As usual, sorry for the anti-posting but here's a brief summary of my last two weeks and I'll write for real after the padres go home.
1. Week with Amy and Annie - absolutely fantastic. Perfect mix of hanging out, luther gossip, beach time, and drinking presidente and brugal.
2. Cabarete for Charlotte and Mike's 21st birthdays - team mess but mom Krista whipped out her skills and still managed to make out out, hookah, steal a beer, and white girl dance in every club on the beach.
3. Parents made it here safely! We got champagne and iced towels as they checked in.. the first of many free drinks I would receive this week because my parents are cool and they don't realize i'm not actually staying at the hotel.
4. EARTHQUAKE on thursday. first one of my life and i barely knew it was happening but the dominicans flipped shit while we thought it was an airplane or something.
4. HAITI on friday.. that's right, made it across the border and back without getting kidnapped or robbed and successfully bought a cute purse for less than three dollars at the haitian market.
5. Mom got her camera ripped off her arm in Santo Domingo by a guy on a motorcycle (terrifying experience..) and now they're scared the leave the hotel, but hopefully we can have a good rest of the trip.
more real updates soon, AMOR.
Monday, April 6, 2009
Friday, March 20, 2009
9 – 20 Marzo
Tuesday we decided it was time to skip school and go to Sosua. Being a good kid and knowing I’m going to skip class when my parents are here I went to my 8am and met them at the bus station for some McD’s bfast. It was sadly cloudy the entire day until about 5:30 which was about 10 minutes of evening sun before we got on the bus to go back. It was still an awesome day, we played in the ocean a lot and just hung out and obviously beach > school any day so victory. That night we got back and I went double dating with Richard and Brie and their friend Nico who is Richard’s giant friend who I met at the Haitian party on Saturday. No joke, both of these guys are at least 6’4 and are just hugely built guys and since a lot of Dominican guys are about 5’4 and 150 pounds they look even bigger in comparison. We saw “Apparaciones” (Appearances) which was in English but was a terrible movie about witchcraft in the 1800s. (Our only other choice of movie was Mega Diva which did not look promising). Also, the theaters follow the Dominican rule that if you have air conditioning you have the blast the shit out of it or it’s not worth having. Literal igloo in there. We all went to Nico’s apartment to hang out and while we were there his roommates found a little present in the kitchen.. a live tarantula. Yep. Sooo much wildlife but as always, part of the experience.
Thursday night we went out to Fogon with a lot of people from the other programs who we’ve been meeting so that’s fun because we’re branching our friend circle out even more and they’re all really cool guys. It’s so refreshing to have guys who are just your friends and you can hang out with them knowing that their only goal is to sleep with a blond American girl so that’s been a wonderful new development for us. Oh ha and there was this really attractive guy there who bought me a drink and asked the bar tender to give him my number and when I went and talked to him the first thing he says to me is “I want to be your boyfriend, I love you.” Naturally I laughed but told him I don’t want a boyfriend and he still proceeds to invite me to his house the next day, and slips in the fact that he’s 30 and has a 2 year old daughter. No gracias senor. Although he told me that “love has no age” I still just laughed and had to ignore his 30 calls the next day because that’s just too much for me. We went with everyone to another Haitian party at a dance club and a bunch of the guys from my dance class were there so we practiced all of our routines which is so much fun, especially after a few cocktails.
Friday I had a girls shopping day with Brie, Trena, and Joe downtown (Joe doesn’t live with any other students and gets really bored so he comes on a lot of the girl dates to pick up girls while we do girl things. It all works out). About 95% of the stuff I could never imagine wearing because it looks like a corset or something that would fall apart after you wash it once but I bought one cute top for like $6 so that was a score. After walking around and shopping for most of the afternoon we rewarded Joey and ourselves with yogen-fruz on the way back. I’m literally going to cry when I can’t have it anymore and 100% am going to try making it when I’m home. That night we met Ben and Iverson at the monument and I tried a lot of the Dominican street food for the first time. We had empanadas which were awesome and things called keepay (that’s for sure just phonetically spelled.. I’ll investigate later) that are like shredded chicken mixed with cheese inside a crispy ball of fried breading.. hard to explain but amazing. After we went back to the dance club we went to when Paige was here and Nico was there along with Rosie and Dimitri so we hung out with them and danced there and stuff before going home.
Saturday was PI DAY (3.14 woo!) so my friend Jared invited me to his house to celebrate with them. Him and Will (sorry about the random names, I assume they mean nothing but we keep hanging out with these guys so yeah) bought apple and guayava pies along with making their own pie with graham cracker crust, a layer of peanut butter, Bon ice cream, whip cream, crumbled up chocolate cookies, and chocolate syrup on top. Phenomenal. We had that with beer which was a terrible combo but boys drink beer with everything so I just went with it. Later that afternoon I went to Dimitri’s house to have a “tanning party” with Dimitri, Rosie, Richard, Brie, Nico, and Richards roommate Gracia. Aka, Rosie, Brie, and I put our towels out on the roof and laid out in our swimming suits while these guys all crouched under this really tiny part of the roof that gave like 2 feet of shade. Hilarious. Rosie made bean dip and we just hung out there all day so that was really fun. That night we had all planned to go out but everyone decided to stay home besides Joey and I so we went and met Jared and Peter (another guy from the other program who also is in my dance class along with Jared) at a pool hall and watched them finish their game before we went to this dance club named Ahi bar. Joey and I had bought a little bottle of rum and some coke before and made our drinks which usually you can just carry around with you to the outdoor clubs but we went into this real bar so I had to drink my entire drink before we walked in so I got surprise drunk which ended up being perfect because they played tons of bachata and meringue so Jared and I just did all of our dances from class and probably looked like fools but I had a great time so I didn’t even care. Everyone is literally such good dancers and Jared is dark and could look fake Dominican so I was literally like the only white girl in the bar and I’m sure I looked like a fool but I had a great time. We even tried doing salsa which is way hard and we only learned for like five minutes in one class so it was a struggle but way fun. After that bar we went up to the monument parking lot (tons of people just drive their cars up there and play loud music and just drink and hang out there) so we just walked around there and helped Joey pick up girls. Again, friends who are boys time proved to be so much fun. Jared, Peter, and I went on this random stage thing while Joe was talking to people and Jared tried to break dance because apparently he can but might have had one too many cocktails so more just jumped around/proceeded to fall a lot. We went back and met Joe who had met some guys who wanted to take us all to a strip club.. I love boys time but not quite that much so we decided to go. Jared, Peter, and I went back to Jared’s house to celebrate Pi Day round two with more ice cream cake which was a strange combo with the rum and cokes but overall a very successful holiday.
Sunday was pretty worthless, slept until noon and did homework/laid out/watched the office with Rosie. Not bad. Monday too pretty uneventful; school, homework, the office, rinse repeat.
Tuesday was surprise St. Patrick’s day.. literally no one celebrates it down here so we all forgot until like the afternoon so we decided to go out to Fogon to celebrate. It was pretty empty except for the small crowd of Americans wearing green and drinking more beer than usual but it was fun and we met Ben’s friend Victor from La Vega who was really fun so that was cool. Better than fake getting written up like last year so we’ll definitely take it.
Wednesday I went to my community service as usual to find out that the kids I usually do sports with were on a field trip so I got to help out with the chiquitos, the little kids who were between like three and five. Literally adorable, they made bracelets, necklaces, rings, and earrings out of fruit loops on strings (also eating a ridiculous amount of fruit loops which I tried and were stale and terrible but they loved them) and were just so adorable. I brought my camera with me and when they found out I had it with me it ended up creating a two hour senior pic session of all of these babies. They were so funny, they would do ridiculous poses and ask me to take “just one more! Just one more! Ok one more. Now again!...” so I ended up with about 150 pictures of the same ten kids on my camera doing different poses. So much fun though. And before we left the teacher had them sing us all a song that had all of these actions and dance moves so that was adorable. There is no way I’m leaving this country without stealing one of them. That night I worked on a lit paper all night which took awhile but I’ve gotten literal A+s on my other two big papers so I wasn’t too worried.. I literally haven’t gotten A+s since elementary school and it’s obvious that I do not have an A+ Spanish writing level so I think it’s funny but a good confidence booster. Oh also random tangent, one day I was wearing soccer shorts because I came from playing sports with the kiddies and they turned me away from the library. They literally don’t let you in if you’re wearing athletic shorts, and we don’t know if it’s just for girls or for everyone but I couldn’t believe it and I’m glad that Luther lets me be a slob otherwise I would have failed out of school by now. That’s all about that.
Thursday we had a girls night at Trena’s house which was so much fun. We bought chips and dip and salsa, had pizza, oatmeal cookies (that they put too much water in so it turned into a giant cake but was still good) and Bon ice cream.. sooo much food but amazing to have a little American-ness. We also drank an entire jug of wine so that was pretty cool. We girl chatted and watched Baby Mamma so that was really fun to just have a chill night with the girls (Joe was mad because he said it was just a “don’t let Joe hang out” night because he’s the only guy who ever comes anyway but it was more the idea of it). Oh and Trena’s host sister who looks about 21 was there and we told her to have some wine and later we found out she was in fact 15 but magically had bigger boobs than all of us so we never could have known. Ridiculous. Still a really great night, I love all of these girls so it was way fun.
Finally I’m actually caught up on here for you.. and even if it sounds like I drink everyday I really just have one or two cocktails so don’t worry mom. I’m literally loving everything and AMY COMES THIS SATURDAY so I cannot wait to spend the week with her and Annie (for non-Luther kids, Amy is one of my best friends from school who plays golf with me and her and Annie spent the semester here last year and now I’m living with their family so they’re coming to stay with us/visit people/play with me so I’m way way pumped) and then my parents get here the following Tuesday! I’m sure everything will be a blur but I can’t wait for everything, love love it so much. Hokay les extrano a todas, espero que todo este bien! AMOR.
Tuesday we decided it was time to skip school and go to Sosua. Being a good kid and knowing I’m going to skip class when my parents are here I went to my 8am and met them at the bus station for some McD’s bfast. It was sadly cloudy the entire day until about 5:30 which was about 10 minutes of evening sun before we got on the bus to go back. It was still an awesome day, we played in the ocean a lot and just hung out and obviously beach > school any day so victory. That night we got back and I went double dating with Richard and Brie and their friend Nico who is Richard’s giant friend who I met at the Haitian party on Saturday. No joke, both of these guys are at least 6’4 and are just hugely built guys and since a lot of Dominican guys are about 5’4 and 150 pounds they look even bigger in comparison. We saw “Apparaciones” (Appearances) which was in English but was a terrible movie about witchcraft in the 1800s. (Our only other choice of movie was Mega Diva which did not look promising). Also, the theaters follow the Dominican rule that if you have air conditioning you have the blast the shit out of it or it’s not worth having. Literal igloo in there. We all went to Nico’s apartment to hang out and while we were there his roommates found a little present in the kitchen.. a live tarantula. Yep. Sooo much wildlife but as always, part of the experience.
Thursday night we went out to Fogon with a lot of people from the other programs who we’ve been meeting so that’s fun because we’re branching our friend circle out even more and they’re all really cool guys. It’s so refreshing to have guys who are just your friends and you can hang out with them knowing that their only goal is to sleep with a blond American girl so that’s been a wonderful new development for us. Oh ha and there was this really attractive guy there who bought me a drink and asked the bar tender to give him my number and when I went and talked to him the first thing he says to me is “I want to be your boyfriend, I love you.” Naturally I laughed but told him I don’t want a boyfriend and he still proceeds to invite me to his house the next day, and slips in the fact that he’s 30 and has a 2 year old daughter. No gracias senor. Although he told me that “love has no age” I still just laughed and had to ignore his 30 calls the next day because that’s just too much for me. We went with everyone to another Haitian party at a dance club and a bunch of the guys from my dance class were there so we practiced all of our routines which is so much fun, especially after a few cocktails.
Friday I had a girls shopping day with Brie, Trena, and Joe downtown (Joe doesn’t live with any other students and gets really bored so he comes on a lot of the girl dates to pick up girls while we do girl things. It all works out). About 95% of the stuff I could never imagine wearing because it looks like a corset or something that would fall apart after you wash it once but I bought one cute top for like $6 so that was a score. After walking around and shopping for most of the afternoon we rewarded Joey and ourselves with yogen-fruz on the way back. I’m literally going to cry when I can’t have it anymore and 100% am going to try making it when I’m home. That night we met Ben and Iverson at the monument and I tried a lot of the Dominican street food for the first time. We had empanadas which were awesome and things called keepay (that’s for sure just phonetically spelled.. I’ll investigate later) that are like shredded chicken mixed with cheese inside a crispy ball of fried breading.. hard to explain but amazing. After we went back to the dance club we went to when Paige was here and Nico was there along with Rosie and Dimitri so we hung out with them and danced there and stuff before going home.
