La Fiesta del Espiritu Santo

So this past Monday was the Festival of the Holy Spirit in my little campo. They had told me that a lot of people came, but the truth of the matter is that it´s insane!! The roads were completely full of cards. My doña counted 24 vehicles in front of our house, and that´s not counting all the motorcycles and horses that came through. This included city trucks that came full of people to medium sized tourist buses. The center of town was crazy. There were groups of people playing the drums and dancing palo. Check out the video below. There were people cooking everywhere and selling food to the masses. There was perica ripiao which is another typical music from here that was the basis for the merengue. See picture below. I should have taken video of that too but I was slackin´. Another time. There were venders selling candles and rosaries and crosses and all other sorts of cheap (plastic) religious symbols. The church was so crowded you couldn´t get into it and you could hardly walk down the streets. Craziness!! I could go on and on but time is short and I need to go get lunch. So here´s the pictures and videos. I´m working on my cinematography skills on the videos still. Some of the cooking that was going on. This is how they make a delicious pot of grits here in the DR. With lots of butter and salt. It´s super yummy. Soup a.k.a. Sancocho (which roughly translates to boil) Perico Ripiao A horse that someone rode in on!
Drumming and dancing palo.
The road in front of my house.
Another example of the road in front of my house. It was madness!

More tomorrow!!

So I was going to write more today but I´m feeling a little worn out today. Another not so fun part of being a Peace Corps Volunteer is constant bathroom issues of which I´ve had a few. Anyway, probably nothing to worry about, but I´ve had the runs for a few days now (yes, I know, that´s more information than you wanted to know) and so I just called the medical doctor and she wants me to give a poo sample. Yes, I´m as excited as you are, but it´s common procedure here. So I´ll probably be back in town tomorrow to turn in my sample. So more stories then!! Lots of love to all!!

Motoconchos

So Sunday I headed back to el campo (the country). I finally got some pictures and video of me on a motoconcho so here they are for your viewing pleasure. I hope this will allow you to appreciate my life as a volunteer a little more. Despite some pictures to the contrary it's not all sunshine and beach, there's also fun rides on the back of motorcycles down dirt roads, oh, and I'm coming to the festival next.

Santo Domingo

So as I mentioned I went to Santo Domingo last weekend. I had to get a shot and needed a break for a couple days from campo life, which thank goodness Peace Corps understands and allows us a couple rest and relaxation days every now and again as long as we don't abuse it. I went out to an Italian restaurant with a friend on Friday night. Saturday I went with a friend to the beach. It's the local favorite for capitleños (capital dwellers), although a friend told me it's also one of the most polluted coastal areas in the country. I personally thought it was pretty, thank goodness my friend didn't tell me that until after I returned. Here's a few pictures from Boca Chica.


Yes, I swear I´m in the Peace Corps!!







Further than that, Saturday night was the despedida (farewell) of a volunteer who had to ET (early terminate) because she couldn't find a buyer or renter for her condo back home and couldn't afford to let it go. It was unfortunate because she was a good volunteer and didn't want to leave. But we had a good time sending her off. We even went to a casino. They look the same here as they do in the states. Probably owned by the same companies too.

