Last Day

On our last day in the Dominican we had a goodbye party at a country house in Santiago. It was a house made in the 1980s that had beautiful multi-colored tiles on the floor and an outdoor pool + BBQ. We ate steak and sausages and salad and had a grand ol' time sitting under the stars and laughing about our days in the DR. At one point, we all sat in a circle and went around one by one sharing our thoughts about the experience. Everyone expressed how grateful they were for the friendships gained, the history that had been shared with us, the amazing Dominican food, the generosity of the host families, etc. etc. I talked about how amazing I thought it was that I had experienced such extremes on this trip; I had been on such amazing highs while out dancing or being surrounded by such tropical beauty or hanging with my host family etc. etc. But I had also been so humbled by things like the orphanage, by the devastation in Haiti, by  the Haitian orphans that Dean showed me, by Mudo's death, by poverty, by the street market in Santiago etc. etc. etc.

After the party, we went back to our homes and hung out a bit until the nighttime festivities kicked in. I got to chat with Boli and the new host student, Jamar. We had a great conversation and it sort of stinks that right when our relationship has reached a deeper level I have to go home!!! I am going to miss all the crazy characters in this house - the weirdo cat, crazy Juan, all of the houseguests, ahhhhhh everyone!

Later on that night we went to Puerto Del Sol to hang out before dancing. It was one of those nights during which  I could have cared less what we did. I was just so happy to be alive! ie. one of my friends and I needed pesos from an ATM so we went out in search of one, which ended up being a 40 min walk because we couldn't find a working one - she was so annoyed, but I was in heaven! =P

Later, we went out dancing at Vintage, a nearby club. Rolando came and we danced merengue/salsa. I also befriended some Haitians that one of my American friends had been hanging with all week. They were multilingual; French, Creole, Spanish, English - that is amazing!

Then we went back to my host brother's house and stayed up late and I hung out with Rolando some more. He is so funny and completely relaxed all the time. I'll miss him a lot.

Rolando drove me to the airport the next morning and taught me how to say "how do I check my bags?" in spanish.

It's funny, you would think that the thing that I would have been most frustrated by was not knowing the language, by communication issues and cultural differences between myself and the Dominicans. But thinking back, it seems as though each time I was frustrated or annoyed it was because of some encounter or interaction with the Americans on the trip. Granted that I was not in the DR long enough to really experience what it must be like to live in a culture where your own language/culture is not the dominant one or experience any significant form of culture shock, what I have come to discover is that the language barrier and cultural differences did not both me in the least- it was fun and exciting trying to communicate, getting lost in translation. I made friends with cab drivers and waiters and students and Haitians and foreigners from other programs and performers and teachers. I spoke through the language of dance and listened with ears keen on learning. I watched and acted and reflected and went in and out of being conscious of my status as a foreigner, as a host student, as a New Yorker and then as a sister, a friend, and a human. Because I often did not have the words to express what I wanted or what I was feeling, I had to rely on other things like hand gestures or body language or facial expressions or broken Spanglish. And that was a learning experience in and of itself.

I've tried to capture all that I've felt, seen, and experienced in this blog. However, like the small, yet most important, messages that are lost when you communicate cross-culturally, there is no way that I could have ever really done complete justice to my life in the DR. There are adjectives that I can use to point in the direction of how I felt and experienced the whole trip; amazing, humbling, breathtaking, relaxing, new, self-explorative. But these only just scratch the surface.

Hasta Luego Republica Dominicana!  más que palabras....



Truth is something which can't be told in a few words. Those who simplify the universe only reduce the expansion of its meaning. 

Day 13

Juan (the crazy one) told me yesterday that he loves me and wants to marry me and have 7 children. My host family and their friends seem to get a kick out of this and yesterday they made us take a wedding picture by the hot tub.. hahaha.

The host family got a new host student last night - his name is Jamar and he is fresh out of high school. He is very attractive and very young and slightly ghetto and I feel slightly frightened for him. I wonder what it would be like to live in a foreign country for 3 months fresh out of high school?

We gave a presentation in Spanish yesterday. It was about the first time we met our host families. I played the warm, welcoming, nurturing mother. We made everyone laugh. That was cool.

Anyway, I think that I've written about the deaf/half-blind/mute worker who lived in and out of my host family's house and who has been around for 17 years. Well, he died last night.

