just a little weekend trip

Travis and I took off at 6 a.m. on Saturday morning for a little 3-day weekend. We did our best to pack very light (and did it successfully!), planned just a little, and took off expecting a chill weekend. Instead, we were constantly surprised, shocked and stimulated by amazing, ridiculous and hysterical things. This posting contains just the notables of our three-day weekend:

Day One:
6:20 a.m. (ish) we board a very full bus. I barely squeeze myself into a small uncomfortable space, sitting on the edge of some board. Travis finds nowhere to sit, so stands, hunched over because of his height, stuck with the backpack on his back.
6:50 a.m. (ish) our speedy-fast guagua comes to an abrupt stop. There is a traffic jam, which we find out several minutes later is due to an accident involving a bus and a very large half-dead cow. With hundreds of dilapidated buses stopped & running, the exhaust fumes overwhelm us. Our bus driver and cobrador (guy who collected our money) disappear to investigate the accident on foot. Eventually the driver returns and begins a game of inching forward, which becomes a bumping fight with another bus, ending in tons of screaming (the exciting part about this is that I can understand angry, screaming Spanish now!)
We arrive in Sabana de la Mar to meet up with volunteers and enjoy cold beer and fish at a local restaurant, swapping stories and planning an afternoon of activities.
An amazing boat tour of Los Haitises National Park ensues. The mangroves are overwhelmingly cool, the Taino pictographs in the caves amazing, and the rain just a drizzle. Our motor breaks. About 15 minutes later we can breathe again and get in safely.
The evening is spent drinking, playing games, swapping the kind of stories that can only develop in Peace Corps and nail painting (my friend Robyn has learned to paint “Dominican nails”).

Day Two:
Trav & I leave Sabana early to head to Miches. While I nap on the small guagua, Trav encounters some small towns and a few memory-makers:
-the 40km ride takes almost 2 hours, thanks to the bad road and the fact that the driver seemed to know everyone along the route, and so made many stops to chitchat about… the weather(?).
-men exercising their roosters for a cock fight. This includes being bent over, shoving the rooster from hand-to-hand, making it fast on its feet & spinning it in circles
-a murdered man on the side of the road, with a crowd of about 40 chattering about it. No a cop in site, but a freshly-dead body displayed for all to see.
We take another bus and then a long motorcycle ride to a beach that came highly recommended by volunteers. The beach is called Playa Esmeralda and it’s a deserted beach in a little cove. Our beach experience, though beautiful, was severely tainted by swarming, terrible no-see-ums (little teeny-tiny bugs that chew you to pieces and don’t respond to repellent). The only respite was the water, which though amazing, was chilly due to the rain clouds and drizzles. So, we swam, swatted, then packed up to head out. One problem: no transport. My friends had told us that it’s easy to get a bola (free ride) out, so we began the muddy walk in the mosquitoey wilderness, hoping to get picked up. An hour later, with blistered feet due to walking in sandy wet sandals, we got our bola and arrived back to Miches for a tranquilo evening of cooking & cribbage with our friend Kevin.

Day Three:
After a solid night’s sleep (at last!), we made our way towards home. The rain stayed with us, an off & on drizzle that resulted in our ride from Miches to El Seibo, which is quite hilly and green, to take place almost entirely in a cloud. We couldn’t enjoy the view of the hills, so held tight, praying the driver knew the windy pot-holed roads well. (he did and the mist was beautiful). We arrived into Higuey (the closest city to Veron) in order to experience the celebrations of the Dia de Altagracia. There’s a virgin statue in their impressive basilica that has some special powers on the 21st of January. For that reason, people migrate there from all over the country to wait in line to touch the virgin, leave her offerings, pray and light a candle. We’re talking Catholicism on steroids here people. Thousands and thousands of people came, including many whom were sick, deformed or injured, searching for either a miracle from the virgin or a handout from someone making promises to the virgin. We elbowed through the crowds dressed in their best, some fervently praying, other begging for handouts, a few camped out on the sidewalks for the night, and many just gawking like us. We felt comfortable taking pictures because so many other Dominicans were.
After the basilica, we strolled the streets which were filled with vendors peddling everything imaginable—empanadas, early-season mangoes, bras, shots of liquor, baseball caps, and some kind of salad-shooter type device (I’m not kidding!). We filled our bellies with fried street food, bought 8 mangoes, and made our way home for a normal evening of muchachos stopping by to say hi.

oh holy night

(photo taken in Santo Domingo. Check out the bald angel!)

