La Brujeria

Kirsi está mala. My neighbor, Kirsi, is sick. She’s 26 years old and just had her first child this past March. About 3 months ago, Kirsi began to feel sick. Her entire body hurt, she was nauseas and dizzy and tired all day. Basically she didn’t feel like doing anything, but luckily she lives with her parents and younger siblings so they all help take care of baby Yunilka.

They have taken her to the clinic in Nagua numerous times, and each time the doctors run all sorts of bloodwork and analysis and can’t ever find anything wrong with her. The last time she went to the clinic, the doctor told her that it was a mental thing, a problem with anxiety, and they should take her to see a psychiatrist.

My (un)professional opinion is that she has post-partum depression. While she has her family’s help in taking care of the baby, she lacks support from the baby’s father, Yunior. She and Yunior have been together for 3 years. However he still lives in Nagua with his wife and children. He comes to visit Kirsi about two days a week, but this wouldn’t really be my ideal relationship, and I’m sure it’s not hers either. And having children and taking good care of them is such an important part of a woman’s life here that I imagine it can be stressful if a woman feels like she’s not quite up to the job.

She, her family and the town of Baoba think she has been possessed by an evil spirit (a spell cast by her boyfriend’s wife). I went, along with four older women, to Kirsi’s house to pray for her. It was basically an informal exorcism, where we all prayed for the evil spirit to leave Kirsi’s body. It was very moving, and after the prayers, she seemed to be healed. The women said that their exorcism worked. However I think it was just helpful for Kirsi to know that these women were praying for her and loving her and supporting her.

But now Kirsi is feeling the same symptoms again. The family doesn’t want to take the doctor’s advice and take her to see a psychiatrist because “ella no está loca.” I tried to explain that sending her to a psychiatrist does not mean that she’s crazy, that even I have been to see a psychiatrist because of a problem with anxiety, but they are not interested. What they are interested in is taking her to see a witch so that she will cure the evil spirit that haunts Kirsi’s soul.

The belief in la brujeria (witchcraft) is extremely common here in the Dominican Republic, especially in the small campos, like Baoba. Just today, one of my kids pointed out an older woman to me. “Ella es una bruja,” she told me. I asked how she knew that this woman was a witch, and her response was that her feet were burned. Apparently the rumor is that this woman was flying in the night and someone was cooking on the fogon (outdoor stove) and when the woman flew over the fogon, she burned her feet.

Hopefully Kirsi will feel better soon. Although if she is cured soon after visiting the witch, everyone in Baoba is going to tell me “I told you so” because I have been so vocal in my non-belief in witchcraft and superstitions.

While The Cat's Away...

I had to go to Santo Domingo on Wednesday morning for an appointment with the American embassy to get my green card (I’m one step closer to coming home! Yay!). However the trip meant that I would miss my Wednesday night Escojo meeting. Four of the girls were going to teach the rest of the kids about sexually transmitted diseases and HIV/AIDS, and I had faith that everything would go smoothly without me there. Remember, my goal is that the group continues even after I leave here, so this would be great practice to see if the group really could function on its own. Upon my return, the girls immediately pounced on me, eager to tell me about all of the drama that happened while I was away. I now have my doubts about the longevity of the group. Ok, here’s what happened:

Four girls were scheduled to give the charla on HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases. I have a manual with all of the information and they had supposedly been studying the material all week. Before I left I went to Marlene’s house to give her all of the supplies she needed and answer any questions that she might’ve had. She told me not to worry, that she had it completely under control.

The charla was at 7 pm. Every Wednesday night our Escojo meetings start right on time. After me being here a year, the kids have now learned that I am punctual and still work on American time. I don’t believe in this silly Dominican schedule where everything starts about an hour after it’s supposed to. About a handful of Escojo members showed up at 7, and the four girls who were in charge of the presentation in my absence, told them that tonight there would be no charla, that I had canceled it. So those people left. Sandy (my co-leader) showed up around 7:30 and told the girls that of course there would be a charla tonight and that it was up to them to give it. The girls later told me that they thought Sandy was jealous of my leadership, and he wanted to prove to me that he could hold a successful Escojo meeting without me.