When I came home from school last week Boli, my host brother, told me that "Mudo," (this is what everyone called him), which means mute in spanish, had run away, back to his family's house. Yesterday, I was told that he was in a coma. Last night, after we got home from a night of merengue/bachata dancing, Boli got a call saying that Mudo had died.

Mudo is the "Tom" (my uncle who has down syndrome) of the Dominican. Everyone knows him and loves him and he is practically famoso (famous) here. He spoke his own language, using hand gestures and making sounds to express himself, just like my Uncle Tom has his own language. But after being around him for a while, you begin to understand him and you can speak his language too. Mudo was hilarious, just like Tom, always making funny, exaggerated gestures. He cleaned dishes and did other small household tasks and my host family (my host mom is excellent) took him in as one of their own - sort of like they do with everyone. For my host mom, everyone is her child.

Before we went out dancing last night I told Boli the story of a fish that we got in Brooklyn who died a week after we got him. My roommate and I painted a picture of him after he died and wrote "...Just passing by" as the caption. Boli and I talked about how amazing it is that people can enter into your life for such small amounts of time, yet make such deep, lasting impacts. This is how I feel about Mudo - I knew him for a mere 3 days, and then he was gone with the wind.

So at 4am last night we went to Mudo's house. There were lots of tears and lots of people sitting around and lots of spanish consoling and mourning that I didn't understand. Mudo's stepmother lit a candle for him and said that he was in heaven (I think?). He really was an angel. They had his body wrapped up and his head wrapped in a cloth so that only his face was showing. He looked so peaceful. It was such an experience.

This morning I showed my host mom a picture that I had taken of Mudo (the one on this page) and wrote in spanish on google translator: "I am so blessed that I got to meet him. This picture is special because it is one of the last ones taken of him."

This trip has had so many extremes. I have felt extremely happy when I went out dancing or while we were playing with children or at the beach or just being at home or in the warm weather or immersed in this beautiful enviroment. But I have also, at times, felt profoundly sad or, I guess, humbled by other experiences-  last night at Mudo's house, the earthquake in Haiti, the orphanage, walking with Dean and watching him interact with homeless Haitian boys, hearing about the plight of Haitian's form Lauren, seeing extremes of wealth and poverty existing side-by-side, etc. etc. etc. That, I think, is the theme of this trip - extremes - of emotions, of wealth, of lifestyles, of understanding, of...everything. There is so much beauty here accompanied by so much inhumanity - what is different about the Dominican is that here, the extremes are amplified.

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?

Day 12

I spent a lot of time with children today. First at a public school, observing a kindergarden and a fourth grade class, and then at an orphanage where I got to play with the residents. Children are fantastic and the characteristics that they share are cross cultural. The school was very poor, but the Principle told us that it they were better off than some schools. I have no clue how children focus in the school! It seems so difficult since the windows are constantly open and there is constant noise from all over the school. Both the kindergarden class and the 4th grade class were focused on learning as a collective group - the children got little individual attention and the school style in general in terms of maintaining any sense of order - the kids stood up in class or walked around the room and at recess when they got excited because we wanted to take their picture, they created essentially a mosh pit  and the teachers just stood by and watched. Everything about the school seemed ancient - the toys were falling apart, there was no soap in the bathrooms, the computers were so old, and the books were taped together. The students all wore uniforms complemented by pieces of their own styling - it was a pretty conservative style of dress- actually dress in the DR is a lot more conservative than I thought it would be. I learned more from the kindergarden class than I did in my class at PUCMM. They were so cute!

The orphanage was a former drug dealer's house that had been reposessed. It was gorgeous!! They had a pool and an outdoor pool house where some of the boys lived and about 5 bathrooms and gorgeous, open living rooms/dinging rooms. All old drug dealer's homes should be used for such noble purposes! When we pulled up the orphans came out to greet us and we were overwhelmed by love. They held our hands and and gave us hugs and brought us out to  a big patio where we got more love and hugs. They ranged from about 6 to some older kids who were around 13. Whenever I meet a new person, especially a child,  I say "Yu eres mi maestra" (which hopefully means you are my teacher haha). They put on a little show for us and sang us spanish songs. I felt like I was home watching my cousins Morgy and Shelly perform for the family. We brought them lollypops and milk and other small food items. We left when they went in to have dinner (white rice and meat) and it was the first time I saw a anyone say grace in this country. They said it collectively and a small girl, about 8 or 9 did a fantastic job of leading everyone in prayer. It was an incredibly humbling experience.

