It’s already been 5 weeks in the DR??

Somehow time has just flown by and we are heading back to Michigan tomorrow!

Last night we went out to dinner with our professor, Karen, our coordinator Bernadette, and our host moms Adela and Estela. It was so much fun! The restaurant was called El Conuco and besides yummy food there was music and dancing for entertainment. The dancers were so talented, I cannot believe the moves they were doing. The girls were spinning so fast I don’t know how they could stand up after. They taught some of us to dance too. I am an awful dancer and I didn’t want to be the entertainment for the whole restaurant so I joined the band instead. I do really want to take salsa dancing lessons when I get home because it looks like so much fun!

Today was our last day at school, and it was another half day of exams. My students took their Spanish and Sociales exams. I felt bad because I wasn’t much help to them because they obviously study Spanish at a much higher level than I am capable of and I do not know much about Dominican social studies. But, it’s not something I should worry about because I wasn’t expecting to become fluent in Spanish in the short time I’ve spent here. I took 3 years of Spanish in high school and an intermediate course during college, but it has been 4 years since I’ve used it at all, so it took me a few weeks just to get used to the language again. I was looking through some old papers that I wrote for my Spanish 201 class and I was pretty good at Spanish back then, I wish I had kept practicing! I was proud of myself for writing a thank you note to my host family in Spanish though! So when I get home, the plan is to take Spanish and salsa lessons!

Thank you to my host teacher, Ms. Pacheco, my students, everyone at St. Thomas School, my professors, my host family, and of course the other 5 student teachers for making this an unforgettable experience. I will forever treasure the memories made here!

Top 10 Reasons I’m Excited to go Home and Not Ready to Leave

I’m ready to head back to Michigan because…

10. There is hot water at home. I can’t wait to take a warm shower.

9. I can brush my teeth with water from the faucet without potentially poisoning myself.

8. Going to a restaurant and ordering a water doesn’t mean paying for a bottle of water.

7. Feeling like I will probably survive car trips. I feel like kissing the ground every time I step out of a car alive here.

6. I can drink milk! It’s weird how much I love milk (I sometimes drink a half gallon a day). Milk is so strange here, it is super pasteurized and is kept warm on the store shelves for months. I can’t.

5. Knowing how much things cost. 500 pesos? Is that a lot? I don’t know. Take 5000 pesos out at the ATM, sure!

4. Not getting hissed at every time I walk down the street. Yes, we are a group of light skinned and blonde young women, but staring and hissing is unnecessary, and is not going to make us like you, sir.

3. Normal doors. The door to my apartment has a normal lock, a deadbolt, a chain lock, a latch lock, and bars with a padlock. The hallway to my bedroom also has padlocked bars. It literally takes 5 minutes to get out with all of the keys involved. What if there was a fire?

2. Having independence. I love just getting in the car by myself and going to do whatever it is I need to do. I can’t even go to the grocery store alone here!

1. To see my friends and family, of course! So much fun is planned for this weekend in celebration of graduation. I can’t wait to see everyone!

I’m really going to miss…

10. Being able to count on beans and rice at dinner every night. Lula makes the yummiest rice!

9. Being greeted by Adela when she gets home from work. She is the sweetest lady ever! I’m going to miss hearing “Hola chicos! ¿Como estan?”

8. Practicing my Spanish skills with native speakers. I really loved talking with Adela in Spanish. I want to take Spanish lessons when I get home because it would be so great to be fluent.

7. Everyday adventures. If you’ve kept up on my blog, you know what I mean.

6. Warm weather. When I looked at the weather this morning it was 4 degrees at home. I was chilly when it was 72 the other day. I will be the one at graduation with a snowsuit, blanket, boots, and mittens under my gown.

5. Panadero! The bread seller rides his bike cart in front of our house every evening yelling panadero. Estela always goes out to buy delicious bread for us. How convenient!

4. Colmado. Basically a 7-11, but you can hang out with your friends and watch the baseball game over a cold presidente.

3. Knowing that the ocean is so close.

2. Relaxing on the patio with good friends. The 6 of us student teachers have gotten pretty close in the past few weeks. Spending our evenings on the patio with a game of euchre and conversation has been great.

1. Time passing so slowly. Dominican minutes last twice as long as American minutes. If it feels like I’ve been at school for 4 hours, it’s only 10am. It seems like we have endless hours of free time after we have finished all of our work.

