Monday, May 26, 2008

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.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

i love your blog danielle! you are quite the writer!! its so interesting and your pictures are great. :o)
love you, Ash

Eileen said...

Oh Danielle,

Your blog brings back such memories!!! Pointing with lips, cold showers, understanding little of what's going on around you, learning from children, rain cancellations -- I had all these in Mexico.

The first time it rained really hard when I teaching, I schlepped to the university -- puddles up to my knees, useless rainwear and umbrellas, sideways rain -- and was really proud that I arrived before class! Of course, I was the only one there! Unlike where you are, the rain usually came from 1 - 4 or 5 hours per day during the rainy season and then stopped (just enough to keep clothes on the line wet all the time). So about 20 minutes after the rain stopped, the students started to arrive. "Maestra! Que haces aqui?" [Teacher, what are you doing here?

they asked.

It looks really beautiful where you are. You're not far from my acquaintance Rafael Emilio Yunen. He's now the director of the museam, "Centro Leon" in Santiago. If you want his email, let me know. He was in an evaluation seminar we did here in Kalamazoo in 1995.

You're not really, really far from the center of Dominican baseball, either. I think that San Francisco de Macoris sends more baseball players to the U.S. than any other place in the D.R. Do you know?

Did you know that there are about 50 students at WMU from the D. R.? they started out at CELCIS studying English, but I understand that some have now begun their studies. I haven't met them yet. The guy from the D.R. who's in international affairs office -- I think you met him -- brought them here.

Bob and I are fine. Still working with the KBS GK-12 project. Will get finished with ROKS soon, am done with PT3. I'm winding down on purpose so I can take a breather and decide what to do next with my life.

I'm thrilled that things are going well for you. It all sounds just about on track! And the black dress is gorgeous!

Love

Eileen