the past two weeks (in a nut shell)

Yes, it’s been too long I know! The truth is that I’ve been too tired to write. Honestly my energy is still too low to give you a nice story about my past week, but I will attempt to please you here. March 17th I celebrated my 25th birthday! It was a low-key kind of day for me considering I’m used to St.Patrick’s day being a full out party in the states. In my group there were two other people who shared my b-day so the whole day it was Feliz Cumplianos all day! It was sweet. My family had originally planed on taking me out to the discoteca (dance club), but when I got home Mayra had hurt her big toe earlier that day and wasn’t feeling up to dancing. Also, as a birthday present I got a Typhoid shot!!! And apparently I wasn’t supposed to drink beer and needed to take it easy. So it wouldn’t have worked out anyway. Mayra and the family got me some awesome red earrings and a necklace to match. Alex gave me a CD of Bachata music, Aventura. I’ve listened to the CD once but so far I like what I’ve heard, the lyrics are easy to understand so hopefully it will help with my Spanish. As a present to myself I taught the afternoon yoga class. Aside from feeling supper drugged up, the day went by like any other day. Thanks to all who sent me birthday wishes on facebook.

Wednesday was the last class of the week because we were preparing for our trips to current Peace Corps Volunteers (PCV). I was heading to Tenares to visit Cecilia. But before I could out of Entrena I had to sit through a painful 4 hour Spanish class. It was the first time I’ve splurged for sugar between lunch and dinner. Since Dominicans love sugar here, it’s easy to find sweet stuff everywhere but hard to find healthy snacks. So, because they eat lots of rice and potatoes I’ve been watching my portions so I don’t blow up like a balloon. With that said, I’ve also been careful to not eat the sweet stuff, but on this day I blew it and thus the trend has continued. You may think that I could just grab some fresh fruit to snack on but that is not the case. Fruit isn’t really sold in the Colmados (small corner stores) – thus it’s not on my way to or from Entrena. I’m thinking that will change once at Community Based Training (CBT) or my permanent site.

Thursday was an early day because Lindsey and I met up with enough time to get to the bus stop by 7:30AM to catch our appropriate busses. I took the guagua to kilomitro 9 to catch the other bus to Tenares. I wasn’t sure the route that it took so I didn’t take a nap on the bus. Instead I watched the scenery change from city to campo. Outside the city it is such a different world. The fields are filled with green grass, cows, horses, and fields of agriculture with beautiful mountain ranges in the background. It was breath taking. I finally felt like I was in a beautiful tropical country! About time I think. The bus took a round about way to get to the city but luckily I was brave enough to ask the guy next to me if the stop for Tenares was close. Sure enough, it was the last stop so I really had nothing to worry about. Once off the bus I found my way to Cecilia’s house by way of a friend of her’s who knew I was coming. Anthony showed me to her house and the moment had finally arrived, I would find out what it’s REALLY like to be a Peace Corps volunteer. I was excited about getting a first hand account of the roller-costar we will experience for the next year to two years. Starved we walked to three different colmados to find veggies and pasta for out lunch. Back at her apartment (above one of the colmados) we chopped and cooked up a wonderful college style pasta dish. I got the low down on project partners and a reality check on my hopes and dreams.
Tenares is a pueblo in the Cibao region of the DR. this part of the DR is nicknamed “the bread basket” because it’s the most fertile area of the island and produces the most produce. Interesting fact #1: Rice is a big crop in this area. Fact #2: Drug dealers invest in homes here. So there’s money from all sides benefiting this valley. So the town has lots of small shops and seems to be doing fine. Why would they request a PCV? Well the Secretary of Education put a computer lab in a primary school and there is no one to run it. Funny enough – Cecilia has been there a year and still couldn’t get her counter part to open up the lab, because she doesn’t want the kids to break the computers. It seems absurd, and it is. And that’s exactly how Cecilia felt about it. I won’t bore you with any of the details about her bitch fest, but let’s just say this is not an easy job when working with others. On the bright side, her apartment was awesome. Although it wasn’t furnished there was a shower (with cold water only) and a toilet that you could flush!!!!! I felt like I was in a palace just because of that. Oh! The things we take for granted.

Saturday we took a day trip to Playa Grande. This marked my first trip to a DR beach! The sight was amazing; water various shades of blue and the sun luxurious. I felt I could stay there a whole week. The one-day trip was good for my base tan. I had one after my vacation to Miami in early February, but it’s fading away. Although we were only there for the day it was well worth the four hour round trip.