So the girls started giving the charla. Although they have known about this presentation for over a month and have had all of the materials to study for a week, not one of them practiced beforehand. So they read from the book. Elizabeth (11 years old) is a slow reader, and the kids in the group weren’t paying attention to her reading. So Marlene (19) ripped the book from Elizabeth’s hands and told her “Lauren said you don’t know how to read, so I’m going to read it for you.” Elizabeth ran to her house crying. About five minutes later, Elizabeth’s mom Nila marches up to the group, grabs her son Brian and says “You’re going home Brian. These whores(!!!) don’t know how to properly give a charla and you’re not going to stay and listen to this disaster.”

The girls that Nila called whores are her nieces (by marriage), so basically this started a family feud with about everyone in my neighborhood since everyone is related. I went house to house, explaining that it was my fault, that I shouldn’t have left the group alone without a leader. I talked to Elizabeth and Nila and explained that maybe it would’ve been better if Nila talked to the girls in private and not called them whores in front of every other member of the Escojo group. And I explained to the other girls that everyone is in the group to learn, so maybe it would’ve been better if they were more patient with Elizabeth and helped her with her reading. Everyone apologized, and the family is now reunited.

A Frog Went A-Courtin'

Have I mentioned how almost every guy here in Baoba “is in love with me.” I am not being vain. It’s the truth. Of course most of them haven’t even said one word to me, but they see a blonde haired, blue-eyed American running in her knee-length shorts in the morning, and they are immediately hooked. Basically I ignore all of the catcalls and whistles because the guys who I really care about and who know me, they know I don’t like the attention. And sometimes I resort to my sassiness and tell the tigueres why their behavior is disrespectful. It’s easy to be sassy when the guys are cocky and rude, but I have now been faced with an even more difficult situation: there are nice guys that like me too, and I can’t bring myself to be rude to them. This leads to the courting process as they try to get me to fall in love with them. I have an example.

Yovani is 21. He’s a really nice guy. He knows a few English words and is in my latest English course. He also has a 2 year old daughter (sidenote: the daughter is a hermaphrodite and just recently went to the capital to remove her boy genitalia to officially make her a girl). He left high school before graduating and occasionally works harvesting coconuts. He’s not really my type (but that I mean I’m not into guys who are younger—and shorter—than me, have kids, did not graduate from high school and lack a reliable source of income).

The courting process started with him crashing my dominoes game and kicking out whoever my partner was so that we could be partners. This actually happens a lot. A guy sees me playing and wants to be my partner so that in the case that we win, he can say something cheesy like “we just understand each other, we make a great team, etc, etc.”). I didn’t really make anything of it until he started visiting me in my house. He would always visit in the early evening, around 6 pm, and there would always be other kids hanging out in my house, but there was a huge signal that perhaps he was looking for something more. Sitting on the front porch at night with someone of the opposite sex basically means that the couple is dating or about to date. And he would always bring me a little gift. During the courting, the boy always brings the girl some little gift to accompany the porch sitting time. Yovani would bring me gum and ice cream, and coconuts….lots and lots of coconuts.

I didn’t want him visiting me at night because I didn’t want the community to talk about “my new boyfriend” and also didn’t want to give the wrong impression and lead him on. So I asked a couple of 18 year old boys what I should do. I didn’t want to offend Yovani by telling him that I didn’t want him to visit me. He was a student in my English class and my job as a Peace Corps volunteer is to not shun anyone away. The boys told me that I should lie and tell him that I have a boyfriend. But if I used that lie, I would have to say that the boyfriend was someone in Baoba because if the boyfriend doesn’t live here, Yovani (like all Dominicans) wouldn’t feel threatened and would of course continue his visits. I think the boys I was talking to just wanted me to use one of them as my fake boyfriend so that they could tell people we were dating.

So Yovani came over one night with one of his friends. I was playing cards with Brandy, my 8-year-old neighbor. Because he was with his friend, I wasn’t going to say anything about him not visiting me because I didn’t want to embarrass him. But then Yovani started asking me if he could bring over this wine for us to drink. And later when some of my girls were over here, we were all talking about condoms and how to use them because I had just given them the presentation for Escojo. And Yovani asked me how old I was when I first used a condom. I was speechless. But Dominicans are blunt, and he is no different (sidenote: I was at a funeral once and the lady who was sitting next to me – who I did not know – asked me if I was a virgin. Dominicans say what they are thinking with no respect to whether it is appropriate or not).

