Salto Alto, Monte Plata – More Photos Coming Soon! [Photo Cred: Prince Phillipe]

Life in Photos

My mom sent me a camera and this was the only photo on it. I love her 🙂

Preciosa

Meeting time! There were fifty plus people but I couldn’t take the photo until the very end.

It’s bicycle season and that means lots of repairs from the bad roads.

Milagros

Squishy ❤

Natural scenery

The Chicas Group

I’m growing vegetables!!

Cooking with Jaiya 🙂

A Woman Doing a Man’s Job

Check out that lawn. This was pre-chopiaring.

As with any other culture/country, things are often different from what you are accustomed to in your own culture/country. It is one of the greatest parts about the Peace Corps service–you get to experience and learn about a culture/country different from your own. A lot of times it is adventurous and fun but sometimes it is downright frustrating. I experienced the latter this week and I think it was a great learning experience for everyone, not to mention one of my proudest moments.

Let me give you some context: in my community ( I hate generalizing), women and men have more traditional roles–men do most or all hard labor and women take care of the house and children. The roles are a lot more rigid here then I am used to, and it can be incredibly frustrating for a person like me. You know, stubborn, sometimes too manly, independent, need-no-man type of person. Oh, you say that sounds like a feminist? I guess so…

Anyway, I live in a cute little house that has a HUGE yard. Since we don’t have lawnmowers here, in order to cut the lawn, the family can either pay someone to do it, or the man of the house does it. Well, since I had neither a man in my house or money, I decided to do it myself. But let me back up a bit because I am jumping ahead.

The term for cutting the lawn is chopiar which is interesting also the word used to say gold-digging. You know, a gold-digging woman. Why? I have no idea. To chopiar the lawn, a man takes a machete and literally cuts it manually with a machete. It is hard, laborious work, and clearly not what my community considers a women’s job. But last week, I was visiting Connie and Victoria and saw Connie, this young mother of three, chopiaring her patio and is I was inspired. I mean, truly inspired by her. Connie never ceases to amaze me–she is the health promoter that went to thirty interviews with me, all the while carrying in her arms her infant son as we walked miles. And her she was again doing this “man’s job” all the while wrangling three boys around. Sure, she probably could have waited for her husband to do it, but she just did it herself, I’m not sure why. A I watched her, I thought “Wow, I can do that”. She made me feel as though I could do it too. I have never felt inspired by someone really before, but she inspired me with her quiet strength that had me in awe.

Connie herself with her son, who she carries everywhere.

So, a few days later, I decided to at least to attempt it. I have never done anything like it before and I didn’t even have a machete, I had to ask Papa to use his, which he grudgingly gave me and made me promise not to cut myself (I smile and said I promised, of course). My Mama just thought I was crazy and actually laughed. This would turn out to be common reaction by people as they saw me carry the machete to my house to cut my lawn.

I tied up my hair, slapped on a hat, and in the midday heat, I got to work. For four hours, I labored and thought I would die, but I am stubborn, remember, so I kept going. I had to take a million brakes, and I had to duct tape my fingers from blisters, but I kept going. People walking by watched in shock at me doing it, but I kept going. People commented, laughed, told em to stop, told me I was crazy, but I kept going. The ants tore my feet apart and my body went numb, but I kept going. I kept thinking of Connie, and how stupid it was that people thought a woman couldn’t do this, and it kept me going. For four hours, I swung that stupid machete that was getting duller and duller after ever swing, and the closer I got to my goal, the more exhilarated I felt. It was incredible. I had no idea what I was doing but after an hour, it just became natural. There is not much to it, and once you get the swing, you can just keep going. I was slow, clumsy, and had to constantly take breaks, but after four grueling hours, I had reached my goal.

Day 3: Right Hand. Still Swollen, Still couldn’t bend my fingers, but my blister is not so disgusting looking.