Sunday we went to San Francisco de Macoris and had lunch with a few other volunteers and their trainees at a cool place called El Patio. The theme of the restaurant is like your out on a patio. The furniture is patio furniture and the margaritas are amazing! You could also pick up wireless Internet from the Wi-fi Park across the street. Not a bad trip at all! I had such a good time feeling independent and out of Entrena’s watchful eye. I really wanted to write you all about my week but I had lots of homework and just couldn’t do it all. I also hit the hay around 9 o’clock that night because I was that tired.

Monday was just an ordinary day in the life of a PCT. Wake up, eat mashed potatoes or plantains with a fried egg on top with papaya on the side. Walk 30 minutes to the training center, try to get on the internet with 30 other people, get on just long enough to see that I got a few emails, and then off to the first meeting/class of the day. That morning we divided into our specific programs to discuss how our PCV visits went. There were some people who had about the same experience as me. Others had volunteers that are kicking butt and taking names. Some people felt disappointed because they saw volunteers just living a life of laziness, not teaching class or trying to get the community to respond. But to their credit, you can only do so much and the rest is up to the community. In these cases the communities are usually the ones at fault. I’m sure I’ll get into more of this once I’m a volunteer. The rest of the day was more information and Spanish classes. Tuesday was about the same. On the home front, my family is fine. Mayra is feeling just fine but we still haven’t gone dancing. Honestly I don’t think we ever will, which is fine with me. I’ll have my time while at CBT – so I hear. Alex has been a huge help for my Spanish. We sit and talk for most of the nights. The little gal who lives in my house likes to make fun of us because Alex has a thing for me. Oh well. He understands that we’re just friends though and that’s all that matters.

Wednesday we had our Spanish and PC exams. I passed both with flying colors!! I got a 96 on the PC exam – something I wasn’t expecting. I mean I knew I passed but that was a higher score than I had thought. Go Me!!!! The Spanish exams were fun because we had to go around to different areas and pretend that they were stores or we needed to rent hotel rooms or something like that. It was to test our speaking competency and it looks like I have it. Hooray! I was feeling a little stressed out when I got home because I had to pack just one bag for CBT (those of you who saw how I packed before leaving imagine how I fit it all into one bag!). I didn’t pack everything but most of it I got to fit into my REI BEAST! Yes, the name of the bag is the beast - a fitting name. When I got home the luz (electricity) was on which was unusual. I should have taken advantage of the light but I wasn’t ready to start packing so I sat outside with Alex and chatted about the day and other pointless banter. Come 8:30PM the luz was still on and I forced myself to pack up then. I broke a sweat zipping up my bag, a success I think. It was pretty freaking heavy but I lucky for me I’ve got yoga mussels. So the luz didn’t go off until 11PM or later and was even on when I woke up Thursday morning.

Thursday I gave my Dona the pottery and card I brought from Asheville, NC. She seemed to like it but she’s a hard read. Then Lindsey, Jeff and I drug our stuff across the highway to the corner of the Entrena road and waited a while for a taxi/carro publico that could fit all our bags in the back. It was funny experience, carrying such heavy awkward things. Imagine please, I have the beast in one hand, my messenger bag slung across my body, a motoconcho (motorcycle) helmet, a small black case of medical supplies (I volunteered to bring mine – like an idiot), and a bag with my mosquito net. What a fool others and I must have looked like trucking ourselves up the hill at Entrena! I guess its all part of the experience. At 2PM we were loaded like sardines into 3 different mini-van taxies on our way to the bus stop in Santo Domingo. From there 2 of the 3 taxi passengers were hustled into a medium sized bus, again packed like crayons in a box but this time for a two hour ride to El Seibo!

El Seibo is in the eastern part of the country. From what I’ve seen so far it’s a very nice and clean city. It was chosen as a UN Millennium city, which I think means it is supposed to set the standard for the UN Millennium goals, that’s what I’ve been told anyway. So the important thing is that the toilets flush, there is running water in the house and there is always luz! When I got into my house I found it to be much more luxurious than my home in Las Alcarrizos. Although my room is small and one of the girls just moved her clothes out of it I do have a TV in my room! (more on the family later another post) Right now I’m watching TV Chile! In addition to the commercials they show “postcards” of Chile. I’ve seen some of the desert I went to, which was nice to reminisce about that trip while on this one! I can tell already that being in El Seibo will spoil me for where ever I get put after these 5 weeks.

Today (Friday) we start our adventure into the technical training portion, doing community diagnostics, learning hardware, and taking more Spanish classes! I’ve only felt homesick once so far and that passed once I was able to get more sleep and rant to my gal pal Lindsey.