It’s Chavecito time, of course!
President Hugo Chavez is taking Venezuela back in time — by 30 minutes, to be exact.
His government’s plan to turn back clocks by a half-hour has some Venezuelans pleased at the prospect of sleeping in. Others seem vexed that Chavez is making the entire nation change its daily rhythm. Some bloggers suggest Chavez wants to get out of Washington’s “imperialist” time zone, but it will also mean that Venezuela will be a half-hour apart from his Cuban allies.
“It seems crazy to me,” says 38-year-old Maritza Mendoza, who sells orange juice from a sidewalk stand in downtown Caracas. “It’s a whim, just like the change of the currency.”
Actually, it’s not. It makes good financial sense to hike the value of the bolivar so that you no longer have the absurdity of millionaire salaries for what turns out to be rather modest-paying work; likewise, it sure as hell beats the fuss of springing forward and falling back to just have one time all year round. The half-hour compromise would work fine for me. Can we bring it to Canada too, please?
(Yeah, I know–OW isn’t too fussed on all this time-changery. I agree with him that Chavecito really needed to do a better job of explaining things in advance and getting people ready for the changeover. Putting it to a vote might’ve been nice too, but given all the voting they’ve had to do of late, it’s probably overkill. This confusion is certainly not helping to boost his image in the you-know-where; it just leads to more ramping-up of the “crazy dictator” geek chorus. Which is already at an all-time high–a sure sign of another impending coup attempt.)
(BTW, OW: I believe the clocks would have been set BACK half an hour, since we in the Eastern time zone are still on Daylight Saving Time. We “fall back”–a full hour–on November 4.)
(You’re welcome!)
