MS lives in a big white house with a large red-tiled courtyard in the back, dominated by a big tree that drops large red fruit and makes everything magenta. There are five dogs and three cats. We enter the house through a gate into the large, tiled kitchen/dining room. Once again there is only cold water in the trickly shower. I haven't explored the house but it seems to sprawl with a bunch of white-walled rooms.
Another couchsurfer, N, Argentinian, was here when I arrived. I thought he was hot, with his necklace and curly brown hair. Also, MS's sister, C, and her husband K live here with their two sons (teenage and adolescent). MS is Venezuelan but grew up in Buenos Aires. He films tourists on their ocean tours and has couchsurfed around Venezuela but not seen all of it yet.
MS cooked N and I a dinner of pasta and meat sauce. I scooped up the sauce around the meat. I don't think beef flavour enhances sauce. Ms is warm and we had a good chat, easy and personal right off the bat - not that I'm not usually like that.
After admitting that I was worried about trying to find the buses to the beach and finding my way back, N offered to take me to the beach with him the next morning. MS had to work. I woke up at 8.00am and read while I waited for N to wake up. N and K appeared around 9.30 and K made us breakfast of tiny toasts with butter and jam. N and K needed to go to the bank, so I tagged along in order to later be dropped off at the por puesto stop to Playa el Agua. I had a brief wander around the mall where the bank was. I don't like malls in Venezuela any more than I like malls anywhere else, but I did buy another disposable camera ($30 bolivars) at a Kodak shop.
N's very sexy friend C, also Argentinian and also a couchsurfer, is working as a waitress while living on Margarita and she joined us for the afternoon. C, with her big husky voice and large eyes, was the one who knew how to get to the beach. We met a few friends of hers close to the far end of Playa el Agua, past all the umbrellas and beach chairs, stands of food and drink. Also past where others were swimming.
Playa el Agua
This is Venezuelans' idea of a beautiful beach. I feel like I'm always a negative voice, critical and complaining, and I am trying to throw off that role, but I don't want to lie about my trip and my impressions. For me, compared to Australian beaches, Agua is ordinary. The water was olive green and cloudy, the food shacks sometimes dilapidated and hodgepodge, the sand dark, flat and stirred up by feet. The beach doesn't have dunes or beautiful beach scrub. On the far end is a pretty sand hill with green vegetation, but that is all that stood out.
A handsome bearded man selling homemade falafel, and who explained his belief in Indian subcontinental spirituality, told us that Agua usually has good surf but today is calm. There were waves breaking near the shore, but the water was shallow for such a long way that I couldn't play in them properly. Also, despite the relative smallness of the waves, they were powerful and knocked me down. I couldn't hold up my weight against them and kept tumbling backwards. Despite this, it was much welcomed to finally be in the ocean after my days of hot and humid waiting.
After my solo fight with the waves I joined the others, who took turns swimming. This was not a good day for me. N isn't particularly talkative with me, and though C is lovely, she and the others spoke Spanish and I felt bored and lonely. I wished I was on the beach by myself as being alone is never as lonely as feeling alone with people. One of C's friends, a computing professor, spoke some English and I chatted with her and the falafel seller, who also spoke English. Eventually I decided that it would not be rude to read. I read, I went back into the water, I walked along the beach, I had a beer. C left around 3.00 and the others had left before her. N napped and listened to his MP3 player while I alternately walked and read. At 5.00, I woke him up. We had been warned not to stay too late or else we'd miss the last por puesto back to the city.
N and I had begun walking back towards the road when a man stopped us to say that a tortoise had been found on the beach. Playa el Agua is dotted with orange tape and stake enclosures around small areas of sand with signs reading 'tortoise eggs, do not step on.' N had explained that Agua is famous for its huge tortoises, and a volunteer society protects their eggs by erecting barriers and helping make sure the hatchlings get safely to the sea.
We turned back around so that we could see the tortoise, but when we got to a site of commotion, all we saw was a dense circle of excited people, some men up on a raised platform directing the activity below and whistling and shouting, someone digging a hole and other people walking around inside the enclosure. I assume that eggs were found and were being buried. I did not see a tortoise.
N and I caught a por puesto back to Porlamar and he left me near the bus stop to Los Robles. When I got back to the plaza with the big, tacky, iridescently painted clamshell I tried to remember how to get back MS's. I walked for a bit, realizing I had no idea which way to go.
It was dark and I decided it was probably not a good idea to keep wandering. So I sheepishly called MS, walked back to the plaza, and he picked me up. I made sure to pay attention on the way but I'm still not sure I could get to MS's place or back again.
When we arrived back at MS's house, he made us very nice coffee. He said it is normal percolated coffee with whole milk, but it had an extra flavour, a bit nutty or spicy. Delicious. I presume it must be the flavour of powdered milk, which is a bit frothy from the blender. I had a little pack of milk biscuits and one of salted crackers. And that, along with the morning's bread and the afternoon's beer, was all I ate that day. I love this not being hungry thing. I've lost weight, even despite all the cheese I ate with S. I hope I can keep the weight off in NY with its pizza and Mexican food. Maybe if I move to Brisbane, where it is hot and humid most of the year, I'll be thinner.
MS asked me if I wanted to go out for drinks with him and I said yes. I thought that something might happen between us and before we went out I practiced saying no, using my swollen eye and red blotches as an excuse. I do look terrible: my left eyelid is huge, making my face uneven, strange and red. I felt itchy and ugly. Nevertheless, I did not say no.
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