On the way back I had the taxi driver drop me off at Calle Del Sol (he had noooooooooo clue what he was doing and took us in circles) where I thought I was going to take a yoga class. But when I got to the Culture Center I discovered that there was no yoga class - only a 2 hour tango class. It was something that I had not anticipated doing, but, alas, those are always the best kinds of experiences. So I took a 2 hour tango class from an Argentinian teacher who was amazing - very strict and precise and passionate. What a sexy, passionate, performative, intimate, staccato-ish dance!! We learned a 3ish minute dance and the teacher asked me if I was a professional dancer. It is so awesome to communicate through body language and not words. Wow - that was an incredible. Why is it that all of the best things happen to be unplanned!

 I LOVE WORLD DANCES! So far I've experienced African, Argentinian, Spanish, Classical, Arabic, Greek, Chinese.... ahh they are all so symbolic and incredible.

Later on we went out dancing - I danced to reggaeton and merengue and salsa with Rolando who I would describe as a very gentle dancer. If I had to identify the word that I used most frequently on this trip it would definitely be "bailar" - to dance.


The truest expression of a people is in its dance and in its music. Bodies never lie.

Days 10 + 11

I've developed a profound sense of empathy for Haiti and its people. I'm so ignorant! I only just learned that Haiti and the Dominican Republic share the same piece of land.. and it it took a natural disaster to prompt me to investigate its whereabouts. How is it that a "nation" like Haiti even exists in the condition that it does? The peace corps has been pulled from there, since (according to mi amigos) they cannot guarantee that volunteers will be safe there. It is the poorest nation in the Americas, with most Haitians living on less than $2 per day. How is that even possible? There are millions of people there and it is about the size of massachusettes. One of my friends (I forget which one) told me that planes will not even fly there and that it is hard to get a bus to go there because it is so dangerous. I don't know whether or not it is true? There is not only racism against haitians here in the DR, but also what is called "colorism." Lighter skinned Dominicans are considered of higher status than darker skinned Dominicans (Haitians). It is almost sad that I seem to have internalized this a bit - I can't remember if I already blogged about it, but my Chinese friend and I bumped into a man who was from Haiti in Santo Domingo. He looked the part and when he came up to my friend speaking almost perfect Chinese and subsequently proved that he could not only speak Chinese, but also French, Spanish, English, Puertugese, German, and Creole, I found that I was absolutely astonished that *a Haitian* who was so young (our age) could make the switch between so many different languages. What made me feel this way? I must have somehow subconsciously come to believe that all Haitians were uneducated because this is how the culture treats them and really a lot of them are not.

When we see little boys begging for money or offering to shine shoes or wanting to sell us flowers on the street, they are usually Haitians. My peace corps friend works primarily with Haitian boys, who are not allowed to attend school past 6th grade without a birth certificate, which a lot of them don't have because their parents abandon them. The lady who did my braids was Haitian and claimed to have 4 children and no husband (he abandoned her).  Yesterday, i thought about taking my braids out because they are getting a little itchy and I miss swinging my big hair around, but after the earthquake I decided to keep them in in memory of her and of the plight that these people face.

How can there be such extremes of wealth in the world? Why can't some rich business man or movie star come in and give Haiti a million dollars, fix things, do something, anything! It seems like common sense that we would want to help out fellow human beings.

Lauren, a PhD student on this trip and our TA advisor is doing her dissertation on the changing linguistic landscape in Haiti. She has been to Haiti a few times and says that they are the nicest, friendliest, most grateful people she has ever met! I sensed this from the woman who did my hair. Get this:
While Lauren was staying in Haiti, 3 times she was asked by boys and mothers of little girls if she would like to have their children. One time, she was holding a little girl and the mother walked away saying "you an keep here." Lauren had to physically chase after the woman and tell her "I don't want your child!" Mothers want to give away their children to Americans so that they can go get educated and work in America and send money back home. Talk about poverty and desperation! This makes all the gender roles and family/child relationship issues that we have in America seem so trivial. And it makes me mad when I think about children not appreciating their parents or developing attitudes like "my parents owe me this or that." In Haiti, parents don't even owe it to their children to stay with them.

