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@themarabinian
Port of Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
Circus of Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
Square scene in Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
Street scene in Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
View of Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
Port of Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
Circus of Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
Square scene in Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
Market scene in Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
Santa Barbara church, Maracaibo- Venezuela
Oil derricks in Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
Port of Maracaibo, Venezuela
Venezuelan vintage postcard
Maracaibo, My Own
A poem by Udón Pérez
Because I sing to you when the first bright shimmer, Rising from dawn, climbs over the mountain, And shines on the old âEmpañado*,â who, like a camel, Lies still as the sun gilds his brow and his hump;
Because I sing to you when the splendid focus Of the sun on high rekindles its fire, And seems to my eyes a fantastic seal That stamps the vast message sent down from heaven:
Because I sing to you when the crimson circle Of the setting star recalls the single eye Of some Polyphemus above the sapphire peaks⊠Because I sing to you calling you mine; Though irony bites, and the snarling pack Of rabid critics mock my devotionâ
Let them bark, let them bite! While the palm groves, With sleepless plumes that border your lagoon, Stand to my sight like a host of Indians Guarding their homelandsâŠ
And your shadows feign nocturnal mangroves; And your waning moon, a Guajiroâs bow, Pierces the flanks of the dark night With golden arrows from your shining stars.
While your islands, that once heard my praises, With maras, aliles, moporos, and toas, And in their native, vital symphonyâ Birds, breezes, branchesâoffer me themes, I shall still call you mine, Maracaibo, my own.
Mineâwhen you summon your men of valour, When your poets make their hexameters ring, And in lips and pens, without cowardly fear, The ember of Isaiah burns in your protest.
Mineâwhen you reach out your hand, prepared To bind the wounded, to calm the afflicted, To wield the plowshare of labourers Or the axe that opens the virgin forest. When you shelter children, the aged, the women, And like an anthill your workshops stir, And in your schools there is sunlight and song.
Mine when you laugh, mine when you prayâ Mine at all hours, Maracaibo, my own!
Cradle of my fathers and of my grandsires, Cradle of my Idaâforever departedâ Cradle of my children, where my life unfolded Like a chalice opening to your sunlit skies!
In you have all my longings borne fruit; You have been my shield, my aegis in battle; You gave to my victories their flowering laurel, And crowned my misfortunes with asphodels.
My dreamlike birds have built their nests Among your rose gardens, and sleep in peace Beneath your cypresses, my beloved dead. Let the pack bark and bite, the rabid hordeâ While I call you, with the voice of my soul, Mineâfull-throatedlyâMaracaibo, my own.
___________________
Freely translated by Morales y Loaiza.
*Probably a local reference to El Empalado.
Nostalgia
This letter was written to my father in 2014, a few months after I had moved abroad. It was a moment of deep nostalgia, when the landscapes I once saw only on television became part of my daily life, and the warmth of my homeland turned into a memory I could touch only through words. Reading it now, I realize it was not merely a letter to my fatherâbut to Maracaibo itself.
I grew up watching foreign TV shows and comic strips that spoke of snow, of four seasons marked by flying ducks and carpets of fallen leaves.
I grew up in Maracaibo, where a normal day means 38°C in the shade, and there are no ducks, no squirrels, no raccoonsâonly parrots, iguanas, and parakeets.
I grew up surrounded by natural wonders: birds of every colour crossing a blazing blue sky, mangoes, guavas, and coconuts everywhere; and yet I was entranced by the image of a distant land, one I had never seen, longing for a snowfall that never cameâand never willâupon my own.
Now I find myself in this foreign place, one I will never truly call mine. And because it lies in the North, it reminds me more of my televised childhood than my native city doesâwith its heat, its people, its unyielding sun.
For the children of my cityâthe one still suffering from the neglect of its own inhabitantsâI donât wish for an education that turns their backs on the beauty around them. The children of my city deserve to know it, admire it, respect it, love it, and protect itânot out of civic duty or moral obligation, but out of the genuine affection of one who feels blessed by nature.
I want our little marabinians to grow without slingshots, sticks, or stones. I want children who love to plant and can appreciate flowers without needing to pluck them. While elsewhere people tend to plants that will die with the coming autumn, what about my paradise of eternal summer? What about that city so dearly loved by the sun?
No one told us about the high price we would pay for fouling that Edenâonly to run away in search of the world we once saw in the comic strips.
âLetter to My Father. September 28, 2014.
The Marabinian Ruins I: The Da Costa GĂłmez Mansion
âIn the shadow of forgotten glories, the DaâŻCostaâŻGĂłmez Mansion standsâits bricks whispering ghosts of grandeur, exile, and memory. May we see it not as a haunted ruin, but as a living archive of Maracaiboâs soul.â
To speak of Maracaibo's old mansions is to invoke a vanished cityâone of elegance, ambition, and architectural grandeur. The Paraiso neighbourhood once brimmed with such places: proud testaments to wealth made in coffee, copper, and commerce. Among them stands a structure that locals now call the "Palacete Loyola," often misnamed, always misunderstood.
For decades, it has been the subject of whispered legends: a cloaked figure rocking an infant in the tower, tunnels burrowed beneath its gardens, cries in the night. Children dared one another to touch its gates. Passersby crossed the street. But beneath the patina of myth lies a deeper truth. This is not simply a haunted house. It is a house that haunts usâbecause it remembers what we have chosen to forget.