Happy Noche Buena to all. Noche Buena, good night, is the big thing here. The 24th of December. Leading up to today, many-a-pigs were fattened, houses painted and apples imported from America.

One of you (my loyal readers) lamented about the crazy American holiday season and remarked that you were sure that my experience here was much different and that the people (Dominicans) remember the REAL meaning of Christmas.

BUUUUENO

*in training, another PCV taught me that buuuuuuueno is a good word to use when you don't really want to say much more about the subject or something was said that is far from the truth.

So back to Noche Buena. Mom's in town, so we took her to the barrio for the afternoon. With a house full of the regulars-- muchachos & guys our age, different visitors stopped by, bringing gifts of food-- a fried hunk of pig, spaghetti, a special bread sold only at Christmas, a half an apple, a few grapes, a few gum drops, some chicken. I meanwhile made brownies in order to have something to share. An unknown treat here that, unlike most American foods I cook, people always love.

Sitting on the receiving end of gifts of food was quite special. (And in reality, I am almost always on the receiving end in this country!)

The Pig: Pig's the big thing to eat for Christmas. There's been quite a buzz the past few weeks as people have been fattenin' 'em up for the big day. I often heard that "eso es para el 24" (that one's for the 24th)!(un) Fortunately, we missed the mass killing, as we were busy enjoying the Punta Cana beach, kayaks, catamaran and pool.

The House Paint: Don't ask me, people just like to repaint the outside of their houses for Christmas. A woman I was visiting with told me she hates Christmas this year because she doesn't have the money to repaint her house.

Apples: In a world of locally grown pineapple, passionfruit, melon, oranges, mangos, papaya, bananas, and ton of other amazing tropical fruits you've never heard of, people get REALLY excited about red delicious apples imported from America, that have often sat in a cardbaord box or the sun for a day or two too long. They're more expensive than the other fruits, but coveted, especially this time of year. Fruit stands all over hang them decorativly by the stem and people by them for Noche Buena.

I share these tidbits of what I have seen of a Dominican Noche Buena with you with hopes that you realize that I am just pulling out what seems noteworthy & odd. I love this place, I love these people and I appreciate their traditions, but at the same time, I laugh too. Some things seem bizarre to me, and those are what I have highlighted here. I could have just as easily spent my words on how this entire month (and especially today & tomorrow) is about being with family, enjoying life, making things beautiful and eating good food. When it's put that way, we don't seem that different.

After several hours in our barrio, we moved onto visit Maria, the town mayor, whom I lived with for 3 months. She brought us into her formal living room and treated us like special guests. The party was hopping with about 30 people, complete with ear-blowing music, flowing alcohol, 2 pigs cooked on a spit and that oh-so-special Christmas bread. Maria's 80 year-old father begged me to eat a piece of pig, then gave us all a cheap, sweet red wine that most everyone seemed to be drunk on. Mom danced a few merengues, then we ate more pig (ok, I didn't. I don't eat pig here) & spaghetti and received gifts of apples.

Now we're back at Punta Cana with a pineapple that we've converted into a Christmas tree, carols over the internet and bathing suits drying in preparation for tomorrow.

Si, es una noche buena.

my world

I live in a dream world, maybe a cartoon. It's so rich, so bright, so full, so big that it's hard to document.

I saw a duck beating up on a dog a few weeks ago.

I worked with folks to host a fishermen's exchange-- bringing together fishermen from other parts of the Caribeean to meet the guys I work with. My guys had never met other fishermen. I had yet to recognize how much of the world my newly-aquired (aquiring) Spanish opens to me.