This is a strange sequence of events that happened before the earthquake struck:

1.  I was in the gym running, thinking about poverty and unequal dispersions of wealth and whatnot when all the sudden I started thinking about natural disasters, earthquakes in particular, and how I had forgotten about them and their potential for devastation.

2. A movie with Salma Hayek came on the TV and there was an earthquake in it that shook the earth, sent buildings toppling down, and killed a lot of people.

3. I went to the back room to do some pushups and all of the sudden the ground started shaking. I didn't know what was going on. It was so scary. It sounded like the wires to the building overhead were snapping and I thought that it might be collapsing so I ran to the nearest window in case I might need to jump. It lasted about 30 seconds. The gym lost electricity and everyone went running for the exit. When I ran out into the main part of the gym some of the employees were standing at a nearby exit shouting and laughing and talking excitedly. This put me at ease and I assumed that the earthquake was small and inconsequential. I was happy that I got to experience it.

Then I got home and watched the news and realized that it was a 7.3 on the richter scale in Haiti, which shares an island with us. I realized that it was a big deal, that it had devastated a country that had already experienced so much at the hands of poverty, flooding, economic instability, etc.

It felt almost like I had been warned that there was an earthquake coming - weird.

That was my first earthquake. It felt surreal! I rememember watching What the Bleep Do We Know and seeing a scene in which a Shaman and his people were standing by the ocean shore  looking out. There wer three ships coming in, but the people could not see them because they had no recollection of what a ship was stored in their consciousness. This is sort of how I felt about the earthquake. I had no experience with it, it was such a foreign thing to me, that it felt strange and unnerving to experience it and it was difficult to identity what it was.

My heart cries for Haiti and I feel like because I know French and have been placed here in the Dominican I should be doing something more than sitting here watching what is going on.

Anyway, that is my experience of the earthquake. Yesterday, we went to visit a museum called the House of the Three sisters. It was a  house that three sisters who had been killed by a dictator called Trahidi (spelling?) in the 1950/1960s had lived in. They were activists who went around the country creating cells of Dominicans who were opposed to his tyranny. They were all sisters and very beautiful. They were killed by him because of their activism, and there death had been staged as a "Car accident." There was one sister who was still living and she came to the house to see us- we got to talk with her and take pictures with her. She was the sweetest, kindest old lady! She had just finished writing a book about her experience and her sisters. It was written in Spanish, but I bought it anyway and am planning to use it as a way to help me learn Spanish. She signed it for me.

Social activism is so inspiring!

We came home that day and went to a jazz performance at the Teatro Nationale. It AMAZING. so chill. There was a musician there who had made his own instruments and who sang in his own language, according to how the music was moving him, totally improving the whole performance - the other members of the band had to just go with it - it was so inspiring and cool to see people lose themselves in their music and I definitely felt connected.
http://www.fellevega.com/

 Rolando and I read Corinthians in Spanish tonight. I learned that "love" is "caridad" in Spanish, which is my host mother's name. He is so, so sweet.

If I speak in the tongues of men and angels, but have not love,
I have become sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal.

And if I have prophecy and know all mysteries and
all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains,
but have not love, I am nothing.

And if I dole out all my goods, and
if I deliver my body that I may boast
but have not love, nothing I am profited.

Love is long suffering,
love is kind,
it is not jealous,
love does not boast,
it is not inflated.

It is not discourteous,
it is not selfish,
it is not irritable,
it does not enumerate the evil.

It does not rejoice over the wrong,
but rejoices in the truth

It covers all things, it has faith for all things,
it hopes in all things, it endures in all things.

Love never falls in ruins;
but whether prophecies, they will be abolished; or
tongues, they will cease; or
knowledge, it will be superseded.

For we know in part and we prophecy in part.

But when the perfect comes, the imperfect will be superseded.

When I was an infant,
I spoke as an infant, I reckoned as an infant;
when I became [an adult],
I abolished the things of the infant.

For now we see through a mirror in an enigma, but then face to face.
Now I know in part, but then I shall know
as also I was fully known.

But now remains faith, hope, love, these three;
but the greatest of these is love.

Day 9

Today was a day reserved for traveling. We woke up early (and barely), packed up our loot, and headed down to the breakfast buffet where I had an omelette and a yogurt with honey. Then we boarded a bus headed for Santiago.