I felt incredible. It was the most rewarding moment I think I have had in a long time and I have never felt so proud of myself. Sure, I tore up my right hand, and for days I wouldn’t be able to bend my fingers because they would be so swollen and sore, but I did it. When people looked at my torn hand in disgust and shock and lectured me on why I should not do a man’s job, I just smiled and proudly showed off my hands like they were great battle scars. People can’t understand why I would do it and why I am so happy about it, but I think that maybe I have gained a little more respect. Of course, Papa lectured me on how I can’t do it because it’s not a “woman’s job” to which I told him I never knew there were jobs just for me and jobs just for woman. To me, I told him, there are just “jobs”. He harrumphed.

J showing off his skills. I looked prettier doing it (a total lie).

People keep asking me, “Why didn’t you just make J do it?” and the answer is that I am proud and stubborn and I needed to see if I could do it. I like knowing that I can do things on my own. Fortunately, when people start telling him how he should never have let me do it, he told them that he doesn’t let me do anything, I just do it and he is proud of me for it. At least one person supports me 😉

 

I felt really good about myself until J came the next day and did twice as much as I did in one hour, but really he had the advantage–this wasn’t his first time. And because he knows me fairly well now, he left me part of the lawn to do when my hand heals.

For now, when people ask me, “B, did you really chopiar your patio? Are you crazy?” I just say, “Yes, and next time I will do it faster”.

xoxo

B

I Had a Visitor!

I had a visitor! And I am for once not talking about the creepy-crawlies kind (all those are frequent). Nope, Julia, the previous volunteer in my community came and visited! She was here for four days or so, and I think we collectively blew our community’s mind. She is tall and white…I am tall and white…so as you can imagine the people who didn’t know us really well would call her B and me Julia. It was slightly entertaining…but really it was just great to talk to someone who was in my shoes just a year ago. She understood the community, the people, the life better than anyone else, and it felt good to talk to her. She made me feel better about a lot of things, and cleared up even more (fact: she did not visit every person every day).

Julia! And Julie and Milagros and Connie and my Chicas girls!

It’s hard to be compared, but she helped make me feel better about being different, and how no one is perfect. As a second generation volunteer, you are held up to sometimes daunting standards and expectations and its hard for the community that is so traditional to bend and change and realize that each volunteer is different. But we are learning.

We had a nice time andaring together, had a nice little party with some close friends, and then she left. It was too short but very sweet and even though at first I was hesitant for her to come, I am really glad she did.

Chicas girls!

In other news, my Chicas group is taking off! We are learning about the scary and terrifying and uncomfortable topic of adolescence and body changes and the girls are slightly terrified of the idea, but are even more curious. And to celebrate the end of the topic we are going to have a nice picnic by the river for no reason at all but simply because its fun.

My child.

In other frustrating news, we are so close to submitting our grant for the latrine project. We just had our final committee meeting yesterday to make the final family selection and go over some more logistics, but now we have hit yet another obstacle. It is common to have a million things go wrong with your projects as a PCV, but it never makes it any less frustrating. But, we persevere. The women coordinating the project with me are fiery and I have seen them bring grown men down a few notches. I have also seen them somehow coordinate to have fifty people show up at the same place at the right time. It was like witnessing a miracle, I swear.

Stand-off.

Oh! I almost forgot! I got a cat. A kitten, actually, though age is TBD. J just randomly showed up with the kitten a few weeks ago and goes ,”her you go!”. he told me her name was Meirusa, which roughly means “Bad American Cat/Rat Killer”, which is confusing and since my mom can’t say that name, I just call her Rei (Ray). Her and Coby are now actually having fun playing together compared to hating each other before and trying to attack each other (kind of like me and my brother…). She likes to do drop attacks on him from the bed when he runs into the bedroom–it’s wonderful.

Meirusa aka Rei aka Coby’s sister

 

Anyway, I will end this post now so it doesn’t become too jumbled, but don’t worry, I am about to continue in another one 🙂

xoxo

B

The (Other) Family

I have talked a lot about my wonderful and amazing health promoters who are incredibly important people in my life. I have also gone on and on about mi mama y papa aqui but today for this post, I wanted to share with you the other important people in my life here. I have become incredibly close with one family here especially, and spend nearly every day with them. Somehow I have inherited three new brothers, which always leads to ridiculous joking, me doing the famous finger wagging, and all of us just laughing constantly. I have inherited a strong sister/mother/aunt (she is too young to be my mom really) and uncle who are always helping me, giving awesome advice, overfeeding me, and just making me feel loved always.

