More Pictures

Happy Holidays and Happy New Year!! Hello all! I know I´ve been horrible about writing on this thing for quite a long time now so I´m trying to make up for it. Here´s some older pictures to share. I´m doing well, I´ve been a little homesick over the last couple weeks, after Mom and Dad´s visit and then realizing that this is the first Christmas in my 30 years of life that I haven´t spent with Mom, Dad, and Nate. However, things are going well, I´m enjoying a chance to relax in my site since it´s the holidays and nobody´s in school or doing a whole ton of work either. So I´ve been catching up on visits to people, reading a lot of cheesy historical romance novels, watching movies, sleeping a lot, and generally just relaxing for a few. Come January things are going to get busy again so I´m enjoying the down time while I can. All right, time to head out. But best wishes to all!! I´m thinking about all of you and miss you and hoping for some more visitors whenever anyone has some time and doesn´t mind roughing it for a few days.


Here I am!! I know you guys have missed seeing my lovely face so I thought I´d put up a picture, although this is a couple months old, but I think I look roughly the same.


Taking corn of the cob. This is part of the harvest that my friend Thony´s dad, Chelo, brought down from the loma. It´s used to make chen chen (which is grits), and to feed animals, mainly chickens and pigs.


A cool looking little green snake over on a tree in La Peña at Tima´s house. Tima is the president of the women´s group I´ve been working with and just a really cool lady in general. Speaking of my women´s group I finally got vegetable seeds for them to plant. Although, I´m still waiting for the grant approval and for it to get posted on-line.


We have these celebrations all the time in my community that are called Noche Vela. There´s always a procession from the church to the house where the Noche Vela is going to be. Everyone comes by chanting and singing and playing palos (big bongo type drums), carrying flags, pictures of saints, statues of saints, and in their church dresses. There´s a specific type of dress here that pretty much all the Catholic women in my site have and some men too. It´s usually bright colored and has some sort of cross sewn into it.


This is Nino, who is 97, born in 1912 he told me and has lived his whole life in El Batey. I see him walking all over the community, which is spread out over 10 kilometers so it´s not exactly short distances he´s going. He is one of my favorite old men here!


Efrein is one of the community leaders here in El Batey. He lives in the part of the community called Los Cerros.


Two handsome gentlemen hanging out in La Javilla, the center of town. It´s called La Javilla for the big (huge) trees that are there that are known as Javilla trees. Not sure what they are called in English.


This is my friend Thony and his niece, or is it his second cousin, or maybe his third cousin once removed. Man, I don´t know how people down here keep it straight. Pretty much they just call everyone primo or prima. And it seems at this point that most of the people in town are somehow or other related. If there first cousins then they call each other primo hermano or prima hermana and immediate aunts and uncles and godparents are tio and tia. Either way, this is one of the prettiest little bundles of joy I´ve seen!

Llorona

So this is my new little puppy Llorona. She's called Llorona because she cries a lot and Llorona means the crier. She doesn't cry as much now but she's a handful. Although she won't go to the bathroom on the cement. She stays at the house by herself when I leave. She loves to play and I have a feeling she's going to eat my flip-flops before long. I need to get her some little toys to play with. More on all later. Lots of love to all. And since I may not be on for a bit: Happy Holidays! and Happy New Year!

'Leners and Papi's Visit

Mom and Dad came down for 3 weeks in November. It was fun to get to show them around and see their impressions of my life and the culture in the DR. We started with a couple of days in the capital. I took them up to Entrena, the place where we had training at the beginning of our time here. Then we went and visited my first host family, which was really fun because I hadn't seen them since May and it was great to be able to introduce my parents and my dona to each other. We also walked down the Malecon, which is like the boardwalk by the ocean in Santo Domingo and went down to the Colonial Zone and I showed them some of the Columbus era buildings around there.

