And Then There Was One...

In a Eurocentric travel industry, South America often gets short shrift. It’s quite a distance for most Northern Hemisphere visitors, airfares are relatively high, and the continent’s stereotyped reputation for crime and disorder is a deterrent for some—even though, at present, Venezuela is the only real basket case in that regard.

On arrival at Santiago's international airport, Australians may feel singled out.

That said, some countries have also made it harder for themselves because of arbitrary visa rules, but there are fewer holdouts now. Argentina has eliminated the onerous “reciprocity fee” instituted by its previous government and Chile’s similar measure now applies only to Australians—as Aussie arrivals to Santiago’s international airport quickly learn (Chile does not inflict this fee at other airports and land borders, however).

Visiting the Cataratas do Iguaçu (the Brazilian side) has become less expensive for several nationalities.

The big news, though, is the breakthrough in Brazil. Every time I’ve visited the country—only infrequently—entering has been a hassle. That’s because Brazil has taken the “reciprocity” issue a step farther, requiring an advance visa from US citizens even for a day trip from the Argentine side of Iguazú Falls. The last time I did it, the Brazilian consulate in Buenos Aires told me to get the visa in Puerto Iguazú, where that consulate required me to change my US cash into Argentine pesos (in a local exchange house, at a disadvantageous rate).

The worst is over, though. Last month, the country announced that citizens of Australia, Canada, Japan and the United States may now apply for their visas online, at a cost of US$40, rather than in person or by mail at a cost of US$160. The idea, apparently, is to encourage tourism and, if so, it’s a good start—but even better would be eliminating visas entirely. That said, the United States will probably continue to require Brazilians to pay that same US$160 fee simply for a privilege of applying for a visa, with no guarantee (and no refund if no visa is granted). Still, it’s an encouraging measure on Brazil’s part (Brazil, by the way, will return your fee if it refuses you a visa).

Bolivia is now the outlier. Following the example of Argentina’s previous government, it instituted a visa requirement that requires any US citizen to pay US$160 at any Bolivian consulate (that’s even more restrictive than Venezuela, despite that country’s notoriously contentious relations with the US). Again, in fairness, Bolivians must go through the same process to enter the United States, with no guarantee that the request will be successful.

¿Adios Hugo?

Normally, in this blog, I don’t venture outside the Southern Cone countries, but the week’s biggest event has taken place in the only South American country I have never visited – Venezuela, where the charismatic president Hugo Chávez died on Tuesday. Some Venezuelans might disagree that I have never set foot in the country, because I have visited parts of neighboring Guyana over which Venezuela has an irredentist claim, but I can assert that I’ve never had a Venezuelan stamp in my passport.

Chávez, of course, was a controversial and polemical figure. Like Chile’s Augusto Pinochet, he was a military golpista (coupmonger) although, unlike Pinochet, his attempt to overthrow Venezuela’s constitutional government failed. When he finally did ascend to the presidency, through legitimate elections, he went about concentrating power through patronage politics, largely financed by oil revenues. Despite his ability to communicate with his country’s dispossessed, Chávez did them a great disservice – with his hyper-personalized politics and short attention span toward policy, he undermined the country’s institutions. Though he was not personally murderous (unlike Pinochet), his de facto neglect helped make Venezuela one of the world’s most violent countries – the capital of Caracas averages two homicides per hour.

In a recent edition of The New Yorker, journalist Jon Lee Anderson (biographer of Che Guevara) described Chávez as the “Slumlord of Caracas” in an article that would discourage just about anyone else thinking of visiting the city. On Tuesday, Anderson published an incisive post-mortem follow-up that characterized the former colonel as one of the world’s “most flamboyantly provocative leaders.” Anderson’s nuanced assessment of Chávez avoids demonizing him, but does point out his contradictions and weaknesses; the late Christopher Hitchens was not so generous in writing about his own personal encounter with the Venezuelan caudillo.

Chávez is gone, but will Chavismo survive? Oddly, the Caracas caretaker government prohibited mourners from snapping photographs of the autocrat in his open casket but, according to his designated successor Nicolás Maduro (pending elections), Venezuela will mummify the corpse for public display in a monument worthy of Lenin or Mao. This would make a great supplementary chapter for Heather Pringle’s remarkable study The Mummy Congress, but the Venezuelans could look for precedents closer to home – the Chinchorro mummies of Chile, for instance, or Evita Perón in Recoleta (though Evita’s cadaver is not on public view, the crypt is).

None of Chávez’s strongest ideological allies, most notably Rafael Correa of Ecuador, Evo Morales of Bolivia, and Cristina Fernández of Argentina, has the charisma to assume his role on the global or even the regional stage. More than that, none of them has the petro-dollars that Chávez used to buy his way onto the scene (Ecuador is an oil exporter, and OPEC member, but a relatively small one). President Fernández, for her part, believes just as strongly in patronage politics but has even fewer options – not only has she had to undertake emergency measures to keep dollars from fleeing the country, but she was also in hock to Hugo – as the conspicuous presence of his "Bolivarian" PDVSA, in the Buenos Aires barrio of Retiro, would indicate. Not so long ago, Argentina was self-sufficient in oil but, after decades of mismanagement, it now has to import.