I finally have a camera, so I took some pictures to show you all. They own a motorcycle repair shop, so I have been picking up some new skills (are you not proud, dad?) and also Jaiya is teaching me to cook (Dominican style).

I love them, and as with all important people in my life, you should meet them. I present for you My (Other) Family.

Jaiya and Sonino

Kinney

Elliot! So stinking precious…

Joel, who I told to look normal and he gave me his rico suave look…

xoxo

B

It’s One of Those Bad Days

Coby is 3 Months old today!

I warned you, I would like to state for the record, that I was going to post all the good, bad, and ugly here in this blog. And this is one of those ugly days.

Now, I hate to be a Debbie-downer, or more like a super sad sally, so I have put in some good things in between here. The reality is that we have to always keep our eye on the good parts when we are in the middle of the ugly ones.

Here we go.

First, I want to update you all on the love of my life AKA my little fluffernutter Coby, who has grown exponentially in a terrifyingly fast manner and is eating and biting everything. He likes to think that my legs are play toys and that he can bite me like he is playing with other dogs. We are rapidly trying to break the habit. Anyway, he has recently learned to sit and now lie down! Such an accomplishment. Not to mention he is coming almost always when I can for him. And let me tell you, the sight of him running full speed for me, ears flying back, tongue falling out his mouth, and his little gordito self sprinting full head just makes me melt with happiness every time.

He keeps me happy. And he always drives me insane. It must be love, right?

The gorgeous Mela.

A few days ago, Meghan came to visit and she brought another addition to our family, Mela, this adorable two-month old kitten that I have been waiting for now for over two months. She was beautiful and had these big blue eyes and gorgeous coloring. I noticed soon after I got her that she had a nasty parasite that was preventing her from eating and making her lethargic, and her hair was falling out. So, I took her to the woman in our community who sells animal medicine and the anti-parasite medication. Without getting into details, Mela accidentally received the anti-parasite medication for a horse, not a two pound kitten. By the time I noticed it, it was too late. She died last night, after three long days of giving her saline injections and feeding her milk with a syringe. I have never cried so much.

For those who know me, I get incredibly emotional over animals for some reason now. I have cried over fish my brother caught and put alive in our sink to eat. I have balled over my mom killing moles that were tearing up our yard. So imagine how upset I am over this beautiful kitten that was my responsibility, that was given to me, and died over a mistake that I could have prevented. I have mentioned a million times before Peace Corps emotionally compromises you, and let me tell you, like Spock in Star Trek after the Vulcan Planet was destroyed, I was/am emotionally compromised so much that I had to take a me day today and get away. I could’t deal with do my job today. It is even harder when everyone views it as nothing because pets and animals are not a thing here. J even said right after she died that he will just get me another one. Needless to say, I cried harder.

That is the ugly part. I know what you’re thinking, “B, that’s not that bad”, but trust me, small things like that are crushing. And she wasn’t a small thing. I lied. She was a living being.

Anyway, I don’t want to talk about it anymore, so I am going to push forward to end with a good thing. I have been doing a young girls group, that I am in love with. The photo here is of a core group of my girls who are just so unbelievably bright and beautiful. They are infectious and eager and full of adventure. This week, we talked a lot about what it means to be “unique” for a girl, and how each of them is a unique person, unlike anyone else. It took a bit for them to really understand it, especially since they are at the age where they love their friends and want to emulate them in all ways. We made books about ourselves and how we are unique, made chocolate chip pancakes, and then had a talent show. I love being around young girls, when they are still young enough to not be jaded and are always smiling and happy. One of the girls told me in one of our groups talks that one of the reasons she loved our group was because it was the one place where people didn’t tell her “No, you can’t do that” and instead we tell her, “You can do anything”.

