Water

Ten years ago the people in my community were washing their clothes in the river. They have memories of the first time that their water came from the aqueduct pipe. I have many colleagues working in communities that are still planning and constructing systems to bring water to their houses a couple days a week. Running water changes the culture of a place, completely changes the way of life and the health of the people and the environment. Knowing these people as they are now, it is mind boggling for me to think of them moving their water completely by hand, washing and bathing in the rivers which we use now only for recreation and for the extraction of sand and river crab.

So if we don’t get our water from the river here where does it come from? Many residents of the US answer either ‘the city’ or ‘the well,’ as the people here in the Dominican campo say ‘the aqueduct.’ What magical places then, these cities, wells and aqueducts – constantly producing an infinite amount of drinkably, bathably, washably clean water, just turn on the faucet! But really, where does it come from? Is it possible to use it all up? Especially on a relatively small island surrounded entirely by salt water…

So I started an investigation, like an explorer searching for a lost city, or more appropriately a fountain of youth…a fountain of life, if you will.

I began with the aqueduct. I happen to work with the organization that manages it and, showing interest, one of the guys agreed to plan a day trip with me to where it all begins. Or so I thought. The day came, we packed lunch and headed South into the mountains. The road is unpaved and the closer we got to our destination the smaller and bumpier the beaten path became. The view from my house is a gorgeous but it gets even better as the mountains get higher and the road drops of hundreds of feet to the full flowing, blue Rio Bao. More than an hour later we reached the national park building where Maximo, a chubby elf of a man has the job of park guard. His main duty appears to entail eating and playing dominoes with himself. Hey, at least park guards are written into the budget.

The hike from here to ‘la obra de toma’ – the building of take is an hour. This is a small dam where they extract the water from the river which is bound for my house. En route of the semi strenuous hike in the mid day sun my collegeue shares with me that a fungus destroyed part of his nervous system in his head, he’s had three operations and he has asthma. I think to myself, ‘perhaps I should have come more prepared to this day hike…Lets see, in my backpack right now I have enough bananas, casave bread, water and pistachios (thanks mom and dad!) to sustain us for days, I have a long sleeved Patagonia baselayer – versatile enough for many emergency situations, a camera – should we need to document our final days, and a cell phone with no signal – should we find use to for the alarm, calculator or Pong-like game, Brick Attack.

I was extremely excited to reach the obra thinking, “Wow, to see where the water we use for everything really comes from!” I climbed on top of the giant cement box that filters out the sand to get a better look up at the river flowing into the iron grate bound for the pipes. From here I could see upstream to a series of small waterfalls flowing out of the forest…but wait…this isn’t the beginning…this is only where the aqueduct starts, not the water! Where does the water come from? “The aqueduct,” say the people who use the faucet. “The river,” say the people who run the aqueduct. But here the trail ends, what do the people who run the river say? I plan to find out.

the view from my house

HALLOWEEN!

I had been feeling a little disappointed about the lack of change in the seasons living here in a subtropical climate. As I am a lover of thick wool sweaters and anything made out of apples, autumn is my favorite season, especially in Michigan, and when I was informed by their Facebook profiles that a group of my friends was busy making delicious apple butter I became truly jealous. But it is getting cooler here in the mountains.

A few weeks ago, I woke up a little chilly and started using light blanket in addition to a top sheet on my bed. Also, initiating my environmental youth group, Brigada Verde, and planning the regional conference has kept me too busy to even notice what month it is.


Our Brigada Verde group had its first meeting a few weeks before Halloween and my muchachos were already ready to start planning the design of our new “poloches” – from the English words polo shirts, a term they use to describe polo and t shirts. The problem arose when they realized that we are brand new group and have no money to buy poloches. I suggested a fiesta to raise money - a Halloween fiesta – and they freaked out. Where I live everyone has family living in Nueva Yol – New York – and so they are familiar with the holiday but have never celebrated it. They were ecstatic about the idea. So we spent the next few weeks selling tickets and preparing.

There is an extremely few number of days of the year in this country where the sun does not shine in full force. But on the 30th of October in my campo it rained all night. We woke up on October 31st to a grey sky and a foggy mist in the valleys – perfect for Halloween! It was fairly cool the entire day, but the true miracles were that the sky never cleared up and at 8pm people from surrounding communities were lined up outside the door waiting to get in to our fiesta.

It was a great night, complete with a choreographed thriller routine and live tarantula. We had covered the venue completely with Spanish moss and it didn’t really matter if the electricity went out or not – which it always does – because only candle light led the partygoers from the bar to their tables to watch the spooky presentations.


My muchachos are phenomenal - they went out and caught a live tarantula before the party! We hung it where the people went to buy their drinks. The ghoul and I let it go at the end of the night.

Some of my ghouls waiting in their coffin for the people to walk in the door.

My mom sewed me a sleaved jacket out of material I found and I tied the remnants around my waist.

My brother had the winning costume with a wicked stake through his head, complete with strawberry flavored blood. I'd be a vampire too if it always tasted that good!

Don't ask me how they climb trees without branches... One of my muchachos in the pine tree throwing moss down for us to decorate.

The itsy bitsy spider

This is my smallest cousin here, we call her chi chi (chee chee). One day a while back she was upset and so I started singing the itsy bitsy spider, complete with hand motions. She totally loved it and from then on every time I see her she starts imitating the itsy bitsy spider crawling up the water spout with her little hands smashed into a bundle. I'm certain that by the time I leave she'll be singing it in English. I am a serious animal lover but this picture is so funny, and its the little things that keep you entertained and positive when you live in the campo.

