one year ago I began studying Spanish for one main reason and that was to enable me to one day visit Venezuela and see for myself what life is like here well I've just flown into the country into Caracas an hour ago I'm totally on my own but I'm ready to explore I've already found a mosaic what comes to mind when you hear the name Venezuela probably not very positive images and that is not surprising Venezuela has an image problem brought on by a seemingly endless crisis that has seen its economy contract at an astronomical rate
but it wasn't always like that in Venezuela in the past it had a thriving economy built on oil and its capital Caracas was the most modern and wealthy in Latin America and so I traveled all the way from Peru over Andes mountains along Amazon River to finally reach a country I'd always dreamed of visiting and to see how things were now was Venezuela really as bad as its image and more importantly would it ever be able to relive its past glories now I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little bit nervous we all
know Venezuela's reputation for criminality and unlike every other YouTuber that has been here I'm totally on my own I've got no contacts I've got no contacts no friends no knowledge so um let's see it's bloody noisy let's see if I can survive the streets of Caracas on my own probably not too Fair IES we stumbled upon the Gordon Ramsay of Caracas Senora is anyone else seeing this [Applause] Venezuelan there we go we're into it now we're already into it we're into the string of things we've met our first [Music] it's not as dangerous as they
say Sushi see they're a friendly bunch here in Venezuela [Music] wow Amigo okay okay wow the sad thing is Venezuela used to be one of the richest countries in the world that's hard to believe right Concord used to fly from Paris direct to Caracas but that was a long time ago and things have gone downhill and so the people now of the country have been reduced to selling some belongings here on the streets of Caracas wow what a place it is but I feel safe the people are friendly for God's sakes I hope [Music] he's
singing me a slow romantic song I want something with energy so I can move so I can share my skills okay I'm paying you not to sing any more enough [Laughter] crikey that was the worst singing I've ever heard [Music] but a policy that is really taking place here in Venezuela there's a soup kitchen here people queuing up and a lot of old people bringing cups and all classic bottles cut in half so eat some food restaurants [Music] so there he goes these people are feeding the poor elements of society here in Caracas and it
looks delicious in fact I might come back later and get your big food difficult times difficult times in Venezuela despite the fact it's sitting on top of billions of barrels of oil Edition s [Music] again Anton says wow [Music] wow so okay Clara so the guy was telling me I believe that it's safe up here in the barrier that we're about to go to so I'm going to show you something there and it's safe because it's not controlled by the police it's controlled by the people of the Barrio [Music] um architos Uno Uno vamos a
man who's caught us on his motorbike he's going to take me to the top of the hill okay Suzuki [Applause] foreign [Music] well we've come to the very very noisy Barrio January 23. named after the day when democracy finally came to Venezuela back in the 50s but we've gone to see the statue of commandante Hugo Chavez let's move away from the music it's a little bit too louder let's move away Chavez was an incredibly charismatic man and he was elected and then re-elected by venezuelas well the poor and the downtrodden who in reality we're sick
of being ignored by Venezuela's corrupt leaders high oil prices help Chavez run social programs into Barrios he nationalized the oil industry to help do this and for a long while things went very well until they didn't and here we've crossed the street and look what's here we've got the church of Saint Hugo Chavez look at it dios con Nosotros God is with us and who is against us and this picture of Jesus along with Hugo Chavez as you can see here where that kind of represents how some of the people are locked not but some
of the people in Venezuela equate Hugo Chavez kind of as a kind of jesus-like figure helping the poor of Venezuela it's a bit more complicated than that but anyway here we are Santo Ugo Chavez Del 23 Barrio 23. do that in English [Music] [Music] well we've left the noisy part of the Barrio because I saw just down the road at some well pretty awesome street art check these places out look at this the sort of the sort of street art you see in all socialist countries here's one that says eterno Eternal commandante Venezuela Hugo Chavez