So after the wine and condom comments, I felt like this game could not continue. I told Yovani that he was welcome to visit me anytime he wanted during the morning or afternoon, but he could not come visit me at night. I said that people were gossiping about me (which may or may not have been true- I hadn’t heard anything, but that doesn’t mean much), and that I had to protect my reputation. He told me that he understood and since then has stopped by a few times to say hi, but never at night. And he’s still in my English course, so everything seems to have worked out okay. His feelings weren’t hurt, and I no longer have to feel uncomfortable with him visiting me.

Paseo

I mentioned briefly in my last entry that I have been doing some traveling with Dominicans lately. For some reason, various families keep inviting me to spend the day with them as they travel the country. And of course I keep accepting the invitations.

Las Galeras, Samaná

The first invitation I received was from Sofia and Miguel. They’re my 50-year-old neighbors, and both of them grew up and met in Las Galeras, Samaná. They have five children (26, 24, 22, 16, and 14 years old) and all of them were born in Las Galeras before Sofia and Miguel moved to Baoba. Up until this trip, 13 years had passed since the entire family had returned to Las Galeras. 15 (children, grandchildren, and a few family friends) of us piled into a pickup truck and we made the 3-hour trip to Miguel and Sofia’s hometown.

One of the most interesting things about the trip I noticed was how everyone was dressed. For those of you who don’t know, Dominicans absolutely love to look their best. I was dressed comfortably in jeans, flip flops and a sleeveless shirt, but all of them were dressed to impress with stilettos and tight, sexy outfits. However the minute we arrived, they all went to change into more comfortable, everyday clothes. So the only people who saw them all dressed up were the same ones who were traveling with us. This seemed a little ridiculous to me, but oh well.

During the day, Sofia toted me around to all of her family members and old friends, bragging that she was now friends with the Americana. I didn’t mind this because people kept wanting to impress me so they kept giving me stuff: rice, beans, milkshakes, oranges, peanuts and a bunch of bananas. It was great. And around 4 o’clock we all piled back into the truck to get back to Baoba in time for them to watch their telenovelas (nighttime Dominican soap operas).

Santo Domingo

The next paseo was to the capital, Santo Domingo, with Valerio and his family. (Sidenote: Valerio is the guy that shot off his gun at the Patronales festival in one of my previous blog entries.) I have been to the capital many times and I always dread the long trip, but this was my first time going in a private car. Not having to deal with public transportation for the first time here seriously changed my whole perspective of the city.

We took the scenic route, stopping at various “attractions,” one of them being a Catholic church that has the statue of a Jesus that apparently does miracles. I took pictures of the statue and of a Jesus on the crucifix because they told me to. It was then that I realized that I was invited to share this family vacation with them because I own a camera.

Once arriving in the city, we went straight to the zoo. We ate lunch standing in the parking lot (chicken and various vegetables that Sylveria, Valerio’s wife, had cooked the night before), and then were ready to go. The zoo was okay. It was a much smaller zoo than most of the ones in the US, and a lot of the animals' cages seemed too small for them. But we got to see about 15 different animals, so that was cool. Seriously, the animals in the zoo were: 2 lions, 3 tigers, a bear, 2 rhinoceroses, 3 monkeys, 2 chimpanzees, 5 snakes, 4 hippopotamuses, 3 ostriches, 2 crocodiles and a bunch of pigeons, flamingos and water buffalo (or as Valerio called them- “weird-looking cows”).

After the zoo, we went to the aquarium, which was basically just a bunch of fishbowls. There were two sharks and two turtles, but every other animal in the aquarium was some type of fish. And I believe that if you’ve seen one fish, you’ve seen them all. Valerio and his family were all amazed by a rare species called the “Pescado Gato” and they were even more amazed when I told them that Dad used to fish for them in my grandparent’s lake house and then eat them.

One interesting thing about both the zoo and the aquarium was that they each had two separate entrance fees: one for Dominicans and one for foreigners. For the zoo, the price for the foreigners was three times the local price, and the price was double for the aquarium. So I basically just hid in a corner while Valerio bought all the tickets, so people wouldn’t know I was a foreigner. I don’t know if you all are aware, but my pasty white skin tone tends to stand out in this country of beautifully tan brown people.