Then we headed out to the campo for 10 days. It happened to be the first ever patronales in my campo, which is usually associated with some kind of saint. However, being called El Batey we don't really have a saint associated with us so it was really just a big party all week long until midnight every night. Unfortunately, Mom and Dad, and later I came down with gripe (flu), but we still managed to do some wandering around. We went up to Elias Piña on the border to go to the Haitian market, which was huge, but pretty neat. It had everything under the sun from vegetables, to little barbecues, to blankets.



Also, the little neighbor kids stopped by every day to hang out with Mom and Dad. Here's the kids with Dad, Madelin, Cristofer, and Carlo.



And we went and visited my friends and neighbors. Here's 'Leners with one of my favorite doña, Miladi.



Also, Dad worked on some projects. He made a path with cement and rocks that leads from my back step to the letrine, which is so nice because before when it rained it was a muddy mess. He also made a dry well around my water spigot that looks great and again, keeps it from being a muddy mess. Mom took lots of pictures and videos, played the guitar, did some cooking. They both did a lot of reading which you can see from the picture below. I think my favorite 'Leners quote from the time was, "It's kind of like camping." Which I'd never really thought of before, but I guess is kind of true. I got cold water from the spigot outside for washing, bathing, dish washing etc., a nice latrine out in the back, although I do have a nice comfy bed and tables and chairs and a cement floor and a roof, even if the walls don't reach the ceiling.



After hanging out in the campo we went to the beach for a few days. We checked out the rocky beach at Los Patos and stayed at a little Italian run hotel/restaurant and had some great pizza for dinner, then we moved to a very pretty resort called Playazul which had a pool, private beach, a yummy French-inspired restaurant. It was great! Much nicer than the digs I usually stay in when I'm traveling around the country.

Hanging out drinking coconut milk straight from the coconut at Playazul.




Mom and Dad walking down the beach in Los Patos.



It was a great visit and so good to get to show Mom and Dad what my daily life is like here in the DR and to get a little vacation to the beach as well. Thanks Mom and Dad!! Miss you!!

Hanging out at my house!

I love my house!! It's sweet, it's off the main road so it's quiet and friends come and stop by to visit quite a bit. Here's some photos from the first couple months in my house.


A couple little friends Buche and Dabin road over from the other side of town on a horse to visit. They entertained me by singing reggaeton and bachata songs.


Francisco, Pedro, Andrioli and Niño hanging out at the house listening to songs.


Here's a picture of my kitchen/dining/living room. It's a little messy, but it usually is.


Mayra and Thony looking at my photo album with pictures from home.


My friend Francisco in a Blazers jacket.


Andrioli, Miguelito and I hanging out on the porch.


My neighbor Lidia helping me make a broom to brush the leaves off the dirt in front of my house.


A tarantula. There have been 6 in my house.



This is what it looks like in my house when there's no electricity in the evenings.


Sunset looking out my back door.


One of the many frogs that has been in the house. I tried taking them out of the house but they just keep coming back so I've decided they're my friends.


My friend Thony and the neighbor boy Niño hoeing the weeds in my back yard.

More Random Photos!!

Sunset up on the loma (hill) talking to Mom and Dad.


My friend and favorite motoconcho driver Papito.


One of my favorite farmers, Cadito and I in front of his house.


Actually this is a good story. I was on my way back from the capital and arrived in San Juan at 5 pm, which is pretty late when you're trying to get home by dark, but what I almost always do because then I can sleep in a little bit. I arrived at 5 and walked to the motoconcho stop to wait. Meanwhile storm clouds were threatening from the north, which is where I live. Luckily a friend of mine showed up right after I got there. So I strapped my casco on my head and hopped on and another friend hopped on behind me since it was the only motorcyle likely to pass for quite a while. We started heading up the road and saw a friend heading down in his truck. He stopped and told us it was a huge storm up in El Batey and we should stop at so and so's house on the way and wait for him. We continued on heading to so and so's house, however, before we had gone far, it started pouring rain, the thunder was so loud the ground felt like it was shaking, and lightning strikes were landing decidedly too close for comfort. We arrived at so and so's house (I just don't know the guy's name, thus why he's so and so) and got us and the motorcycle under cover and waited for our friend with the truck. About half an hour later he showed up and we loaded the motorcycle in the back of the truck and we all hopped in. We got back to El Batey, but unfortunately, the river had come down. This happens when it rains really hard up in the mountains and comes pretty much like a flash flood. Needless to say, I live on the other side of the river. Pretty soon we had a crowd gathered there waiting for the water to go down. About 45 minutes later my friend Coco decided to try to wade across to see if the water was low enough for us to cross in the truck. Coco stripped to his underwear and crossed the river which was up to about his waist without too much trouble so we decided we would probably be okay. We started out as far up as possible on the upstream side. We almost got stuck in the middle, water was coming into the cab, and when we made it to the other side we were as far downstream as we could be and still be able to get onto the road.