look at it crikey and then on this side of this building here we've got a picture of Che Guevara check it out and then over here we've got one more of Presidente Chavez Chavez Bieber check this one out look at it Chavez Viva wow what an interesting place this is and um so far I'm liking Venezuela I've only been here about two hours but I like it let's have a little walk through the area where people live see what it's like down here where did Venezuelans actually live I'll tell you what they do like they
do like a potted plant on their balcony let's see what it's like through here a little chilled piece of Caracas IO piece of crackers and look people look after their Gardens maybe grow a few veg few coconuts people hanging their washing out it's like italystas gracias gracias and Caracas is it always so we've come into a little Community Center here in the barrier here in the Barrio 23 and I suppose this is where they run education programs teach people things organize security before we were told that in this part the people run the security of
the Barrios and here you can see so I'm writing I don't know what's going on and probably that's why they were Keen to like ask me what I was doing because they're in charge of the situation here they're running it making sure everything's safe and Gente so yeah so he's confirming that here the people control the barrier so that it's safe oh Manchester United Manchester United [Music] ah there we go we had a little tour of the little commune of um 23 January 23 right let's get out of here let's get out of here and
head to other areas probably a lot more dodgy that was fun well we're walking down out of the Barrio and the truth is as I said before I don't know anyone I've got no knowledge about this bloody place I've got no contacts I'm on my own there's no one with me which means I don't know where I'm walking and if where I'm walking is going to be a really dodgy area I might just stumble into the worst part of Venezuela or Caracas anyway I feel okay feels good let's walk down head to another part of
town mucho estas you do see all of the crackers lots of American cars in different states a little bit in a sense a bit like Cuba because in the past I mean there was a lot of American workers here America brought a lot of money here into the infrastructure because of the oil industry Venezuela has the most the most proven reserves of oil in the entire world more than Saudi Arabia more than Russia unfortunately it has no bloody idea how to manage that oil industry which is why instead of looking like Moscow probably Riyadh Caracas
looks a bit run down whoa another American Truck vamos hola someone says [Music] yeah you see you trans sanctioned Venezuela impossible Coca-Cola look have you got Samba in your country hey yo who's this behind me okay guys on the motorbike aqui Venezuela in Venezuela same Coca-Cola problemos 500 meal wow okay battle usted Battle Is Dead boy races in Venezuela here in Venezuela you have two currencies you have the local currency bolivanos named after Simon Bolivar and you have dollars a lot of people use dollars and so sometimes you pay in dollars but if they don't
have change they give you change in their money I can't show I've only got two bloody hands but anyway that's what happens you have to accept the old bolivanos which you don't really want you'd rather have dollars in your pocket anyway let's continue who section [Applause] you don't see that on Hove High Street [Music] [Applause] all right claro oh yeah I'll go wow I've discovered a little shop under a Motorway flyover let's have a look at it this is how people are surviving wow look at it this is how people make money here in Venezuela
they just sell things wherever they can find basically and here under the flyover they set up a shop selling children's toys magazines functions we're off so he finds them from different people and stuff it's a little bit similar to the one that we found in Bogota [Music] biblicals wow maybe I should buy this for the melandros Para malandros s [Laughter] okay Clara oh no that's your sketch oh you know a cuantos anos wow eight annuals [Music] okay into the Santa oh I see so you've got some awards wow I don't know what he got this
for but um pretty cool hey architect Architects see so this guy's an architect but he has a shot under a bridge situations he's disappeared into the hole the black hole of the bridge wow wow so he's an architect literally living under a bridge that's his house under there see you soon this is foreign [Music] that's the situation in here in Venezuela you can be a highly educated man An Architect no less and still you're forced to live under a bridge and sell pieces of crap that probably no one's ever going to buy sad however we