Saturday was PI DAY (3.14 woo!) so my friend Jared invited me to his house to celebrate with them. Him and Will (sorry about the random names, I assume they mean nothing but we keep hanging out with these guys so yeah) bought apple and guayava pies along with making their own pie with graham cracker crust, a layer of peanut butter, Bon ice cream, whip cream, crumbled up chocolate cookies, and chocolate syrup on top. Phenomenal. We had that with beer which was a terrible combo but boys drink beer with everything so I just went with it. Later that afternoon I went to Dimitri’s house to have a “tanning party” with Dimitri, Rosie, Richard, Brie, Nico, and Richards roommate Gracia. Aka, Rosie, Brie, and I put our towels out on the roof and laid out in our swimming suits while these guys all crouched under this really tiny part of the roof that gave like 2 feet of shade. Hilarious. Rosie made bean dip and we just hung out there all day so that was really fun. That night we had all planned to go out but everyone decided to stay home besides Joey and I so we went and met Jared and Peter (another guy from the other program who also is in my dance class along with Jared) at a pool hall and watched them finish their game before we went to this dance club named Ahi bar. Joey and I had bought a little bottle of rum and some coke before and made our drinks which usually you can just carry around with you to the outdoor clubs but we went into this real bar so I had to drink my entire drink before we walked in so I got surprise drunk which ended up being perfect because they played tons of bachata and meringue so Jared and I just did all of our dances from class and probably looked like fools but I had a great time so I didn’t even care. Everyone is literally such good dancers and Jared is dark and could look fake Dominican so I was literally like the only white girl in the bar and I’m sure I looked like a fool but I had a great time. We even tried doing salsa which is way hard and we only learned for like five minutes in one class so it was a struggle but way fun. After that bar we went up to the monument parking lot (tons of people just drive their cars up there and play loud music and just drink and hang out there) so we just walked around there and helped Joey pick up girls. Again, friends who are boys time proved to be so much fun. Jared, Peter, and I went on this random stage thing while Joe was talking to people and Jared tried to break dance because apparently he can but might have had one too many cocktails so more just jumped around/proceeded to fall a lot. We went back and met Joe who had met some guys who wanted to take us all to a strip club.. I love boys time but not quite that much so we decided to go. Jared, Peter, and I went back to Jared’s house to celebrate Pi Day round two with more ice cream cake which was a strange combo with the rum and cokes but overall a very successful holiday.
Sunday was pretty worthless, slept until noon and did homework/laid out/watched the office with Rosie. Not bad. Monday too pretty uneventful; school, homework, the office, rinse repeat.
Tuesday was surprise St. Patrick’s day.. literally no one celebrates it down here so we all forgot until like the afternoon so we decided to go out to Fogon to celebrate. It was pretty empty except for the small crowd of Americans wearing green and drinking more beer than usual but it was fun and we met Ben’s friend Victor from La Vega who was really fun so that was cool. Better than fake getting written up like last year so we’ll definitely take it.
Wednesday I went to my community service as usual to find out that the kids I usually do sports with were on a field trip so I got to help out with the chiquitos, the little kids who were between like three and five. Literally adorable, they made bracelets, necklaces, rings, and earrings out of fruit loops on strings (also eating a ridiculous amount of fruit loops which I tried and were stale and terrible but they loved them) and were just so adorable. I brought my camera with me and when they found out I had it with me it ended up creating a two hour senior pic session of all of these babies. They were so funny, they would do ridiculous poses and ask me to take “just one more! Just one more! Ok one more. Now again!...” so I ended up with about 150 pictures of the same ten kids on my camera doing different poses. So much fun though. And before we left the teacher had them sing us all a song that had all of these actions and dance moves so that was adorable. There is no way I’m leaving this country without stealing one of them. That night I worked on a lit paper all night which took awhile but I’ve gotten literal A+s on my other two big papers so I wasn’t too worried.. I literally haven’t gotten A+s since elementary school and it’s obvious that I do not have an A+ Spanish writing level so I think it’s funny but a good confidence booster. Oh also random tangent, one day I was wearing soccer shorts because I came from playing sports with the kiddies and they turned me away from the library. They literally don’t let you in if you’re wearing athletic shorts, and we don’t know if it’s just for girls or for everyone but I couldn’t believe it and I’m glad that Luther lets me be a slob otherwise I would have failed out of school by now. That’s all about that.
Thursday we had a girls night at Trena’s house which was so much fun. We bought chips and dip and salsa, had pizza, oatmeal cookies (that they put too much water in so it turned into a giant cake but was still good) and Bon ice cream.. sooo much food but amazing to have a little American-ness. We also drank an entire jug of wine so that was pretty cool. We girl chatted and watched Baby Mamma so that was really fun to just have a chill night with the girls (Joe was mad because he said it was just a “don’t let Joe hang out” night because he’s the only guy who ever comes anyway but it was more the idea of it). Oh and Trena’s host sister who looks about 21 was there and we told her to have some wine and later we found out she was in fact 15 but magically had bigger boobs than all of us so we never could have known. Ridiculous. Still a really great night, I love all of these girls so it was way fun.
Finally I’m actually caught up on here for you.. and even if it sounds like I drink everyday I really just have one or two cocktails so don’t worry mom. I’m literally loving everything and AMY COMES THIS SATURDAY so I cannot wait to spend the week with her and Annie (for non-Luther kids, Amy is one of my best friends from school who plays golf with me and her and Annie spent the semester here last year and now I’m living with their family so they’re coming to stay with us/visit people/play with me so I’m way way pumped) and then my parents get here the following Tuesday! I’m sure everything will be a blur but I can’t wait for everything, love love it so much. Hokay les extrano a todas, espero que todo este bien! AMOR.
Sunday, March 15, 2009
20 Febrero – 8 Marzo
Aaand fail. Sorry for the ridiculous almost month long delay.. I finally actually made friends and school picked up so my amount of free time went way down. Anyways, ultimate ramble session GO.
Friday we went out with Diego and Ben, two Dominican engineers who the kids met out at a bar one night. We were all just hanging out at fogon and I mentioned that my dad worked at IBM just because I assume most engineers will know that and Diego literally flipped out and asked if my dad would give a conference or a presentation when he came to visit. I assumed he was kidding but he’s definitely called me and came across campus to seek me out at school to get information and is 100% serious. I’m glad I make friends because my dad is so cool.. good job Krista. We went to this dance club after and even though there weren’t that many people we got to go practice our meringue and bachata so that was fun. They were both really nice and Ben is from La Vega so he said he’d take us all to Carnival on Sunday in his car so that was cool.
Saturday there was a Haitian roof party so we decided to make it a dress theme night, our favorite. We all went to Franks (bar/liquor store that’s pretty close to all of our houses) and just hung out there for a few hours. Oh and legitimately the most giant human beings I’ve ever seen in my life came into the bar.. they were a Puerto Rican basketball team who was here playing in a tournament and they literally put man baby to shame and were terrifying but fun to talk to. They were going to come to the party with us later but ended up not going but still fun. The party was on the roof of an apartment building and they brought DJs and speakers and a bar up there and everyone just hangs out and dances. You could see the monument and like the whole city so that was awesome. It started raining after awhile though so the party ended pretty quick but still a sweet night.
Sunday Ben took us to La Vega for round two. It was cool that he has a car but he has literally the smallest toy car I’ve ever seen and six of us packed in there for the half an hour car ride. Ben usually is in Carnival and dresses up in the masks and the costumes and stuff so we were going to go meet his friends but they had already started in the parade by the time we got there but we still got to meet them as they came past and I got to try on one of the masks.. extremely sweaty but I felt like a badass. It was the last Sunday of carnival so it was pretty nuts there but I got hit a lot less so that was much better. And when the parade ended they just cranked the music up and it was a giant dance party in the street, what could be better. We ate terrible cheap pizza for dinner and then went to his friend Iverson’s house before going out to the clubs (even though it was a Sunday people go out after the parade for the month of February). As we were walking we saw that Omega, our favorite street meringue singer was performing at a concert in La Vega (there’s one song that they literally play everywhere, there’s no way I’ve gone a day since I’ve been here without hearing it at least twice so its become our song) so we went to go see him. We didn’t get to hear him play our song but it was still sweet and just like a big outdoor concert so that was cool. We went to a club after that was super packed even though it was like 8:00 on a Sunday but really fun and we all danced and hung out there until we came back to Santiago at like midnight. Going with someone who knows what he was doing and where to go was so much fun because we felt more like a part of it rather than just American tourists who were way out of place.
25 Febrero
Although Monday and Tuesday of this week took forever, PAIGE GOT HERE ON WEDNESDAYYYYYYYYY! Her week here was the most fun I’ve had so far and I’m so excited she got to come down. She got in at like 10 at night so when she got to my house she met my family just for a few minutes because it was so late. Her three years of high school Spanish were a little rusty so it was funny to watch her try to talk to my parents, I mostly just translated but she learned really quick and by the end of the week could understand a lot. Thursday we laid out on our roof (I forgot how pale people are from Minnesota in the winter haha) and had lunch with my family which she absolutely loved. Coming from eating popcorn and cereal all the time to having an extreme meal made for you everyday was great for her and my mom is just such a good cook and I’m glad she got to experience it so she knows just how good I was talking about. She came to my dance class to watch (laughed at me a little which was expected but I’m one of the best ones in the class, which doesn’t take much in a group of uncoordinated Americans). I showed her around campus and we had Bon (the major ice cream place here, so good). That was where she finally understood how much we get stared/whistled/hissed/etc at.. there was a pickup truck full of probably 15 guys who all just yelled at us and people who kept driving by just whistling or honking or staring.. she said she believed that people did that but didn’t really believe my descriptions until she got here. That night we went over to JB, Carlille, and Steeve’s apartment so she could meet them and Dimitri. She was surprised at just how nice and welcoming they were and just fun to hang out with. We went to a Haitian party at a club and she was way pumped about that because it felt like a club club like the movies and she’s only been to the Roscoes and bars in Rochester so she was really excited and got to dance with cool Haitian boys and was pumped about it.
Friday we went to Cabarete, a beach town on the North shore, to spend the night there and go out because it’s where the best clubs are by us. Ben and Iverson were going with us and were going to drive us and I had talked to them right before I went to bed and they said they were going to meet us at 9:00. Paige got her first experience of Dominican time: they finally came at 10:45. Ridiculous but we had McD’s bfast which was great and we still got to the beach by around 1:00 so that wasn’t too bad. We spent the whole day on the beach and it was an absolutely perfect day so I’m really glad Paige got such a great weekend there. Ha but just due to Minnesota winter she was pale as a dove and some guy who came up to talk to her told her she was the whitest girl on the beach. Hilarious but she got a solid tan by the end of the trip. Cabarete is really windy so it’s where they do a lot of windsurfing and kite surfing. We didn’t try it but it was really cool to watch because there were tons of people doing it and learning how to do it. We had some Dominican food for dinner and went to get ready for the night. We actually ended up getting a really nice hotel for $15 per person with four in one room and six in the other and it wasn’t extreme cousin style like Sosua. Ha I tried to explain the concept of cousin style to Ben but I don’t think that’s something that translates. Some friends of Randi and Charlotte (aka their mom’s brothers who happen to be 20 and gorgeous.. sometimes you date your host uncles?) came to hang out and they didn’t speak any English so Paige had a good Spanish lesson and was surprised at all the random words she remembered. We pregamed at the hotel and then went out to the clubs which are all right on the beach, like you walk through the sand by the ocean to get from club to club: awesome. There were tons of people out and tons of different clubs with different kinds of music and it was just an absolute blast being that close to the ocean and with that environment. After the bars we decided we wanted to swim in the ocean, which we found out pretty quick was illegal when the police came and told us to get out.. oops. But it started pouring so we went back to our hotel to sleep and get rested for the next day at the beach.
Saturday we shopped in the morning and had breakfast at a restaurant on the beach and just spent the whole day at the beach. It was another absolutely gorgeous day so that was phenomenal. We walked farther down the beach to some of the giant waves and Joe, Brie, Paige and I played in them for a long time until we were completely full of salt water and had to rest so we could see. We had some Dominican food for lunch and then decided to buy cigars to smoke on the beach. I’ve never smoked a cigar and probably won’t again because it was gross and I didn’t really get the point but I still felt like a badass so not bad. When we were kind of getting ready to go we found out that Ben and Iverson had drank three bottles of rum and were drunk and planned to stay Saturday night too but didn’t tell us.. Dominican planning is amazing. Luckily we caught the last bus back so nothing was a problem. That night we went to Fogon to celebrate my birthday and when we got there we found out that you can buy a wristband for 100 pesos (about $3) and you can drink as much as you want so Paige and I got those and sucked down vodka cranberries from 11-12 until my birthday so that was fun (don’t worry mom, I wasn’t even real drunk on my 21st bday so nothing to worry about). Two guys who I met the first weekend I was here were there and wanted to talk to Paige but spoke absolutely no english so I translated for all of them for like an hour, it was actually really fun and Paige was surprised that I could actually do it and say everything we wanted to.