I was a superhero. I helped with a coral gardening project. A successful attempt to keep an endagered coral alive. I felt like a superhero- fighting against the current to plant little coral cuttings into the dead reef.

My hammock is used often.

My house is always filled with small children bringing me gifts of plants for my backyard, a sour orange to eat or juice their mom made.

Somehow I am gaining professional experience here too. Between the hammock & the beach, I write grants and help negotiate between a fishers community and a multi-billion dollar company.

I share my day-to-day with my best friend and love of my life. We learn Spanish together, pop homemade popcorn, cook banana pancakes, explore and recall what life was like with a 40 hour work week.

I paint murals. I dug deep and found my inner artist. Ok, actually, I coordinate. The community paints. But I still had to overcome a crazy fear of art and paint.

A grocery store line can take 30 minutes because for fun, the cashier examines everything.

I deal in a currency (pesos) that I'm still not used to. I flip out at a $1000 grocery bill (USD$30)

My friends are named Chito and Reyito. Chito looks a lot like a street thug ... bling'd out and pants low with a cool motorcycle, but he's my best Dominican friend.

Avocadoes are the size of ... I don't know ... they're huge. And cheap. And I eat them a lot.

Ya.

my fav DR pix thus far

halloween fun

Thanks to my friend Judy's birthday, we had an excuse to throw a PCV Halloween Party in StoDgo. Although I had other plans for a costume, learning that Judy was going to be a bee and then finding some fabulous carbdoard trash on the side of the road, led me to become a honeycomb for the event. Two pieces of string, some cutting and a headband, and whaaalah! Instant costume!

Travis sported his "Nurse Shark" digs quite well.

On Halloween evening I realized I had done nothing at home to celebrate, so using the basin we normally use for dish washing, I created a jack-o-lantern. Recycled trash bags become a spider, and my mosquitero was my green blob costume that I used (with sound effects and lights off) to greet an unexpecting Trav when he arrived home.

I also used Halloween as an excuse to buy one of our favorite colmado treats--MasMas. A MasMas is 12 pesos of milk chocolate and usually a raisin or 2-- and sometimes even a peanut.

My muchachos were disappointed that the spider wasn't a pinata, but otherwise it was a great time.

Mural Painting

In Peace Corps training we were taught how to direct the painting of a mural. If you look back on my older posts, you'll see a picture of a water cycle mural that I did with another volunteer. After that experience of teaching kids how to use a paint brush, cleaning spilled paint, and dealing with general chaos, I swore to never do another. Never say never.

When I began brainstorming with folks from the UM project that I help with on ideas for environmental education in the schools related to coastal ecosystems, it seemed perfect to suggest a mural. Then somehow I took responsibility for it. And then somehow 20' x 8' sounded like a good idea, instead of the 4' x 4' murals we did in training.

Fearful and with a brush & pencil in hand, I pieced together drawings and pictures, and with the help of local artists, 2 murals have been created thus far, and more to come.

Each mural takes about a week. They were painted almost entirely by school kids.

This experience has been incredibly rewarding---it's fun to give kids an opportunity to do something they've never done before, it's something that will last for years, and it's a chance to teach about each thing we're painting. As you see from the 2 murals below, the idea was to teach about how coastal ecosystems are interrelated--hence the mangroves, sea grasses, beach and coral reef.

I love that together, we've created something beautiful (& educational) that will last. I'm also proud because I've conquered my fear of paint & artistic projects. No, I can't draw and paint an entire mural, but I can organize people to!

(will post a completed pix one of this ASAP)

Super Mario Kart

Alright, so I realize that there are MUCH greater priorities in development that I could focus on here, but sometimes those weigh me down a bit. So here's how you can help: some muchachos that I live and work near have a Nintendo 64 and Super Mario Kart (beepbeep!). We thoroughly enjoy it, but there's only one problem--there are only 2 controllers and both and on the edge of breaking. Soooo... here's the all call: Anybody have any old N64 controllers you could send my way? 1, 2, 3 , or 4 would be appreciated and used more than you can imagine.

Beep!beep!