Venezuela and Yaracuy are voting
Second update: I voted!!!!!

...and believe me, it was not easy....

I did arrive around 10:30 AM and I made it back home at 3 PM. I endured blistering sun (I had a life saving large straw hat) and once inside the school (where I spent the last hour and a half of waiting time) I had to hug agaisnt the walls to avoid a tropical downpour (the hat did help some again).

All of this for just pushing two buttons!!!!! I have been voting in that school for 5 years now and I have never had a line that lasted more than half an hour! I can state it without any doubt: The Electoral Board has created a voting system which was designed to discourage people from voting, not to mention for cheating, for the pro Chavez side at least.

It is ludicruous to have to wait for so long. And I cannot even blame the digitization of the finger prints which actually was fast. No, the blocking point were the damn machines used when we could have written a single cross on a paper ballot. As I was arriving to the door of the voting room, we were told that the voting was suspended for 15 minutes as the machines "needed to recharge their batteries". What?!?!?! The machines are not designed to work for 12 hours straight!? Who paid for those machines? Who selected them? Who should pay for that fraud? Yep, that is right, Jorge Rodriguez who was the one pushing that system down everyone's throat, not to mention the digitization machines.

But the spirit in the long line was wonderful. People took everything and it became a big party of sorts. Some people even bought frozen ice candy and distributed it to all!!!! I cannot say that I saw any obvious chavista. Everyone I talked to was a SI!!!! amazing!!!! OK, I am not voting in a popular district (it does have a barrio but it is still middle class mostly), but still, I did not see people silent, or trying to pretend....

Well, I do not know what the result will be in the country (though I got some info that the results so far were going in favor of the SI) but if chavez wins in my voting center, then there is electoral fraud.

And speaking of electoral fraud. Next door city, La Independencia, in chavista hands, apparently many people that punch the SI get a NO ballot. I know that because the local TV was visiting our center and one of the journalist told us that they were making a report on that question. Interestignly nobody has come to complain that their NO button gave a SI ballot... Coincidence? Naahhhh....

OK, now lunch and some TV. I will be back in a couple of hours. But I can advance one thing, as I am listening to TV, lines are huge everywhere still, the poor organization if for all to see, and people are holding, people are holding...