can't blame all the poverty in Venezuela solely on government is management the US has sanctioned Venezuela's oil industry thus denying the country billions in foreign revenue and my own government the UK is stolen tons of Venezuela's gold which is being held in British Banks and who suffers from such actions that's right the people of Venezuela just like the people of Syria do and the people of Iran well you're disappointed aren't you this is all too safe for you not what you expected of Venezuela if you want danger and preferably some big old titties well I
can't promise titties on the Eastern edge of Caracas is South America's biggest barrier and Venezuela's most dangerous it's called petari let's go and check it out now before we go to patare I want to buy something something that's going to give me protection and there's a shop up here that sells exactly what we need these shops or this shop here sells deities they're a kind of a pseudo Venezuelan religion that people believe bring the owners who have a bison Fortune luck safety which is very important in Venezuela and some of these statues depicts real-life melandros
from the Barrios foreign [Music] in the 1960s he was a cop killer and um yeah so this is one of the most popular statues Ishmael [Music] and he looks just like me we bought our lucky Saint malandro Miguel so I think now we can go to patare and everything will be okay he'll look after me now truth be told I'm not the first YouTuber to visit in all honesty I've seen about three or four others go there before me the difference is however they all had local guides offering both knowledge and protection me however I'm
just jumping on a bus and turning up sake we have a wrapper on the bus [Music] this is we've arrived with Miguel let's um let's hope everything goes okay well myself and Miguel have made it to the main square of patari the old Square named after Antonio Mr Beast no soy no Mr Beast it does Mr Beast if only no otra otra okay pleased to meet you pleased to meet you wow anyway we're here on the main square of pitardi the old Historical Center named after Antonio sucre Grand Marshal of ayakucho I accoutrement this in
Peru where there was a battle in the past for the independence of South America and there's a malandro's watching it anyway petara used to be a town it was it was founded by Farmers from the Canary Islands in fact it's a similar climate here to the Canary Islands and so everyone is staring at me I've never been so nervous anyway yeah that's it but it's not a town anymore it got so big that it kind of got encapsulated into Caracas and here we are being stared at by the entire town of patara do you speak
English no why not you like Mr beasts okay YouTuber and Venezuela in Venezuela Mr Beast you've got fans here in Caracas okay [Applause] well this part of Qatari is nothing like I expected it's just like an old Colonial little Spanish Town and um yeah it's kind of better than the center of the city even this is the part obviously that was first founded by the people from um the Canary Islands as I said before and um yeah wow I'm being followed by school kids everywhere I go I'm going up on a register if I'm not
careful hola como estas it was wow she's saying walk around and don't be afraid just do what you want it's very safe here let's see okay gracias well the guy there has told me that the part of bitari that I'm looking for the dodgy part is kind of up here and somewhere else so um let's go have a little look okay [Music] wow see how friendly they are here said welcome to Venezuela anyway where's that dodgy part yo You're Expecting it is wow we've met a senorita from here let's go and check out this statue
maybe it's a statue of melandro look at it well it's not a malandro it is Jesus it's the Jesus of Pizzaria look at it Plaza Sagrado the Heart of Jesus of potato look at him that's Jesus folks Jesus will protect me and so will Miguel Kontos right let's find a motor taxi hola Moto taxi quiero senor your boys [Music] oh go ahead we're going with a female motorcycle driver how is she gonna protect me Amiga [Music] okay right then we're on board we're going up high into the dodgy Barrio let's check it out there thank
you we've stopped off halfway up the hill to the top of potato let me take my house off and you can just see these basically homemade houses I mean every home is homemade but still look at these old brick houses just thrown up by people people who have moved from all over Venezuela to Qatari this kind of illegally built barrier and there's some petarian people up there hello hello I didn't see them at first wow look at this and they run illegal electricity lines into their houses they don't pay bills wow look at it and
down there we've got a big old football pitch and a swimming pool who expected that into the Santa so we've stopped off in one of the streets high up in the barrier patada just so we can show you here how the houses are built look at them house on top of house just heard the word gringo hola como estas Okay so tan Largo wow okay anyway they have nice nails here in potato look how the houses are just built one on top of the other on top of the other on top of the other I