Hanging out with Thony's family

My friend Thony's mom, Marina came from the capital to visit in September. I went over to meet her and hang out with the family.


Here I am with Thony's sister Dori and mom Marina.


Thony and his dad Chelo grinding corn to make chen chen, which is pretty much grits. They are grinding by hand, no motorized flour grinder like we have at the farm, although it's practically the same grinder that we have.


Here's Marina sifting the ground corn to get the fine flour out.

Luz

I'm a bit behind in updating this thing. Thus why I'm going to tell you about something that took place in mid-August when I moved into my new house. I moved into my house on August 17 after 2 other houses fell through. My landlord had constructed walls for the latrine and finished the cement walls on the house. He, however, had not paid the neighbor for the light in several months so she had cut the wires. So the first week I was in my place there was no light while my neighbor waited for my landlord to pay. A week of candlelit dinners later my landlord finally paid my neighbor so we could finally get the light hooked up.


My friend Thony connecting the wires close to the house.


My neighbor Goné connecting the wires that are in the tree.

Birthday Celebration in El Batey

The chicken that was sacrificed to provide sustenance to my friends who came to celebrate my birthday with me.


Scalding and taking the feathers off the chicken. No easy task let me tell you, thus why I left it to professionals like Papote and Cristian.


We made our own fogon with rocks we found around the house. Here Thony and Chichito are chopping wood and getting the fire started.


Cutting the chicken turned out to be the process that involved 3 people. Andrioli, Chichito and Thony finally got through it all though.


Mmmm...look at that well-seasoned chicken cooking. Not sure if I´ve ever mentioned it before but they love these things called Sopitos, which are like buillon cubes. The first two ingredients are salt and MSG. If I don´t have high blood pressure by the time I leave here it will be a miracle.


Now all rice here must be picked through and rocks, etc. picked out before it can be washed and eventually cooked.


Papote throwing in the rice. It seems to always end up being his job, not quite sure why.


El chef, Chichito


El Chef taking a break from his cooking duties to dance a bachata with my neighbor and friend Mayra.


Hanging out and chatting and eating under the mango trees. What could be nicer than this!


I even hauled out the guitar and played a couple of songs for my friends. I translated one into Spanish and now they´re waiting for the other ones. Someday I´ll get around to it.


Here´s what the food looked like. It´s called locrio and one of my personal favorites. Especially with fresh avocados since we were and still are in the middle of avocado season.

Random Pictures of People

Miguelito and Milvio


Old guy, can´t remember his name.


Yanco (short for Jean Carlos) and Rafaelo.


Old lady in a pastora (that´s what they call the hats).


Me dancing with Bienvenidos, the leader of the Catholic Church and all around fun person to be around.


My friend Thony with his little sister Marchelis. She just got her hair done so that´s why it´s in curlers. Nobody wants to have curly hair here. They all want it to be straight.


Yamily, the daughter of my 15 year-old friend Yafresi.


One of Doña Maria´s 8 children, all about a year apart.


This is the youngest of Maria´s children.


Cafe, just about the cutest little boy you can think of and you should hear him talk, it´s so cute. It´s what I think Nate was probably like when he was little.