 

One Last Trip to La Zona Colonial

As I mentioned yesterday, it is exam week for all 3 of our schools in Santo Domingo. All of use student teachers either have a half day of giving exams or no school at all, so our professor decided to excuse us from school so that we could spend one more day exploring and doing some souvenir shopping.

We went to the Colonial Zone this morning and visited a market. It was set up kind of like a flea market in the U.S. with people selling all sorts of goods. I was glad that we had Estela, one of our host moms, with us to help us barter. If she hadn’t been there we would have been charged so much more! We are not used to bartering at home, so it is pretty difficult, at least for me. Shopping was very overwhelming because the merchants were so persistent that we buy something from their shop. They would say things like “it is free to look” to try to get us into their store. I ended up with some very nice gifts for my friends and family, I’m so excited to see them in a few days! I also bought some jewelry for myself. I love wearing cute rings so I bought a larimar ring and an amber ring. Larimar is a type of stone that is only Found in the Dominican Republic. It is the pretty blue one in the picture. I have just always liked amber (fossilized tree resin) so I was excited to find that in many shops here too.

After the Colonial Zone we went to lunch at a Mexican restaurant near our apartment. It was delicious! I highly recommend Gastronomia Mexicana to anyone in Santo Domingo!

I forgot to mention in yesterday’s blog that I tested out Dominican Taco Bell. Anyone who knows me knows that I am quite the Taco Bell connoisseur. The verdict: Fiesta Fries are not as fun as they sound, but they have way better desserts than are offered in the U.S. I had a dulce de leche quesadilla that was quite yummy. Also, crunch wraps are crunchy wraps. Remember this, because I learned that they don’t know what you mean if you just say crunch wrap. I think it’s funny that there are so many American fast food and casual dining restaurants here and that they use the same (or very similar) names (in English) for the items on their menus.

Visiting the Sugar Cane Fields

This morning we visited a sugar cane field where 19 different Haitian families live and work. We did this as kind of a service learning project and to see how other people live in the DR because all of the students we work with are quite wealthy. This was a very eye opening experience that cannot be put into words.

Last night we made cream cheese sandwiches and filled a piñata with candy in preparation for the trip. We traveled far from Santo Domingo, toward the mountains that separate DR from Haiti. Once we reached the little village, children started running out to greet the van. By the time we got out of the van though, the children were all gone. We started handing out cups of coca cola to the adults sitting outside, and eventually the kids started to reappear. They had been called inside the change into nicer clothes because there were visitors! It was surprising because these people have so little, but they wanted to look as nice as possible. We handed out the sandwiches and chocolates, which everyone loved. I had some little “silly band” bracelets with the CMU Flying C logo that I handed out to all of the kids. They had no idea what CMU was, but they loved their new accessories! Then we set up the piñata. They loved it! When it broke open the kids were instantly in a huge pile on the ground, grabbing as much candy as they could. No one cried about being trampled or not getting a turn to hit the piñata or not getting enough candy. At home there would have been a lot of tears the way this game happened, but the culture is so different here. The older kids were so willing to share their candy with the little ones.

Next the kids started games of soccer and baseball. It was amazing how fast these little kids could throw a ball! And then hit it clear over the roof of a house! They were incredibly fast runners, too. It was very clear that they didn’t spend their afternoons playing video games inside like so many kids in the U.S. They were so happy to have just a flat soccer ball, a baseball, a bat, and a glove, it was remarkable.

It was astounding to see the huge gap between the rich and the poor in this country. I know it can be seen at home too, but it is so apparent here. Our students in the private schools are all very privileged, they have anything and everything they want and need. I know most of them will never travel to one of these sugar cane fields to see how others live…their families may even be the ones who own the sugar cane fields and provide the low wages and unsanitary living conditions. I hear my students, both here and in Michigan complain about little things that truly are first world problems. But then to see that this really is a third world country in some areas, and that the children are so grateful for everything they have, is just heart breaking.

I am so glad that we had this opportunity to help.

27 Charcos

What a fun day! I’ve been looking forward to the trip to the 27 Charcos for weeks, but I had no idea how awesome it would be! I was expecting to walk around the edges of some beautiful waterfalls and just see nature. Boy was I surprised.. I ended up hiking up a mountain in the jungle, jumping off cliffs, and sliding down the waterfalls. It was amazing! Oh did I mention that it is finals week back at CMU? So while everyone is studying this weekend, I have been fortunate enough to be a part of this great program that takes me to jump off waterfalls! How cool is that?!