mean let's just finish this let's hope that there's um no earthquake here otherwise they're all coming down are we off again vamos where are we off to I think I'm gonna be kidnapped oh interested wow wow this is how they live up in Qatar we found the perfect person to show us battali by chance Rico oh my God wow [Music] I'm so lucky that I found this um motorcycle driver just show me here look we're up in the barrier look at all the houses just on top of each other well all the way down there
the whole side of the mountain the whole side of announced it's difficult to see because it's um it's very overcast and drizzly and gray but the whole just thousands and thousands and thousands of houses everywhere every square inch wow the biggest barrio in all of Latin America English I keep a little bit yes okay that's perfect wow so pleased to meet you so pleased to meet you I'm having a tour of Qatar I've heard so many things and I wanted to see it for myself all right um you're living here and you'll like it yeah
I like it so far yeah people are friendly yeah I was real we're finally with with upsiders right okay yeah I think other people from other parts of Caracas believe that everybody here is a malandro or something like this yes but of course here is just normal families trying to survive no they're making a life they're wrong let's buy a beer in the commercial center of pitale Venezuela okay Venezuela it's the safest place in Venezuela here wow it smells strongest milk ah wow okay and Tom says so that's really interesting that these people saying that
they feel extremely safe here they can walk in the night time the shop stays open in the night time no problems that it's just a reputation that came from the past when it really was dodgy but now the economy is a little bit improved people have a bit more money and stuff and so now it's in Venezuela it's like some gang signs I'm trying to pay for my beers and my drinks and they're saying it's on the house no no in Venezuela Carpenter [Laughter] adios adios wow you see what nice people what nice people they
have here in batare not the reputation that it has refused buy me drinks pour me drinks a little bit drunk refused to take my money but decent people Caracas we made it safely sin milandros s that was pizzare We Made It it's not half as dangerous the roads are it's not half as dangerous not even close to what people say I didn't even need Miguel I do like him anyway let's get out of here if you look at a map of Venezuela you'll notice that about 20 kilometers from the capital Caracas is the sea the
Caribbean Sea no less so let's jump on some transport and go and check out the beach see what it's like down there La Playa La Playa La Playa pontes gasoline cuantos Venezuela foreign okay foreign [Music] we've arrived in this Beachside town here in Venezuela let's go and check it out man my ass oh what a colorful little place where's the beach I'm not really dressed for the beach look at the same of me got me tracky pants on don't know if I'll be swimming anyway let's look oh Myanmar I wrote this quest for foreign [Music]
okay okay anyway where's the beach let's go and check out the beach the Caribbean Beach here in Caracas okay it's the Caribbean's worst Beach officially look at the state of it flipping egg why did he drop me off at this beach it's awful check it out lucky look at this this is the dirtiest Beach on the Caribbean look at it let's go down let's go down this is not what you think of when you think of Caribbean Beach check it out it's absolutely bloody filthy someone's built themselves a little Hut next to the beach if
it was a decent Beach it'd be ideal but it's not anyone home I own a person in a casa I own a personal key wow nobody home well after visiting that beach I'm not sure if I want to eat any fish from the ocean let's give it a try though [Music] where's our friend where's our lady friend [Music] look at this wonderful service you get here the best service in Venezuela where's Beach best service [Music] they brought me a drink I didn't ask it's like a sugary Brown water foreign [Music] have a look at your
stomach first see if there's any plastic in there [Music] no plastic so we don't know what fish it is exactly but I do know that it's absolutely full of bonus it's going to take me an age to get through this if I don't choke while I'm eating [Music] hola mi Amores wow look at these lovely Venezuelan people blowing me kisses husband doesn't look happy husband doesn't look happy husband was giving me the Death Star anyway let's walk along here a little bit see we can't find a bit of a better Beach because that beach was
