Well, I survived my first Christmas in the Dominican Republic! It was a bit of an emotional ride but what the heck, this whole experience has been. I was fortunate enough to video chat with my family, aunt, uncle and cousins along with a few friends so I did get a little piece of home which was great.
As you would assume, Christmas here is different in many ways. The celebration consists of "Noche Buena" y "La Navidad" on what would be our Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. On Noche Buena families cook big meals and spend the evening drinking and dancing. La Navidad consisted of more drinking, dancing and in the evening everyone wears a new outfit. Looking at the BIG picture, it is easy to find similarities - family, music, food and cooking but it was NOTHING like home.
Family. Over the past few days, my little community of about 200 people has practically doubled. My house of four people has turned into a house full of eight people, three of them being grown adults (and all eight of them sleeping in just two beds). Two of my Dona's sons came in town for the holidays with one of their spouses. One of them is the father of Aumendi (my little brother) who also has another child, a three year old little girl named Yubelacy. Up until this point I was unsure of where Aumendi's parents were. It is quite common here for grandchildren to be living with their grandparents and it is all for different reasons. Aumendi's mother explained to me that when her family left my community for work, Aumendi hated his new community, there were no kids and the pace of life in a bigger neighborhood was too much for him. She then brought him back here to live with his grandmother and go to school here. He is five years old and has made a decision to live away from his mom, dad and little sister. It was really neat to see them interact. I have watched Aumendi get picked on and pushed around by a lot of kids in the neighborhood and this week he and his little sister have been inseparable. His dad also took him to the big city and bought him a new outfit for La Navidad and a water gun so he was the coolest kid on Christmas Day and he looked adorable in his new outfit and his little loafers which he hated! It was also great seeing my Dona surrounded by her sons. It reminded me a little bit of home. She really is a wonderful woman!
Yubelacy y Aumendi
Aumendi in his new Navidad outfit!
Music. The music here is completely different to say the least. One of my favorite things about Christmas back home is the music. Within the first hour of my Dona's son arriving he pulled out four enormous speakers into the front yard of my house. Yes, my Christmas was full of music - BLARING bachata, meringue and reggaetone having nothing to do with Christmas but singing about finding an American to give you a visa. Merry Christmas! So yes, this year I woke up on Christmas morning to bachata music and looking out into my front yard to people drinking rum!
Food. I haven't seen my Dona outside of the kitchen in the past three days. She works so hard and manages to keep a smile on her face throughout it all. We had a HUGE meal for Noche Buena which consisted of roasted chicken, apples, potato salad, empanadas, pasta, bread, hen and other birds that I am not sure what they were. Everything was really good. It was a little strange because she served me first and I ate dinner at a table by myself staring at a wall but it was really good otherwise. Definitely not like Christmas dinner at home but all in all it was a good meal. In terms of drinking, it is a major past time in the Dominican Republic. Not too many people drink in my community on a nightly basis but they have made up for it over the past few days. I can look out into my front yard now and it looks like my old college house, empty bottles everywhere. Everyone drinks, age doesn't matter. As I am writing this, there is still music blaring in my front yard with about 15 guys aged 22-30 drinking and my Dona keeps sending out platters of food for them to eat. She has been whispering a countdown to me over the days... "in two days they are leaving" "tomorrow, we will be alone and it will be quiet again".
My Dona w/ part of my x-mas dinner!
So yes, Christmas was definitely different, the 85 degree weather and constant sweating made it easy to forget what was going on back home and now it is practically over, just a few more hours of these same 10 songs I've been hearing over and over. Anyways, I hope everyone had a lovely Christmas and I was thinking of all of you!