Sunday was my real birthday day so when Paige and I went down for lunch my family surprised me and had decorated with balloons and streamers and nice plates and they had champagne and everything and the girls even got to have coca cola in their wine classes so that was so much fun. They sang ‘feliz cumpleanos’ and everything, adorable. My family is so nice I can’t even handle it. That afternoon I gave Paige a tour of Santiago. We went to the monument and walked around on Calle del Sol and sat in a park for awhile and then got yogen fruz which is literally the most amazing thing I’ve ever had. It’s a part of the ice cream place Bon and the use literal yogurt that’s frozen and you pick three fresh fruits to put in and they mix it all up and it was like heaven in a cup. We just kept walking around and ended up at the river as the sun was setting, so gorgeous with the mountains in the background. 100% fake life. Rosie had been staying with her parents in Puerto Plata since Wednesday so I was going through withdrawal and she finally got home Sunday night so we went back to hang out with her. Mama brought a cute tray of whiskey on the rocks in to Rosie’s room for us to drink.. It was absolutely terrible but so fun that she did it so we choked it down. Rosie ordered me pizza for my present (phenomenal present) but there was a problem with the credit card machine and they never called her to tell her and she had to call back twice to figure it out and the pizza came like two and a half hours late but she managed to argue a 50% discount all in Spanish, I was so proud of her skills because talking on the phone is extremely difficult. My parents also had bought a Bon ice cream cake (fun fact: you make a wish when you cut the cake instead of blow out the candles here) and got me a necklace and earrings that are beautiful, they’re way way too nice and amazing. That night we went to the monument to hang out and ended up meeting Alex and Rafael and hung out with them there for awhile then went to their friend’s liquor store that was actually closed but since their friend owned it we just drank in there at like 1 in the morning on a Sunday? A little sketch but it was fun. We went back to the monument and hung out there until like 3:30 and I had to get up at 8 to go volunteer so we went to bed and crashed.
Monday Paige slept in and I went to go teach my kiddies. On my way there the girl who I do it with called me and told me she wasn’t coming and neither was the other girl who goes with us and when I got there I found out the fourth girl dropped the class so I was on my own with the kids but it actually went really well. We played “Krista says” (like simon says) and telephone and they really seemed to like it and paid attention to me and learned stuff for two full hours, it was so fun and I could finally tell that they had warmed up to me and were really excited for me to come. That afternoon I watched the movie “Blowup” in my lit class and since it was in English Paige came but it was a really weird movie so Paige said that was the worst part of the trip haha. After class Paige, Rosie, and I went and got yaroa which is like a heart attack in a box: French fries with meat, cheese, and mayo on it. It was gross and amazing at the same time. That night Paige wanted to go out again because everything was so exciting for her but I was absolutely exhausted because I’ve never gone out four days in a row and still gotten up at 8 multiple days in my life so we just watched The Office and went to bed.
Tuesday we had planned to go to Puerto Plata to go to the beach but when we woke up it was rainy and the weather said it was suppose to rain all day so that was a big let down. But we jut watched more of The Office and hung out during the day and she went to my dance class again and after class we went to Fogon and got tostones (fried platanos that taste like French fries and are awesome) and a Presidente at 4:00 haha. That night everyone went back to Fogon for Paige’s last night and Ben and a few of the guys who Paige had met came to hang out with her. Paige went up and ordered her own beer and she was pumped to legally buy a beer. There weren’t that many people out but it was still fun just to chill with everyone. We went home pretty early because we had to get up at 7 to get Paige to the airport.
Wednesday morning Paige had to leave, very sad day. But mama got her a necklace and earrings kind of like mine for staying with us, broken record but literally she’s just so so nice. Paige got on her plane and got home safe but I was sad for her to go, the week literally went so fast. Everything started going crazy fast about the week before she got here and have not slowed down, I’m going to have to go home before I know it. Crazy.
Thursday night I went to Changeling with Ben which was actually a really good but super intense movie. Iverson and Angelica were at Fogon so we went to go see them after and Joe, Charlotte, and Randi ended up being there too so we hung out with them and even though we were just going to say “hi” I ended up getting home at 2.. poor choice because Friday morning at 6am we were leaving for our excursion to Samana. Three hours of sleep was def not enough but I just slept on the bus. We got to Samana late in the morning and took a boat for about an hour out to a national park (all very Pirates of the Caribbean looking, ballin) First we saw Bird Island which is like a big rock island that has lots of trees on it where there are just tons and tons of birds flying around. The fisherman on the shore give them their left over fish and they all keep having babies there and live there all the time so that was cool. Next we went to a cave that was really awesome and not as big as the first caves we went to but still huge and they gave us giant flashlights that were just really cool. We had lunch on the boat and after swimming in the ocean for a little bit we got to go kayaking! It was completely calm water haha but we got to go into all of the mangroves where there are just tons of giant trees that grow in the water and it was so peaceful and green and lush and just like a rainforest movie and I can’t even describe it. Trena and Brie tried to Xgames kayak and ended up having to lift their kayak over a giant fallen log and in the process Trena had two crabs on her back and a sting ray swam right by them. Agoooo yuck. Still, one of the coolest things I’ve done since I’ve been here. We took the boat ride back and then drove an hour to Las Terrenas which is a different coast town. It was starting to rain so that was kind of a let down but our hotel had a pool and we hadn’t been able to swim without salt water so we just sucked it up and swam there. It was an all inclusive resort (awesome) so it was a tonnn of old Americans and Europeans but we still had a good time. We got cocktails and drank them in the pool and then had a phenomenal dinner. After we ate we went to go explore the town; no one ever goes out until for sure 11:30 but it was fun to just walk around and see the different bars and restaurants. We went back to the hotel for our free cocktails and just hung out by the pool and played dominoes and just chatted. Some people were going out but Randi, Brie, Rosie and I decided to go skinny dipping in the ocean, group bonding. It was so so much fun and a better choice than going to the bars and finding out there were mostly just prostitutes. Sorry guys.
Saturday morning was supposed to be our beach time but it was cloudy and rainy which was lame but we just hung out at the beach anyway and did fake jazzercise/kickboxing exercises and everyone else looked at us funny but it was really fun. In the afternoon we drove back to Samana to go to a lecture of the descendants of ex-slaves from Philadelphia. They were brought down in the 1800s and kept up their traditions since then even though Trujillo (even dictator in the early 1900s who tried to get rid of all the black people in the Dominican Republic by shipping them to Haiti or killing them) tried to prohibit their English speaking and their traditions and stuff. They gave us ginger beer (not for me) and these really good break cake things. Then we made the four hour trip back to Santiago. That night we went to Fogon for the wristband special and pregamed there until we went to a Haitian party. This one was in like a big rented building thing that you could use for a reception or something. A lot of the study abroad kids from other programs were there too so we hung out with them and with our Haitian friends so that was fun.
Sunday I was way tired in the morning just from not catching up on sleep in the last two weeks but after lunch Angelica came to my door and said that her, Iverson, Ben and I were going to this lake river thing so I had to get my stuff ready really quick even though I looked like death and went with them. We went to Bonao which was like half an hour away from Santiago and it was just a river that ran through the hills and stuff and people and families just go there to hang out and swim. It was absolutely gorgeous because it was like a river/waterfall with all the rocks and stuff so we spent the day there just hanging out. The guys are from La Vega so they took us to their favorite sandwich place then we headed home. Overall a very awesome weekend, A+ for the nature in the DR. I’ll try to do better at keeping up and I’ll write soon, I promise. I miss everyone so much but everything is going ridiculously fast so I’ll be back in no time. LES AMO!
Aaand fail. Sorry for the ridiculous almost month long delay.. I finally actually made friends and school picked up so my amount of free time went way down. Anyways, ultimate ramble session GO.
Friday we went out with Diego and Ben, two Dominican engineers who the kids met out at a bar one night. We were all just hanging out at fogon and I mentioned that my dad worked at IBM just because I assume most engineers will know that and Diego literally flipped out and asked if my dad would give a conference or a presentation when he came to visit. I assumed he was kidding but he’s definitely called me and came across campus to seek me out at school to get information and is 100% serious. I’m glad I make friends because my dad is so cool.. good job Krista. We went to this dance club after and even though there weren’t that many people we got to go practice our meringue and bachata so that was fun. They were both really nice and Ben is from La Vega so he said he’d take us all to Carnival on Sunday in his car so that was cool.
Saturday there was a Haitian roof party so we decided to make it a dress theme night, our favorite. We all went to Franks (bar/liquor store that’s pretty close to all of our houses) and just hung out there for a few hours. Oh and legitimately the most giant human beings I’ve ever seen in my life came into the bar.. they were a Puerto Rican basketball team who was here playing in a tournament and they literally put man baby to shame and were terrifying but fun to talk to. They were going to come to the party with us later but ended up not going but still fun. The party was on the roof of an apartment building and they brought DJs and speakers and a bar up there and everyone just hangs out and dances. You could see the monument and like the whole city so that was awesome. It started raining after awhile though so the party ended pretty quick but still a sweet night.
Sunday Ben took us to La Vega for round two. It was cool that he has a car but he has literally the smallest toy car I’ve ever seen and six of us packed in there for the half an hour car ride. Ben usually is in Carnival and dresses up in the masks and the costumes and stuff so we were going to go meet his friends but they had already started in the parade by the time we got there but we still got to meet them as they came past and I got to try on one of the masks.. extremely sweaty but I felt like a badass. It was the last Sunday of carnival so it was pretty nuts there but I got hit a lot less so that was much better. And when the parade ended they just cranked the music up and it was a giant dance party in the street, what could be better. We ate terrible cheap pizza for dinner and then went to his friend Iverson’s house before going out to the clubs (even though it was a Sunday people go out after the parade for the month of February). As we were walking we saw that Omega, our favorite street meringue singer was performing at a concert in La Vega (there’s one song that they literally play everywhere, there’s no way I’ve gone a day since I’ve been here without hearing it at least twice so its become our song) so we went to go see him. We didn’t get to hear him play our song but it was still sweet and just like a big outdoor concert so that was cool. We went to a club after that was super packed even though it was like 8:00 on a Sunday but really fun and we all danced and hung out there until we came back to Santiago at like midnight. Going with someone who knows what he was doing and where to go was so much fun because we felt more like a part of it rather than just American tourists who were way out of place.
25 Febrero
Although Monday and Tuesday of this week took forever, PAIGE GOT HERE ON WEDNESDAYYYYYYYYY! Her week here was the most fun I’ve had so far and I’m so excited she got to come down. She got in at like 10 at night so when she got to my house she met my family just for a few minutes because it was so late. Her three years of high school Spanish were a little rusty so it was funny to watch her try to talk to my parents, I mostly just translated but she learned really quick and by the end of the week could understand a lot. Thursday we laid out on our roof (I forgot how pale people are from Minnesota in the winter haha) and had lunch with my family which she absolutely loved. Coming from eating popcorn and cereal all the time to having an extreme meal made for you everyday was great for her and my mom is just such a good cook and I’m glad she got to experience it so she knows just how good I was talking about. She came to my dance class to watch (laughed at me a little which was expected but I’m one of the best ones in the class, which doesn’t take much in a group of uncoordinated Americans). I showed her around campus and we had Bon (the major ice cream place here, so good). That was where she finally understood how much we get stared/whistled/hissed/etc at.. there was a pickup truck full of probably 15 guys who all just yelled at us and people who kept driving by just whistling or honking or staring.. she said she believed that people did that but didn’t really believe my descriptions until she got here. That night we went over to JB, Carlille, and Steeve’s apartment so she could meet them and Dimitri. She was surprised at just how nice and welcoming they were and just fun to hang out with. We went to a Haitian party at a club and she was way pumped about that because it felt like a club club like the movies and she’s only been to the Roscoes and bars in Rochester so she was really excited and got to dance with cool Haitian boys and was pumped about it.
Friday we went to Cabarete, a beach town on the North shore, to spend the night there and go out because it’s where the best clubs are by us. Ben and Iverson were going with us and were going to drive us and I had talked to them right before I went to bed and they said they were going to meet us at 9:00. Paige got her first experience of Dominican time: they finally came at 10:45. Ridiculous but we had McD’s bfast which was great and we still got to the beach by around 1:00 so that wasn’t too bad. We spent the whole day on the beach and it was an absolutely perfect day so I’m really glad Paige got such a great weekend there. Ha but just due to Minnesota winter she was pale as a dove and some guy who came up to talk to her told her she was the whitest girl on the beach. Hilarious but she got a solid tan by the end of the trip. Cabarete is really windy so it’s where they do a lot of windsurfing and kite surfing. We didn’t try it but it was really cool to watch because there were tons of people doing it and learning how to do it. We had some Dominican food for dinner and went to get ready for the night. We actually ended up getting a really nice hotel for $15 per person with four in one room and six in the other and it wasn’t extreme cousin style like Sosua. Ha I tried to explain the concept of cousin style to Ben but I don’t think that’s something that translates. Some friends of Randi and Charlotte (aka their mom’s brothers who happen to be 20 and gorgeous.. sometimes you date your host uncles?) came to hang out and they didn’t speak any English so Paige had a good Spanish lesson and was surprised at all the random words she remembered. We pregamed at the hotel and then went out to the clubs which are all right on the beach, like you walk through the sand by the ocean to get from club to club: awesome. There were tons of people out and tons of different clubs with different kinds of music and it was just an absolute blast being that close to the ocean and with that environment. After the bars we decided we wanted to swim in the ocean, which we found out pretty quick was illegal when the police came and told us to get out.. oops. But it started pouring so we went back to our hotel to sleep and get rested for the next day at the beach.
