Dia de Accion de Gracias

Happy (belated) thanksgiving everyone! Since Thanksgiving obviously isn't celebrated in the Dominican Republic, I am here in the capital to celebrate with all of the other Peace Corps volunteers. We had this huge all day event yesterday at a fancy shmancy country club. We each paid 500 pesos to come to the festivities, but it was so worth it. I went swimming (my first time swimming on Thanksgiving! Crazy!), played soccer, beach volleyball and dominoes, danced with my fellow youth volunteers in a talent show, and danced in a bachata and merengue contest. And the food was great- turkey, stuffing, cranberries, cheesy mashed potatoes, batata (which is like the dominican equivalent to sweet potatoes), broccoli, salad, and pumpkin and pecan pie. There were about 200 people at the thanksgiving, and since for the first time EVER I could not celebrate Thanksgiving with my real family, it was nice to celebrate it with my peace corps family.

Things in Baoba are really moving along. I play dominoes every night (surprise, surprise) with a group of teenage boys that come to my house, and during the day I visit houses and chat with the women of the houses. I had my first english class on Tuesday, and there was a great turnout. 18 students showed up, ranging in age from 11 to 27, and they all had so much energy and enthusiasm. Within the 2 hour class, they learned how to introduce themselves by stating their name, hometown, nationality and profession, and then they just played a lot of competitive learning games. It was great, and now I'm not so nervous for my next group of students on Saturday.

With my youth group, we're doing an angelito thing for christmas, which is kind of like secret santa. So every Wednesday (when our youth group meets) we give a small 20 peso present like candy to the person whose name we drew out of a bag, and then on the last day we have a big christmas party and give a 200 peso present. My person is a 15 year old girl so that's an easy one to buy a present for. I have no idea what I would have bought if I had selected the names of one of the 30 year old guys that are in my youth group.

The good, the bad, and the ugly

The Good: I have started a "club de corredores" with the youth in Baoba. I started running to the beach every morning, and each morning I would go, more and more kids would meet me at the corner to run with me. So I turned it into a club. Now there are about 14 members, and we run every Saturday and Sunday. Although I need to note that I use the term "run" very loosely. I run, they walk in their velour tank tops, flip flops, and blue jeans. And they think I'm they crazy one for running in shorts and a t-shirt. But anyways, I promised them that if they ran for 10 weeks, I would throw them a party, so they're all pretty siked about that. And also I'm trying to figure out a way that I can use the club to teach them about exercise and nutrition...and maybe also have them pick up trash around the beach.

The Good: English classes start next week. I got sick and tired of having every one in Baoba ask me "When are you going to start working?" They don't seem to understand that before I can do my work, I have to get to know the community and its resources. In fact, Peace Corps recommends that we don't begin any programs until after living in the community for three months. But I decided to go ahead and give the people what they want. So I'm going to be teaching two English classes per week, each one for 2 hours, for 16 weeks. Hopefully, then they will give me a break.

The Bad: While my living situation is nice (I have my own room and bathroom), I find myself getting more and more annoyed at the people who are constantly there. Technically the people who live there are my Dona (who is deaf) and her 14-year-old neice. But everyday my dona's daughter drops off her two bratty kids to spend the day there. And let me tell you, they are horrible! One is 6 months, and all he does is cry. But I can deal with him. Worse, is the 2 year old who isn't potty-trained, yet his parents don't want to buy diapers for him. So he just runs around naked and pees everywhere in the house. He also cries and cries, and then my dona yells at him, and then he pees because he's scared. It's a vicious cycle and a constant headache.

The Ugly: I am recovering from a week-long bout of conjunctivitis. Let me just copy what I wrote into my journal about it on Monday: "I'm sitting here in my bed, doing the exact opposite of what I'm supposed to be doing. I'm being antisocial, because, alas I have conjunctivitis (pronounced cone-yunk-ti-vi-tis in espanol). My right eye is leaking pus; but on the bright side, it only leaks half the time because during the other half of the time, I cannot even open it. Also it is currently burning from the cherry juice that all of my neighbors squeezed into it as a cure-all. All I really want to do right now is lie on the couch of the Teal House and watch Arrested Development episodes with Noora and Harold. But that is impossible, so I am just laying in my room that feels like sauna and hoping for a quick recovery." After the cherry juice episode, I went to the pharmacy and bought eye drops, and am 90% recovered. Modern medicine certainly works wonders.

Well that's about all I know. I've basically just been doing a whole lot of drinking cafecitos, playing dominoes, and showing off my shuffling skills (everyone in this country is stunned by my ability to rapidly shuffle playing cards). I made the 1.5 hour trip into the big city of San Francisco de Macoris to use the internet and have lunch with other volunteers today, so today is the most excitement I've gotten in about 3 weeks.