And the last attraction before heading back to Baoba: riding the metro! President Leonel Fernandez apparently decided that the one thing his developing country was lacking was a metro. He spends only 2% of the national budget on education (this includes paying teachers salaries, building new and repairing old schools, buying books, etc.), yet he has somehow found billions of dollars to fund this cool transportation system in the capital.

This was my first time riding the Dominican metro, and it was definitely the first time riding “el tren” for Valerio and his family. (It was also the first time they had ever ridden an escalator, and watching them hesitantly step onto the moving platform was a very amusing experience for me.) Before all of the girls got on the metro, they all sprayed themselves with perfume and touched up their lipstick, powder and eye liner. They all wanted to look GOOD before this big adventure. And they absolutely loved it. We bought one ticket (40 pesos= $1.25 US) and just did a round trip and rode through all of the stops until we arrived back to where the pickup truck was parked. After the metro trip, it was 5 o’clock, so we called it a day and headed back to Baoba.

Family Spotlight: Chavela y her grandchildren

Broken families are such a common occurrence here in Baoba. They’re common in all parts of the country, but even more so in Baoba because it is a coastal town. When Dominicans think of the United States or of Puerto Rico, they think of a better life for them and their families. Therefore many people leave in yola (illegal boat crammed full of Dominicans) to get to the US and send money back to their families here in Baoba.

One of those people is Fabiana, the mother of three of the kids in my youth group: Meri (19 years old, went with me to the Escojo Regional Conference in Jarabacoa last May), Yan Carlos (17 years old, has a crush on my sister Jordan) and Yoansi (16 years old, troublemaker). Meri is finishing high school in a special program that puts her junior and senior year together. Yan Carlos is a sophomore and I can tell he is just itching to leave school and start working. And Yoansi is in 7th grade…imagine 16 years old and in seventh grade! He has a lot of problems with school and with bad behavior and I think it’s due to his mom leaving when he was 11. He was the youngest when she left so he’s had to deal with basically growing up without a mom. Fabiana lives and works in New York City, and has been there for the past 5 years old.

It’s very hard to find work here in Baoba, and Fabiana left because she thought she could better provide for her family if she was getting paid in dollars. When I look at Yoansi’s problems with school, I often wonder if it’s worth it. Which is better- to have your kids grow up with parental love, support and discipline or send money to them?? It’s such a hard choice, and it’s a choice that almost all of the families here have to make. They almost always choose the money.

The three kids live with their grandmother (and my domino partner) Chavela. And I actually live in Fabiana’s house (if she ever gets caught and sent back here by US immigration). Let’s all hope she doesn’t get sent back here until after next November because otherwise I will be needing a new place to stay.

Piolin, the kids’ father, lives here in the Dominican Republic, in Puerto Plata. But as Yan Carlos explained to me, he is their father and not their dad. He helped to conceive the kids, but after that he has not done anything to support them. Fabiana sends them about $50 each month (sometimes less, depending on how her tips working in a bar are that month) and all of that money goes to Chavela to pay for the food. If the kids want anything special- shoes, clothes, school supplies – they call their mom and hope she sends them more money or they hit up their aunts or uncles for spare cash.

There have been a couple of times where they have been unable to go with me on a trip because they can’t afford the 50 pesos (about $1.50). I have offered to pay for them to go, but their pride and stubbornness refuses to let them accept the money. (It’s actually very ironic here that the people to whom I want to give money never accept it, and the people to whom I refuse to give money never stop asking.) I do however constantly send over whatever platanos or bananas grow in my front yard. Technically, as the renter, the plants and trees are mine. But I don’t eat that much, so I feel better sending food their way.

Another reason why Fabiana left was because she was dating a yola-captain. I’m not sure if she was dating him because he could give her a free ride (passage on a yola is usually extremely expensive) or if he gave her a free ride because she was dating him, but either way, they started dating and then left for a better life in the US. After about two months in New York, she broke up with him. And here’s the shocker…he sent an assassin to kill her! She found out about the plan, paid off the assassin when he came asking “where is Fabiana,” and everything turned out alright, but geeez what drama!