One day I let my host dad use my computer for a presentation... his flash drive had a virus.

The virus ate my computer somehow... I don't even pretend to know how these things work.

My project partner fixed it... but I lost everything.

I have not had my computer to write while I am at home and post when I get near the Internet ...And that is why I have not posted to my blog.

The good news is I'm back in action and I have a bunch to write!

Expo Cibao!

The family that I live with has been amazing, supportive and has taken care of me more than I could ask for. Whenever he drops me off somewhere or I leave to go to the city my host dad asks me if I have enough money and when I’ll be back. One night I stayed with our extended family thinking that my parents knew I was there and my host mom stayed up half the night worrying herself to death about what happened to me…don’t ask me why she didn’t call me…but the point is she is great. I spend a lot of time with them but my cousins are actually closer to my age 16, 18 and 20 and my aunt is more like a mother to me, so they have adopted me into the family as well.
This weekend was the yearly expo at the fairgrounds in Santiago, the capital of the Cibao region of the country (the central valley) and so we planned a family trip, the six of us. A couple days before, our younger brother and mom got pink eye and so they had to stay behind for the trip...and so we were four, but we had a great time.

"Solidarity with vision of the future, Santiago"

At the fair we checked out exhibits of all kinds of businesses and products, from powdered milk to clean energy and I even found the booth of Foreign Policy the magazine in Spanish. We also checked out the cows on display, a merengue group, the art museum’s exhibit and store and got some ice cream before heading to a pueblo neighboring ours for their patronales celebration.

Most of the pictures are us with the cows and acting silly for the camera...as you can see.

Gordita

There is an analogy to describe the experience of learning a new culture. It says that each culture has its own colored glasses and each person in the culture is permanently seeing the world in that color. When you move into a new culture you can put on new glasses but it’s impossible to take off your own, just as it is impossible for you to forget your culture when you leave it. So if American culture is blue and Dominican is yellow, my world right now is green. It’s very difficult for us to understand other cultures without judging them through our blue glasses. Although I may try, I can never understand what its like to be Dominican. I can only ask questions, try to understand and imagine what it looks and feels like in yellow. One of the things that is nearly impossible to see in green is that telling someone they’re fat is not offensive. “Oh, estas mas gorda!” – Oh, You are fatter! the women say to me when they haven’t seen me in a while. Although most would like to be skinny and they know it’s healthier, when they tell you that your fatter it just means that your family is feeding you well, that you are happy and healthy. Although I was blessed with “good” genes, wonderful family support and have never had body imagine issues, this, the unbalanced diet, and the fact that I actually am fatter than when I left the states, is taking a serious toll on my self esteem. I keep telling myself that it’s not the end of the world, they mean it as a compliment and reminding myself I have been running during the week. It’s the only place where you can have so many people in love with you, always telling you that your eyes, skin and hair are perfect, and still have a body imagine complex.

San the Sun God

He looked so majestic sitting there in the sun I couldn't resist a picture. He ran with me today! Albeit not far, but he is improving. Maybe one day we'll be back to our old routine. He's taken to following me everywhere I go and sleeping under my bed since I saved him.

The Peace Corps Act (22 USC 2501 ET SEQ.)

Congressional Declaration of Purpose

“The Congress of the United States declares that it is the policy of the United States and the purpose of this Act to promote world peace and friendship through a Peace Corps, which shall make available to interested countries and areas men and women of the United States qualified for service abroad and willing to serve, under conditions of hardship if necessary, to help the peoples of such countries and areas in meeting their needs for trained manpower, particularly in meeting the basic needs of those living in the poorest areas of such countries, and to help promote a better understanding of the American people on the part of the peoples served and a better understanding of other peoples on the part of the American people.”

I'm working too!

September 8th: One of the great thing things about working in development as a Peace Corps volunteer is that we have the time and take the opportunity to get to know and integrate into our communities before and during our development work. We take into consideration what is right for the community and what they are going to want and be able to sustain after we leave. Working within the capacity of our communities with a two year limitation, the projects are typically small and the development is slow but it is more empowering for the communities than handouts. To give you all an update on my work and to hold myself accountable for it in the future, I have included here some of the things that I’m currently working on, project ideas, goals and dreams for my work and life here:
- Brigada Verde: A nationwide environmental youth movement to learn and teach their communities about environmental initiatives. I’m starting a group in my community, co-planning the regional conference and co-chairing the national committee.
- Reforestation: We are planning the construction of a nursery to grow trees for reforestation. I am working with the neighborhood association where I live to work on reforesting the rivers and educating the property owners about why it’s important. We also have a trash clean-up scheduled for the end of the month!
- Women’s groups: I would like to work with the women’s groups on nutrition, cooking and how to minimize waste by using organic stuff to make compost.
- English Classes: I’m teaching English three nights a week and compiling a manual on how to teach English using environmental themes.
- The Schools: I’m working with the science teacher on her environmental science lessons and activities. We want to start a garden at the school and I would like to help them write and institute a curriculum addendum on human impacts on the environment.
- Radio: Another volunteer and I are planning a monthly radio show where we answer questions on environmental topics.
- WMU: My alma mater now has a huge population of Dominican students on scholarship and I’d like to work with WMU and the Secretary of Education here to facilitate service learning projects for the Dominican students to come give back to their communities.
- Beer: Although I have no prior experience in brewing, I plan on starting a beer revolution by brewing and distributing the DR’s first beer darker than Bud Light. I have a dream of opening a brew pub. Send supplies! Email tips and recipes!

