Getting ready to start english classes

So i have had a pretty busy last couple of weeks here. A few weeks ago I had creole language training, so i had a chance to go back to the capital for a few days (we started training there) and then to a batey (a hatian community) where we were at for the last few days of training. It was really nice to be in the capital for a bit. We went out to get pizza a couple of nights, i was able to go to the peace corp office to use internet and get another couple of books to bring back with me to site (which i have finished all but one at this point), and we even went to the mall to go see a movie! Walking through the mall i felt like i was back in the united states. there were all of the usuall stores, a food court, and even the people there were whiter (in my campo everyone is pretty dark skinned, as this was an upperclass mall many of the patrons were more well of dominicans, which at times means they have lighter colored skin). The rest of creole training in the batey was also pretty nice. I was expecting to be ruffing it as people keep telling us bateys are the poorest, worst off communities in the dominican republic, but when we got there it contraty to what i had though. there were two seperate dorm room type buildings, on for the guys one for the girls. we had screens on the windows (first place i have been with screens to keep bugs out), running water, a real toilet, and even showers that the water actually came down from above, i didn´t have to shower from a bucket. I guess there are lots of church groups that go to this batey to do work so i believe that is why that had such nice facilities for us. But it was pretty nice, i felt like i was back in school. we would have class in the morning, have lunch and a little time for a siesta, class in the afternoon, dinner, and then time to hang out talk and play dominoes or cards.



About a week and a half ago i went to San Juan de la Maguana, the major city here in my region, for an emergency cordinator meeting with other volunteers in the region. We basically just talked about a couple things, we got to meet some of the older volunteers in our region, and then we had to rest of the day off. THe volunteers from the new group all stayed the night there, actually we stayed in a pueblo called Juan de Herrera where one of our friends live, but we went to San Juan for the night as they were celebrating patrinales, the festival of the patron saint John the Babtist. We also went to eat at a mexican restuarant, suppsovily the best one in the country, which was really amazing. I ate guacamole and chips (they don´t eat guacamole here usually, even though there are tons of avocado), a taco, a flauta, all of which i smothered in delicious hot sauce (something else they don´t eat here). This was for me probably the highlight of my night, probably the highlight of my past two weeks since this was one of the best meals i have eaten since being here. But later in the night we went to the park where tons of people were hanging out and taking and drinking, and then later went to a club where all of the girls went dancing merengue and bachata. i danced a bit but mostly just sat drinking my rum. we went back to our hotel at about 3 in the morning then i woke up the next morning to head back to my house.

THe only downside of this whole trip was that on the car going to San Juan i somehow mangaged to loose my cellphone, so i was having to plan a trip to go to the capital to get another, which i was not to happy about considereing it would be expensive trip and only for one night, and also that wanted to stay in my campo as i had just left that weekend. So this past wednesday i came to the peublo to attend a meeting and then was plaining on taking the bus to santo domingo. First though, i went to go buy an empanada for my breakfast. At the empanada stand a man looked at me for a minute then said I know you, i have your cell phone. IT was the driver of the car that brought me to San Juan and he had my cell phone, which he gave back to me, and which also still had all of my minutes i had put on there. I was quite suprised, and also quite happy, because i had already considered it lost and it was such a coincidence to run into him at the empanada stand at exactly that moment, and that he was honest enough to return it. SO needless to say i never went back to the capital.

So besides my traveling, i have began to do interviews with people in my community for my diagonostic. its a little slow as sometimes it takes an hour to complete just one, not because it is long but because the people don´t understand what i am asking (when i ask what is the biggest envronmental problem in the community people tell me the road needs to be paved) or else we diverge into other things. Sometimes i talk to someone who is knowledgable and gives me some usefull information but the majority of them i haven´t really learned anything new, just that everyone just wants me to fix up there houses, which i am not here to do. I have also been attending more community meetings, going to little parties they have in my community at times (they call them cumpleanos, which means birthdays, but they are really to commemorate the 1 year, 5 year, or 7 year aniversary of when someone died), and still trying to figure out what i will be doing for projects in the next month. I have also been making my own peanut butter, which is delicious, have just planted and hoping will grow some mango, avocado, and passion fruit seeds, and hanging out with my friends in the community. Tomorrow i am starting with english classes, which shoud be interesting as i think my youngest students are going to be 6 and my oldest in their 50s, with all the ages in between. It might be kinda of chaotic, i am probably gonna have to split it up into 2 or 3 classes, but i´ll see tomorrow how many people will actually show up. people have a habit of saying they will come to meetings then not showing up, or being half an our late (which i am not going to tolerate in my class).