Saturday we shopped in the morning and had breakfast at a restaurant on the beach and just spent the whole day at the beach. It was another absolutely gorgeous day so that was phenomenal. We walked farther down the beach to some of the giant waves and Joe, Brie, Paige and I played in them for a long time until we were completely full of salt water and had to rest so we could see. We had some Dominican food for lunch and then decided to buy cigars to smoke on the beach. I’ve never smoked a cigar and probably won’t again because it was gross and I didn’t really get the point but I still felt like a badass so not bad. When we were kind of getting ready to go we found out that Ben and Iverson had drank three bottles of rum and were drunk and planned to stay Saturday night too but didn’t tell us.. Dominican planning is amazing. Luckily we caught the last bus back so nothing was a problem. That night we went to Fogon to celebrate my birthday and when we got there we found out that you can buy a wristband for 100 pesos (about $3) and you can drink as much as you want so Paige and I got those and sucked down vodka cranberries from 11-12 until my birthday so that was fun (don’t worry mom, I wasn’t even real drunk on my 21st bday so nothing to worry about). Two guys who I met the first weekend I was here were there and wanted to talk to Paige but spoke absolutely no english so I translated for all of them for like an hour, it was actually really fun and Paige was surprised that I could actually do it and say everything we wanted to.
Sunday was my real birthday day so when Paige and I went down for lunch my family surprised me and had decorated with balloons and streamers and nice plates and they had champagne and everything and the girls even got to have coca cola in their wine classes so that was so much fun. They sang ‘feliz cumpleanos’ and everything, adorable. My family is so nice I can’t even handle it. That afternoon I gave Paige a tour of Santiago. We went to the monument and walked around on Calle del Sol and sat in a park for awhile and then got yogen fruz which is literally the most amazing thing I’ve ever had. It’s a part of the ice cream place Bon and the use literal yogurt that’s frozen and you pick three fresh fruits to put in and they mix it all up and it was like heaven in a cup. We just kept walking around and ended up at the river as the sun was setting, so gorgeous with the mountains in the background. 100% fake life. Rosie had been staying with her parents in Puerto Plata since Wednesday so I was going through withdrawal and she finally got home Sunday night so we went back to hang out with her. Mama brought a cute tray of whiskey on the rocks in to Rosie’s room for us to drink.. It was absolutely terrible but so fun that she did it so we choked it down. Rosie ordered me pizza for my present (phenomenal present) but there was a problem with the credit card machine and they never called her to tell her and she had to call back twice to figure it out and the pizza came like two and a half hours late but she managed to argue a 50% discount all in Spanish, I was so proud of her skills because talking on the phone is extremely difficult. My parents also had bought a Bon ice cream cake (fun fact: you make a wish when you cut the cake instead of blow out the candles here) and got me a necklace and earrings that are beautiful, they’re way way too nice and amazing. That night we went to the monument to hang out and ended up meeting Alex and Rafael and hung out with them there for awhile then went to their friend’s liquor store that was actually closed but since their friend owned it we just drank in there at like 1 in the morning on a Sunday? A little sketch but it was fun. We went back to the monument and hung out there until like 3:30 and I had to get up at 8 to go volunteer so we went to bed and crashed.
Monday Paige slept in and I went to go teach my kiddies. On my way there the girl who I do it with called me and told me she wasn’t coming and neither was the other girl who goes with us and when I got there I found out the fourth girl dropped the class so I was on my own with the kids but it actually went really well. We played “Krista says” (like simon says) and telephone and they really seemed to like it and paid attention to me and learned stuff for two full hours, it was so fun and I could finally tell that they had warmed up to me and were really excited for me to come. That afternoon I watched the movie “Blowup” in my lit class and since it was in English Paige came but it was a really weird movie so Paige said that was the worst part of the trip haha. After class Paige, Rosie, and I went and got yaroa which is like a heart attack in a box: French fries with meat, cheese, and mayo on it. It was gross and amazing at the same time. That night Paige wanted to go out again because everything was so exciting for her but I was absolutely exhausted because I’ve never gone out four days in a row and still gotten up at 8 multiple days in my life so we just watched The Office and went to bed.
Tuesday we had planned to go to Puerto Plata to go to the beach but when we woke up it was rainy and the weather said it was suppose to rain all day so that was a big let down. But we jut watched more of The Office and hung out during the day and she went to my dance class again and after class we went to Fogon and got tostones (fried platanos that taste like French fries and are awesome) and a Presidente at 4:00 haha. That night everyone went back to Fogon for Paige’s last night and Ben and a few of the guys who Paige had met came to hang out with her. Paige went up and ordered her own beer and she was pumped to legally buy a beer. There weren’t that many people out but it was still fun just to chill with everyone. We went home pretty early because we had to get up at 7 to get Paige to the airport.
Wednesday morning Paige had to leave, very sad day. But mama got her a necklace and earrings kind of like mine for staying with us, broken record but literally she’s just so so nice. Paige got on her plane and got home safe but I was sad for her to go, the week literally went so fast. Everything started going crazy fast about the week before she got here and have not slowed down, I’m going to have to go home before I know it. Crazy.
Thursday night I went to Changeling with Ben which was actually a really good but super intense movie. Iverson and Angelica were at Fogon so we went to go see them after and Joe, Charlotte, and Randi ended up being there too so we hung out with them and even though we were just going to say “hi” I ended up getting home at 2.. poor choice because Friday morning at 6am we were leaving for our excursion to Samana. Three hours of sleep was def not enough but I just slept on the bus. We got to Samana late in the morning and took a boat for about an hour out to a national park (all very Pirates of the Caribbean looking, ballin) First we saw Bird Island which is like a big rock island that has lots of trees on it where there are just tons and tons of birds flying around. The fisherman on the shore give them their left over fish and they all keep having babies there and live there all the time so that was cool. Next we went to a cave that was really awesome and not as big as the first caves we went to but still huge and they gave us giant flashlights that were just really cool. We had lunch on the boat and after swimming in the ocean for a little bit we got to go kayaking! It was completely calm water haha but we got to go into all of the mangroves where there are just tons of giant trees that grow in the water and it was so peaceful and green and lush and just like a rainforest movie and I can’t even describe it. Trena and Brie tried to Xgames kayak and ended up having to lift their kayak over a giant fallen log and in the process Trena had two crabs on her back and a sting ray swam right by them. Agoooo yuck. Still, one of the coolest things I’ve done since I’ve been here. We took the boat ride back and then drove an hour to Las Terrenas which is a different coast town. It was starting to rain so that was kind of a let down but our hotel had a pool and we hadn’t been able to swim without salt water so we just sucked it up and swam there. It was an all inclusive resort (awesome) so it was a tonnn of old Americans and Europeans but we still had a good time. We got cocktails and drank them in the pool and then had a phenomenal dinner. After we ate we went to go explore the town; no one ever goes out until for sure 11:30 but it was fun to just walk around and see the different bars and restaurants. We went back to the hotel for our free cocktails and just hung out by the pool and played dominoes and just chatted. Some people were going out but Randi, Brie, Rosie and I decided to go skinny dipping in the ocean, group bonding. It was so so much fun and a better choice than going to the bars and finding out there were mostly just prostitutes. Sorry guys.
Saturday morning was supposed to be our beach time but it was cloudy and rainy which was lame but we just hung out at the beach anyway and did fake jazzercise/kickboxing exercises and everyone else looked at us funny but it was really fun. In the afternoon we drove back to Samana to go to a lecture of the descendants of ex-slaves from Philadelphia. They were brought down in the 1800s and kept up their traditions since then even though Trujillo (even dictator in the early 1900s who tried to get rid of all the black people in the Dominican Republic by shipping them to Haiti or killing them) tried to prohibit their English speaking and their traditions and stuff. They gave us ginger beer (not for me) and these really good break cake things. Then we made the four hour trip back to Santiago. That night we went to Fogon for the wristband special and pregamed there until we went to a Haitian party. This one was in like a big rented building thing that you could use for a reception or something. A lot of the study abroad kids from other programs were there too so we hung out with them and with our Haitian friends so that was fun.
Sunday I was way tired in the morning just from not catching up on sleep in the last two weeks but after lunch Angelica came to my door and said that her, Iverson, Ben and I were going to this lake river thing so I had to get my stuff ready really quick even though I looked like death and went with them. We went to Bonao which was like half an hour away from Santiago and it was just a river that ran through the hills and stuff and people and families just go there to hang out and swim. It was absolutely gorgeous because it was like a river/waterfall with all the rocks and stuff so we spent the day there just hanging out. The guys are from La Vega so they took us to their favorite sandwich place then we headed home. Overall a very awesome weekend, A+ for the nature in the DR. I’ll try to do better at keeping up and I’ll write soon, I promise. I miss everyone so much but everything is going ridiculously fast so I’ll be back in no time. LES AMO!
Saturday, February 21, 2009
11-17 de febrero
Sorry for the long break in between posts, I’ve started to be really busy lately and got way behind so here’s last week and I’ll post the rest soon! I also apologize in advance.. this is going to be an extremely long post.. it happens. Last Wednesday was my second day of volunteering in the hogar (hogar = home). After more than a week of constant rain, I finally saw sunlight at my house about half an hour before I was supposed to leave. So, naturally I assumed the rain was done (also I decided I didn’t need my umbrella).. completely wrong. I got in the concho and halfway there it started pouring again. There are two different conchos that run on the route that I needed to take so when I got in I asked the driver if they were going past the hogar emiliano tardiff and he said yes. When we got to the road that he told me it was on I got out, in the pouring rain, and walked up the street to discover he had dropped me off at the colegio (high school) emiliano tardiff. I walked around the neighborhood for awhile because I knew I was close, but got real discouraged real quick with the rain so I called Jonathan and he didn’t know where I was so I just went back to the main road and had to explain to another concho driver (there were about 5 other Dominicans in the car too) that I was lost (and completely drenched) so he took me to the place and didn’t make me pay because I was so pathetic. Finally I got to the hogar but you have to ring the buzzer to have someone come let you in. However, no one came to answer the buzzer and after about 10 minutes of more rain I was about to leave because I didn’t know what to do and finally some kids came to get me. The kids who are there in the afternoon are the older ones and they just looked at me like “how is this girl supposed to teach us anything” but because of the rain we couldn’t go outside to do sports so I played with the little babies for about half an hour and then left. Better luck next time.
That night we went out to Fogon to watch karaoke night (like Spanish love song karaoke.. hilarious) because Randi’s mom was getting married so she was leaving for four days and we had to get out of the house after all the rain. I saw a ton of my Haitian friends and it was just really refreshing to just hang out with a bunch of people. Angelica even sang which was hilarious but so much fun.
Thursday was absolutely gorgeous and the worst day to have class from 8am to 6pm but on the way to school after lunch Rosie videotaped the walk to campus and I made fun of her because anyone who watches it will probably get motion sickness. That night we went over to JB’s apartment to do a power hour (take a shot of beer every minute for an hour) but we only got through about 20 minutes before all of the beer was gone because instead of using shot glasses we just had little plastic cups and everyone got a little too excited. The guys went to go buy more and we never really resumed but did have a very successful dance party that lasted for a really long time. Afterwards on our way home at 2am we decided to stop and get burritos at this restaurant that was still open which seemed like a good choice until mine tasted like it had cream cheese in it and did not sit well with me. After walking everyone home (Joe and I live the farthest away so we walked all the girls home), I texted Rosie to come back (she had stayed to hang out with the guys but getting up at 8am and cocktailing doesn’t mix well for me so I wanted to go to bed) but she had fallen asleep waiting for me and didn’t actually end up getting my texts until the morning so I had to wait up until like 4:30 until I called her from the home phone (which you are not supposed to do bc calling a cell phone is like calling long distance but I didn’t have any minutes left on my cell phone, which never even happens but it was just an unlucky event) and we kind of got in trouble for leaving the alarm off for such a long time in the middle of the night but we got everything straightened out and now always both bring our keys.