The Brilliant and Beautiful Girls! ❤

That’s why I love what I do.

Because the truth is, there isn’t anything we can’t do, especially when we are surrounded by people who love and support us.

I am here, after all.

xoxo

B

P.S. Cacata Kill Count: 6

P.P.S. All within the last month.

P.P.P.S. All in my house.

P.P.P.P.S. All killed by someone else.

P.P.P.P.P.S. Yes, I literally ran out of the house and down the road to find some muchacho to kill them.

Silk Panties and Development

I know, I know you are probably only reading this because of the words “Silk Panties” in the title. Or you are trying to figure out if I have gone a little nutty over here. I assure you, I have always been nutty.

Now, what could I possibly be talking about in this post. I have a point, I promise you, albeit it may not be one you believe, like, or understand. But I have one.

Let me begin with a story.

When I arrived to this steamy tropical country nine months ago, I had a nice stack of good ole’ cotton underwear. Through rough hand washing, rats, and lots of wear, these poor cotton underwear started to just fall apart and become full of wonderful holes. I, of course, kept on wearing them since I had no other option and lets be honest for a second, the holes made them cooler. Too much information? Okay, forget that part and let me continue.

After a particularly bad battle with the rats in my house in which I lost a pair of pants and essentially all the good underwear I had left, I was forced to concede and buy some underwear here, or as they call them “panties” (such a vile word). Well, I quickly found out that all they were selling were silk ones and no comfy cotton like I was accustomed to. So, with no other options, I grumpily bought them.

A bit later I was at my wonderfully divine and good friend Jaiya’s house (I have no idea how her name is spelled, I just spell all things phonetically now) and we got talking about the fact that I couldn’t find any cotton underwear in this whole country. She gave me this “are you nuts, of course not” kind of look, and then proceeded to tell me how of course they don’t have cotton underwear here, that’s ridiculous. And when I began arguing with her why (because obviously my american cotton is the best option) she began listing what are now super obvious reasons 1) Silk is cooler and in this hot tropical climate you need cooler 2) They are more airy 3) They wash MUCH better and easier 4) They hold up to wear and tear a lot better.

And then she started laughing so hard she started crying. “B! You have been wearing cotton panties this whole time? No wonder you are always so hot!” Then she laughed even harder. After calming down a bit she looks at me seriously and goes, “Well it looks like the rats did you a favor. God must have sent them to save you from your panties” and then she continued laughing for another solid ten minutes. Meanwhile, as you can imagine her laughing at me so much caused everyone around and walking by to stop and ask why, which then proceeded to being an entire conversation with the people of my community about how crazy I was for wearing cotton panties and how the rats came to eat them to help me out.

Lord.

So where am I going with this? Well, silk panties has a lot to do with my work and development work in general. You see, I came in here with my american cotton panties, thinking I had the right method down, I knew what I was doing, and paid no attention to what all the Dominican women were doing. I didn’t bother taking their lead, or trying to figure out exactly why they were only selling silk panties. I tried to make meeting times in the morning (a no-no), tried to jump start all these groups, and just race ahead. You see, with development, its easy to come in with your ideas about how to do something, and try to push it into the culture, onto the people, and fit it even when it probably isn’t the best option, or the right one.

If you take the time to stop, look around, and take a hint and take the lead from the people who are living in working in the community long before you arrive and will be long after you leave, you will learn a few very important things that will only make your work easier, better, and more efficient. Like that women can only meet in the evening after the work in their houses is all done, the women didn’t want more groups, they wanted more community outreach work, and more. In reality, taking the lead from the people will probably be the only way for your work to succeed.

You need to toss away your cotton american underwear, and swap them in for some silk Dominican panties, just like everyone else. You will find they are more comfortable, easier to wash, and a thousand other bonuses. Sure, I could have kept pushing forward with my own ideas, my own cotton underwear, but eventually it would have just completely fallen apart.

I would have failed.

