Hugo Chavez!
Sara showing off her master blowpipe skills at the Orang Asli village in Taman Negara.
Sara and the rafflesia flower (Cameron Highlands), the largest flower in the world.
View of the Boh Tea Estate in the Cameron Highlands.
Since we've been gone we've been walking around the Cameron Highlands, shown above, visiting the mossy forest, the rafflesia flower, and fruit, veggie, flower and tea farms. That was all beautiful at spring time temperatures, as shown above. Really, it deserves more explanation, but right now we're more psyched about HUGO CHAVEZ!
So after Cameron Highlands, we're off to KL for Sara's conference. We stayed in a hotel that has .... amenities that we are not used to, for example hot water, carpet, towels, a thermostat.... it was heavenly. It also had a red carpet leading from the door to the elevator, and when we enquired who it was for Sara was told the President of Venezuela (to which she said "HUGO CHAVEZ?" and the doorman said yes, and so on). Two days later we were heading to the elevator after breakfast and the security people told us we couldn't go up, HUGO CHAVEZ was leaving for the day! So we wait patiently for the man himself, and when he shows up a minute later he stops to chat with one of the hotel staff, and a few other people, so we stopped and looked on. I mean HUGO CHAVEZ! We're reading Hegemony or Survival by Noam Chomsky, which is depressing bed time reading, but details the US's dislike of Venezuela's leader.
Anyhow, the press was there taking pictures, and we were off to the side, just observing, when he starts to make his exit down the red carpet. As he's walking, he looks over to the two stragglers who clearly don't belong in this hotel, and yells to us "Where are you from?". When we say Canada he comes over (EEK! HUGO CHAVEZ is coming to talk to us!) and asks us about our travels, our education (Chemical Engineering was a real winner!), the Blue Jays, and emparts some philisophocal wisdom on how the world would be better off with more women rulers. Our heart to heart talk lasted about 5 minutes, and after we shook hands we had a permasmile for the next half hour. Sara was late to the conference that day, but it was a worthwhile diversion. HUGO CHAVEZ said she was CLEVER! teehee....
Sara and the rafflesia flower (Cameron Highlands), the largest flower in the world.
View of the Boh Tea Estate in the Cameron Highlands.
Since we've been gone we've been walking around the Cameron Highlands, shown above, visiting the mossy forest, the rafflesia flower, and fruit, veggie, flower and tea farms. That was all beautiful at spring time temperatures, as shown above. Really, it deserves more explanation, but right now we're more psyched about HUGO CHAVEZ!
So after Cameron Highlands, we're off to KL for Sara's conference. We stayed in a hotel that has .... amenities that we are not used to, for example hot water, carpet, towels, a thermostat.... it was heavenly. It also had a red carpet leading from the door to the elevator, and when we enquired who it was for Sara was told the President of Venezuela (to which she said "HUGO CHAVEZ?" and the doorman said yes, and so on). Two days later we were heading to the elevator after breakfast and the security people told us we couldn't go up, HUGO CHAVEZ was leaving for the day! So we wait patiently for the man himself, and when he shows up a minute later he stops to chat with one of the hotel staff, and a few other people, so we stopped and looked on. I mean HUGO CHAVEZ! We're reading Hegemony or Survival by Noam Chomsky, which is depressing bed time reading, but details the US's dislike of Venezuela's leader.
Anyhow, the press was there taking pictures, and we were off to the side, just observing, when he starts to make his exit down the red carpet. As he's walking, he looks over to the two stragglers who clearly don't belong in this hotel, and yells to us "Where are you from?". When we say Canada he comes over (EEK! HUGO CHAVEZ is coming to talk to us!) and asks us about our travels, our education (Chemical Engineering was a real winner!), the Blue Jays, and emparts some philisophocal wisdom on how the world would be better off with more women rulers. Our heart to heart talk lasted about 5 minutes, and after we shook hands we had a permasmile for the next half hour. Sara was late to the conference that day, but it was a worthwhile diversion. HUGO CHAVEZ said she was CLEVER! teehee....
posted by Sara and Dave at 8/30/2006 12:59:00 a.m.
5 Comments:
GET OUT!
That's NUTS!!! Now you'll have a pretty neat place to crash when visiting Venezuela...you know, since you and Hu are buds now.
That's awesome!
Well now, that's about the coolest thing I've ever heard. Did you get a picture?
So now I'm two degrees of Kevin Bacon away from Chavez. You two, however, are now two degrees away from every major leader in the world. Kick ass!
nat vd
THAT IS AWESOME!!!!!
SARA YOU ARE SO CLEVER I AM SO PROUD OF YOU!
:D i have a vicarious permasmile too now
WOW
ยต
Wow - that's incredible! Did you know now that it might be tough to get in and out of the US, now that you and Chavez are pals... ;) That's fantastic guys! What a story!
No, we unfortunately didn't bring our camera to breakfast that morning, and we don't know if he would have waited for us to go back to the room, so no, we didn't get a picture. =(
But he thought Sara was clever =)
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