Hav­ing en­dured a gru­el­ing boat ride from Tu­cu­pi­ta to Trinidad and then sev­er­al days of hid­ing in the forests of Pa­lo Seco be­fore their ar­rests, 17 Venezue­lans have fi­nal­ly set­tled in­to a house at Morne Di­a­blo, Pe­nal.

They have lim­it­ed food, a trick­le of wa­ter and no med­i­cine for their sick chil­dren.

Yet to them Trinidad is like a par­adise. Com­pared to their home­land, there is no short­age of food here. The fam­i­ly gave Guardian Me­dia an ex­clu­sive in­ter­view of their plight and their hopes for the fu­ture.

The fam­i­ly is rent­ing the house for $3,000 a month.

Eu­melis Or­daz was the first to ar­rive in Trinidad on April 7 and al­though she does not speak Eng­lish, her com­pre­hen­sion of the lan­guage has land­ed her a job at a vil­lage restau­rant.

She works long hours to pay for the rent and of­ten she brings home food for her fam­i­ly.

Most of her salary goes to­wards rent but she is hop­ing that if the oth­er Venezue­lans get jobs, they too can con­tribute.

Among them are a uni­ver­si­ty eco­nom­ics grad­u­ate, two high school grad­u­ate, two teach­ers and a sergeant with the Venezue­lan army.

We will have this full re­port in Sat­ur­day's Trinidad Guardian.