With our work, one of the cardinal rules is to never harm the community, which can happen if you put on those blinders. Taking the time to know your community and to see what they are doing will be a way for you to adjust your project, ideals, work, to make it actually work for the community.

Otherwise, you will be stuck sweating in cotton panties that all the rats want to eat, with your whole community laughing at you, the crazy Americana.

Now, go throw away those ugly cotton catastrophes and go put on some nice silk panties so that you can get to work.

xoxo

B

Patronales Festival! The few times we can dress up and look fancy in our communities.

I Got a Child and a Husband All In One Week

Long time no…blogging? I haven’t been able to get on the internet long enough to punch out a blog post with actual details for a bit. A lot has to do with the fact that we just celebrates our Patronales and that is now being followed by the elections that takes over everyone’s life here. Plussss not to mention that I can barely get out of my site, and if I do I’ll probably not be able to get back into it. Why, you ask? Well, it turns out that May, June, July, August are the months of rain and storms and possibly hurricanes (but I have to see one here yet, but then again there is still plenty of time). As I have talked about before, we have two sections of the road that the rivers cross, and a really small (low) bridge that crosses one of them. As you can imagine, continual rain has flooded the rivers almost every day, thereby preventing any cars, motors, and usually people from crossing the road. Not to mention the dirt roads are especially muddy and dangerous at this time.

Coby, the boy who stole my heart 🙂 we also call him lobito or “little wolf” (also otter but I pretend it just means little wolf)

I was with J coming back from the capital the other week, and after about an hour of rain, the second, smaller river flooded over the road, and not just a little bit…no I am talking the water was a solid four feet or more over the road, rushing incredibly fast making probably a nice white-water rafting adventure. I, patient as a monk (re: not patient at all) was also very hungry and anxious to get home. So after waiting at least an hour or so, the river really had not receded that much but the men had started to carry the motors very carefully and very slowly across this rushing river in the pitch black darkness. So, I thought, if four men can carry a motor across, I can cross it by foot, right? I should probably also note that I was wearing a maxi dress at the time and carrying grocery bags. J was not happy about me crossing, but seeing as I was going to go with or without him, he conceded.

Let me tell you, the river was rushing a lot stronger than I thought. With my maxi dress hiked up to my waist (think Rose in the Titanic and how heavy and dangerous it was for her to have that obnoxious dress) with J having a death grip on one arm and grocery bags in the other, I somehow made it across the river and just slightly almost died (euphemism?). I tried not to think about how at any moment a log or tree or cow could come rushing down the river and take me out and then it would have been bye-bye B with everyone watching. Which, I would note that everyone probably would have videoed the gringa crossing if it wasn’t dark out.

This is the smaller of the two rivers that was flooded and also the one I crossed and nearly got swept away. Yikkessss…

So, long-story short, crossing is nearly impossible for the next few months. I am accepting all air drop packages at this time.

The other great thing about all the rain is that besides not being able to do essentially any work, having no access to the outside world, and continually nearly wiping out in mud, my house has a nice puddle display going on. For those who don’t know, my house has a roof made of zinc, typical here, and as with all zinc roofs, there are small holes in the roof. I have probably about twenty. It’s just a thing all zinc pieces have, I have no idea why. When it rains gently the water doesn’t come into the house, but remember this is hurricane season so it has been raining ridiculously hard. As such, water is continually leaking into my house, on my bed, onto my computer even as I write this now which means I have to write it under a blanket. On the plus side, I have continual “running water” for showering as I can shower under the water coming off the roof out of the gutter. It’s the positives, people.

Honestly, I don’t even know what my life was like before Peace Corps. It seems like a lifetime away. I faintly remember always having a phone, and schedules, and hot water, and running water, and being rat-free, and not being concerned about rain. But I can’t even fathom that really anymore. Kind of like how I can’t fathom Donald Trump is the Republican Candidate but that’s a bit off topic.

I have been here for nine months, seven of it being in my community and to be honest, I get anxiety just thinking about getting on a plane to go back home. It makes me nervous to think about that world over there with all that…stuff….the easy way I can get food and clean water and get from point A to point B. It’s…daunting to be honest.