On the way back we stopped at a place called Les 3 Ojos (the 3 eyes). It was an underground cave with different levels and stairs that you could use to walk down to them. It was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen and I can't believe how far down it descended. On the way down we saw a massive iguana chillin' on the walkway. He was gray and appeared to be sunbathing. We walked down to another level and had to take a little wooden boat pulled by overhanging ropes by one of the workers to get across the lake. Once across,  we walked down a few more levels and on the way down we saw these massive bee hives, bats flying around, and tree roots that hung down from the trees on the above levels that were about 5 times the length of the tree itself! On the last level we got to see the body of water where a scene from Jurassic Park was filmed. Apparently the scene took 30 hours to film and was edited down to only 20 minutes in the actual movie! I'll have to watch it again and look for that part. I can't believe that such a beautiful, beautiful world exists underneath the earth!

We stopped for lunch at a nice restaurant along the side of the road. I ordered Creole soup and a chicken salad which were both massive! Dominican portion sizes are sooooooo biggggggg! And there are never ever any desserts - just amazingly fresh fruit virtually everywhere! I bought some Dominican gummy-type candy just to see what it was like - It was sweet and tasted like candy back home, but I don't think they made it with high fructose corn syrup. I wonder if there is a lot of that ingredient down here? While we were waiting for everyone else to finish up with paying and whatnot me and Alicia walked around a small village next to the restaurant. It is amazing how poverty and wealth can coexist so closely!! We saw a mansion with gates and barbed wire next to run down wooden huts that barely had doors that closed. That is the DR for ya!

We arrived back home at 4pm. I was super tired from traveling and dancing and all the stuff we did and I felt so grateful that I had a nice home to come back to. Which makes me think about people who don't have that - who embark on long journeys to find food or work or do other survival type things and then have no place to come back to.

I gave Camilla the necklace I bought her and made her a card that said "Happy Birthday! You are a beautiful girl! With Love, Leila." She was upstairs playing a princess game - she loves the Disney princesses. It was the first time I got to see her room and I noticed that a lot of her toys were American - like the Jonas Brothers bag and disney princess everything and Hannah Montana. Sleeping Beauty is called Princess Aurora here. Rolando and Bolivar (the boys) were home when I came back. We went outside and played spanish music and drank some wine followed by whiskey and club soda (haha) by the "hot" tub, which was really a cold tub since they don't turn on the electricity because it costs too much to heat. Rolando (who is a DJ and an amazing dancer) taught me how to salsa and merengue in the   hot tub and then he helped me with my spanish. It was paradise, as usual.

As the traveler who has once been from home is wiser than he who has never left his own doorstep, so a knowledge of one other culture should sharpen our ability to scrutinize more steadily, to appreciate lovingly, our own

Day 8

It is amazing how fast the days go by here. Waking up at 8am seems to early when you are out until 3am dancing and whatnot, but then 9pm arrives so quickly that you are happy you woke up to greet the sun. At 8am I woke up and went downstairs for breakfast where we were supposed to meet everyone. Everyone else except for one other girl and my professor were still sleeping so I got an omelette, toast, some fruit, and yogurt (it was a very American buffet as our hotel is geared towards foreigners from out of the country) and sat with them. They were in the midst of a conversation of a conversation about different cultures and intercultural marriage and religion etc. Shondel (professor) expressed some of her opinions. I have some thoughts about them. I shared mine. It was interesting and I like the fact that there is always someone with whom to exchange perspectives and who is willing to share on this trip. Then I went upstairs to shower and change and get ready for our tour around Santo Domingo.

The first tour was a waking tour around the streets of Santo Domingo. It is a very touristy and historical city like I imagine many capital cities to be. It's streets are so cute, made of cobblestone and very narrow. There are parks with benches where children play and people got to sit and chat like the parks at NYC back home. Our first stop was a nearby cathedral. We couldn't go in if our shorts/skirts were not at least knee-length so some of the girls had to  sit outside (later they were allowed in, but only after a man at the door gave them scarves to wrap around themselves). The cathedral was very old and very beautiful. There were little open rooms along the sides with tombs and shrines and a beautiful, beautiful nativity set made of lifesize figures was set up in the back. The icons were all extremely dark and the stained glass was painted abstractly. We had a funny tour guide who joked that he as going to give us a 2 hour mass. All of our tour guides thus far have been so funny in their own unique ways - I wonder how they developed their senses of humor. This tour guide told us that Christopher Columbus was rumored to have been buried in Santo Domingo and that there is a lot of debate about exactly where he is now and what is heritage is. Everyone seems to want to claim him for themselves! After we left the cathedral we walked to a house the Christopher Columbus's brother had lived in, but which was also used to house house prisoners. It was this MASSIVE castle made of stone and brick with a million rooms. I daydreamed about how fun it would be to play hide and seek in. Then we went to a museum dedicated to Christopher Columbus and saw some old documents and whatnot.