terrible what's interesting about this little coastal town is you can see that in the past it was so much better just like all of Venezuela principally Caracas is the same look you can see before there were like houses here maybe that was a restaurant or a hotel and now he's just completely destroyed there was obviously a Heyday in Venezuela and unfortunately for the people that Heyday has long passed maybe he'll come back one day I don't know but right at the moment he's pretty much at the bottom of its um a bits none hey danus
I don't know anyway yeah lots of these kind of things around in Venezuela yes I'd like to make a long distance for long distance phone call please never mind wow they just came up to me walked out of their way came up to me and said be really careful with your camera here because you're on a very dangerous Street really Feels Alright to me but we will always heed the advice of a knowledgeable local and then just carry on doing whatever we're doing anyway let's walk on so after what that family just said now would
be a good time to discuss dangers and how I feel being in Venezuela before I came I was absolutely bricking myself I tell you a story or I'll let you into a little secret I almost didn't come when Ben bottled out I was considering bottling out myself but um I've come and I've got to be totally honest with you I feel as safe here as I felt safe in any other country that I've been to this feels no worse look the melandros are asleep you guys are asleep this feels no worse to me than um
any other country I've been to that's the truth I feel the safer as I do back in England so um yeah I don't know maybe it is dangerous I'm just very naive or maybe it's not anyway carry on those are my opinions on the dangers here in Venezuela Viva Venezuela see lots of cop is about if the old Bill are about it's okay I think behind this wall wow I think behind this wall is another Beach let's go and see what it's like oh listen here is the player no no okay gracias oh here we
go this looks a bit more chill guys peep in the actual sea wow we're literally 150 meters away from the other pollution field beach but this one looks like it's a little bit better let's go and check it out well this is a little bit more like it this is different from the other Beach check it out people having barbecues people in the sea this reminds me of that town we went to in um Sinaloa Mazatlan check it out normal families clean Beach pretty much oh can I find some boobies for a thumbnail anyway this
is it look at it the best beach in Caracas possibly with a lovely view of a factory behind it check it out oh and here comes some tourists ah okay this is your job wow medical see Medical Services okay uh so this is basically the medical services that they have here for people on the beach if there's an emergency or someone's drowning he's basically the David Hasselhoff of Venezuela this guy doesn't look like him but still he is and this is it wow the problems okay this is the Tiburon office if you have a problem
on this filthy Beach you can come here they'll save you pull some plastic out of your mouth whatever [Music] wow this is so indicative of so many well no not socialist countries many countries in fact I suppose that just they built all this infrastructure when he had a Heyday and for Venezuela that was in the 50s and the 60s when oil prices were Sky High and I suppose they built all this infrastructure and then the crisis came and then everything just left I never understood that about countries whether that being Kyrgyzstan or whether it be
here in Venezuela why they let the infrastructure just just why they let the infrastructure just fall apart because it's harder to build it than to maintain it surely but what whoa there's a guy having a piss in a bush put your knob away put your knob away no problem same problems see everyone needs to piss every now and then okay wow I never expected to see a Venezuelan knob not today when I was planning my trip to Venezuela I was told that my debit card probably wouldn't work here and so I got a load of
USD out the bank in small denominations tens five ones to spend here but I have been using my debit card it's worked fine which means I'm left with a load of cash probably about 400 left and there's one person here in Caracas that I'd like to give it to senor senor oh no well that's the end of the film I suppose full roll senor missed out on a few great I feel bad now senor well that's it from Caracas I would like to explore more Venezuela but unfortunately my Spanish isn't quite good enough yet to
do that kind of a journey justice so I'm now going to go away for a month or two try to study a little bit more and then come back when um yeah when I'm a little bit more fluent however I do hope that this video has maybe changed some perceptions or preconceptions that you had about this country because it certainly changed some of mine um yeah it's been a mega Journey that started all the way in Cusco in the undies and has finished all the way here in Caracas so um not much more to say
but adios Mis Amigos adios misamorez from Caracas [Music] [Applause]
