Venezuela

The nature of the oil industry is ebb and flow. It’s cyclic. And when you work in the field, even a minor change in the industry can affect your day-to-day. That recently happened to us down in Mexico. We lost some contracts and all the sudden we went from being a busy, over-worked location to a slow location. I mean ‘crap there’s not enough chairs in the office for all these field engineers and there’s no rigs to send them to’ slow. This is where it comes in handy working for the largest provider of oil-field services. Instead of sending us home or even laying-off engineers, SLB simply sells us off to the highest bidder in another SLB location.

For me, that highest bidder was Venezuela (although I have suspicions they sold me to the only bidder). This means that Venezuela pays my location over twice my salary for the privilege of my experience and expertise for a set amount of time (in my case, one month). To be honest, I suspect Venezuela is mostly looking for warm bodies with how much activity there is. Either way, it means I got an all-expense paid trip to Mexico City, for the visa, and then on to Venezuela.

I've been here for three weeks now and I finally have some internet and so I will attempt to answer the most pressing of questions.

Where is here? I flew first to Caracas, which is the capital city and home to such beloved characters as Chavez and Madero (more on them later). All I saw of Caracas was the outside of the airport as I walked (escorted) from the international terminal to the domestic terminal.  I then took a flight from Caracas to Barcelona. Not that Barcelona. Once I arrived in Barcelona, I met a taxi and then drove another hour or so to arrive at the SLB base in a town called Anaco. I hung out in Anaco for a day and then was sent to my first rig. From Anaco I drove to El Tigre to buy groceries, about an hour’s drive. From El Tigre we drove another 3 hours further south and to the east into the fields. The fields here are huge. It’s all part of a heavy oil development that Venezuela has been producing from for years. This is called the ‘Faja’ (think of the J like an H) and it’s split into four fields. I’m in the one furthest to the east. I have a google maps pin-drop if you want anything more specific than that.

Is it safe? It was slightly overshadowed by Ukraine, but Venezuela recently had several months of protests turning violent, army enforced curfews and a small fit of kicking out the international media. With all that in mind, I’m not worried about my safety. First off, I’m not participating in any protests, although I do love a good chance to tell dictators to go to hell.  Second, I’m not international media. I also don’t work for the CIA or any other American government entity. Basically the biggest threat to my safety is someone who would want to do me harm in order to take what I have simply because they are without.  I’m well aware of this threat and well trained in what to do in these situations. Most crime is petty, without violence.  That being said I’m still careful.  And of course, I’ve been spending most of my time safely away from any civilization at all. If someone wanted to rob me, it will be a several hour drive to get to me. In short, I feel safe with the guidelines and security my company lays out for me.

What’s the food situation? Some of you may have seen/heard of/talked to me about frantically packing enough peanut butter, tea and sugar to survive for a month. It was a good call. We went shopping to a smaller town the other day and went to 4 different grocery stores trying to find everything. We still didn’t get everything we wanted to. All the stores are Chinese owned. Imagine if you will, an American trying to speak Spanish with a Chinese trying to speak Spanish. It was interesting. We had one big win in finding mayonnaise (which I’ve never been happier to see). We bought a lot of chicken and some fresh vegetables. There was no beef anywhere. Ham and cheese were easy to find. I looked all day for laundry soap and never found it. We had to go specifically to a bakery to find sandwich bread and then went to a vegetable stall to get something different than carrots and potatoes.

I only could find dry beans, no pre-cooked. No sugar. No toilet paper or paper towels or Kleenex. A lot of basics are missing here. If you think it doesn’t sound that bad, it’s really not. We’re not starving, but it takes a lot of convenience out that’s I’m used to. Think of getting off a 12 hour shift and then cooking an entire chicken in order to make dinner. Or soaking beans and then cooking them and then refrying them if you want a burrito. Or having to pre-mix your milk for your morning cereal. We can live without a lot of things but there are a lot of conveniences we become accustomed to that are missing here.

What’s the most challenging? Work stuff aside, the hardest thing has been communication. In a few ways: I’ve become so accustomed to Mexican Spanish that the Venezuelan accent has been hard for me. I don’t understand people well and I suspect many of them have similar problems with me (the plus side, I’ve been mistaken for a Mexican a few times, which makes me feel awesome about my horrible Spanish). The second part is, even though I have a phone it refuses to make international calls or add the data package I bought, which basically makes it useless for me. Even after calling 5 or 6 times in three weeks, the issue has yet to be resolved and I’ve given up. The first week I had no internet at my rig, which was torture. I have no problem being without internet on vacation or in the city. But on a rig, when it’s just you and one other person on shift for 12 long hours every night… well, it’s gets boring. Field Engineers are used to talking to each other a lot and I missed my friends. Now that I have internet, I’m a lot happier.

What’s the most rewarding? Again, keeping aside strictly work stuff, it’s been fun to see how I’ve handled this.  I’ve been in Mexico for so long that I’m used to most of the things it throws at me (not to say that there’s not plenty of new challenges to come).  Coming to a brand new place and not knowing what to expect or who I’ll meet or what it will be like is a feeling that many people never experience. There’s a special kind of fear that comes from stepping out into the unknown.  The rush of building a life in a new place for the first time is what drove me to leave and go to Mexico almost 3 years ago.  I like seeing that I can still do that. Even knowing the ups and downs I’ve been through in Mexico, I’m glad to see that I haven’t lost my willingness to step into the unknown and see what’s waiting on the other side. 

And the work stuff? Ah the actual reason I’m here. The work stuff here is about 180deg different from Villahermosa. It’s been amazing. I’m learning a ton and getting experiences here that I don’t get in Villa. The wells here are very fast and all horizontals. I’ve been on two lateral sections and now a curve landing horizontally.  They drill SO fast here. As DD, I’m on the floor during all drilling because you have to make decisions in seconds. It feels like I’m holding my breath the whole time they drill just watching for any sign I need to change something. It’s nerve-wrecking to be in charge of and I spend my nights running back and forth between the floor and my computer.  It’s exhausting but so far it’s been rewarding. Every company man has told me I’m the first female DD they’ve ever seen, but it hasn’t been a bad thing. I usually run into a little resistance in Mexico from some people, but here I haven’t had any problems. Typically they assume my trainee is the DD, but that’s pretty normal and they usually figure it out soon enough.

All and all, Venezuela has been a great experience. I’ve learned a ton and even though it’s been hard at times, I’m glad I had the opportunity to see and do something different.