Venezuelans bemoan scarcity of makeup

Venezuela's famed models and aspiring beauty queens are struggling to doll themselves up as shortages turn eye shadow and breast implants into coveted luxuries.

In a country that glorifies voluptuous women and opulent beauty pageants, even basics like deodorant are now at times tricky to find as strict currency controls have led to a scarcity of dollars for imported goods.

Determined models and pageant competitors are doing their utmost to keep the show on the road.

"I exhaust myself visiting pharmacies, I look everywhere for makeup," said Ileanne Davila, a 19-year-old civil engineering student and model.

"Once I couldn't find red eye shadow ... so I used lipstick," she said as she took a break from a photo shoot. "I can't find powder for my skin color. So sometimes I mix two hues."

Her long dark hair straightened, and her lips and eyes covered in black makeup for a rock 'n' roll-inspired shoot, Davila said she hopes to break into commercials or television because, she explained with a sigh, she's not tall enough to compete in Miss Venezuela.

Davila is one of dozens of girls aged 3 and up who attend a modeling academy run by Gisselle Reyes, a former Miss Venezuela contestant who now prepares girls for the pageant, teaching them how to strut down a runway and about pageant etiquette.

But even at this glamorous bastion in Caracas' affluent Altamira area, beauty product shortages are crimping plans to follow in Reyes' footsteps - sometimes quite literally.

Young girls don their mothers' heels because they can't find stilettos in their size. Their pageant coaches usually make them work the runway barefoot - or strap them into oversized shoes with Scotch tape.

Girls share makeup and find online videos on how to make deodorant at home. Even when they can locate the beauty products they want, some are unable to pay for them as scarcity drives up prices.

Davila estimates the price of a good face powder, for instance, has increased 500 percent in the past 18 months. Even aspiring Miss Venezuelas are having trouble getting their hands on makeup ahead of the pageant on Oct 9, said an instructor who, like the candidates, is barred from speaking to the press in the runup to the event.

'Living for beauty'

The quest for beauty is one of the rare pastimes that unites this polarized oil-rich nation.

The country boasts seven Miss Universes, a record topped only by the United States. Venezuela is thought to have one of the highest rates of breast implants in the world, and plastic surgeries are sometimes given away as raffle prizes.

But now, doctors say the beloved Botox and breast implants can be hard to come by.

When Maria Eugenia Espinoza decided to replace her 8-year-old implants, equivalent to bra size 36, she was told only implants equivalent to size 42 and up were available.

"Imagine!" said the 46-year-old mother of two. "I would have looked like one of those dancing girls!"

After searching for five months, Espinoza found implants in time for her scheduled operation.

Critics have long said Venezuela's cult of beauty objectifies women and promotes shallow values. And Osmel Sousa, president of the Miss Venezuela pageant, provided more ammunition when he said last year that ugly women invented the concept of inner beauty to feel better about themselves.

The shortage of beauty products can seem frivolous when compared with the scarcity of medicines and basic goods from flour to diapers.

Venezuela's scarcity index hit a record 28 percent in January, indicating that 28 out of 100 basic consumer goods were scarce. The central bank hasn't given data on shortages since.

Currency controls first enacted by former president Hugo Chavez more than a decade ago mean companies struggle to get hold of the hard currency required for imports.

Chavez's successor, President Nicolas Maduro, blames the shortages on rapacious smugglers who scoop up price-controlled goods, including shampoo, to resell them on the black market or even in neighboring Colombia.

Some government supporters scoff at the idea that a pampered elite is overstating the magnitude of shortages to try to weaken the president.

(China Daily 09/27/2014 page10)