Friday Rosie and I laid out all morning, did homework, napped, and ran in the afternoon, and then I went out with Brie, Angelica, Joe, Charlotte, Sally, and their language buddies from the university (you can sign up to have a ‘buddy’ so you help them with English and they help you with Spanish.. I don’t have one yet but just kind of latched on with their group). They were such nice guys and my first friends that weren’t Haitians that I’ve actually hung out with and haven’t just had a class with so that was fun. We went to a bar to get drinks before going out dancing, but while we were at the first bar someone stole one of the guy’s batteries out of his car. While trying to figure out what to do, a taxi drove by and was like “hey what do you guys need.. well hey I have a battery right here in my trunk if you want to buy it for 900 pesos..” sketchy so we think the taxi guy was the one who stole it and then just sold it back to him, but there was nothing else we really could have done. Once that mess was over we finally got to the club which was so much fun. It was super packed (which we were excited about, finally we got to go to a place where there were more people than just us) and it was like people our age up to people who were in their 60s. It was a really classy looking club, I wasn’t drinking at all so I don’t know how expensive the drinks were but there were like lounge rooms off of the dance floor and cool lights and I just felt really classy. They played reggaeton and techno but also bachata and meringue so I got to practice the moves I learned in class! We danced with the guys we went with and with a few random guys but it was really hard to try to talk to anyone because the music was so loud but it was still such a fun time to actually be able to dance. I got creeped on by a guy who was clearly older than 30 but it’s all part of the experience.
Saturday was Valentines Day and our mom set the table for lunch with red candles little teddy bears and gave us heart-shaped lollipops on our plates with a little valentine that the girls made us. In the afternoon Rosie and I walked around on Calle del Sol (there are a lot of shops and people and stuff) and didn’t buy anything but it was fun to just walk around and see more of the city. When we came back we helped Stephanie clean her room (she has soo many toys and Rosie and I ended up reliving our childhoods and playing with the toys rather than actually cleaning.. she had a skip-it and a million barbies) and it was actually really fun because for the first time both her and Jenny kind of opened up to us and acted like themselves around us so we were really excited. Although there were parties and stuff for Valentines day, Rosie and I decided to hang out with the fam and we watched Harry Potter 4 and go to bed at 11:30 which was probably the best vday I’ve ever had.
Sunday we left for Jarabacoa at 8:30 to go ride horses to a waterfall. The ranch was absolutely gorgeous, it was set like right in the mountains and all of the trees and plants were just amazing. We each got assigned a horse and a little boy who actually drove the horse and we just had to try not to fall off. These little boys were so cute and even though they were like 8 years old could just run and jump on the horses like a vault.. nuts. It was so fun to ride, we went through the woods a little bit and crossed a river (my orthodics got a little wet) and around on these trails until we got to the waterfall. The little boy just stripped down to their underwear and dove in off the cliffs.. we were a little more cautious because the water was freeezing but we walked across the pool thing the waterfall made to a smaller waterfall and the big falls were too strong and when we tried to walk up to them we just got pushed down the river. After swimming/playing at the falls for awhile we rode back to the ranch for lunch and pool time. It was really nice to finally have a pool to swim in after sweating every day for the last two months. In the afternoon we to La Vega for carnival. It was absolute madness, like a state fair/tgiving parade on drugs. Everyone wears these extreme costumes that are really bright colors and these giant masks that all look scary but are really cool. Different groups of people have different costumes and they get judged in Santo Domingo, Santiago, and La Vega and the best ones get to go to Santo Domingo for the final competition and they pick first, second, and third place. There were tons of people there to watch because La Vega is the place where it’s the biggest in the country. It was really cool, but the downside was getting literally hit by the guys in costumes.. they all have ropes connected to bags of sand or something and swing them and hit people in the ass and hips. Like really hard. I have a giant bruise the size of a softball on my hip still a week later. I still don’t understand why they do it but whenever I ask anyone they just say it’s tradition. They aren’t supposed to hit you while you’re on the sidewalk, but they would trick us into telling us they wouldn’t hit us so we could take a picture with them and then one of their friends would come up from the back during the picture and hit us really hard. Or little kids would just come onto the sidewalk and hit you where you just got hit.. it was ridiculous but quite an experience. Ha and one guy came over to Rosie to take a picture with her and afterwards he took her hand and pulled her into the street and was like ‘let’s you and me get out of here’ but in his mask and everything. Hilarious. And I think we didn’t make it any easier for ourselves because Rosie, Brie, and I stood together so they would come up to us and yell ‘rubia’ (blonde) and try to hit us on the sidewalk. I think we’re going to go back next weekend (it’s like 15 minutes from Santiago) because Randi had to go home for her mom’s wedding and it’s the last weekend so should be crazy so I’m pretty excited. Maybe a few presidentes with ease the pain next time. Ok sorry again for being a slacker and not writing, but I miss you all very much! BESOS.
Sorry for the long break in between posts, I’ve started to be really busy lately and got way behind so here’s last week and I’ll post the rest soon! I also apologize in advance.. this is going to be an extremely long post.. it happens. Last Wednesday was my second day of volunteering in the hogar (hogar = home). After more than a week of constant rain, I finally saw sunlight at my house about half an hour before I was supposed to leave. So, naturally I assumed the rain was done (also I decided I didn’t need my umbrella).. completely wrong. I got in the concho and halfway there it started pouring again. There are two different conchos that run on the route that I needed to take so when I got in I asked the driver if they were going past the hogar emiliano tardiff and he said yes. When we got to the road that he told me it was on I got out, in the pouring rain, and walked up the street to discover he had dropped me off at the colegio (high school) emiliano tardiff. I walked around the neighborhood for awhile because I knew I was close, but got real discouraged real quick with the rain so I called Jonathan and he didn’t know where I was so I just went back to the main road and had to explain to another concho driver (there were about 5 other Dominicans in the car too) that I was lost (and completely drenched) so he took me to the place and didn’t make me pay because I was so pathetic. Finally I got to the hogar but you have to ring the buzzer to have someone come let you in. However, no one came to answer the buzzer and after about 10 minutes of more rain I was about to leave because I didn’t know what to do and finally some kids came to get me. The kids who are there in the afternoon are the older ones and they just looked at me like “how is this girl supposed to teach us anything” but because of the rain we couldn’t go outside to do sports so I played with the little babies for about half an hour and then left. Better luck next time.
That night we went out to Fogon to watch karaoke night (like Spanish love song karaoke.. hilarious) because Randi’s mom was getting married so she was leaving for four days and we had to get out of the house after all the rain. I saw a ton of my Haitian friends and it was just really refreshing to just hang out with a bunch of people. Angelica even sang which was hilarious but so much fun.
Thursday was absolutely gorgeous and the worst day to have class from 8am to 6pm but on the way to school after lunch Rosie videotaped the walk to campus and I made fun of her because anyone who watches it will probably get motion sickness. That night we went over to JB’s apartment to do a power hour (take a shot of beer every minute for an hour) but we only got through about 20 minutes before all of the beer was gone because instead of using shot glasses we just had little plastic cups and everyone got a little too excited. The guys went to go buy more and we never really resumed but did have a very successful dance party that lasted for a really long time. Afterwards on our way home at 2am we decided to stop and get burritos at this restaurant that was still open which seemed like a good choice until mine tasted like it had cream cheese in it and did not sit well with me. After walking everyone home (Joe and I live the farthest away so we walked all the girls home), I texted Rosie to come back (she had stayed to hang out with the guys but getting up at 8am and cocktailing doesn’t mix well for me so I wanted to go to bed) but she had fallen asleep waiting for me and didn’t actually end up getting my texts until the morning so I had to wait up until like 4:30 until I called her from the home phone (which you are not supposed to do bc calling a cell phone is like calling long distance but I didn’t have any minutes left on my cell phone, which never even happens but it was just an unlucky event) and we kind of got in trouble for leaving the alarm off for such a long time in the middle of the night but we got everything straightened out and now always both bring our keys.
Friday Rosie and I laid out all morning, did homework, napped, and ran in the afternoon, and then I went out with Brie, Angelica, Joe, Charlotte, Sally, and their language buddies from the university (you can sign up to have a ‘buddy’ so you help them with English and they help you with Spanish.. I don’t have one yet but just kind of latched on with their group). They were such nice guys and my first friends that weren’t Haitians that I’ve actually hung out with and haven’t just had a class with so that was fun. We went to a bar to get drinks before going out dancing, but while we were at the first bar someone stole one of the guy’s batteries out of his car. While trying to figure out what to do, a taxi drove by and was like “hey what do you guys need.. well hey I have a battery right here in my trunk if you want to buy it for 900 pesos..” sketchy so we think the taxi guy was the one who stole it and then just sold it back to him, but there was nothing else we really could have done. Once that mess was over we finally got to the club which was so much fun. It was super packed (which we were excited about, finally we got to go to a place where there were more people than just us) and it was like people our age up to people who were in their 60s. It was a really classy looking club, I wasn’t drinking at all so I don’t know how expensive the drinks were but there were like lounge rooms off of the dance floor and cool lights and I just felt really classy. They played reggaeton and techno but also bachata and meringue so I got to practice the moves I learned in class! We danced with the guys we went with and with a few random guys but it was really hard to try to talk to anyone because the music was so loud but it was still such a fun time to actually be able to dance. I got creeped on by a guy who was clearly older than 30 but it’s all part of the experience.
Saturday was Valentines Day and our mom set the table for lunch with red candles little teddy bears and gave us heart-shaped lollipops on our plates with a little valentine that the girls made us. In the afternoon Rosie and I walked around on Calle del Sol (there are a lot of shops and people and stuff) and didn’t buy anything but it was fun to just walk around and see more of the city. When we came back we helped Stephanie clean her room (she has soo many toys and Rosie and I ended up reliving our childhoods and playing with the toys rather than actually cleaning.. she had a skip-it and a million barbies) and it was actually really fun because for the first time both her and Jenny kind of opened up to us and acted like themselves around us so we were really excited. Although there were parties and stuff for Valentines day, Rosie and I decided to hang out with the fam and we watched Harry Potter 4 and go to bed at 11:30 which was probably the best vday I’ve ever had.
Sunday we left for Jarabacoa at 8:30 to go ride horses to a waterfall. The ranch was absolutely gorgeous, it was set like right in the mountains and all of the trees and plants were just amazing. We each got assigned a horse and a little boy who actually drove the horse and we just had to try not to fall off. These little boys were so cute and even though they were like 8 years old could just run and jump on the horses like a vault.. nuts. It was so fun to ride, we went through the woods a little bit and crossed a river (my orthodics got a little wet) and around on these trails until we got to the waterfall. The little boy just stripped down to their underwear and dove in off the cliffs.. we were a little more cautious because the water was freeezing but we walked across the pool thing the waterfall made to a smaller waterfall and the big falls were too strong and when we tried to walk up to them we just got pushed down the river. After swimming/playing at the falls for awhile we rode back to the ranch for lunch and pool time. It was really nice to finally have a pool to swim in after sweating every day for the last two months. In the afternoon we to La Vega for carnival. It was absolute madness, like a state fair/tgiving parade on drugs. Everyone wears these extreme costumes that are really bright colors and these giant masks that all look scary but are really cool. Different groups of people have different costumes and they get judged in Santo Domingo, Santiago, and La Vega and the best ones get to go to Santo Domingo for the final competition and they pick first, second, and third place. There were tons of people there to watch because La Vega is the place where it’s the biggest in the country. It was really cool, but the downside was getting literally hit by the guys in costumes.. they all have ropes connected to bags of sand or something and swing them and hit people in the ass and hips. Like really hard. I have a giant bruise the size of a softball on my hip still a week later. I still don’t understand why they do it but whenever I ask anyone they just say it’s tradition. They aren’t supposed to hit you while you’re on the sidewalk, but they would trick us into telling us they wouldn’t hit us so we could take a picture with them and then one of their friends would come up from the back during the picture and hit us really hard. Or little kids would just come onto the sidewalk and hit you where you just got hit.. it was ridiculous but quite an experience. Ha and one guy came over to Rosie to take a picture with her and afterwards he took her hand and pulled her into the street and was like ‘let’s you and me get out of here’ but in his mask and everything. Hilarious. And I think we didn’t make it any easier for ourselves because Rosie, Brie, and I stood together so they would come up to us and yell ‘rubia’ (blonde) and try to hit us on the sidewalk. I think we’re going to go back next weekend (it’s like 15 minutes from Santiago) because Randi had to go home for her mom’s wedding and it’s the last weekend so should be crazy so I’m pretty excited. Maybe a few presidentes with ease the pain next time. Ok sorry again for being a slacker and not writing, but I miss you all very much! BESOS.