On to other things. Overall, the past month or so has been good. I am feeling more comfortable in my community and everyday a new kid warms up to me and screams my name when passing by. All of the children are on Christmas vacation so that has been fun. Usually the days are quiet because they are at school but I have been busy being pulled in every direction. Like I have said, the first three months in my community is supposed to be spent building trust. We are not supposed to start any big projects but only little things. I had planned on starting English classes but I have put that on hold and instead put on a cricket tournament and will hopefully do a volleyball tournament in a few weeks. The cricket tournament was fun. It was a bit disorganized as I had expected. I had two boys in the community round up teams over the course of a week and I would check in with them everyday. The day before the tournament I asked for the list of teams and both the boys had put themselves on about three different teams. Each of our cricket teams had only two people so I had to explain to them that they can't be on more than one team because it is impossible to play on two teams at once. They continued to tell me it was fine and I continued to tell them it wasn't, that it doesn't make sense. We worked through that and ended up having about 12 teams. It was a learning experience and definitely a case of trial and error but all in all we had a good time and even painted our faces. I gave the winning team each a little pack of silly bands and I can't explain what a hit they were. Now everyone is asking for all sorts of tournaments, dominoes, baseball, volleyball, basketball etc.
Cricket Tourny
I am still in the process of interviewing people in my community. It has been hard to get things done over the holidays and I think it will be hard over the next week or so as well. The pace of life here is slow on any given day, and then throw in the holidays and it is basically a lost cause to even attempt to accomplish anything right now. So for now, I am just going to have to put some of that to the side.
For those of you who know me well, you know that I am very impatient when it comes to time. Not much else phases me but if I am running late, I get anxious. If you tell me you will pick me up at 7:30, nine out of ten times I will be standing in my front yard waiting for you but if you are five minutes late, I will be on the phone asking where you are. I hate being late and there is no such thing as being late here. Actually, there basically is no such thing as time in the Dominican Republic so it has been trying. I experienced the same thing when I was in Tanzania and I promised myself I would try to not get so caught up with time upon my return but it did not work out. I understand it is a different culture and blah blah blah but 9:00 still means 9:00 wherever I may be. For example, I get a phone call asking me to attend a meeting in my community with the senator of the nearby city and a few Brazilians whom are investing in nearby land, "it is very important you attend because it would be great for my community because it will provide jobs" ok great, meeting starts at 10:30, I will be there and so will two other volunteers that live in neighboring communities. The two other volunteers arrive in my community at about 10:20 and we then wait for my project partner to finish getting ready. By the time she is finished it is close to 10:45 and we are all getting anxious because we are late and we have a 15 minute walk ahead of us, I mean this is important, it is the Senator right? We would look awful showing up late. We arrive at the location to find that nobody else is there other than two men setting up a tent. Ok, great, its 11:00, we are late but where is everybody, I thought this meeting started at 10:30? Time passes, nobody else has showed up. We are all kind of looking at each other as each minute ticks by. At about 12:15 people start coming and fifteen minutes later, the senator, the Brazilians and his entire entourage show up. I still don't understand. The meeting was supposed to start at 10:30, it was now half past noon. All of the Dominicans were told 10:30 but they didn't start arriving until 12:15. Was 10:30 just a joke? Why not just say 12:00 or 12:30? How did the Dominicans know that 10:30 really meant 12:30? Yes, it may sound petty but when this happens a few times a week and you are sitting in the Caribbean sun dripping sweat, it does get frustrating. Then I have to remind myself - who cares, I have nothing else going on, I have nowhere to be, this is why I am here. It is hard though and to me, 10:30 will always mean 10:30.
I have one last, quick story to share before I go hide my head under my pillow because my ears are bleeding from this music. A few days before Christmas, one of my favorite little boys, Franlin, was told to pack his bags because he was going to spend some time with his mother (he also lives with his Grandma here). This has happened a few times with other kids, some have returned, some haven't, I haven't quite figured it out. I think Franlin will return at some point, I will let you all know when that is. Anyways, I was going to help him pack and he pulled out his bookbag and this is what it was!
Rock Chalk!
That about sums it up for now and below are a few more pictures. I will be spending my New Years in Cabarete which is in the Northern part of the country with other volunteers so I will let everyone know how that goes! Have a wonderful New Year!!
Fanlin y perro @ the river Playing Cricket
Me, Franlin y Marielis
Me and some of the girls @ the beach!
