{"id":426332,"date":"2024-12-03T11:08:49","date_gmt":"2024-12-03T11:08:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=426332"},"modified":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"-0001-11-29T14:00:00","slug":"Venezuela-s-Pearl-of-the-Caribbean-loses-its-luster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/Venezuela-s-Pearl-of-the-Caribbean-loses-its-luster\/","title":{"rendered":"Venezuela’s ‘Pearl of the Caribbean’ loses its luster"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the five stars that used to adorn the facade of the Margarita hotel on the Venezuelan paradise island of the same name has fallen off.<\/p>\n

Not that there are any guests to notice.<\/p>\n

The hotel is abandoned, its peeling facade a symbol of the decline of an island once dubbed the “Pearl of the Caribbean” that has been robbed of its shine by a severe economic crisis.<\/p>\n

A short drive away by car, a\u00a0herd of cows grazes in front of another vacant former five-star hostelry, Lagunamar.<\/p>\n

It looks as if an earthquake ripped through here, tearing the roof off a pool-side pavilion, tossing lamps and toilets around the garden and leaving mounds of rubble.<\/p>\n

The damage is, in fact, the work of vandals, who steal scrap metal to sell at a profit or to build shacks.<\/p>\n

Margarita, a major source of pearls in the 15th and 16th centuries, used to be a playground for American tourists, drawn to its palm-fringed white-sand beaches and turquoise waters.<\/p>\n

But Venezuela’s economic collapse, high crime rates and growing international isolation in the wake of bitterly disputed elections have caught up with the island of 500,000 people.<\/p>\n

The signs of decline are everywhere.<\/p>\n

Several clothes and souvenir shops along the main shopping drag, Santiago Marino, stand empty.<\/p>\n

And power outages are frequent. An explosion last month at a gas facility in the nearby state of Monagas led to blackouts of up to 20 hours at a time.<\/p>\n

“This is not the Margarita of the past,” Jose Padobani, a 26-year-old barman, told AFP. \u00a0<\/p>\n

– ‘All my friends have left’ –<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n

An 80-percent drop in GDP over a decade of increasingly repressive rule by strongman President Nicolas Maduro between 2013 and 2023 pushed more than seven million Venezuelans — almost a quarter of the population — to seek a better life elsewhere.<\/p>\n

Many had hoped to return after July 2024 elections, in which polls showed an easy win for the opposition.<\/p>\n

But those hopes were shattered when Maduro claimed victory — despite results published by the opposition showing their man, Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia, winning by a landslide.<\/p>\n

“All my friends have left, but I don’t want to leave,” says Juan Caiman, a 44-year-old furniture maker, whose Colombian father immigrated to Venezuela in the 1980s to escape the violence unleashed by drug kingpin Pablo Escobar.<\/p>\n

Caiman, who makes luxury furniture in an workshop near the abandoned Margarita hotel, is one of a group of business people determined to tough it out on the island.<\/p>\n

Fadwa Hage, 55, owner of an adjacent sports shop on Santiago Marino, said those who had stayed behind did so to protect their businesses from looting.<\/p>\n

But she also sees tentative signs of a recovery.<\/p>\n

“This year, just on this one block, three new businesses have already opened,” she said.<\/p>\n

“We have beaches, mountains and lots of activities in which to invest. This island is unique!”<\/p>\n

– Signs in Russian, Turkish, Chinese –\u00a0<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n

In the near absence of Western tourists, the government has launched campaigns to attract visitors from Venezuela ally Russia, Cuba and Poland.<\/p>\n

Some 40,000 Russians have visited Margarita since 2023, according to official figures, lured by all-inclusive packages, including limitless alcohol, in hotels with generators that keep the lights and air-conditioning on.<\/p>\n

Signs posted around the island welcome visitors in Russian, Turkish, Polish and Chinese, and kite-surfing lessons are also offered in those languages.<\/p>\n

But many islanders complain they are not benefitting from the new revenue streams.<\/p>\n

“We depend on Venezuelan tourists because Russian tourists don’t spend a thing,” Demetria, a masseuse who has been offering treatments on the beach for 16 years, told AFP.<\/p>\n

Peter, a 44-year-old Russian IT specialist who was on his first visit to Venezuela this year, said he was surprised to find hotels, shops and restaurants abandoned.<\/p>\n

“It’s as if they were built for ten times more tourists,” he said.<\/p>\n

– ‘The art of coping’ –<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n

In the low-income neighborhood of Las Maritas, Crismar Lopez uses two candles and her cellphone flashlight to illuminate the kitchen where she makes hot dogs to sell on the street for $1.50 a pair.<\/p>\n

The recent power cuts put Lopez and her husband out of business for two weeks because they could not refrigerate food.<\/p>\n

But the 47-year-old mother of three says she is used to muddling through.<\/p>\n

“Venezuelans are masters in the art of coping,” she said.<\/p>\n

mbj-pgf\/cb\/st<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

A street food vendor works in the Las Maritas neighborhood of Margarita<\/p>\n

-Juan BARRETO
<\/figcaption><\/figure>

<\/p>\n

Hotels lay abandoned and vandalized in Margarita<\/p>\n

-Juan BARRETO
<\/figcaption><\/figure>

<\/p>\n

Islanders are making efforts to appeal to tourists from other places — such as with this kitesurfing sign, written in Russian<\/p>\n

-Juan BARRETO
<\/figcaption><\/figure>

<\/p>\n

A man fishes at Juan Griego bay in Margarita Island, a Caribbean paradise in decline after a years-long economic and political crisis<\/p>\n

-Juan BARRETO
<\/figcaption><\/figure>

<\/p>\n

Some islanders say there are tentative signs of recovery, with scattered new businesses opening<\/p>\n

-Juan BARRETO
<\/figcaption><\/figure>

<\/p>\n

Beach vendors in Margarita say they struggle without the tourists<\/p>\n

-Juan BARRETO
<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the five stars that used to adorn the facade of the Margarita hotel…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23812],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-426332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-national"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=426332"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426332\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=426332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=426332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=426332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}