The mansion was commissioned in the 1920s by Joshua (JosĂ©) Da Costa GĂłmez, a Sephardic Jewish entrepreneur from Curaçao. An investor in Maracaibo's electric tramway and the famed UniĂłn brewery, Da Costa GĂłmez symbolized a modern, cosmopolitan elite. His house was a statement: a sprawling, ornate structure on Doctor Portillo Avenue, shaped vaguely like a shipâperhaps in homage to his maritime lineage. Belgian architect LĂ©on JĂ©rĂŽme Höet is believed to have been behind its eclectic design, mixing Italianate forms, neo-Renaissance flourishes, and the sinuous lines of Art Nouveau.
Da Costa GĂłmezâs story took a darker turn: accused of political dissent against the dictatorship of Juan Vicente GĂłmez, he went into exile and died in Curaçao in 1938. With his departure, the house fell into a state of legal and symbolic abandonment, stripped of both its owner and its name.
After Da Costa GĂłmezâs exile, the mansion became the official residence of Zulia's governor Vicencio PĂ©rez Soto in 1928. It was later sold to German nationals, becoming the Colegio AlemĂĄn, and then repurposed by the Jesuit-affiliated San Javier Organization. It was during this Jesuit era that the misnomer "Loyola" took root, linking the site to Saint Ignatius of Loyola.
Over time, the house served many purposes: a school for girls (Colegio La PresentaciĂłn), a trade institute, a visual arts school (Julio Ărraga), and even a mechanic's workshop. Each incarnation layered over the previous one, eroding the original identity of the mansion while embedding it further into the city's everyday memory.
The Da Costa GĂłmez Mansion remains one of Maracaiboâs most visually distinctive buildings. Its brickwork, central tower, and grand staircase reflect a romantic vision of European elegance filtered through Caribbean heat. Inside, there once were imported mosaics, carved wooden altars, and a small chapel oriented toward 79th Street. Underneath, a network of tunnels connected the mansion to other estates, their supports resembling mining shaftsâa hidden infrastructure that fed local legend.
But beyond the physical, the house acquired metaphysical dimensions. Stories of a nun falling to her death, of ghostly cries and creaking wood, became part of the folklore. These tales say more about collective memory than actual events; they are proof that the mansion still occupies a vital place in the cityâs imagination.
By the 1970s, the mansion was home to the PĂrela family, who lived there until the late 1980s. Thereafter, it stood in accelerating decay: overgrown gardens, shattered windows, graffiti-covered walls. Though declared of public interest in 2014 and briefly allocated funds for cultural restoration, the project faltered. A plan to turn the mansion into a cultural centre, artist's residence, and urban park never materialized. The building remains, in essence, abandonedâinhabited only by the myths it once inspired.
More than a haunted house, the Da Costa GĂłmez Mansion is a mirror of Maracaibo itself: glorious, neglected, misunderstood. It deserves more than rumours. It deserves documentation, preservation, and reanimation. Whether as a museum, archive, or cultural beacon, the house can become once again what it was always meant to be: a place where history is not just remembered but lived. Let us call it by its name. Let us restore it to our civic story.
I Was Born There, But I Come From Elsewhere
I am not your typical Marabinian. Perhaps I would have made sense in a different timeâwhen Maracaibo was a kind of tropical Athens, full of poets, writers, and thinkers. A city that pioneered electric public lighting, that stood proudly as a port, that dared to imagine itself at the forefront of Latin American modernity before the curse of oil hollowed out its promise.
Today, most proudly call themselves maracuchos, embracing a demonym thatâif weâre honestâbegan as a diminutive. A playful insult turned badge of honor. And while I understand the warmth and vibrancy behind the term, I canât help but feel disconnected from it. The loudness, the bravado, the contradictions. A deep love for the homeland paired with a participation in its slow unraveling.
I returned in 2018. What I found was a city that felt ghosted by its own greatness. Rusted vehicles, pillars of smoke from burning garbage, a yellow haze of dust and heat. The green was gone. The lakeâonce proudâcontinued to be a repository of sewage and spilled oil. It no longer reflected the sky, only our failures.
But I donât despise Maracaibo. I donât mock its people.
I grieve.
I mourn a version of the city that maybe never quite existedâat least not in the way I imagine it. I fell in love with photographs and architecture, with fragments of letters and books. I fell in love with a promise.
I am a Marabinian who believes in elegance, in dignity, in craftsmanship. I find comfort in Art Déco curves and Art Nouveau flourishes. I cherish the lost refinement of proper voseo. I still believe in poetry, and in the quiet power of restraint.
Once, people wore linen suits at 38°C and quoted Udón Pérez by heart.
The Marabinian exists because some dreams deserve to echoâeven if all we have left are echoes.
Celebrating Udón Pérez: The Marabinian Poet of Zulia
UdĂłn PĂ©rez (1871â1926) is one of Zulia's most celebrated poets, known for capturing the spirit of Maracaibo through his literary works. His poetry, inspired by the beauty of the Catatumbo and the warmth of Zulian culture, immortalized the region's essence. PĂ©rez also wrote the iconic anthem of Zulia, Over the Palm Trees, which remains a symbol of pride for the state. His legacy endures as a timeless representation of Maracaibo's cultural heritage.