Monday, February 9, 2009
3 – 9 Febrero
This was our first real routine week of school with out holidays or random trips. It finally feels like this is where I go to school and that I’m not just some tourist wandering around (people still stare all the time but I don’t think there’s a chance for that to stop so oh well). Wednesday was Dimitri’s birthday so Brie and I went over to JB’s apartment to hang out with the guys. I tried Haitian rum.. I hate rum so it was terrible but not as bad as other kinds I’ve had. And Dimitri’s mom had made this like super sweet/thick as syrup/rum drink that I only had a sip of but was really good but I felt like I should have put it on pancakes. Thursday it rained all day and after a full day of class Rosie and I did not feel like going out so we watched Sex in the City for about three hours and went to bed early. Oh and for dinner that night mama made pancakes and the Dominican equivalent to oatmeal.. it’s a lot thinner and a lot sweeter and you drink it out of a coffee mug (Rosie didn’t understand this at first and put water in her oatmeal mug and mama laughed at us). It was good but too sweet to drink a lot of.
Friday it was still raining so we didn’t do much during the day, just homework and watched the Office for most of the day. That night we went to this Haitian boy Clement’s apartment to have a few cocktails and play spin the bottle like middle schoolers before we went to this house party where we met up with Brie, Joe, Charlotte, and Randi. There were a ton of people but it was all outside in the backyard this time but still had like a bunch of different DJs so that was cool. The police came I guess, which meant nothing except they had to stop playing the music so after lingering there for a little bit we all went back to JB’s apartment to hang out. Oh and we were just talking about cultural differences with them and they said that almost all guys lose their virginity between 11 and 13. I could not believe it but sex is just way more casual here which is just so weird and different for me. But, before we knew it it was 4am and we came home.. mama laughed at us the next day but was ok with it because usually parties don’t start until so late here.
Saturday was even more worthless than Friday.. since we went to bed at like 5am we didn’t wake up until like noon. After lunch we were still recovering from the evening before and tried to watch a movie in Rosie’s room but we both fell asleep for like three hours. Amazing how I can just always keep sleeping here when it’s raining because you really don’t feel like doing anything. When we woke up we went to La Sirena which is like a wal-mart type situation because we had planned to watch Mean Girls with Stephanie and Jenny and we wanted to make them puppy chow but couldn’t find any of the ingredients so we decided on rice crispy bars. And luckily for us looking like death, we ran into JB and Dimitri so that was pretty random/funny/unfortunate. When we got home we made our rice crispy bars and Jenny was at a friends house so we decided to watch the movie another night. That night Rosie and I went with JB, Dimitri, and Carlille to meet their friend Paolo and we hung out as his apartment.. oh my god. It was the nicest apartment I’ve ever seen in my life, and he lives there by himself. It was like extremely well decorated and clean and huge. His parents live in New York and he lived there with them for 15 years but decided to come back here for school. They were going out to a club but dropped us off before because we had to get up at 7:30 on Sunday.
After getting completely ready Sunday morning, Jonathan (our program director) called us a little after 8 saying that our excursion was cancelled because it was still pouring rain. Sooo let down, because I was way excited (we were going to go to Jarabacoa to ride horses to a waterfall then go to La Vega for carnival in the afternoon.. and those are all very outdoorsy activities so it doesn’t make sense to go when it’s raining but still) so naturally I went back to bed and took a three hour nap. I’m going to be so rested when I come back it’s going to be out of control. I watched two and a half movies with my mom after taking my second nap of the day and finishing my homework through Wednesday. Loser. We also watched the news which was really sad because tons of people’s houses were flooded and completely destroyed and normally it doesn’t rain this much. So sad.
This morning (Monday) was my first day of volunteering with the kids in the orphanage/home place. It was absolute chaos but I absolutely loved it. There were about thirty kids who “split” into two groups (they were all about eight years old or younger) of little kids who were going to do art and the older kids who we were going to teach English. There were four of us from the university, two for the little kids and two for the older ones. However, we were all in the same room that also had all the toys in it and it’s been raining for the past three days. And we didn’t get any training whatsoever, they literally were just like “ok here you go you have two hours teach them English good luck!” It was ridiculously crazy but the kids were all excited to learn it was just difficult with the environment. We managed to teach them “hello my name is..” and “what is your name” haha except when we had them practicing writing it I wrote my example as “my name is Krista” and all of the kids wrote “my name is Krista Juan” or whatever their name was because they didn’t understand that Krista wasn’t part of the English. Hilarious but I clearly need to improve my teaching techniques. After about 20 minutes of trying to get them to focus we gave up and just let them play and helped individual kids with what they wanted to practice. They know the “head shoulders knees and toes” song and I quizzed them on the individual parts and they only kind of knew them but it was cute to watch them go through the song in their heads to try to figure it out. I’m really excited to plan what to teach them and try to make fun activities because I think we’re really just on our own. I’m with the older kids on Wednesday afternoon so I don’t know if that will be harder or easier but I guess I’ll find out. I miss all of you so so much, les amo!
This was our first real routine week of school with out holidays or random trips. It finally feels like this is where I go to school and that I’m not just some tourist wandering around (people still stare all the time but I don’t think there’s a chance for that to stop so oh well). Wednesday was Dimitri’s birthday so Brie and I went over to JB’s apartment to hang out with the guys. I tried Haitian rum.. I hate rum so it was terrible but not as bad as other kinds I’ve had. And Dimitri’s mom had made this like super sweet/thick as syrup/rum drink that I only had a sip of but was really good but I felt like I should have put it on pancakes. Thursday it rained all day and after a full day of class Rosie and I did not feel like going out so we watched Sex in the City for about three hours and went to bed early. Oh and for dinner that night mama made pancakes and the Dominican equivalent to oatmeal.. it’s a lot thinner and a lot sweeter and you drink it out of a coffee mug (Rosie didn’t understand this at first and put water in her oatmeal mug and mama laughed at us). It was good but too sweet to drink a lot of.
Friday it was still raining so we didn’t do much during the day, just homework and watched the Office for most of the day. That night we went to this Haitian boy Clement’s apartment to have a few cocktails and play spin the bottle like middle schoolers before we went to this house party where we met up with Brie, Joe, Charlotte, and Randi. There were a ton of people but it was all outside in the backyard this time but still had like a bunch of different DJs so that was cool. The police came I guess, which meant nothing except they had to stop playing the music so after lingering there for a little bit we all went back to JB’s apartment to hang out. Oh and we were just talking about cultural differences with them and they said that almost all guys lose their virginity between 11 and 13. I could not believe it but sex is just way more casual here which is just so weird and different for me. But, before we knew it it was 4am and we came home.. mama laughed at us the next day but was ok with it because usually parties don’t start until so late here.
Saturday was even more worthless than Friday.. since we went to bed at like 5am we didn’t wake up until like noon. After lunch we were still recovering from the evening before and tried to watch a movie in Rosie’s room but we both fell asleep for like three hours. Amazing how I can just always keep sleeping here when it’s raining because you really don’t feel like doing anything. When we woke up we went to La Sirena which is like a wal-mart type situation because we had planned to watch Mean Girls with Stephanie and Jenny and we wanted to make them puppy chow but couldn’t find any of the ingredients so we decided on rice crispy bars. And luckily for us looking like death, we ran into JB and Dimitri so that was pretty random/funny/unfortunate. When we got home we made our rice crispy bars and Jenny was at a friends house so we decided to watch the movie another night. That night Rosie and I went with JB, Dimitri, and Carlille to meet their friend Paolo and we hung out as his apartment.. oh my god. It was the nicest apartment I’ve ever seen in my life, and he lives there by himself. It was like extremely well decorated and clean and huge. His parents live in New York and he lived there with them for 15 years but decided to come back here for school. They were going out to a club but dropped us off before because we had to get up at 7:30 on Sunday.
After getting completely ready Sunday morning, Jonathan (our program director) called us a little after 8 saying that our excursion was cancelled because it was still pouring rain. Sooo let down, because I was way excited (we were going to go to Jarabacoa to ride horses to a waterfall then go to La Vega for carnival in the afternoon.. and those are all very outdoorsy activities so it doesn’t make sense to go when it’s raining but still) so naturally I went back to bed and took a three hour nap. I’m going to be so rested when I come back it’s going to be out of control. I watched two and a half movies with my mom after taking my second nap of the day and finishing my homework through Wednesday. Loser. We also watched the news which was really sad because tons of people’s houses were flooded and completely destroyed and normally it doesn’t rain this much. So sad.
This morning (Monday) was my first day of volunteering with the kids in the orphanage/home place. It was absolute chaos but I absolutely loved it. There were about thirty kids who “split” into two groups (they were all about eight years old or younger) of little kids who were going to do art and the older kids who we were going to teach English. There were four of us from the university, two for the little kids and two for the older ones. However, we were all in the same room that also had all the toys in it and it’s been raining for the past three days. And we didn’t get any training whatsoever, they literally were just like “ok here you go you have two hours teach them English good luck!” It was ridiculously crazy but the kids were all excited to learn it was just difficult with the environment. We managed to teach them “hello my name is..” and “what is your name” haha except when we had them practicing writing it I wrote my example as “my name is Krista” and all of the kids wrote “my name is Krista Juan” or whatever their name was because they didn’t understand that Krista wasn’t part of the English. Hilarious but I clearly need to improve my teaching techniques. After about 20 minutes of trying to get them to focus we gave up and just let them play and helped individual kids with what they wanted to practice. They know the “head shoulders knees and toes” song and I quizzed them on the individual parts and they only kind of knew them but it was cute to watch them go through the song in their heads to try to figure it out. I’m really excited to plan what to teach them and try to make fun activities because I think we’re really just on our own. I’m with the older kids on Wednesday afternoon so I don’t know if that will be harder or easier but I guess I’ll find out. I miss all of you so so much, les amo!
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
27 Enero
Ha so I’m sitting in my room and Jenny and Stephanie start listening to “candy shop” by 50 cent and singing along.. hilarious.
28 Enero – 2 Febrero
Sorry about the long break between posts, but now school is getting pretty routine so I’ll probably end up just posting at the beginning of every week. Last Thursday Charlotte, Randi, Angelica, Joe, Trena, and her friend went out to the monument. No one was really there (people usually go on Friday through Sunday nights, but JB told me that starting a few years ago a lot less people started hanging out there) but we bought a bottle and took shots and got a little silly and walked around for a bar by the monument and when we didn’t find anything we headed back to fogon, ha. There was almost no one there but there were a ton of people at the bar next door so we hung out there. There were quite a few CIEE (another study abroad program like ISA, we have classes with them and are white people with them so we’ve gotten to know some of them) people there and we talked to some Dominicans too. When that bar closed at 12 we were still weren’t ready to go home so we went to fogon and some guys watched us being drunk and bought us a beer and they were actually just really nice guys to talk to so that was fun. Friday Rosie and I laid out and we had an ISA meeting in the afternoon (they told us about our next excursion.. we’re going to ride horses to a waterfall!! And go to La Vega, the main place for carnival so I’m really excited) and we just did homework until that night. Brie and I went out with JB, Demitri, and Carlisle (he was at the party last weekend too) and we went to two bars by the monument. One was more like a dance club but it was really small and we were the only people in the bar but the second bar was more like an outdoor restaurant on a patio. I felt cool because it’s the first time in my life I’ve ordered a drink off of a menu. Brie and I got mojitos, me gusta mucho. We all went back to JB’s apartment and since the guys had been telling us how bad all the Dominican music is (they’re Haitian) we listed to traditional Haitian music. It was kind of like reggae sometimes but different other times, it was cool and different than anything else I’ve really heard. We came back at like 2 because Brie was going to the beach at 8 Saturday morning and I was going to the campo with my family but it was really fun to hang out with new people and just get to know those guys.
Saturday morning our whole family went out to the campo. It’s basically just a big amount of land that our family owns (with all of my dad’s brothers and stuff) that has rice and other fields and just land with a bunch of trees and hills and pastures for cows and stuff. It was absolutely gorgeous; there was a little cabin-like thing that just had a kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom but had a really nice patio and the entire yard was shaded with trees so I was finally at a perfect temp all day. And it wasn’t just our family but (I think) most of my dad’s brothers and their families so there was another CIEE exchange student and two of Stephanie and Jenny’s cousins that were 5 and 7 and adorable. The little cousins had just gotten a dog that morning (it’s name was poochy) and it was soo tiny and adorable and it was so cute to watch the girls play with it.
There was a little “lagoon” aka pond that we went to and threw bread in the water and watched tons of fish eat it. Then papa took us around the land and we picked guavas off the trees. He had a huge long stick with prongs on the end of it and a huge knife so I figured he was just going to poke the fruit down but when we got to the first tree he literally jumped in the tree and started climbing to get the fruit down and threw it to us and we put it in bags. It was literally hilarious because I really did not expect him to be climbing the trees. We got to eat guava fresh off the tree; they gave us green ones first but those tasted like literal shit because they were so sour. But we tried yellow ones which are riper and those were much much better. We just walked (/hiked.. it was really hilly) around and papa gathered more fruit and we just looked around. And we got probably five feet from the cows that were grazing in the pasture so that was cool. We had lunch and cheesecake and dulce de leche but a solid version that was phenomenal and just basically relaxed the entire rest of the day. I played dominos with mama, Rosie, and Mary (the CIEE girl) and the three of us took naps in lawn chairs. The old men played dominos really fast and were really intense about it, maybe someday I can play with them. Oh and poochy kept trying to attack the horses (the dog was barely bigger than a hamster). Hilarious. Overall it was just such a relaxing day and so good to be out of the city and be able to be outside all day.