We left bright and early at 5:30am to drive to Puerto Plata. We were the first trip out to the waterfalls today and we had two really fun guides, ChiChi and Moreno. We had about an hour hike to reach before getting to the waterfalls, which was great because it warmed me up because it was pretty chilly.

We made it to the first pool of water, and that was kind of a test run. We swam a little and jumped off a small ledge. I was terrified of even that little jump, but I had no idea what I was in for next.

When we got to the big waterfalls we had to either jump or slide, there was no walking around it. Sliding was fun, it was crazy seeing these natural waterslides made by water!

When we got to the biggest drop we could choose to slide down or jump off. At first I was going to slide. Jumping from 30+ feet into deep water sounded crazy. But then I thought that I should jump because a) I wanted to say I did it (and hopefully have a cool picture!) b) it would hurt less than the slide and c) jumping would be faster than sliding. So I jumped. After they counted uno, dos, tres about 7 times, I finally made it off the ledge. Clearly I am terrified, as you can see me flailing about in the picture.

I’m so glad that I did the big jump, it was a lot of fun! There was a little more sliding and jumping and then we reached the end of the waterfalls. After a short hike back to the buildings we were greeted with a delicious buffet, which was necessary after all the hiking and adrenaline rushes.

I thought it was interesting that admission to the Charcos, including a helmet, life jacket, and guide was only 500 pesos (about $12). It would be at least $75 dollars to do something like that in the states, I’m sure. And there were no waivers to sign, that would never happen in the U.S. Luckily no one got hurt, because our guides were so helpful and kept us safe. I am covered in bruises, but they were worth it! I have a trip all planned out now because I would really like to take my family to the DR. We could stay at Olga’s house in Las Terrenas and visit the waterfalls. The only expensive part would be the plane ticket!

On the van ride home I was reading the Hunger Games while everyone tried to nap, and I made a little friend.

This teeny tiny baby lizard crawled onto my finger and was just the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen. I didn’t know what to do with it, but luckily we were stopping for a baño break so I gave him a new home in a potted plant.

It was a fantastic day, and we have another interesting excursion planned for tomorrow. We spent the evening making sandwiches and filling a piñata with candy to take the the children at the sugar cane fields tomorrow. It will be a very new experience.

Visiting Other Schools

Today half of our group of student teachers visited other schools in Santo Domingo. We went to the International School first thing this morning, and wow, was it different from St. Thomas! I really like that it has an outdoor amphitheater, a pool (being built), a functioning library, an art museum, and it is more out in the country. All of the teachers that I met there seemed very nice, and the little kids were just adorable. Today was one of those days where I wish I would have been an elementary teacher instead of secondary. But since I’m a week away from graduation, I better stick with what I have, haha. I go back and forth a lot, I never could decide 100% if I wanted elementary or secondary. Lucky for me, I can have the best of both worlds by working in museum education!

After International School, we visited my school. We just wandered around looking at everything, which I haven’t even done yet! It turns out my school has a store, an auditorium, and tons of extra classrooms that I never knew existed! Next the group headed to St. Michaels, but I stayed at my school because I planned to go souvenir shopping with a couple of the teachers after school. We went to quite a few different places to get things for our friends and family back home. It was nice to see some different areas of the city, too! I am most excited for the sweets that I picked up in la zona colonial – dulce de leche and cacao balls.

We have an exciting excursion planned for tomorrow morning at 5am so I am heading to bed! I hope to have some really cool pictures to post from our adventure.

On December 1st I built a Sandcastle, and other adventures in Las Terrenas

Due to Thanksgiving we had a 4 day weekend so we decided to take full advantage of it by heading to beautiful Las Terranas. It was quite the adventure! Here is the story of our trip.

Friday: We woke up bright and early to catch the 7am bus from Santo Domingo to Sanchez. We arrived at the bus terminal, bought our tickets, and learned that we would have to take the 8am. So we killed time by playing Euchre (I still haven’t gotten the hang of it). The bus was fantastic, probably the comfiest seat I’ve ever sat in, and the view was amazing! We drove through the mountains and jungle, saw rice paddies and other farms. We arrived in Sanchez, where we would take a taxi the rest of the way to Las Terrenas. Sanchez is an interesting little town…when we got off the bus we had no idea what to do. Men were yelling in Spanish trying to get us to take their taxis. Finally we found a nice taxi and were on our way. Here is what we saw on our drive:

Once we arrived at the house we rented we ran to the bodega to grab some provisions (mac n’ cheese) then headed to the beach! The house was so cute, and it felt like we were in the jungle!