THis weekend for the 4th of july i am going to the Samana peninsula where abunch of volunteers are meeting up in a small resort town right on the beach to celebrate. so i am exicted to see some of my friends that i havent seen in a month and a half, as well as to hangout on the beach with a beer in my hand.

But thats all for now, i need to go do some things in the peublo then i am going to another volunteers house for the night (we work with the same group in the pueblo) to write up a charla (lecture) we are going to be giving about fuel effiencient stoves. hope everyone is doing well, and ill try to post something new in the coming weeks.




some of my friends playing music at a little fiesta by my house

some pictures

my dad moving the cows to water them



view of some houses from the "cell phone" hill



another picture from the loma



the enramada at my house



the garden at my house, they just planted yucca here

First two weeks at site

May 30, 2009

So all of this stuff will probably be a week old by the time you read it because i am in a pueblo now at an internet cafe but the internet is not working, so i´ll have to wait untill another day to send it.

But every has been going pretty well the past two weeks that i have been here in Yabonico. Everyone here gets up around like 5 30 to start working, either milking cows or going out to work in the fields. I don´t get up quite that early, maybe around 7 30, or days when i want to come to the pueblo i have to get up earlier (like today) to catch the truck that leaves at 6 30. My days so far have consisted of pretty much similar things but in different orders. I have either been walking around the community trying to get to know people, which can take up lots of time, usually entire afternoons since my community is rather spread out. In the part i live at there are a little over a hundred houses, and in another part that takes about 40 minutes to walk to there are 30. then there are also 3 other sections that are in between those numbers, but this ones take a little bit longer to get to so i still haven´t walked to them yet. Also, i still have a bunch of other houses i have to go to in the first two sections first. But the people are all really nice for the most part. Most of the Doñas at the houses offer me a cup of coffee, juice, a mango (they are beginning to be in season), or a mint (which everyone loves and always has around here) when i stop by. Sometimes though i just kind of sit there awkardly for 10 minutes or so without haveing much to talk about, which is a little uncomfortable, but at other houses i sometimes am talking for a while which helps my spanish and also helps me learn more about the community. I have also been asking some about the projects people want me to help with here, and lots of them have told me they want a latrines, as many houses are lacking them here. As of now i have no idea of how to make latrines, but i think the Peace Corps is going to teach us in our in service training in two months, or i hope so. If not i´ll need to be looking it up on the internet.

The past Wednesday i actually helped one Doña make a compost pile at her house, which i was really excited about as this was the first project, albeit small, that i have done here. A lot of kids also want me to teach them english, but i think im gonna wait another month before starting that as i still wanna get a little bit better grasp on spanish first, and also im just not ready right now to teach a class. I hang out around the kids a lot too, playing hackey sack, trompo (its a spinning top they make out of wood that they throw/start by using a string, its pretty cool actually), or they like to try playing my guitar even though there is really only one kid who knows how to play anything. He did teach me a little merengue though which was good as the kids are always asking me to play merengue or bachata which i don´t know that well. They do get a kick when i play this one mariachi/flamenco song, they always say ¨play antinio banderas¨ because it sounds like a song he plays in the movie Desperado. It sometimes is a little annoying though because i can´t just sit and try to practice or learn songs by myself as it always attracts a crowd and i have to pass it around to everyone, but they are always sharing with me so i should be sharing as well.

I also go over to one of my negibhors house some nights because when there is electricty they are usually watching some sort of movie. Some of them are american movies, some are ones from here, and they also really like martial arts movies. We watch some Thai movie last night be couldn´t understand anything as they weren´t subtitles or translation from the original language, but there were lots of fighting scenes so i guess you could kinda of understand what was going on.

Other times though, i am just sitting around at my house not really doing anything, or wating for lunch so not wanting to get anywhere but then it takes an hour longer than i thought so i kinda of waste my mornings. But whenever i am sitting for like 2 hours or me i usually eventually just get up and walk around some, even if i don´t visit a house there are some cool trails through the forest and by the river. Yesterday after walking up to that one part of the community 40 minutes away i took the long way home, walking back along the river and enjoying the nature and all of the trees. When i was passing by a mango tree a ripe mango fell to the ground, which i retrieved, and it was probably the best mango i have ever eaten, it was super sweet and perfectly ripe. This is the second time i´ve walked by a mango tree to have one fall right at my feet, i feel like its gotta be a good sign or something.

But i also have attended a few community meetings the past two weeks, and a couple other random things. Today i bought a machete in the market, as they are probably the single most useful tool you can have in the Domincan Republic. The are used to chop wood, cut down trees, sharpen stakes , cut the grass, make toys, and more that i can´t thing of right now. I had to borrow one to cut sticks to the correct length when i was making the ¨fenced¨ area for the compost, but now i have my own for all the compost piles i´ll hopefully be making in the future.