September 11, 2008

The people here in the DR are incredibly hospitable and generous, and even more so here in the campo. When you visit a house you will be asked to sit, though it seems more of a command than an invitation and you will inevitably be served a coffee or juice at some point during your visit. I was out visiting families and community leaders today and I ended up drinking 6 glasses of fresh fruit juice, including cherry (cereza), lime (limon), melon (melon) and passion fruit (chinola) in addition to a coffee and a few oranges (naranjas) off the tree. I was in heaven!

Because we don’t go to the grocery store every time we have a craving for something like avocados or bananas, you gotta eat the oranges too when they’re ripe. So many days my extended family and I harvest a pile of them and sit for any hour peeling and eating until our lips hurt.

I spent the evening hours today in a small wooden house playing dominoes with my teenage brothers. The light had gone out just as the sun set and not long after a beautiful storm moved in, bringing thunder, lightning and a ton of water. With downpour loud on the tin roof the four of us played dominoes for hours by candlelight, teasing and laughing the entire time.

Various people in my community acknowledged today as a day to recognize for the United States. Dominicans have a strong connection with the United States, so many of their families are in New York and more are joining our society every day. I was proud, on the anniversary of a day we mourn, a day when many people realized that our foreign policy might need some improvement, to be an American who has chosen to engage in the cultural exchange with other countries. I read the book Three Cups of Tea since I’ve been here, a story of a man who gives his life to build schools in a part of the world where it seems that every obstacle is in his way. He finds in his travels that a cause of Anti-American terrorism from the Middle East is a lack of positive educational options. He ventures to believe then that building schools, rather than bombing entire countries of people, is the answer…hmm…what a concept.

I highly recommend reading it.

I am currently reading Truman, a huge biography of Harry S. Truman, Be Bold, a book about people who have chosen to start non profit organizations like Teach for America as their life’s work, Educating Esme, a hilarious journal of a wonderful person’s first year of teaching and Tropical Nature, a unique piece of writing describing the biology of the tropical forest ecosystem in a very accessible, interesting form.

The juice I made with the gorgeous cheeries pictures above. Of course they're no Michigan cheeries but they're alright anyway.

Tropical Storm Fay, Hurricanes Gustav, Hanna and Ike

Welcome to Hurricane season in the Caribbean! It sounds a little scary and the red spinning spirals on the radar are unnerving but here on the ground, at least in most places, it just looks like a lot of rain.

However, as Hurricane Ike approached the north shore of the DR in the last couple days they set into play our emergency action plan, sending all 160 of us to consolidation points across the country.

I live high in the foothills of the mountains in the center of the country making my site one of the safest places during heavy rains and hurricanes, which is why when I packed my things to leave for lower land this morning my family was a tad puzzled. But you're safer here they said, rightfully so.

As I write this I am sitting in a hotel lounge with about 45 other volunteers and although it’s still not raining here we are prohibited from leaving the hotel. Better to be safe – with good food and air conditioning – than sorry. A few of us are even taking the opportunity to get some work done while we’re together, in between delicious meals, internet time, House, MD. marathons and games of dominoes of course!

The morning after we were cleared of Hurricane Gustav I went running. It’s so gorgeous here in the foothills the morning after rain because the sky is clear and you can see crisply into the distance in both directions; over the rolling green hills to the neighboring villages, the pines and the palm trees, and into the mountains. Everything was still wet at 6am and when I ran past the stand of pines not really noticing it, a breeze blew and the smell of pine stopped me mid run. I felt like I was in the Michigan forest and I had to look up to orient myself. I’m looking forward to being back in the campo after all of this rain fills the rivers and makes everything green.

Running Alone

August 30: When San the puppy began running with me months ago it was a huge hassle and I would pray, as I crept out of the house in the mornings at dawn, that he would still be sleeping just long enough for me to escape without him chasing. He was a jumper, too excited to run to contain himself. The back of my calves were always scratched and on some days he would tire himself out around the mid point and I would have to sacrifice my run to carry him up the hills back to the house. We tried strategies to stop him from going; sometimes I would yell at him to stay at the house and he’d wait until I got just out of sight to chase me. Sometimes the family would hold him, yelping frantically, until I was long gone…but he knew the route and as soon as they released him he was off like lightning, racing up behind me faster than you would believe dachshund mutt legs could go. But sometime in the last three months I unconsciously started to enjoy his company.

Today, for the first time in these months, I ran alone.

I originally thought that this entry would be a eulogy to my late running partner, San Gonzalez Ortega Hunt, but he is still alive. On Friday he was hit by something, probably a motorcycle, as I said he is still alive. We don’t run on the weekends and he’s sort of a vagabond anyway so when he didn’t come home I didn’t even notice. On Saturday morning my dad and I happened to be down at the local convenience store partaking in a cerveza for his birthday when we overheard the people taking about the little dog that runs with me every morning. The prognosis wasn’t good, they told me he was at a nearby house and that he was going to die. “I’m sorry for your friend,” my dad said to me in English. They were reluctant, and a little puzzled by my concern but took me on the motorcycle to see my friend when I asked.

