Tuesday, October 31, 2006
A Time Change, Church, and Dance Class
Just so all of you know - all of you who live in the USA - the time never changes here. It gets dark at about 6:30 pm every night and gets light at about 6:30 am every morning. In fact, one of the political leaders decided to change the time here in order to match the US about five years ago, but after about two weeks, he decided to change it back because it wasn't working. From there on out, his term in office went downhill.
As you should know, the time changed on Sunday, and judging from the paragraph above, that shouldn't have had any effect on us whatsoever. I'll come back to the time change...
On Sunday evening, we had arranged to visit an English speaking church that we learned about from the husband of a teacher at St. Michael's. We were going to be picked up at 4:30 since church started at five. So, at around 3:30, I decided to take a shower and get ready for church. While I was in the shower, I heard a knock on our front door - it was Patria, the lady who was picking us up - wondering if we were coming down for church. Since we don't have a real clock in our apartment, we use our computer, which thought we were in Indiana, so at midnight Sunday morning, it automatically changed time. OOPS!! John and I rushed around like crazy for about two minutes, and I went to church with sopping wet hair, but we made it.
Church was GREAT!! Everyone there was incredibly sincere, although many of them had that "missionary" persona. If you don't know what I'm referring to, disregard that last comment. The church meets in a school building, and I would estimate that there were about thirty people there. We think that we will return there on weekends when we're in town.
We met a guy there named Paul who is Canadian and works at another school in the city. He's married and close to our age, although a little older, and we plan to hang out with him and his wife sometime.
Item number three: the dance class. I (Claire) am officially going to aerobics dance class twice a week. Tonight was my first night. I went with the girls and a lady from school. It was really fun, and it proved to me how much I need exercise. I'll try to take pictures sometime. It's the ultimate Latin aerobics class... lots of booty shaking. I'll be sore in the morning.
We hope you all had fun passing out candy tonight. No one really celebrates Halloween here and we're forbidden to at school, so we had the most boring Halloween of our lives. I didn't get to dress up like a tube of toothpaste this year, either, but I will someday!
As you should know, the time changed on Sunday, and judging from the paragraph above, that shouldn't have had any effect on us whatsoever. I'll come back to the time change...
On Sunday evening, we had arranged to visit an English speaking church that we learned about from the husband of a teacher at St. Michael's. We were going to be picked up at 4:30 since church started at five. So, at around 3:30, I decided to take a shower and get ready for church. While I was in the shower, I heard a knock on our front door - it was Patria, the lady who was picking us up - wondering if we were coming down for church. Since we don't have a real clock in our apartment, we use our computer, which thought we were in Indiana, so at midnight Sunday morning, it automatically changed time. OOPS!! John and I rushed around like crazy for about two minutes, and I went to church with sopping wet hair, but we made it.
Church was GREAT!! Everyone there was incredibly sincere, although many of them had that "missionary" persona. If you don't know what I'm referring to, disregard that last comment. The church meets in a school building, and I would estimate that there were about thirty people there. We think that we will return there on weekends when we're in town.
We met a guy there named Paul who is Canadian and works at another school in the city. He's married and close to our age, although a little older, and we plan to hang out with him and his wife sometime.
Item number three: the dance class. I (Claire) am officially going to aerobics dance class twice a week. Tonight was my first night. I went with the girls and a lady from school. It was really fun, and it proved to me how much I need exercise. I'll try to take pictures sometime. It's the ultimate Latin aerobics class... lots of booty shaking. I'll be sore in the morning.
We hope you all had fun passing out candy tonight. No one really celebrates Halloween here and we're forbidden to at school, so we had the most boring Halloween of our lives. I didn't get to dress up like a tube of toothpaste this year, either, but I will someday!
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Big Changes
So many things have happened recently that we haven't had time to blog about them, so here we go... this is going to be one massive blog post about the things that have been going on starting with last Sunday night.
Farewell to Wayne...
Last Sunday night, when we returned home from our weekend away, Wayne (one of the foreign
teachers) called us. We assumed that he was in his apartment on the first floor of our building, but as the conversation continued on, we realized that he had flown the country. He was at home in Canada... he had quit! We were shocked and sad because we really liked Wayne and wanted to continue to get to know him. As it turns out, he had just gotten fed up with the nonsense at school and had decided that enough was enough. He packed his bags on Friday night and flew out early Saturday morning, unbeknownst to any of us. He left a bottle of wine outside his apartment door and told us to have a drink on him - so on Sunday night, we all toasted to Wayne - farewell! (See the picture.) He had emailed and faxed the big kahunas at school and expceted them to find out sometime Monday morning...
We all went to school with bated breath that day to watch and wait until the you-know-what hit the fan. Wayne had asked us not to say anything, but he wanted us not to be in the dark when everyone found out. As it happened, when the you-know-what hit the fan, it happened somewhere in an office, out of the watchful eye of teachers and students. But there were signs...