We got back on the bus and headed for a mall where we were going to have lunch. Some of the girls and Shondel complained that it was too American, but it was important to see that in the DR. They had American stores like Swarovski, Nine West, Pizza Hut, and Haggen Das, but also some spanishy ones that I hadn't heard of. It was a typical mall with many floors and a food court. One of mi amigas told me that she had taken a class about foreign malls and that it is a very American model that has influenced many malls abroad - so I'm happy we got to see it. I had an empanada and some tostones and, later on, an icecream =P.

We reboarded the bus and headed towards al Jardin Botanico (Botanical Gardens) where we took a bus tour, stopping once at a Japanese garden to walk around. The garden looked like something out of a dream. It was so serene, with twisted trees and tranquil beds of water and strategically placed rocks and other plants. I did some yoga poses and frolicked a bit. It was instant paradise.

Our last stop was "the house of lights," which slightly confused me. It was a United Nations type building and there were rooms or spaces dedicated to countries that had chosen to represent themselves in it. I was confused about why some countries were chosen and not other (no arabic countries) and who got to decided what went into the museum. Some of the countries had art or old documents and maps. Others, like the USA, had only pictures (of native Americans). Museums are always interesting because they are, above all else, archetypical examples of power at play and somewhat stereotypical so I enjoy seeing how, exactly, things in them get represented.

We went back to the hotel after the tour and I headed out into the streets to buy some souvenirs. The street where vendors are set up and shops are open for bargaining is conveniently located right outside our hotel! It was just like a NYC street might be and, walking down it, you can tell which products are bought in mass quantities. One thing that all of these places (like the market and now this street) have in common is that there is a lot of colorful artwork. It is so beautiful! Mostly paintings of African woman, animals, scenery, and one of a Dominican girl with a round face and pursed lips who looks lightly Chinese. While I was shopping for jewelry, me and my Chinese friend met some man from Haiti who spoke about 10 different languages. He came up to her and asked her if she was Chinese and then started speaking Chinese (very well)!! He was amazing and it was totally shocking!! Of course I spoke to him in French (he said I was good) and it was a great mental exercise trying to switch between three different languages (french with him, spanish with the men in the store, english with my friend). Languages are so amazing!!!

For dinner, we went to a restaurant called Adrian's Tropical which was located right next to the Carribean. We got to eat while waves crashed up against the restaurant. I had chicken and yucca (haha) and white wine.  It was amazing.

Later on we went dancing at some spots near our hotel. I did some salsa and merengue and dance to reggaeton. If I could, I would dance forever!

The Dominican Republic is so romantic! Everything about this trip feels like a dream. I am in love!

What sets worlds in motion is the interplay of differences, their attractions and repulsions.

Life is plurality, death is uniformity.

By suppressing differences and pecularities, by eliminating different civilizations and cultures, progress weakens life and favors death.

The ideal of a single civilization for everyone, implicit in the cult of progress and technique, impoverishes and mutilates us.

Every view of the world that becomes extinct, every culture that disappears, diminishes a possibility of life

Day 7

There is a rooster who lives close by to our house. He crows everyone morning at 2 or 3ish and continues at intervals of about 5 minutes until later in the morning. Last night, I heard him crow before I went to sleep. The cute cat who lives with us is a sneak. He hid himself in my room last night and since I sleep with the door shut he had no way of getting out. He is such an abnormal cat and his purr is very loud. He jumps on everything!

I woke up to eggs and potatoes for breakfast. The potatoes were gray and Caridad's neighbor told me that they were sweet potatoes. I read the paper while I ate and Caridad (host mom) talked on the phone. Juan was there for a brief second, throwing seductive looks my way as usual (no worries - he is just crazy and funny).