He wasn’t using his back legs at all laying there in their yard but I scooped him up and brought him home not exactly sure what to do next. I suggested to my brother having him put to sleep if he was in pain and not improving but he replied, “You are not the boss.” This is a culture that relies heavily on God to make the decisions. The reply to many everyday questions is “Si Dios quiere” – if God wants it. It’s also not part of the culture here to care for animals like family, dogs are dogs. So without the support of anyone I had no idea what to do. I spent the weekend bathing him, trying to get him to eat and carrying him outside to pee, thankful he was still functioning well enough to wait until he was outside. During the remaining hours he just laid wherever I set him.

Though I imagine he will never be the same he has improved in the last week and a half. Now he walks around like a circus dog with his back legs in the air and yesterday he used his back legs very gingerly! Although he is not his happy jumping self, he is eating and wags his tail whenever I come around. The other volunteer who I work with suggested that I strap him to the front of me in a baby carrier to run in the mornings. I think this is a little extreme but we may fashion him some sort of scooter if I can find some wheels his size!

La Feria Ganadera

August 10: Our county fair housed a showcase of prize cows, a cotton candy machine, a popcorn machine, a plasma screen tv, a satellite dish and three ancient carnival rides. After scoping the array of delightfully well groomed cows - and I’m talking cows at least 2 or 3 times the size of the largest cow you have ever seen - like a large buffalo or something, my brothers and I got drinks and watched the X-games on ESPN in a little tent (in the middle of the campo on a subtropical island) …you never, never know what to expect here in the DR – never! After a while of motorcross, bmx and some fried foods it was getting dark outside and we were preparing to leave for home when my little brother turned to me, begging me to take him on la estrella (s-tray-ya) – the star.

La estrella was a medium sized ferris wheel, not nearly the size of some I had been on before, but just glancing at it you would swear it was taken right from Coney Island around the turn of the century…the last century…a hundred years ago. The paint was gone, along with its original motor and in its place was a makeshift machine moving the iron structure faster than I had ever seen one move. As the cars moved over the front side of the wheel they accelerated a bit and the people squealed. It did look like a lot of fun, and opportunities like this are incredibly rare where we live. The family looked at me waiting to see if I was brave enough to accompany the young boy on this adventure, which of course I was, I was actually really excited. But for some reason I shook my head. “I would really love to,” I said “but here? I don’t think so.” I felt even worse saying it this way because this is where he lives, not near Cedar Point or in the United States where there are regulations, lawsuits and security attached to things like this. But that’s what I said and with both us slightly disappointed, we left.

Less than a half hour our uncle stormed into the house, searching frantically to locate our cousin who went to bed early with a headache - a cable in the center of la estrella had snapped and the two sides of giant wheel, filled with people, moved in separate directions. Fortunately no one died but several people were severally injured, a young girl won’t walk again and I think Samuel learned a new lesson, thanking me.

In Service Training

Thinking back to pre service training they gave us a calendar and told us about all the trainings and opportunities we would have for professional development throughout our service. But back then it didn’t seem to matter much because it was so far away. It was hard to imagine a time when we knew where we would be living for the two years, let alone thinking of a time when we had already been serving there for 3 months. For my training group this time has come in the blink of an eye. We have completed our community diagnostics, our visions, our goals, we’ve started networking, many of us are moving into new homes and its come time to flap our little alas out of the nest and get to work… but first a little more training in some super interesting stuff! Nineteen of us – environmental development volunteers of the first class of 2008 – crawled out of campos in every part of country, strapped on our helmets, hopped onto motos and rode packed guaguas for hours to see each other again. We met for a week in the mountains to learn about agro forestry, native birds, youth movements, grants and more in addition to catching up on what everyone has been up to for the last 3 months.

Our trainer has done an absolutely fabulous job creating opportunities for us to learn from the people who are doing the work that we aspire to do here in the DR. So on Friday half of us hopped in the back of the truck headed for the coffee plantations. We spent the morning with two Class A organic coffee growers learning how to germinate, plant, care for and prune coffee and fruit trees. Following an amazing lunch filled with – gasp – vegetables! we were taken to the little coffee tasting room overlooking gorgeous misty mountain scenery to learn all about the classes, aromas, flavors and regions of the world’s second largest traded commodity.

This experience yet again reinforced that although we live in country where we don’t know the language, we share small spaces with crazy host families, eat the exact same thing every day and shower out of buckets of cold water we are the luckiest people in the world.

On Sunday we took the opportunity to support the area’s local ecotourism with some white water rafting. We lost a couple people to the river but not one person in our class of 36 has quit the Peace Corps so we figured we had a couple to spare.

Adventures of an aspiring Dominican naturalist

My brother and I were wandering around the wild backyard of our grandmother’s house the when we came across a vine that looked similar to Chinola - passion fruit. As a familiarly devious smirk appeared on his face my brother asked me if I wanted to know the plant. In my naivety I said, as I always do when he asks, “Yes, I want to learn everything.” “Segura?” he asked, “Are you sure?” “Yes…” With a ‘suit your self’ sort of shrug he touched the plant to my arm, just barely and paused, watching my face. “What?” I asked … and then my arm burst into flames. Not just the flames of fire…more like fiberglass on fire…inside my arm. At this point I was physically uncomfortable but relieved with my new ability to identify a plant that I was going to be sure never to touch again. “Sigue” he said, walking away – continue. Obediently I followed him, exclaiming aloud the pain to his delight as we continued walking down through the forest toward the river. Passing it nonchalantly he pulled a couple leaves off a small tree, I wasn’t going to ask which one this time, cursing myself for being so curious. With these leaves in one hand he grabbed my arm and crushed them into my skin, the pain evaporating instantly…And there are people who say it’s more difficult to teach environmentalism here.