That night we tried to go out dancing, and yet again failed. We’re finally believe everyone who tells us that only couples go to dancing clubs, but it was still fun to watch. There was this crazzzy couple who like flipped each other around like the hand jive scene in Grease and the guy put an empty presidente bottle on the floor and balanced on it with one foot while the girl spun him around. Tough act to follow. So after watching for awhile we went back to the monument and there was actually a pretty big concert there with meringue, bachata, and salsa music so that was fun to watch. The concert didn’t last much longer after we got there but we just hung out at the monument for awhile and a few randoms talked to us which was interesting as always. Everyone went to a different dance club after but I was really tired from getting up early so I had them take me home and I just kind of hung out and went to bed pretty early.
Sunday rained all day and I had a ton of homework so that was kind of a lame day. We met at a sports bar to watch the super bowl though and that was really fun. I felt like such an adult drinking a beer in a bar watching the super bowl. Geek but still too excited to be legal (and less than a month until I’m literally legal woo!) And Randi is from Pittsburg so she was really pumped and even brought her fan towel thing that you wave at games. There weren’t very many people in the bar but it was still fun to just hang out and have a very American night haha. OH and right as the steelers were making the 100 yard drive the sound on all the TVs got switched to a palates infomercial so we could still see the game but had to listen to people doing palates for like fifteen minutes. Hilarious. They finally figured it out so we could hear Bruce so that was good. This is my first week that I’ll actually have all my classes so that’ll be different than everything feeling like a weekend. I still haven’t started volunteering yet.. but hopefully by next week I can because I really want to play with the kiddds. I hope all is well in the US, I miss you all very very much! Besos (kisses)!
Ha so I’m sitting in my room and Jenny and Stephanie start listening to “candy shop” by 50 cent and singing along.. hilarious.
28 Enero – 2 Febrero
Sorry about the long break between posts, but now school is getting pretty routine so I’ll probably end up just posting at the beginning of every week. Last Thursday Charlotte, Randi, Angelica, Joe, Trena, and her friend went out to the monument. No one was really there (people usually go on Friday through Sunday nights, but JB told me that starting a few years ago a lot less people started hanging out there) but we bought a bottle and took shots and got a little silly and walked around for a bar by the monument and when we didn’t find anything we headed back to fogon, ha. There was almost no one there but there were a ton of people at the bar next door so we hung out there. There were quite a few CIEE (another study abroad program like ISA, we have classes with them and are white people with them so we’ve gotten to know some of them) people there and we talked to some Dominicans too. When that bar closed at 12 we were still weren’t ready to go home so we went to fogon and some guys watched us being drunk and bought us a beer and they were actually just really nice guys to talk to so that was fun. Friday Rosie and I laid out and we had an ISA meeting in the afternoon (they told us about our next excursion.. we’re going to ride horses to a waterfall!! And go to La Vega, the main place for carnival so I’m really excited) and we just did homework until that night. Brie and I went out with JB, Demitri, and Carlisle (he was at the party last weekend too) and we went to two bars by the monument. One was more like a dance club but it was really small and we were the only people in the bar but the second bar was more like an outdoor restaurant on a patio. I felt cool because it’s the first time in my life I’ve ordered a drink off of a menu. Brie and I got mojitos, me gusta mucho. We all went back to JB’s apartment and since the guys had been telling us how bad all the Dominican music is (they’re Haitian) we listed to traditional Haitian music. It was kind of like reggae sometimes but different other times, it was cool and different than anything else I’ve really heard. We came back at like 2 because Brie was going to the beach at 8 Saturday morning and I was going to the campo with my family but it was really fun to hang out with new people and just get to know those guys.
Saturday morning our whole family went out to the campo. It’s basically just a big amount of land that our family owns (with all of my dad’s brothers and stuff) that has rice and other fields and just land with a bunch of trees and hills and pastures for cows and stuff. It was absolutely gorgeous; there was a little cabin-like thing that just had a kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom but had a really nice patio and the entire yard was shaded with trees so I was finally at a perfect temp all day. And it wasn’t just our family but (I think) most of my dad’s brothers and their families so there was another CIEE exchange student and two of Stephanie and Jenny’s cousins that were 5 and 7 and adorable. The little cousins had just gotten a dog that morning (it’s name was poochy) and it was soo tiny and adorable and it was so cute to watch the girls play with it.
There was a little “lagoon” aka pond that we went to and threw bread in the water and watched tons of fish eat it. Then papa took us around the land and we picked guavas off the trees. He had a huge long stick with prongs on the end of it and a huge knife so I figured he was just going to poke the fruit down but when we got to the first tree he literally jumped in the tree and started climbing to get the fruit down and threw it to us and we put it in bags. It was literally hilarious because I really did not expect him to be climbing the trees. We got to eat guava fresh off the tree; they gave us green ones first but those tasted like literal shit because they were so sour. But we tried yellow ones which are riper and those were much much better. We just walked (/hiked.. it was really hilly) around and papa gathered more fruit and we just looked around. And we got probably five feet from the cows that were grazing in the pasture so that was cool. We had lunch and cheesecake and dulce de leche but a solid version that was phenomenal and just basically relaxed the entire rest of the day. I played dominos with mama, Rosie, and Mary (the CIEE girl) and the three of us took naps in lawn chairs. The old men played dominos really fast and were really intense about it, maybe someday I can play with them. Oh and poochy kept trying to attack the horses (the dog was barely bigger than a hamster). Hilarious. Overall it was just such a relaxing day and so good to be out of the city and be able to be outside all day.
That night we tried to go out dancing, and yet again failed. We’re finally believe everyone who tells us that only couples go to dancing clubs, but it was still fun to watch. There was this crazzzy couple who like flipped each other around like the hand jive scene in Grease and the guy put an empty presidente bottle on the floor and balanced on it with one foot while the girl spun him around. Tough act to follow. So after watching for awhile we went back to the monument and there was actually a pretty big concert there with meringue, bachata, and salsa music so that was fun to watch. The concert didn’t last much longer after we got there but we just hung out at the monument for awhile and a few randoms talked to us which was interesting as always. Everyone went to a different dance club after but I was really tired from getting up early so I had them take me home and I just kind of hung out and went to bed pretty early.
Sunday rained all day and I had a ton of homework so that was kind of a lame day. We met at a sports bar to watch the super bowl though and that was really fun. I felt like such an adult drinking a beer in a bar watching the super bowl. Geek but still too excited to be legal (and less than a month until I’m literally legal woo!) And Randi is from Pittsburg so she was really pumped and even brought her fan towel thing that you wave at games. There weren’t very many people in the bar but it was still fun to just hang out and have a very American night haha. OH and right as the steelers were making the 100 yard drive the sound on all the TVs got switched to a palates infomercial so we could still see the game but had to listen to people doing palates for like fifteen minutes. Hilarious. They finally figured it out so we could hear Bruce so that was good. This is my first week that I’ll actually have all my classes so that’ll be different than everything feeling like a weekend. I still haven’t started volunteering yet.. but hopefully by next week I can because I really want to play with the kiddds. I hope all is well in the US, I miss you all very very much! Besos (kisses)!
Monday, January 26, 2009
23-26 de Enero
Friday was another rainy day and we were still tired from the trip to Santo Domingo so we took naps and laid around for most of the day.. solid. We decided to go see the movie Twilight with Bri, Charlotte and Randi and went to go meet them for a movie at 4:30. However, the theater was “broken” until 5:00 until they would start playing movies again (some random told us this.. no one was even working in the theater) so we just hung out around the mall and ate dinner there before the movie. Ha and some guy in the food court gave Rosie a napkin saying “Hello. I think all of you are beautiful and I want any of your phone numbers. I would be very happy with any of you for the rest of my life” haha. Ridiculous but we had a good laugh. We finally made it to the movie and although I judged vampire romance novels at first, I’ve gotten sucked in a loved the movie. That night we planned to go out to this bar that people had gone to earlier in the week and said it was really fun a lot of people. However (standard theme), when we got there we realized that it was a gay bar. Soo after going all the way across town we headed back to El Fogon as usual. Steeve, JB, and Dimitri came again for awhile and we went home pretty earlier.
Saturday we had people at our house to watch the view of Jenny’s Quince (15th birthday ceremony thing). I had seen pictures and already been surprised at how formal their dresses and tuxes were but seeing the tape of it was like watching a wedding/prom/dance scene from Step Up. It was literally as fancy and formal as a wedding with a reception after and then Jenny’s friends surprised her and had choreographed a dance to a lot of popular songs.. mama said they had been working on it for a long time and it was actually really good. Even though it was hard to understand most of it it was so cool to see how important it is and just how different it is than our culture. Also, they played Kenny G through the majority of the video and I just had to laugh because I’ve never heard Kenny G so much in my entire life as I have in the last three weeks.. literally people will blast it from their houses in the middle of the day. Love it. I read the second Twilight book (addicted) for about 4 hours until we got ready to go to this party with Steeve and his friends. He told us it was formal so we wore nice dresses so we were dressed up but when we got to the first place to “pick up some of their friends”, they told us to come up with them but it was like the actual graduation party with the close family. So Rosie and I met the two people the party was for and their families at this very small gathering.. I felt extremely out of place but everyone was nice to us. Ha and they started plaing Nsync at this family party and Rosie and I just cracked up at how ridiculous everything was. We were only there for a little while though until we went to go wait at another apartment for some friends, then went to Steeve and JB’s apartment because we were still waiting and finally made it to the party at about 1:30. I haven’t stayed up later than 2 this entire trip so I was already pretty tired but woke up right when we got there.. the party was so extreme. They had taken all of the furniture out of this entire house and had a DJ, fog machine, black light, strobe light (I’m glad I barely drank anything before because the lights almost made me sick), and a bar outside. I felt ridiculously cool like in a movie. We met quite a few people and danced with some guys (we were the only Americans there so, yet again, a little out of place but it was still fun) who were nice but it was hard to talk to anyone above all the extreme techno music. Rosie and I were exhausted so we left at 3:30 and everyone asked if we were sick because we were leaving so early haha. Oh well, I guess we’ll have to adjust to that. When I got home I just wanted to email my parents to tell them I was going to Santo Domingo the next day (and usually I check my email before I go to bed when people are asleep) and as usual I had already set the alarm and figured the sensor was just downstairs (because I’ve never had a problem before) but when I stepped out of my room I set the alarm off at 3:30 in the morning and it was ridiculously loud. I ran downstairs and shut it off really quick but mama still came down to see what was wrong and I felt really stupid but she was very nice about it and hopefully I just won’t make that mistake ever again.
Sunday morning I woke up early and packed because the night before at 10:00 I had decided to go to Santo Domingo for a baseball game. Baseball is like the national sport and this was one of the final games of the season so we wanted to go even though it was the Santo Domingo team (Licey) and not the Santiago team (Alguilas).We took the bus their and put our stuff in the Hostel that Trena had been staying at all weekend. The lady who owned it was from Tennessee I think and was so nice and a little goofy but the place was cool. Ultimate cousin style with tons of beds packed into small rooms. She sold art though and had it all over the hostel so it was really cool to look at and got me started thinking about what kind of painting I want to buy. The hostel was in the Zona Colonial of Santo Domingo, so right by Christopher Columbus’ house and all of the fortress/church things that are in the capital (we’re going there for an excursion so I’m not exactly sure all what we saw but will find out in a few weeks). We had decently cheap pizza at this outdoor restaurant and it was a really nice part of the city so that was lovely. After that we went right to the game, which cost 50 pesos, aka about $1.50. We couldn’t believe how cheap it was which was awesome. At first almost no one was at the game but about five minutes before it started the entire stadium was packed with people wearing royal blue (Licey’s colors) and everyone and their madre had flags and/or horns and whistles. The flags were fun, the guy right next to us who blew the horn every five seconds was not so fun. All part of the experience I guess. The game was nuts, the fans were so pumped and it was really fun to watch them even though there weren’t many hits. They also sold pizza right out of a pizza box, some guy would just keep grabbing pizzas and selling slices to people. Just different.