So the sindico (kinda like a county commissioner) Felix, my project partner Nivin, and I were talking one day early last week and we decided it would be a great idea to have a meeting with all the community leaders of El Batey. They were in charge of organizing it since I don't know that many people yet. We set the date for Thursday at 4:00 pm, which is not too bad a time considering most people are farmers and out of their fields by then. Well, by 4:00 we had Felix, Nivin, and Santo Suero, a farmer from the area who went back and forth between Santo Domingo and El Batey. So we chatted and waited. After all, we all knew things here worked on Dominican time. Felix and Nivin both told me they had invited a bunch of people, which may or may not be true. Dominicans, like the rest of us to some extent, like to save face so even if they hadn't remembered to invite anyone they would say they had. Needless to say, no one else showed up so I did my presentation of the projects to these 3 gentlemen. Turns out Santo Suero has a group of organized farmers that wants to work with deforestation and growing alternative but locally feasible fruit crops that they could market as well. So after hearing about his organization we all loaded into the inginiero's car to head out to Santo's farm. More about the inginiero another time. We got there and walk out onto the property that is behind his house into this field with these little trees with these GIANT purplish mangos. It was a thing of beauty let me tell you. Check out the pictures below. And the cool thing was that he had started with the local variety of mangos which are tasty but super stringy, i.e. not very marketable and had found starts from this other kind and grafted them onto the original rootstock. And he was using sawdust and cow manure as mulch around the young trees. These are pretty saavy practices for the DR. Not that people aren't intelligent, the vast majority just haven't been presented with different ways of doing things since the advent of chemical agriculture. I was excited to say the least! Even better than that, is that we made plans so that I could attend the meeting of his group this coming Sunday, and we're going to invite some other community leaders. And even better than that, we're going to make plans with his group to go for a horseback ride up into the lomas (hills) so that I can check out the conucos they have up there and also the deforestation that happened years ago and that this group would like to work to fix. And yes, there's still one more thing that's better. Santo's brother, Fredy, brought me some mangos last Friday. Unfortunately I had left for the capital for the weekend. So needless to say a few of the six mangos got eaten before I got home on Sunday, not that I blame anyone because who can resist. Anyway, I was kinda sick Monday and Tuesday so I didn't eat a mango until today (Wednesday) and I wish I had eaten one every day since I got back. It was the best mango I think I've ever had in my whole life!! It was like a meal in itself and I was eating it for dessert!! But I somehow managed to demolish the whole thing in no time flat by the light of my headlamp no less because se fue la luz (the light left, a very commonly heard phrase here) right as I was eating dinner. So I was being dive-bombed by moths as I was munching on this spectacular mango!! I can't wait to eat the one remaining one tomorrow! And hopefully I can snag some more this weekend when I see Santo again. Keep your fingers crossed for me, mine are definitely crossed.

Adriana visits!

Last week was a busy week for me. A good week but a busy week. After updating y'all on my blog last Tuesday I ran some errands in town and met up with Adrienne, the health volunteer who was in El Batey until last November. She was getting ready to head back to the states and stopped by to say some last goodbyes. It was great to have her in town for a couple days so I could pick her mind and she could introduce me to some people who had been helpful to her. Plus, she's a cool young lady anyway! Wednesday we went walking around and I got to see a lot more of the community and meet a bunch of people she had worked with and/or knew in the community. Also, on the walk she showed me a little swimming hole she used to come to with some of the young people in the community when she needed a little dip. It's not super deep, but deep enough to dunk yourself which is more than can be said for most places in this river. With all the rocks and stuff in that area it totally reminded me of creeks back home, although not nearly as cold.


The swimming hole. I´m excited to go try it out someday soon. It´s been freakin´ hot and dry here for the last several days and I think it gets worse before it gets better.



Me, Francisca and Adrienne (a.k.a. Adriana) on the morning that she left to head back to the capital before heading off to the states.

Random Pictures

This is another view of my valley from a different spot. There is corn and yucca being grown in the field in the foreground and the mountains in the background are the foothills of the Cordillera Central, the biggest mountain range in the country.


So I know I´ve mentioned these cactus fences before. But here´s a close-up of how they look so you can get the picture. They may not even be a cactus technically, maybe more of a succulent.


Here´s another picture of the framboyan tree. It´s in full bloom right now and is just gorgeous!


Here´s the little neighbor girl Mari Estel. She´s a little rubia (blondie). Not sure where that came from, but she´s cute. She´s a year and 8 months.


And here´s Mari Estel´s mom Santa. Santa is 25 and married to Manuel who is almost 80. I´ve found it´s better not to ask questions about that. Anyway, they have a 5 year-old who is a handful to say the least. They call him Miñongo (I don´t know what that means)and Mari Estel. I´ll put up a picture of Miñongo if I ever catch him with enough clothes on to be able to post it safely.