I have spent a ton of time with him learning the plants, trees and birds of our region. I know more about the plants here than I do about the ones in Michigan I think! These pictures are from one of our many hikes. After hours of exploring we ended up at a natural infinity pool. The pictured waterfall flowed into a small natural pool where we swam over looking the gorgeous valley pictured above.

This is me sitting on the edge thinking, "Is this really where I live?"

Vamos para el rio! Let's go to the river!

August 4: I was invited by the leader of the women’s group in my community to partake in a day at the river with her catechism class and was super excited to spend the whole day hanging out with people other than my family – who I absolutely love but you know how it is…

Dos Danielas!

So me, a couple adults and a truck bed full of kids bought refrescos – sodas – and headed for el Rio Inoa. The rivers here are completely gorgeous and the people here in the campo love nothing more than to spend the day swimming in them. We swam, ate rice and beans, learned English in the river and made a human pyramid three standing people high before crashing down, laughing too hard to support each others weight.

I was feeling a little sleepy after lunch so one teen made me a bed and a sleeping mask of leaves.

After lunch the teenagers and I we were talking about how much they enjoyed their experience in Scouts and I happened to mention that I can’t wait to start a similar environmental youth group where we live (actually I didn’t just happen to mention it, really it’s the bulk of what I’d like to accomplish during my time here but I have to be sneaky about roping kids in ;) to go camping, take trips, clean up trash etc…and, be still my beating heart, they said, “Well lets start right now!” and began collecting all the trash from the river bank. We finished a huge pile of trash, four smiles (though they don't typically smile in pictures) and a conversation about what color green our new club shirts are going to be - definitely a high point on the roller coaster of being pro-environment…in any country.

Merengue days and bachata nights

On Saturday night a couple weeks ago I attended a fiesta, one of many to celebrate las patronales – days of the patron saints - of a neighboring community. Each community celebrates the patron saint of their church at a different time of year and each has a nine day long celebration to honor him or her. For nine days the church has special masses and for nine nights the community has huge parties. The party that I attended was not one of the nine huge parties but rather a fairly large party to celebrate the fact that it is nearly patronales.

It was the first time that I had attended a party being part of the community and my sister had taken the initiative of dressing me up a bit, adding large hoop earrings, black heels and a rosary to my outfit in an attempt to assimilate me, as I thought the halter top was probably taking it a bit too far. I arrived with a group of young men, family and friends, and not being part of a giant obvious group of Americans was a relief (though I do miss them dearly). As I arrived and was seated with a group of young men the cultural rules here follow that any respectful man who wanted to dance with me would ask my brother permission first. Although I’ve been here for nearly 5 months, this was a new experience and although it seems kind of old fashion judging through the lens of my own culture, it was certainly a great way to weed out the creeps and tigeres - tigers!

Bringing flax to the New World

While I was in the States my grandmother gifted me several pounds of brown flax seed to bring here to the DR (at my request). In the last couple years I have developed an addiction to the seed, which in addition to being part of the plant used to make linen, is a fantastic source of Omega 3 fatty acids and when crushed is delicious on yogurt, granola, fruit or anywhere else a slightly nutty flavor is appropriate. At the airport I had to rearrange some things as my luggage was slightly overweight and I am sure that anyone who saw it was probably like, “Why is this chick transporting animal feed into to the DR?” Which really is a stupid question since there is a huge abundance of livestock here. But anyway, I have an addiction to the seed my grandma uses to make her horses coats shinier and from what I can tell there are about two health food stores in this entire country.

Since returning I have been hand crushing it with my mortar and pestle and putting it in all the food I make for myself and my family. So far it’s been a great hit with my dad and one of my little brothers. They absolutely loved it in banana bread, peanut butter banana milk shakes and banana pancakes…can you guess what we have an abundance of in the house right now, aside from flax?

When something is in season here you usually can’t get much of it during the rest of the year so we just eat it all day every day when it’s around. As an American who is used to having every type of food from every corner of the world at my fingertips whenever I want it, come hell or high oil prices, I hate this. But I hate more to see food go to waste – especially fresh fruits and vegetables, so I have been inventing new ways to eat bananas and avocados. If only Tristan were here to help!

Note: In case you didn’t pick up on it this entry is slightly facetious. I really do love flax but I really have no idea where flax originated and I don’t believe that this hemisphere is the new world – rather it was indeed a world before the Europeans were here :)

Another right of passage

July 22: I am sick for the first time since living in the country. It’s just a stomach ache but there are many hypotheses about what’s wrong with me, including that I ate something from the street vendors and I got too much sun atop the pile of limes yesterday. For the last 24 hours my family has been curing me with liquid concoctions and depriving me of anything tasty. The concoctions almost all contain lime and salt and taste horrible. I think it’s a tad curious that the only ingredient that we have an abundance of – lime - happens to cure what I have, but I trust their knowledge of natural remedies. Besides, I think the ingredients are less important to them than just making my stomach uninhabitable for living things. If not, it’s back to the capital in a couple days to get a scoped for parasites. What fun!

