VENEZUELA MIGRANTS - A QUESTION OF SURVIVAL

"CHAOS, TOTAL CHAOS - WE HAD TO LEAVE TO SURVIVE"

For years now we´ve received frequent news from the growing financial crises and collapse of the Venezuelan civil society. Inflation is sky high and has reached a level not seen since Germany´s financial collapse in the early 1920´s. People are struggling to find or pay for their daily needs. Transportation and public services works only partly, hospitals and health clinics are lacking supplies and qualified staff and criminal gangs are a constant threat in many towns and cities. 

Reading news feeds and watching people on television arriving at their first Colombian destination, exhausted after walking for days to reach the the Colombian border is one thing. To be there, and to see all the people sleeping in the parks and on side walks, and to hear their stories is definitely something else. 

THE MEDELLIN TRANSFORMATION

A multi-level success story to learn from

Sometimes I feel almost ashamed and quite ignorant, coming to a new country, or a new city, just to discover that my previous knowledge has been totally inadequate. Arriving in Medellin, Colombia, this was definitely the case. I knew from my travel preparations and a bit of research that the city was pretty safe and the drug-war was something of the past. Little did I know however, that Medellin had been named the world's most innovative city in a competition organised by the non-profit “Urban Land Institute”. 

The Institute compiled a list of 200 cities based on eight criteria ranging from culture and livability to education and infrastructure and said Medellin, once a stronghold for Pablo Escobar and the drug cartels, had seen one of the most remarkable urban transitions in modern history. Exploring the city today it`s hard to imagine this once was the worlds most dangerous city, where 6000 people were murdered annually from 1990 to 1993.