About halfway through the game someone fell off of the wall in the outfield onto the field and was just laying there unconscious and the security guards ran over and picked this guy up by the back of his shirt and his legs and just ran him off the field.. it was really disturbing and just weird to see (especially because I thought the security guard had shot the guy.. I don’t believe he was dead but he was for sure not moving so it was scary). Five seconds late the game was back to normal though so I’m not sure if that’s a regular occurrence. Ha another eventful thing was that one of the Licey players had picked Angelica out of the crowd and was pointing at her and waving so she waved back and he told someone to come up to her and get her phone number. So they called her down and she typed in a number and like our whole section of the crowd was watching this famous player get our friend’s number. She has a serious boyfriend though and thought it was a little creepy and degrading to get picked out of a crowd so she gave him a wrong number and we think he figured it out about half an hour later when him and like 3 of his teammates were just glaring at her for a really long time. I was fascinated that this was going on in the middle of the game and just laughed because it was a huge slap in the face to this famous guy. Nice. Bri and I had a little boy situation of our own.. there was a boy that was probably four years old sitting three rows in front of us and he kept looking at us and smiling and then hiding and then smiling again.. so adorable. Then his dad lifted him up the three rows and he gave Bri a single kernel of popcorn and then came back five minutes later and gave her a heart shaped sucker and gave me a cough drop. Ha, true love. I literally am in love with the kids down here and want to bring one back with me. During the 7th inning it kind of started to sprinkle and some people were deciding to leave but Bri and I decided to stay a little bit to sit it out.. poor choice. It literally started pouring and the two of us along with the rest of the stadium had to push through to get out of the stadium. It was so chaotic and ridiculous and there were babies just screaming everywhere. The entire crowd tried to push into this very small hallway to try to get out of the rain so it was literally like sardines. Joe got his wallet stolen out of his pocket because it was just so crazy which sucked but we helped him pay for stuff and he just had to cancel his card. We went back to the Zona Colonial to find dinner. Even though it was a pretty touristy area we found a cheap sandwich place so that was good. We just hung out for the rest of the night in this park that was right by what I think was an old church but I’m still unsure.. it was still really awesome though. Some people dressed up for carnival (this really big cultural festival that lasts for the month of February and people dress up in ridiculously bright colored outfits and masks and stuff.. a little scary but I’m way excited for the real holiday) came right by us with drums and people dressed up and dancing.. some of the little kids cried because they were so scared and even though it was only a couple of them it got us all pumped for it to start. We also found out that Licey won because people kept driving through the streets honking and screaming and waving their flags so that was fun to see. We got some phenomenal ice cream and just hung out until a lot of homeless people started coming up to us, just one after the other. It’s so sad to just sit and watch and one man came and asked for money and said he had aids and looked like he was in really bad shape, and we said we’d buy him a sandwich or some food and at first was almost turning down the food even though he said he was starving, but we weren’t about to give an addict money for drugs so we bought him a milkshake and I’m sure he appreciated it but it’s just really hard to watch and try to help without making things worse. People just kept coming up to us so we just had to leave because although we wanted to there’s just no way to help everyone so we went back to the hostel and just hung out until we went to bed.
Breakfast was included with the room so we ate at the hostel and looked at all her paintings and then just walked around Santo Domingo for a few hours (Joe and Angelica didn’t know we were staying over night and didn’t want to pay for the hostel so they went to the bus station at midnight to sleep there and take the 6 am bus back to Santiago.. ridiculous but I guess it’s all an adventure) and Sally went to go see her friends so just Bri, Charlotte, Randi, and I spent the day there. I’m really excited to go back and learn about all of the history (krissttaaa historryyyy) because there are so many historic and interesting places there. We took the bus back and were home by 4:00. A much smoother trip than last time and very well planned so there’s hope for us and I’m glad we got to see a game before the end of the season. There are smaller leagues after this so we’ll probably go to more games in Santiago but we really wanted to get the feeling of a huge game. Very worth the trip. When I got back I went and did “homework” with Rosie, Ronnie, and Racky at El Fogon, aka just hung out but I haven’t spent much time with those guys (they both know Spanish and are cousins and are really cool and nice) so that was fun. More people came over to the house tonight to watch the video of Jenny again and I did some more homework and tried to get mentally prepared to go back to school at 8 am after the four day weekend. (It’s our last holiday for awhile so I’ll actually have to have my four days of class a week.. still ridiculous and I love it). Les amo mucho!
Friday was another rainy day and we were still tired from the trip to Santo Domingo so we took naps and laid around for most of the day.. solid. We decided to go see the movie Twilight with Bri, Charlotte and Randi and went to go meet them for a movie at 4:30. However, the theater was “broken” until 5:00 until they would start playing movies again (some random told us this.. no one was even working in the theater) so we just hung out around the mall and ate dinner there before the movie. Ha and some guy in the food court gave Rosie a napkin saying “Hello. I think all of you are beautiful and I want any of your phone numbers. I would be very happy with any of you for the rest of my life” haha. Ridiculous but we had a good laugh. We finally made it to the movie and although I judged vampire romance novels at first, I’ve gotten sucked in a loved the movie. That night we planned to go out to this bar that people had gone to earlier in the week and said it was really fun a lot of people. However (standard theme), when we got there we realized that it was a gay bar. Soo after going all the way across town we headed back to El Fogon as usual. Steeve, JB, and Dimitri came again for awhile and we went home pretty earlier.
Saturday we had people at our house to watch the view of Jenny’s Quince (15th birthday ceremony thing). I had seen pictures and already been surprised at how formal their dresses and tuxes were but seeing the tape of it was like watching a wedding/prom/dance scene from Step Up. It was literally as fancy and formal as a wedding with a reception after and then Jenny’s friends surprised her and had choreographed a dance to a lot of popular songs.. mama said they had been working on it for a long time and it was actually really good. Even though it was hard to understand most of it it was so cool to see how important it is and just how different it is than our culture. Also, they played Kenny G through the majority of the video and I just had to laugh because I’ve never heard Kenny G so much in my entire life as I have in the last three weeks.. literally people will blast it from their houses in the middle of the day. Love it. I read the second Twilight book (addicted) for about 4 hours until we got ready to go to this party with Steeve and his friends. He told us it was formal so we wore nice dresses so we were dressed up but when we got to the first place to “pick up some of their friends”, they told us to come up with them but it was like the actual graduation party with the close family. So Rosie and I met the two people the party was for and their families at this very small gathering.. I felt extremely out of place but everyone was nice to us. Ha and they started plaing Nsync at this family party and Rosie and I just cracked up at how ridiculous everything was. We were only there for a little while though until we went to go wait at another apartment for some friends, then went to Steeve and JB’s apartment because we were still waiting and finally made it to the party at about 1:30. I haven’t stayed up later than 2 this entire trip so I was already pretty tired but woke up right when we got there.. the party was so extreme. They had taken all of the furniture out of this entire house and had a DJ, fog machine, black light, strobe light (I’m glad I barely drank anything before because the lights almost made me sick), and a bar outside. I felt ridiculously cool like in a movie. We met quite a few people and danced with some guys (we were the only Americans there so, yet again, a little out of place but it was still fun) who were nice but it was hard to talk to anyone above all the extreme techno music. Rosie and I were exhausted so we left at 3:30 and everyone asked if we were sick because we were leaving so early haha. Oh well, I guess we’ll have to adjust to that. When I got home I just wanted to email my parents to tell them I was going to Santo Domingo the next day (and usually I check my email before I go to bed when people are asleep) and as usual I had already set the alarm and figured the sensor was just downstairs (because I’ve never had a problem before) but when I stepped out of my room I set the alarm off at 3:30 in the morning and it was ridiculously loud. I ran downstairs and shut it off really quick but mama still came down to see what was wrong and I felt really stupid but she was very nice about it and hopefully I just won’t make that mistake ever again.
Sunday morning I woke up early and packed because the night before at 10:00 I had decided to go to Santo Domingo for a baseball game. Baseball is like the national sport and this was one of the final games of the season so we wanted to go even though it was the Santo Domingo team (Licey) and not the Santiago team (Alguilas).We took the bus their and put our stuff in the Hostel that Trena had been staying at all weekend. The lady who owned it was from Tennessee I think and was so nice and a little goofy but the place was cool. Ultimate cousin style with tons of beds packed into small rooms. She sold art though and had it all over the hostel so it was really cool to look at and got me started thinking about what kind of painting I want to buy. The hostel was in the Zona Colonial of Santo Domingo, so right by Christopher Columbus’ house and all of the fortress/church things that are in the capital (we’re going there for an excursion so I’m not exactly sure all what we saw but will find out in a few weeks). We had decently cheap pizza at this outdoor restaurant and it was a really nice part of the city so that was lovely. After that we went right to the game, which cost 50 pesos, aka about $1.50. We couldn’t believe how cheap it was which was awesome. At first almost no one was at the game but about five minutes before it started the entire stadium was packed with people wearing royal blue (Licey’s colors) and everyone and their madre had flags and/or horns and whistles. The flags were fun, the guy right next to us who blew the horn every five seconds was not so fun. All part of the experience I guess. The game was nuts, the fans were so pumped and it was really fun to watch them even though there weren’t many hits. They also sold pizza right out of a pizza box, some guy would just keep grabbing pizzas and selling slices to people. Just different.
About halfway through the game someone fell off of the wall in the outfield onto the field and was just laying there unconscious and the security guards ran over and picked this guy up by the back of his shirt and his legs and just ran him off the field.. it was really disturbing and just weird to see (especially because I thought the security guard had shot the guy.. I don’t believe he was dead but he was for sure not moving so it was scary). Five seconds late the game was back to normal though so I’m not sure if that’s a regular occurrence. Ha another eventful thing was that one of the Licey players had picked Angelica out of the crowd and was pointing at her and waving so she waved back and he told someone to come up to her and get her phone number. So they called her down and she typed in a number and like our whole section of the crowd was watching this famous player get our friend’s number. She has a serious boyfriend though and thought it was a little creepy and degrading to get picked out of a crowd so she gave him a wrong number and we think he figured it out about half an hour later when him and like 3 of his teammates were just glaring at her for a really long time. I was fascinated that this was going on in the middle of the game and just laughed because it was a huge slap in the face to this famous guy. Nice. Bri and I had a little boy situation of our own.. there was a boy that was probably four years old sitting three rows in front of us and he kept looking at us and smiling and then hiding and then smiling again.. so adorable. Then his dad lifted him up the three rows and he gave Bri a single kernel of popcorn and then came back five minutes later and gave her a heart shaped sucker and gave me a cough drop. Ha, true love. I literally am in love with the kids down here and want to bring one back with me. During the 7th inning it kind of started to sprinkle and some people were deciding to leave but Bri and I decided to stay a little bit to sit it out.. poor choice. It literally started pouring and the two of us along with the rest of the stadium had to push through to get out of the stadium. It was so chaotic and ridiculous and there were babies just screaming everywhere. The entire crowd tried to push into this very small hallway to try to get out of the rain so it was literally like sardines. Joe got his wallet stolen out of his pocket because it was just so crazy which sucked but we helped him pay for stuff and he just had to cancel his card. We went back to the Zona Colonial to find dinner. Even though it was a pretty touristy area we found a cheap sandwich place so that was good. We just hung out for the rest of the night in this park that was right by what I think was an old church but I’m still unsure.. it was still really awesome though. Some people dressed up for carnival (this really big cultural festival that lasts for the month of February and people dress up in ridiculously bright colored outfits and masks and stuff.. a little scary but I’m way excited for the real holiday) came right by us with drums and people dressed up and dancing.. some of the little kids cried because they were so scared and even though it was only a couple of them it got us all pumped for it to start. We also found out that Licey won because people kept driving through the streets honking and screaming and waving their flags so that was fun to see. We got some phenomenal ice cream and just hung out until a lot of homeless people started coming up to us, just one after the other. It’s so sad to just sit and watch and one man came and asked for money and said he had aids and looked like he was in really bad shape, and we said we’d buy him a sandwich or some food and at first was almost turning down the food even though he said he was starving, but we weren’t about to give an addict money for drugs so we bought him a milkshake and I’m sure he appreciated it but it’s just really hard to watch and try to help without making things worse. People just kept coming up to us so we just had to leave because although we wanted to there’s just no way to help everyone so we went back to the hostel and just hung out until we went to bed.
Breakfast was included with the room so we ate at the hostel and looked at all her paintings and then just walked around Santo Domingo for a few hours (Joe and Angelica didn’t know we were staying over night and didn’t want to pay for the hostel so they went to the bus station at midnight to sleep there and take the 6 am bus back to Santiago.. ridiculous but I guess it’s all an adventure) and Sally went to go see her friends so just Bri, Charlotte, Randi, and I spent the day there. I’m really excited to go back and learn about all of the history (krissttaaa historryyyy) because there are so many historic and interesting places there. We took the bus back and were home by 4:00. A much smoother trip than last time and very well planned so there’s hope for us and I’m glad we got to see a game before the end of the season. There are smaller leagues after this so we’ll probably go to more games in Santiago but we really wanted to get the feeling of a huge game. Very worth the trip. When I got back I went and did “homework” with Rosie, Ronnie, and Racky at El Fogon, aka just hung out but I haven’t spent much time with those guys (they both know Spanish and are cousins and are really cool and nice) so that was fun. More people came over to the house tonight to watch the video of Jenny again and I did some more homework and tried to get mentally prepared to go back to school at 8 am after the four day weekend. (It’s our last holiday for awhile so I’ll actually have to have my four days of class a week.. still ridiculous and I love it). Les amo mucho!
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