July 26: After a few days of laying low, living off a bit of white rice and fresh fruit juices I am well again! I had a hunch that the salami flavored water I was given at a friends house was probably not boiled…so I only had a swig or two…probably a bad idea. Where I live the water is delicious but when visiting others it’s probably best stay away from salami flavored water and uncooked leafy greens!

Note: Do spend one second worrying over the health of this intrepid explorer living in a developing Latin American country. The training and medical care of the Peace Corps is impeccable and I have a huge Dominican family constantly telling me to sit down, go take a nap, I'm not eating enough etc. and monitoring what I eat and where I am every minute of every day and night - I doubt I will ever in my life be as cared for as I am right now!

Selling Limes

July 23: I woke this morning in a small, hot cement room above a plaza 200 miles from my house. Already at 5am hundreds of men were busy buying and selling the previous day’s harvest of plantains, bananas, sweet potatoes, yucca, cucumbers, and other crops. We arrived late last night to park our truck full of limes in a prime selling spot, unfortunately located next to 11 other trucks full of limes. It was still relatively cool out when I pried the slated windows open to see the market so full of people, trucks, cars, carts, bikes and mules that it appeared difficult to move through. As always there was music playing but the shops lining the plaza had not opened yet when I walked down the narrow stairs to the street. I was not surprised to suddenly be the center of attention on the sidewalk but I was distracted from the hissing watching the aesthetically pleasing commercial activity. In addition to the trucks of produce there were women with giant bowls of homemade and processed snacks on their heads and men selling socks, cell phone chargers and tiny bags of water to workers carrying more than their weight back and forth between vendors. If you would have asked me before this morning if one man could carry three giant boxes of cabbage on his shoulder, teetering higher than 5 feet in the air, I would have said probably not. There were dark Haitian men, their bodies entirely muscle, leading carts moved by mules that appeared to be starving. Though they were extremely strong I guessed that the Haitians had only been eating as much as the mules. Finding our truck in the crowded, dirty street I climbed atop the mountain of limes to watch my companions sell. For hours, as the sun climbed in the sky they scooped five gallon buckets of limes, passing them over the rail of our truck into old plastic rice sacks, the unit of measurement used in this market. It was an unusually fast day of selling, though we had been at the market for a total of 12 hours, and we walked away with about $450, before subtracting costs. My companions and I then drove the 200 miles back home to get another truck full of limes for them to repeat the process in the same day.

Whirlwind trip to the Motor City

July 7: While I was boarding the plane bound for Miami in the Santiago airport the electricity went out, a daily part of life in this country and though no one else took note I took it as a wink from the Republica, “Enjoy the States” she said.

Seeing the United States from the air before touching down made the transition between it and the Dominican Republic even more evident. Flying above Miami and the surrounding area I saw the familiar grid pattern encompassing every inch of available land, houses with terra cotta roofs complimented by shiny, unmistakably unnatural turquoise swimming pools every few yards.

Flying over Southern Florida the land below turned from a familiar lawn green to a dark almost black and I saw the clouds reflected in the land, realizing then that it was water…sort of…a mix really. The everglades I imagine, stretching for miles. No houses, nothing human. I could only see water reflecting the sky from thousands of feet in the air. Amazing.

After touching down the only differences I really noticed being in the States again (granted I had only made it as far as the Miami airport) was that the electricity feeding the fluorescent light bulbs was unwavering and the smell of fast food was everywhere!

Near the gate of my plane bound for Detroit I wandered unwittingly into what is a trap even for those Americans who have not been deprived of American news and culture for months…the gift shop and bookstore. After about a half hour I finally pulled myself away from the newsstand, having to convince myself that I wasn’t going to buy the new Newsweek – the Darwin/Lincoln Big Ideas issue, David Sidaris’ hilarious new creation, the Barack Obama Rolling Stone, Oprah’s summer book picks, a book about the transformation of the American Army during the last decade and so many other, deliciously written in English, non fictions that I was dying to read! I wandered over to my gate to snack on a little peanut casave bread I had brought along for the ride when I was stopped in my tracks by a familiar red band streaming bits of news across the bottom of a flat screen TV and three letters, C-N-N, thrusting me from basic environmental education and a cool breeze over rolling green hills in the countryside into who John McCain may or may not have assaulted in 1987. For the next half hour or so, until they called the last group to board the plane I was transfixed on the television, jumping at every little tidbit of campaign garbage like our stray cats onto chicken bones. My mouth watered a bit when a guy sat down near me with the first American quality pizza I had seen in nearly 5 months, but I couldn’t even think of leaving my seat to go in search of one for myself. I was soaking it all in and loving every second of it. If I would have had more time I probably would have paid the $9.95 to buy Miami International Airport’s wireless internet for the day and would have sat there in front of CNN surfing the internet until they kicked me out. It was the first time I ever hoped that my flight would be delayed!

While in the States for less than 7 days I saw my family, who bought me all my favorite foods, said goodbye to the old house and hello to the farm my parents are buying, was ecstatic to be in Traverse City during the Cherry Festival, trekked a little through the dunes on the gorgeous Lake Michigan coatline and was honored to be the maid of honor in the wedding of my great friend, Sonia. I guess I have to grow up now that I'll be 25 this year and all my friends are getting hitched! More pictures to come!