Anyway, I recently got a puppy who is the most precioso thing in this world. His name is Coby, and the little munchkin nugget has become my obsession. I understand how mothers feel about their children now a little bit, because I think he is the bee’s knees aka the greatest thing ever. I also think a lot of my obsession and love for him comes from emotionally fragile Peace Corps state but that’s okay. I didn’t understand why anytime someone saw him for the first time they would tell me how beautiful and handsome and cute he was and then bless him. I mean, he was blessed A LOT. More than me, which I try not to get too jealous over. Meghan, a PCV, told me it was because many people think that if you compliment something the devil will take it because it’s so beautiful, precious, etc. and so you have to bless it afterwards. This explains a lot like for one why mothers always gave me these unreadable looks after I told them how cut their baby was and not bless the baby afterwards.

Yikes.

So anyway, right now I am not able to work a lot. As I said we just finished Patronales which was a weeklong celebration of our Saint (Catholic) where it was like a mini-festival here. There was a day when horses and cowboys/cowgirls came from all over the area to show their horses and ride them in the street, which I had heart eyes over. Unfortunately, my camera died and I couldn’t take any pictures, but next year! There was also a lot of dancing, drinking, and just hanging out with families. It also rained a lot (of course) so there was a lot of rain, but that didn’t stop us!

Combined with this celebration was the beginning of the cacao harvest, which this year has been incredibly good. There is A LOT of cacao right now, which is making everyone very, very happy because this money will provide for their family hopefully until the next harvest in the fall. As for me, I have been spending a lot of time with the younger girls doing games and activities, and trying to do the Me Toca a Mi course in the high school with Julie but that has proved to be nearly impossible. We were trying to figure out why we were having such a hard time getting the administration to back us and to find a day when the kids actually had classes when we heard something interesting. Our boss told us that the Dominican Republic education system is in the bottom five of the world. They have been doing some reforms, but it is slow moving for progress. It’s hard to be frustrated with the teachers or administration or students when it’s the system that is causing many of the problems.

Anyway, what else? We are doing meetings for the clinic and latrine project, but like I said, slow moving…other than that, I am kind of on standby with the rain and am spending most of my day obsessing over my dog or hanging out with my friends in the community. Hopefully we will see some movement at the end of this month because I am going slightllyyyyy (re: super) crazy.

Xoxo

B

P.S. J is the guy who my community thinks I am married to, fun fact.

Things I Never Thought I Would Do, But Now Have Done

Being here, you are affronted with new situations and experiences that you never imagined you would be in/experience. In fact, many of these I would have said before “I would NEVER do that” but alas, I have done them. As a wise man named Justin Bieber once said, never say never.

Things I Never Thought I Would Do, But Now Have Done:

1. Live peacefully with rats.
2. Eat food off the ground because you accidentally dumped it out in the grass and dirt when you were draining water and you had no more food.
3. Cook on a fogone.
4. Wear pants in the Dominican Republic.
5. Cross a rushing river in a maxi dress.
6. Go to a Catholic Church every Sunday.
7. Wash clothes in the river. A lot.
8. Eat my weight in eggplant.
9. Fall in love with tomatoes.
10. Kill a cachata with a machete.
11. Use an oil lamp as a main source of light.
12. Crack a joke in Spanish (and people actually laughed).
13. Build a table and a shelf.
14. Jump rope every day.
15. Go more than a week without peanut butter.
16. Hold a duck. It was terrifying. These are not normal ducks.
17. Date someone.
18. And then be “campo married” to them (don’t worry dad it just means you are dating them and everyone assumes you will get married. Basically.)
19. Eat off dirty dishes that possibly were touched by a rat because you were in a drought without water and starving.
20. Put curry powder in nearly everything because there are basically no other spices available.
21. Be on first-name basis with a vegetable man who personally brings you aguacate.
22. Go to Krispy Kreme.
23. Learn how to change a tire on a motor.
24. Feel like I have made a life here.