clothes and had red bands around their necks. The wife invited the young men to the living room.
Tell me what kind of survey you are conducting. asked his wife.
”We are from the youth organization “Protect Venezuela”, we cooperate with the biggest opposition party in our country and together we made a list, we call it the list of traitors, after the victory of our candidatures, in the elections, we will find all the persons recorded in this list, and we punished him severely!” said the girl proudly.
Yes, but how do you make this list? Or what are you going to do to those you write in this list? asked the astonished wife.
“We will include all the counter-protesters in this list, those who will be fixed, and the members of the list, some will be shot, and some will be sentenced to life imprisonment,” said the girl, straightening her shoulders and stretching her neck.
“It’s understandable but will this help our country?” asked the smiling wife.
“Of course, this is done in the name of the people! And people are always a holy force!” said the girl, taking the list in her hands and standing up.
“Your family seems to be in favor of the government, we have nothing to do here, be careful, you don’t end up on this list” The girl smiled cynically and went to the door with her friends.