My friends are getting married!

May 31: A couple of my friends from high school had been planning to get married in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic since before I received my Peace Corps assignment here. I was excited to be able to make it to the wedding and so Cecilia and I took the opportunity to leave the countryside and head to the cushy American resort to partake in the festivities.

Months ago when we arrived in this country the warmth of the people, even more than the weather, cushioned our entry into this foreign culture, but as we approached the grand gates of the Melia Caribe Tropical Resort the culture and all that we’ve come to know shattered around us without us noticing. The presence of foreign units of exchange (many of which are dollars) has clearly changed both the landscape and the people here. Within the high guarded walls there were hints of the country that receded out into the landscape; the beer was El Presidente, all of the workers spoke Spanish and every once in a while there was a meringue song contrasting the American rap, but the energy was different. Outside the walls of the resort Dominican towns, houses, public transportation, music and food do not exist for kilometers…there is only sugar cane, Haitians cutting it and vacant land.

Though I am still new to this country my perception of Dominicans is a very positive one, they are warm and generous. I would think that years of serving rich tourists would only make a person’s disposition even more friendly - possibly artificially, but friendly nonetheless. This was not the case with the reception at the resort and it was the first sign to Cecilia and I that although we were still on the island, we were no longer in the DR we knew. I must say though that seeing friends, the extremely gorgeous ambiance, the hot shower, the salmon dinner and the unbelievable non-existence of mosquitoes made for a phenomenal mini vacation!

It was not until we boarded a guagua with all the doors and windows open, the fresh air blowing across our faces, the sound of merengue percussion and the friendly cobrador watching over us, making sure he knew exactly where to let us off, that I realized how much I have become a part of this country already and how much of this place I have adopted as my own.

Food grows on trees here

Sugar cane and bananas

An interesting difference in the daily life of suburban Michigan and the Dominican countryside is the natural knowledge of the people. In some ways it seems as though teaching environmental values is going to be more difficult here because there is less formal education. There is trash everywhere. It’s as rare here to see someone use a trash can as it is to see someone not use one in the States. However, there is more of a connection with the land and the resources than we have in the States. In our culture we recognize the products and although there are a great many Americans who know the natural environment, the majority of people where I come from cannot identify a tree and its uses unless they bought it and planted it themselves in front yard…myself included in most cases. We can identify the wood in a hard wood floor but can’t pick the tree out of a line up, let alone a forest.

Have you ever thought about the natural form of the things you eat and use? Aside from the Halls menthol candies and the boxed, ultraviolet light-treated milk, the grand majority of products here in the campo are grown here and the people know them in their natural forms.

Avacado!

Cashews for example – we know what cashews are, they come salted in tins and are delicious, a little expensive. Do you know how they grow? Is it a tree, bush or do they grow underground? Have you ever considered it? Have you ever eaten the fruit?

Though I originally pegged him as a bit of a callejero – a street guy - with his gelled hair and shiny dress shoes, my 20 year old brother is an astonishing wealth of information on the plants, trees, insects and birds of this place. You would think that a guy like this would be way too cool to hang out with the strange American girl whose always wearing that stupid looking motorcycle helmet, but I have been extremely lucky to have a professor on all things natural here. We spend countless hours every week wandering down the river, sifting through my book of Dominican trees and discussing the uses and habits of all the organisms. The other day we were looking through the tree book when we came across Cajuil (ca – hwheel). It’s a small tree with a strange shaped fruit that he told me yields a nut that you can dry and eat. While looking at the drawing of the fruit and listening to his mini-lecture it dawned on me that the shape was quite familiar. I went to my room to retrieve the delicious trail mix that had been lovingly sent from the States and returned to him with a handful of cashews…the nut that just a few minutes early he had been describing to a woman who had no idea what he was talking about. He was astonished and glad to taste the delicious treat without all the work of harvesting and drying it!

A cashew growing off the bottom of the fruit!

May 15th: Work, Day One

… and by work I mean that my project partner takes me around our office introducing me to people. It’s hard starting a new job, trying to remember everyone and make a good impression...and like everything I've done in this country so far, even harder in Spanish. I just attended my first meeting with my work group. A group of 6 young to middle aged men who live super interesting lives, walking a fine line between rural farmers and environmental development professionals. The combination of things that they accomplish everyday is evident in their uniform; nice looking work boots, a nice collared shirt for meetings, and along with the baseball cap long sleeves to keep the tropical sun off the skin. I can't wait to get to know them better and have the privilege to work alongside them! Everyone in the office and in my community has been amazingly welcoming. Since I got here I can’t count the times I’ve heard “Cual quier cosa…en su orden” – “Whatever thing you want…at your order” - It sounds a little more like servitude when you translate it into English, but here it’s just really genuine and endearing.

I try to convey how difficult it is to be here without sounding like I want to come home and try to explain how much I love life here without demeaning the sacrifices we make in our daily lives to do the work we do. The Peace Corps does pretty well in describing it when they say, “It’s the hardest job you’ll ever love.” Teaching biology in an urban high school at 23 years old was the hardest job I’ve ever loved, but this is certainly a close second.

The Life of an Environmental Development Worker

The mission of Peace Corps volunteers is to create an avenue for cultural exchange and to assist in developing countries need for skilled workers. For each of us the first priority is realized in relatively the same manner, but the second changes based on our qualifications and experience.

