Cogiendo Una Lucha

So those of you who know Spanish may know that the verb coger is used most frequently to refer in a rather vulgar fashion to the act of making love. However, in the DR, people use coger for just about everything. You can coger una guagua (catch a bus), or coger una lucha (have a hard time) like my friend Francisco and I did returning from a day of swimming and hanging out with my friend Ruth and her host family. It had rained a little bit in Juan de Herrera, where Ruth lives, but not too bad so we weren`t too worried about the ride home. Of course, we had forgotten that they graded the road, but had not (and still haven`t) put down gravel or anything like that. So we were going along fine on the paved part, then we hit the dirt part. And things went downhill quickly, although not literally. There was so much mud on the road that the front tire kept getting stuck because the mud would fill up the wheel cover thingy (I`m sure it has a name, I just don`t know it). So we had to stop to take out the mud. In addition, it was so muddy that when we were moving we were sliding all over the place so we decided it would be best for me to walk until the road got better so I/we didn`t fall. However, flip flops and mud don`t get along, so I finally had to take off my flip flops and walk barefoot because the mud was sticking so badly to the bottoms! And so I would walk until I met up with Francisco who had gone ahead but would stop to take the mud out of the wheel cover thingy about every couple hundred meters, hoping that the road would get better. But, it never did, so I ended up walking about 6 kilometers barefoot with my backpack on my back, my bag over my shoulder, a helmet in one hand and my flip flops in the other. The road finally got better when we arrived in El Batey. Here`s a couple picks from the trip (walk) home! Needless to say we went and had a much deserved beer after we washed the motorcycle off in the river.


Almost home! You can see all the mud on the front tire and the frame!


Yep, there`s my feet, covered in mud!! I suppose I should think of it more like a spa treatment, except that the thorns that I stepped on told me otherwise!


I love this picture!! It`s one of those you know you`re in the Peace Corps when moments caught on camera!