Saturday: We woke up early because the roosters were crowing (literally, there were so many chickens) and we wanted to see the sunrise.

We spent most of the day at the beach, or relaxing around the house. I think we all read more this weekend than during all of our student teaching combined, I know I did. I have really missed having time to read! The beach was so perfect, it doesn’t even look real.

That afternoon we headed into town for dinner and shopping. First we found the ATM. I randomly withdrew 5000 pesos because I am bad at math and never know how much money it is, but this will become very important later. We checked out the souvenir shops for a while then found a little Italian restaurant. This is when things started to get weird. A man on crutches came into the restaurant and started begging us for money in French and showing us all sorts of injuries. We couldn’t get him to leave and the restaurant workers were not doing anything. Finally he left. Then we sat at a little beach bar when a man with a guitar came to sing for us. It was very strange, then he asked for money. We decided to find somewhere else to hang out when a man (very intoxicated) started following us and trying to get us to buy illegal things from him. It was scary because he would not let go of Bret’s shoulder and we tried everything to lose him. Luckily, we happened upon the taxi who had driven us into town so we quickly hopped in and took off. Then the taxi charged us an insane amount, but we were just glad to be back to our house.

Sunday: I spent most of the morning enjoying the hammock on our porch before heading down to the beach. (Notice my tan is not coming along very well)

At the beach we played in the waves, relaxed in the sun, and I built a sandcastle! It did not seem like it could possibly be December, but I know that it is snowy at home!

At 3pm we took a taxi back to Sanchez to catch our bus home. We got our bus tickets, but the man told us it would be a 4 hour ride home! With that as our only option, we ran across the street to a store to pick up some snacks for the ride. We were planning to catch the 4:30 bus. A bus pulled up at 4, and we ran over to get on. The bus driver said this was not the bus to take to Santo Domingo, and that we needed to wait for the one that would come at 4:30. That was all fine, we just thought the bus was early. We went to sit down in  the bus station and the ticket seller started yelling and banging his hands on the desk. He said we were supposed to get on that bus! Apparently the next bus was completely full and the last bus of the day. What were we going to do?!? Our options were: stay in Sanchez (not really a town I’d like to visit again, let alone sleep there), get a taxi all the way to Santo Domingo (so much money!), call our host family to come get us (such an inconvenience for them). The angry ticket man ended up helping us out by saying he would have a taxi take us to another station to catch a bus. He said our taxi was there and we walked out to find not a car or van, but 3 motorcycles. To have a picture of our faces at that moment… So, we rode 3 deep, with our luggage, no helmet, flip flops, through the mountain jungle, with strangers who didn’t speak English. I refuse to ride a motorcycle with my boyfriend, while wearing a helmet, in a town I feel safe in, but I didn’t have a choice here so I got over my fears right quick. The motorcycle Laura and I were on pulled off, and all I could think was that this was the beginning of a scary movie. We are getting kidnapped. Luckily Bret and Katie showed up and we went to a gas station.

Then the motorcycles were 1000 pesos each. Everyone else just had some random coins with them, maybe 50 pesos. That wasn’t going to cut it. Then there was me, with my 5000. (It’s so weird to say I took out 5 grand from an ATM) I was so glad that I’m so bad at math, because I don’t know what would have happened if we didn’t have the 3000 pesos to pay these guys.This is where we were dropped off:

So we waited at this gas station for the next bus. We were thrilled to find that the guy working there was from New York, and spoke English! And they had a credit card machine so we could buy some snacks. We were so nervous about making our bus, otherwise we would sleep at this gas station. We tried to get on the wrong bus twice, but the nice New Yorker saved us. Then the correct bus showed up, but every seat was taken! We convinced them to let us stand in the aisles for the 2 hour drive back to Santo Domingo.The nice man I was standing next to gave me his seat after an hour.

Finally, we made it to the bus station. I’ve never been so happy to be in the crazy city of Santo Domingo. We grabbed a taxi and headed home where Adela, Estela, and Lula were so happy to see us. They cooked us some amazing chimichangas and it felt like the best meal I’ve ever eaten after a day of eating only chips.