But that is about all for now. I´m sure there are some things i´m forgetting, but hopefully i can touch on some different things the next time i write. Take care all.

FInally got some internet

Saturday June 6, 2009

Hey everybody,

I know it has been a while but the past two times i have come to town to try and use the internet, it hasn´t been working. I had actually wrote a blog post one of these days to post, but of course i forgot to bring my usb drive, and camara, with me to town today. So i´ll probably just be writing about the past week, and post the older blog later (I´m going to be in la capital sunday and monday so i should be able to get internet) But life has been pretty good here in Yabonico for the past 3 weeks. I have been doing lots of walking around trying to get to know the people in my community better, as well as the general geography and layout a little bit better as well. As my campo is made up of a bunch of smaller regions, i have been doing a lot of walking, but it is really nice scenerio walking through the hills, crossing the river, or exploring some of the forests so i don´t mind. All of the people i visit are always nice and welcoming, they usually offer me coffee, juice, or some sort of food (i usually turn down the food though as i am full most of the time).

This past week i did get sick though which was a little bit of a bummer. When i went to bed on Monday night i sudennly didn´t start feeling that well and i had a fever for the entire night and hence didn´t get much sleep. On tuesday morning i just layed in my bed in my room for a while as i still wasn´t feeling well. The only bad part of this is that my room gets really hot durring the day because we have a tin roof, and i don´t have that great of ventalation in my room. My parents here kept telling me to go sit outside where there was a little bit of a breeze, but that meant i would just be sitting in an uncomfortable chair when all i wanted to do was lay down, so it was worth it to stick out the heat. Later in the afternoon i was feeling a little bit better so i was sitting outside under the enramada where the breeze felt nice, when my project partner stopped by my house to tell me that the saftey and security officer for the Peace Corps had been trying to call me (i don´t have signal at my house) and that i needed to call her back immediatly. So i walked up the hill by my house where i go to use the phone. I tried calling her (the security-saftey cordinator) but her phone was busy. But after looking at my phone i saw that i had 4 new voice mails, which is quite a bit more than usuall for me in one day. I had messages from my emergency cordinator, a receptionist at the peace corps office, the security lady, all saying that the pork flu had arrived in the Dominican Republic and that if you had a fever over 100 (mine was 101.6) you needed to call the Peace Corp medic immediatly. So of course i was thinking to myself why did i have to choose this day to get sick, i wasn´t so much worried that i had the pig flu as that they were gonna make me come in to get checked out. But i called the medic and she said that i just had to call her the next day to tell her if my fever went down (which it did) and that since i had only one of the symtoms (the fever) i was proabably fine. So after calling all of the people i needed to call, i walked back to my house and just kinda of relaxed for the rest of the day to try to get better.

Wednesday i woke up early to go to a meeting for CODECAS, an environmental origanization i´m going to be working with that meets in the pueblo here in Las Matas. Only 4 of the members showed up, which i think is a normal thing since the week before when everyone showed up, the other volunteer who is working with the group told me it was the first tiem in 8 months everyone was there. But i was more there just begin integrating myself more into the group, as i don´t have any projects to bring to them at the moment. THey are currently working on stove projects but in different communities than the one i live in. In the afternoon i was waiting around my house because one of my bosses was coming to visit (he was visiting all the new environment volunteers these two weeks) but I didn´t know at what time so i didn´t want to be far from my house. He ended up coming at 5, and stayed for a bit making sure that everything was fine for me at my house and the community, so by the time he left it was a little to late to go try to do much else, so i just stayed by my house and went to one of my neighboors house to watch a movie.

Yesterday though i did get to go do something a little more interesting. I went to go watch this little plays that some kids in my community and also some kids from another community (they traveld to mine by car) performed for part of the community. The little theater group is supported by plan international, which is a big orginization that works with development who i will most likely be working with as well. The skits where about social issues such as the rights of children, communication within the family, and about fighting ignorance and intolerance in the community. I was really happy that i went and it was also good to see that the youth here are already motivated to form groups and talk about these important subjects that are often overlooked, especially in smaller campos. IT makes me feel like i will have an easier time once try to form some youth groups of my own that there is already a base of kids who are motivated to work.

But thats about it for now. THis upcoming week i´m going to the capital on sunday to begin Kreyol language training on Monday at the training center there, and then we are going to go to a batey (a small hatian communit, which usually form to work in the sugar industry) in the south to do more training there untill friday. So hopefully monday i´ll be able to put up the few pictures i got and try to take some more this week. Hope everyone is well back at home. Adios