![]() Viveza criolla (which could be roughly translated as “creole trickery”) has been studied for decades and although it’s possible to see some parallels in all cultures of the world, it predominates in Latin America with some variations by country (in Brazil, for example, it’s called jeitinho, in Peru, criollada, and so on). Practitioners often trick the innocent, use powerful friends for profit, and take advantage of moments of crisis to obtain economic benefits. Īs Venezuelans, we’ve all been victims or perpetrators of this phenomenon: a cultural regional pattern of behavior, where you take advantage of a situation while disregarding law and honesty. So there we were, cheated, tired, and mocked. ![]() We had no choice but to buy from a reseller for a price that made us cry, and it even turned out to be a scam - the fuel had been mixed with water and it didn’t take long for the car to fail. In dollars, in cash.Įveryone got out to (unsuccessfully) protest, yet once the four vans were served, the officer closed the station until the next day because the fuel had supposedly run out. I was with a family member in one of these aforementioned lines, after five hours under Maracaibo’s intense sun, when just before our turn came, four white vans arrived at the gas station and, in front of all of us citizens, went first after some guy paid the officer in charge. For months, government officials in charge of gas stations had been fighting citizens who wait long hours or even days in lines. While the first weeks of quarantine in 2020 passed by, Zulia State, in western Venezuela, had already been going through an internal war for fuel.
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