Overall, it was the most relaxing, yet most stressful trip I’ve ever been on. Thank goodness for Sam who speaks fluent Spanish, and for my bad math at the ATM. Otherwise we might still be in the Sanchez bus station.

Happy December everyone!

So Thankful to Be Here!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving celebration today with our host family and CMU professor. All of us student teachers woke up, watched a bit of the Thanksgiving parade and headed to the grocery store to prepare for our feast. We cooked for our host family because they take such good care of us every other day. It turned out surprisingly well, considering we were not even sure if we could buy a turkey in the Dominican Republic. I made pumpkin pies, and realized that they do not have measuring spoons or cups, so it was kind of a fun guessing game. Luckily, the pies turned out fine!

Groceries purchased at the supermarket located in the mall nearby.

So much good food!

The student teachers sitting at the kids table.

The whole family 🙂

So proud of my pies!

 

It was a lot of fun to celebrate Thanksgiving in another country, it turned out to be quite the adventure! We are so excited to be heading to Las Terrenas for the weekend. It will be great to relax on the beach some more and see another part of the island.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Happy Thanksgiving Eve!

Even though we are in a different country, we are still celebrating Thanksgiving just as we would at home! Our students celebrated at school today with a Thanksgiving brunch including all kinds of Dominican breakfast foods. (I have officially come to the conclusion that I do not like plantains, I think I’ve tried them in every form now.) I also taught government for the first time today, and I think that it went well! School is closed for the rest of the week for the holiday.

After school 4 of us student teachers stopped by a local colmado to hang out and discuss our weekend plans. Our professor even stopped by to chat. On our walk back home we stopped by the grocery store to pick up a turkey so that it could start thawing for our big feast tomorrow. I don’t know how much turkeys cost in the states, but 2500 pesos seemed like a lot! That’s almost $60! But we are trying to feed about 15 people. In addition to a delicious turkey, we are planning to make green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, and more! I am so excited!

We are also planning to stick with our other various Thanksgiving day traditions such as running the Turkey Trot (not me, I don’t run) and eating Lucky Charms while watching the Macy’s Parade (that’s my plan).

Tonight we are going to see a Dominican ballet, which should be very interesting. I hear that it is not like a ballet we would go to in the U.S., so I’m not really sure what to expect.

Week 3!

We are halfway through our Santo Domingo student teaching experience! =

Today I taught U.S. History again. We are still talking about World War I and I am having a great time with it. My favorite time period is from about 1900-1950. The world wars are a fun topic to teach because students find it very interesting and sometimes have stories to add if their grandparents or other relatives were around during the war. One of my favorite things to do while teaching about the wars is to analyze propaganda, it is a great way to see how people felt during the war, and how their government wanted them to feel. I will finish up the WWI unit after Thanksgiving.

In 8th grade Geography the students had a food day! They have just finished learning all about the North and South American continents so each student brought a dish from a different country. We had cheeseburgers and fries from the U.S., empanadas from Argentina, banana bread from Guatemala, nachos from Mexico and so much more! It was delicious. I thought it was funny that the student who brought nachos brought chips, salsa, and queso dip that were all Tostitos brand, and chili that was from Wendy’s. I would have thought they would have some delicious homemade nacho stuff down here, but they brought exactly what I would make at home in Michigan. Not that I’m complaining, I love Tostitos!

The 8th graders enjoying their feast!

Yummy!

Another random cultural observation is that Spanish is exhausting! George and I discussed this over the weekend while we were watching Semi Pro in Spanish on TV in our hotel. He thought the movie was just hilarious gibberish because he didn’t understand a word of it. To me it was almost stressful to watch because I was trying to keep up with what they were saying. This is how I feel everyday, because I understand Spanish except when they are speaking too fast, which is almost always. By the end of the day my brain is fried. I really hope that feeling means that my brain is learning more Spanish, like the way your muscles burn after a good work out. Reading in Spanish is so much easier for me, I think because I’m a visual learner, and because I can read at my own pace. I am so glad that I had really good high school and college Spanish teachers, because I would rather be struggling to understand than to have no idea what is being said at all. So a big thank you to Mrs. Chahbazi, Mrs. Cavric, and Mrs. Vernon for teaching me everything I know about this language!