Army swears in 5,600 more soldiers

The streets of Caracas are decorated with Christmas lights. The sound of traditional Venezuelan Christmas music can be heard everywhere. Daily routines seem undisturbed: children attending school, adults going to work, vendors opening their businesses.

Beneath this facade lurks anxiety, fear, and frustration, with some even taking preventative measures against a possible attack amid the tension between the United States and Venezuela.

The Venezuelan army swore in 5,600 soldiers on Saturday. President Nicolas Maduro has called for stepped-up military recruitment after the United States deployed a fleet of warships and the world's largest aircraft carrier to the Caribbean under the pretext of combating drug trafficking.

American forces have carried out deadly strikes on more than 20 vessels, killing at least 87, reports AFP.

A woman who asked to be identified as Victoria for fear of reprisals has lived alone in western Caracas since her two children left the country and currently works in commerce. She describes her routine in recent months as marked by uncertainty, with each day bringing unsettling developments that rob her of peace of mind.

Although she hasn't stopped doing her daily tasks, Victoria confesses that this state of alert, with the constant question of what might happen next, has disrupted her sleep, reports CNN online.

Sometimes, she says, she gets up in the middle of the night and starts checking the news on her phone, even though she acknowledges that doing so makes it harder to fall back to sleep.

"There's a confrontation in which we, ordinary citizens, have nothing to do," she says, referring to the potential conflict between her country and the Trump administration. "We try to carry on with our daily lives, we try to carry on with our daily activities, but that's always interrupted by the whole situation we're experiencing, which undoubtedly affects us."