Stepping Out of the Boat

We're wondering when we'll wake up in the morning and not dread going to school. It certainly wasn't today - but by the time we actually get to school and get going, things are fine. Today was a busy day.

Last night at about 10:00, I (Claire) realized that I had lost our little zip drive somewhere - and I royally freaked out. A sleepless night later (I'm exaggerating slightly), to make a long story short, I successfully located our zip drive with the help of Jorge (pronounced horehay), the slightly quirky tech guy at school who speaks no English. Thank God!!! John's summer reading tests for this week were on it and nowhere else. Disaster averted.

It's the second week of school - and still no text books. They are apparently still stuck in customs gathering dust - or mold. Here, I think it's more likely that they are gathering mold since the air is so wet. I can't imagine anything gathering actual dust - maybe grime, a mix of the water in the air and what would be dust if it weren't so wet. Speaking of wet, we survived Hurricane Ernesto with no other wounds but a little boredom. We couldn't go out for most of the weekend.

So - to the dirty eggs. We learned something today: The chicken farmers in the USA - or some other person who handles eggs on their way from the bottom of the chicken to the grocery store - wipes all the dirt and chicken-house remnants off of the eggs before they go into the little styrophome things.

Needless to say, the eggs here are all-natural! No egg cleaning for the Dominicans - no sir - they want the little pieces of dirt and grime that came from the chicken farm to stay on their eggs. Today was our first time to buy eggs because we were a little nervous about walking back from the store with twenty bags full of groceries. We didn't want them to get smashed. So, today, after we went to the bank, which I'll address in a moment, we went to a new grocery store and got a few things, eggs being one of those things.

The bank... Finally, since we've been here for three weeks on the nose, we have a Dominican bank account. Holly, a weathered veteran here in Santo Domingo, took all five of the foriegn teachers to El Banco Popular today to establish our bank accounts because pay day is tomorrow. Everything here is last minute. So, we now have our very first (and probably only) bank account in Dominican Pesos. It's nearly impossible for us to open an account here in US dollars - something about the possibility of off-shore money laundering.

After the bank and the grocery, I cooked one of my favorite meals (Butter Curry Chicken with Apples and Raisins) for John, Becky, and Sonya, and we sat and ate and enjoyed. We also discussed the fact that the things we used to think about and do at home seem like some other lifetime - some dream that has evaporated as the rude alarm clock sounds in the dark. Aside from the topic of conversation and the fact that we were getting bitten by mosquitoes the whole time, we almost felt normal.

In all honesty, we're starting to get used to things that we never thought we would: the heat, sleeping on a bed made for one person, mosquito nets, cold showers, etc. I think, little by little, things are getting easier.

Currently, John is watching Monday night football - but it's in Spanish. To me, it sounds very similar to how it sounds in English - a bunch of jargon. It's the same to me either way, but John seems to think that much has been lost since he can't understand any of the announcing or the data charts they put up on the screen. Lucky for John, though, Sunday night football is still in English with good ole John Madden and Al Michaels (he told me the names to type lest you think I've become a football fan).