My second priority is environmental development. In order to work towards sustainability in this area I work in coalition with two regional organizations to plan informal environmental education. As part of our work all PCDR volunteers conduct a community diagnostic to determine the general facts of the community, the strengths and the weaknesses. I say PCDR because each Peace Corps country program is completely different and this is not necessarily the way it works everywhere. Although we already have an idea of what the community wants us to do – because they request us - this diagnostic helps us get to know the people and the true needs. Because I’m still getting to know this place my work will change over the course of the two years but this is how I have been spending my days lately:

6 – 7am Running and Yoga. I still don’t have a bike and I’m starting to notice all the white rice gathering around my waistline, so although I absolutely hate it I’ve been running every week day. I run before the tropical sun gets to high in the sky and before the trucks begin throwing the dusty road into the air. I feel great afterwards and I’m meeting more people because they see me run by everyday and love my running partner, San (pictured below). A few of the local girls have shown interest too, so maybe it will even turn into something bigger.



730am Breakfast. Fried egg over one of the following starchy vegetables – they call them viveres and there are countless varieties that they apparently never tire of. They include potato, batata, yucca, yautia and squash and we don’t have a meal without them. I don’t eat this for breakfast anymore as my family is now buying oatmeal, peanut butter and bananas and I imagine that my cholesterol was skyrocketing from massive egg intake. We also have tea with breakfast every morning.

8-12pm Because I’m still getting to know my community and defining my work here it’s hard to describe what I do everyday in a concise way. Basically I do whatever people invite me to but largely I am riding around on the back of a motorcycle supervising reforestation of private lands or meeting with community leaders to get to know the people in my 6 work communities. I work with an organization called Plan Sierra, Inc. that has been doing reforestation – mostly with Pine – and other environmental development activities for the last 30 years in this region. The dark green tree line in the photo above is all part of a huge pine forest that they are responsible for. Usually my project partner and I are visiting private properties to study how the recent reforestations of pine trees have survived. He is also an agronomist so we spend a lot of time visiting lime orchards, diagnosing diseases and recommending pesticides and fungicides, organic and synthetic, to the farmers growing your limes. I’ve also recently started work on my first book! A fellow environment volunteer and I are writing a curriculum for Peace Corps on how to use English language classes to teach environmental issues. We are super excited about having some sort of concrete project to work on and we hope to have it done by Thanksgiving.

Eventually my work will be almost entirely doing environmental lectures and activities in the schools and with community groups such as the women’s groups, youth groups, and neighborhood associations. I also hope to start an environmental youth group and a girl scouts-like club as we are severely in need of youth activities in my community.

12-2pm Lunch time! Lunch is the biggest meal here and everyone comes home to eat every day, and every day we have what they call La Bandera Dominicana – the Dominican flag – rice, beans, and meat, usually chicken and sometimes salad.

2-4pm In addition to using this time to hang out with my siblings and plan English classes I have been learning the business of limes! My dad grows, buys and sells limes for export to the United States and I have been taking advantage of the opportunity to learn all about the crop. Many days I spend bouncing around in the cab of a truck, riding hours up the dusty mountain road to buy limes. The other day I found myself parked, alongside three young men who have become my brothers and two Haitian workers, atop a truck load of limes. Turns out in order to buy limes you have to know how many there are… and so went the next two hours, and my freshly painted nails…counting limes.



4-8pm Teaching English….thoughts on world domination… Here at PCDR small projects that earn you confiansa –trust – and help you get to know the community are called quick wins. My quick win? Teaching English. When I applied to Peace Corps I told them that I would not teach English and I’ve spent a great deal of time considering the pros and cons. I’ve probably spent more time thinking about this than anything else since I’ve been here. I once believed that teaching English would just be a reinforcement of the idea that the people of the world, and specifically those from the Dominican Republic, need to learn English to be successful. I’ve since come to the conclusion that that me teaching English does not affect the reality that the economy of this country is controlled by the United States. The majority of large companies here, including those that process the sugar and tobacco are American and the two biggest money makers of this country are 1) Tourism (from the United States and European countries) and 2) Remittances – money from family members living in New York. My community is relatively well off and has the highest emigration rate to the States of any in the Dominican Republic. The people here have the things they need, and although there are still countless opportunities for education in every sector, they want more than anything else from me, to learn English. I am here improving my education and quality of life by learning Spanish and it would be silly to deny them the same while they are giving so much to me. And so, for better or for worse I am spending four evenings a week teaching English. We have a lot of fun with it, and eventually I’ll be trying out my new environmental curriculum on them!

8pm Dinner. Fried egg over starchy vegetable…always.

American Food!

As one of the most important aspects of cross cultural exchanges, and to give my mom a break from cooking for election day last week I treated my family to the quintessential American meal - burgers, fries and salad. It was quite an eye opener for them, because if you don't know how to cook rice and beans than you must be completely useless in the kitchen. But after they all ate their second and third servings I think they had a new appreciation for me, and we were down an entire bottle of ketchcup!



Even Flaco (skinny, as we affectionately call him), who typically doesn't even eat his own share of food, had several burgers.



I was surprised and glad to see that most of what I needed was available at the local store - the one and only open on election day here - though I did enjoy making breadcrumbs from scratch as I can't seem to find them even in the big supermarkets.