I had to pack for Santo Domingo so I went downstairs to do that. When I came back up, Juan had brought me suntan lotion, a banana, and another bracelet. By now, I can safely assume that all of these gifts are from the trash. I excitedly responded ohhhhhh muchas gracias when he gave them to me as my host mother laughed in the background. Robinson drove me to PUCMM where we were meeting to leave for the trip. He taught me a little bit about driving standard along the way and blasted really loud reggaeton music in hit tiny, crappy little car. Funny that his parents didn't get him a better car - hid dad drives a BMW and his mom drives an explorer, but his car is more like something that came out of my driveway back home. I wonder what this means.

We took a bus to Santo Domingo, the capital of the Dominican Republic. It was a 2 hour ride. When we got there we ate at this amazing dominican restaurant with a dominican buffet and watched this incredible merengue dancer who danced on a bottle with one foot, and spun around super fast, among other things. Afterwards, I danced with some of the male merengue dancers. Then we checked into our hotel and drove off to a market to bargain and shop. It felt like being in NYC, except everyone spoke spanish and all the products were a lot more colorful. Dominican artwork is so awesome!!! So colorful and a lot of it seems to be about African women. There was a lot of jewelry and a lot of the same tiny knicknacks. I bought some stuff and bargained a bit and learned how to say how much. It was fun to negotiate and I got some good prices!

My camera broke!!!!!!

Then we reboarded the bus and went back to the hotel to get ready for whatever it is we wanted to do at that night. I decided to go to a Dominican Baseball game!! My first baseball game and it wasn't even in the US!! It was a pro game in a really dirty stadium and some of the players were American because apparently American players come down to play in the Dominican to learn more/keep in shape during the winter. There were salespeople walking around the whole time selling popcorn, pork rinds, fruit, pizza in a cardboard box, candy, cheese, and empandas - all out of cardboard boxes. The game proceeded much like I imagine an American game would and I spent a good amount of time learning more Spanish words from the Spanish man sitting next to me and trying to explain how, exactly, baseball worked to my Chinese friend because there is no baseball in China. We were given these orange blowup long balloons that everyone hit together to make noise when their team needed support. The home team was called the Tigers. They had a big screen in the distance showing the players who were up at bat and the stats and videos of the crowd and twice someone from the audition sang kareoke! It was a great experience.

Then we took a taxi home and I got ready to go out again. I was going to go dancing, but by the time everyone agreed on a plan I was a bit tired and didn't want to take a taxi far away from the hotel so me and my Chinese friend Alicia went and got a drink and a sandwich nearby. When we were first looking for a place, two guys started walking with us and attempted to guide us into a dangerous neighborhood, but we luckily were able to make it clear that we had no intentions of hanging out with them or of going where they wanted to take us - that was sort of scary! I had one of the greatest conversations of my life with her and I am so thankful that she is on this trip! she is a real gem. We talked about Americans and how they complain a lot, since, during our complaint session back at PUCMM we both said nothing and before going out to the club here, when the other girls started talking about the teacher, and the experience in general, and different people, which inevitably evolved into more complaining, we both sat their and smiled and laughed. We both agreed that you can always find something to complain about and that people should just be grateful. We also both agreed that being alone is important and that when there is nothing else to say or do people start complaining and that some ideas/things simply cannot be translated. She is amazing and she said that she admired me because I was different, approachable, optimistic, not superficial, and spiritual. It was interesting to hear this assessment of myself, since I  am often unconscious of the way I am coming across to people. She said that her goal, like mine, was to develop into a person who could function cross-culturally, and that she was beginning to sense that she was becoming such a person. We discussed  how important it is to be uncomfortable sometimes and culture shock and and her experience in America and in China and values/qualities that make it easy to become  a person who can navigate through different cultures. I told her about peace corps and we both agreed that we were seeing a lot of poverty on this trip, but not experiencing it, and so we were not developing empathy in this respect, which is what Peace Corps does and why I want to do it! It was such an important conversation and I am blessed that she has entered into my life!

Today, I thought more about Americans that I did about Dominicans, since a lot of us are beginning to become more comfortable here and therefor showing our true colors.

Santo Domingo is awesome! Sort of touristy (there's a hard rock cafe down the street), but nice and colorful and I still feel like I am in a dream!! Let see how long it lasts!

You are not a human being in search of a spiritual experience. You are a spiritual being immersed in a human experience.