Life in Venezuela, 1943

In Venezuela we went to the city of Maracay to live where Dad was working. It was not in the capital city Caracas but to the west of it. We lived in the Hotel Jardin, a big rambling place. It looked Arabic with a long porch with arches the length of the building. It was a fun place for children but I don't think Mom was too happy living there. There were some American soldiers and sailors living there training Venezuelan pilots. They also flew missions looking for German submarines in the Caribbean. Gina and I sort of adopted them, or they us. They were very nice to us, helping to teach me to swim, play pool, and let us ride in their Jeeps to the beach every week.
The hotel dining room had no walls, just the roof on some pillars and was all open to the air. Birds could fly right in and get crumbs from the table. The swimming pool had a family of frogs living in it and the water was drained every week. When you swam, you had to push the frog eggs away. I learned to swim there. There were beautiful flowers growing all around. There was a park right across the street from the hotel and every Sunday morning, early, the army band would play.
The folks rented a house in the city, wanting their family to themselves, and here I had my first room all to myself. I had the walls papered with pictures of movie stars. We had no hot water, just cold, and the kitchen was detached from the house. There wasn't an American school in this town so Mom had to teach us at home, using the Calvert System. What a time she must have had with the four of us! I had a book about Greek Mythology and quite enjoyed it. I don't remember much else about it, except it was fun. Mom taught me and Gina, gave Freddy something to do and had to keep Nancy entertained too. We never could put her down on the floor because of the danger of hookworm. She was just one year old. We gave the maid special shoes to wear while working in the house; the shoes were kept there, not taken home, so she could not bring in hookworm. The walls of the house had little black dots on them that turned out to be ticks. The previous owners had had large dogs. I think the folks used kerosene to get rid of them.
In our second house, polliwogs would come out of the tap when you turned it on. We had to use a strainer to catch them. Wasps had made a nest in the house and I would catch them and put them in boxes. I thought I was very brave for doing this. I never got stung, either, I had my twelfth birthday here. My room, all to myself still, had a private bath with shower; cold naturally. I also had a vicuña rug for a bedspread; soft fur, much softer than llama. I thought this the height of luxury. I loved to lie on the fur and read. I still loved to read and did so whenever I could. I discovered Zane Grey about this time, also Nancy Drew; what fine times I had.
Some little creature made a two-toned sound that we could hear while eating. The notes were the last two from a popular song "St. Louis Blues." We would sing "My Mama done...." then the two last notes "told me" would come from whatever was making the sound.
Mom started Gina and me singing with her in trios and what problems she had! We would end up giggling every time but it was the start of a wonderful experience. Our first trio was "Calm as the Night" not an easy song! She would sing with Gina, then my part with me until learned, then put them together with her singing the third part.
We loved the weekly excursions to the beach. All the Americans in the hotel would go too and we really made it a day. It was so lovely on the beach and the water so warm you could swim all you wanted without getting cold. Palm trees came down to the water's edge and the sand was white and fine. Gina and I rode in the Jeep with the soldiers. The road went over jungle-covered hills where the foliage was thick and green with bright flowers and birds. You could see little waterfalls but Dad said you couldn’t put your hand in the water because of all the microbes that were present. For Easter, we colored eggs and took them to the beach to hide. When it came time to eat them we found they were spoiled so we threw them into the ocean. Next week, when we came back, we found that they had washed ashore and some little boys were collecting them. They thought some exotic birds had laid them. We tried to tell them that we had colored them but they didn't believe us.
Dad's work moved its headquarters to Caracas, the capital, so we moved there too. Our house was called Quinta Bina. In Caracas, the houses didn't have numbers and the streets didn't have names! We found that the houses, street intersections and the neighborhoods or areas had the names. It was very difficult to find an address; you had to take a map with you to find a place.
Our school was a delightful, different experience. The American colony had grown tired of teaching their children at home, so they banded together and started a school using the Calvert System from Maryland which had been used individually in the various homes. It was called "Campo Alegre" Happy Field. The classes were very small; there were only about seven in my fifth grade class. My teacher was an Englishwoman who taught us fractions. That is the only math I have every enjoyed or understood in all my school years! She also read to us. One thing she read was "Canterbury Tales". I thought she said the author was "Choza" and believed this for many years until I realized she was saying "Chaucer". She also read many poems, among them "The One Hoss Shay", "The Eagle" and many others. One day, a vegetable cart came by and she left the class to go outside to buy some brussel sprouts. It was all very casual. We had a Spanish class about once a week but I didn't need it after Argentina. It was very elemental Spanish to help the American children learn. We also studied Greek history that year and I loved it. Gina's teacher was also an English woman, Mrs. DeCoopcrank. Her class sang "God Save the King" every morning! At recess we played jump rope, that was the big thing. This was the most fun school I've ever attended.
In Venezuela I learned about trick-or-treating from the American kids and the candy one could collect on Halloween night. I had not been familiar with this before.
There was a splendid view of Mount Avila from our home. Caracas was in a valley surrounded by mountains. This mountain was covered by lush jungle growth and had lots of waterfalls that sparkled in the sun, especially after a rainfall. The clouds sometimes covered it or just passed over the top; truly a beautiful sight.
I received my first roller skates here and taught myself how to skate by rolling down our driveway and stopping by running into the gates. All our drinking water had to be boiled so every night Mom put two big kettles of water on to boil, then they would cool overnight. Even with this precaution Nancy caught dysentery, and was very sick. Freddy had it too but not as severely. The treatment consisted of practically starving her; we almost lost her. She would cry bitterly when she could hear us eating, she was in another room. After a few days, she could eat a small amount of very green bananas and very watered-down milk. I can remember washing out her soiled diapers in a stone washbasin the back yard. They think she caught it by sucking on the washcloth in the bathtub. The doctor who treated her had lost his little son to that same dysentery just a few months before Nancy caught it.