(MENAFN- Gulf Times) As Wuilly Arteaga walks home through the Midtown neighbourhood of Manhattan, he looks at everything around him with the wide-eyed wonder of a child.
Peaceful, relaxed New York is a far cry from the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, where Arteaga faced riot police while playing his violin a year ago.
'In Caracas, I was used to the greatest dangers, but I like this, it is very calm. It has taught me to be a bit calmer, the 24-year-old musician says.
When thousands of Venezuelan protesters clashed with police between April and July 2017, pictures of Arteaga wearing a jacket with the country's colours and bowing the strings of his violin went out around the world, turning him into something of a peace icon.
A year after the protests in which more than 100 people were killed, the son of a humble Venezuelan family is rebuilding his life in New York.
As he gets home, the first thing Arteaga does is to pass his fingers over the keyboard of a piano that dominates the living room. It is a kind of addiction, as if he were obliged to do it every time he comes in. Next to the piano, Arteaga keeps two violins and a notebook.
'[The piano] was left to me by a friend so I could practise when I came to New York, says the musician, who was trained by El Sistema, a publicly financed voluntary sector music education programme in Venezuela.
In contrast to the dangers he faced in Venezuela, Arteaga now leads what he calls the life of 'a normal person, studying English in the mornings and dedicating the rest of the day to what he most loves: music. 'I play in the New York underground every afternoon and make a living out of that, Arteaga explains while playing the piano.
Later on, he arrives at the Times Square underground station and starts playing in a corner near the entrance to a platform. A group of young people dance to his rhythms while Venezuelan compatriots come to greet him. In four hours, he has earned 200 dollars.
'In Venezuela, I had to play in the underground to survive. Police took my violin away and I was left without a violin and living on the streets. We sometimes ate from garbage, he recalls, distraught.
Many people are still eating from garbage containers in the South American country, where hyperinflation has contributed to a massive economic crisis and sent hundreds of thousands fleeing abroad.
The International Organization for Migration puts the number of Venezuelans living abroad at 1.6 million, while the country's opposition estimates that it could be as high as 4 million.
During the anti-government demonstrations, Arteaga says, he was shot in the face, jailed and tortured ' only for protesting.
He was released after 19 days in August 2017.
'I'm not free because my country is not free, he told the news portal La Patilla at the time. 'I'm going out to resume my fight for freedom, in the only way I know how to do it, through my music.
But Arteaga does not like recalling those times, and he changes the subject. 'What I have really enjoyed in New York is freedom. I'll never feel freer than now.
Arteaga was invited to the city by the non-governmental Human Rights Foundation, which asked him to play his violin and to talk about the situation in Venezuela at a forum in October 2017.
'I was invited and decided to come for 15 days, but the idea was to go back again. When I came here, many threats from the government started intensifying, they were death threats. I became frightened and decided to stay for a while.
'Wuilly basically represents the essence of non-violent resistance in the face of violence, says Roberto Gonzalez, a lawyer representing the foundation.
At the forum, a well-known entertainment personality who wants to remain anonymous offered Arteaga the possibility of staying in New York.
'I wanted to stay, but I had no place to live, and he said he had a flat and I could stay there until I found something. I like it a lot, because all the other flats in the building have been rented out to musicians and I feel at home.
While in New York, Arteaga has disobeyed orders back in Venezuela to report regularly to courts, a situation that prevents him from returning home for the time being.
His lawyer is working to get him a residence permit that would allow him to stay in New York and make use of all the opportunities the city has to offer.
But no matter how embedded he may have become in New York, the musician's thoughts are back with his family and friends in Venezuela, a country he is constantly talking about. DPA
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