That day, Holly informed us that some of the more rediculous formalities and expectations that had been put on us had been removed. That was the first sign. The second sign was the way members of the administration looked at us with concern in their eyes and asked, "How are you doing?" The third sign was a meeting that got scheduled with all the foreign teachers directly after school the next day with all the big kahunas.
A Meeting with the Big Kahunas
In that somewhat awkward meeting with the heads of St. Michael's, we addressed certain parts of Wayne's letter that contained "we" statements. The night before, we (Sonya, Becky, John, and I) had all decided through a pow-wow on the roof what we were going to bring up in the meeting and what we were going to let slide. We also decided that we were going to back Wayne 100% - after all, we had all talked about the reasons he left many a time after school or on the weekends. We agreed with everything he had to say.
So, I won't go into specifics on the world wide web, but as a result of the meeting, and ultimately
of Wayne's departure, we now have a not-so-rediculous job, and a few new things in our apartments. One of Wayne's complaints (and all of ours) is the complete lack of working space in our apartments. The kitchen table is the only flat surface we have, and it's in a very dark corner of the apartment - and because of the way things are arranged, it's the only place for it to be. So - we now have a desk in our spare room (see the picture) and a light installed over our kitchen table! I have already gotten tons more school work done at home because the desk is in a room with light and breeze, and the TV is not in the same room!
We also got a new super-turbo fan. We had previously only had one fan in the whole apartment, and you can guess how that was going judging by our blogs about the heat. We also may be getting screens installed on all of our windows to keep out the swarms of mosquitoes. That was another one of Wayne's complaints; he was shocked that we didn't have screens to protect us from the mosquitoes since there has been an outbreak of Dengue Fever recently.
We are still really sad that Wayne left, but thanks to him, our lives are going to be a little bit more enjoyable at school and at home. Here's to you, Wayne!
The World Series in Santo Domingo - Or Not...
On Tuesday night, we decided to go see one of the World Series games at a sports bar that has a huge big screen TV. We figured that since everyone here is so crazy about baseball, it would be a big deal. Well, it rained on Tuesday afternoon and evening, and when it rains, EVERYTHING stops. Traffic is a mess, no one goes out, and the city just soaks in water. Luckily, we thought, the rain stopped in time for us to walk a 1/2 mile to the sports bar.
We learned something: don't go out even after it has rained. The streets and sidewalks were
completely flooded... but we trudged on. When we got close to the bar, we saw that there was some big thing going on a few blocks further - huge spotlights in the sky, a fireworks dislpay... Wow - we need to check this out! So we walked further until we got to where all the hullabaloo was taking place. (See picture). As it turns out, it was a car dealership. You can't see much from the picture, but there were men in dark suits with ear pieces guarding the whole place, and people were really dressed up. It was weird.
So, back to the bar we went, and asked them to change the channel to the game - but something didn't get communicated. The game was not on the TV. Eventually, a manager came up and mumbled something about
"lluvia" which means rain. We were sitting at the only table that wasn't soaking wet from the rain, and there were hardly any other people at the bar because of the rain. Later, we figured out that he meant the game had been rained out in St. Louis. We all felt like idiots because we had kept asking for them to change the channel to the baseball game. Oh, well. We had a nice conversation and then walked home through the flood after asking the waitress to take our picture. Nothing seems to work out the way you plan here - ever.
A Date on Friday Night
We always like to go out on a date on Friday night - or at least go out to dinner because we've had a long week of work. Well, as soon as we got home yesterday night, it started to pour. You
know from a few paragraphs above what happens when it rains here. So, we ended up waiting and waiting for the rain to stop, getting hungrier and hungrier... but the rain didn't stop. At th end of the week, we don't really have any extra choices for food because we buy just enough to last the week. We have to carry it home, so buying extra just causes problems. We had a Verch (my mom's family) family favorite: noodles and ketchup.
A few hours later, the rain did stop, and we went out just to get out of our apartment. We found a delightful ice cream shop that recently appeared close to our apartment. It's just like Cold Stone Creamery in the USA. We got some ice cream and had a mini-date. It cost us a lot less than going out for dinner would have. Eating out here is very expensive.
I got chocolate ice cream with strawberries and walnuts. John got chocolate with bananas and chocolate syrup. It was a nice treat. Itn't John a goof?
Here's John with a new food item. We don't know what it's called, but it was kind of like a tamal. It had chicken and plantains in it wiht corn meal, was wrapped in some sort of large leaf, and had one tiny raisin in the middle. We decided that every week, we're going to get some new strange thing from the grocery store to try. We'll keep you posted on what we find.
Today is Saturday, and we're going to go shopping to try to find some new swimming trunks for John. The elastic on his has given out, which is a very dangerous thing. That means we'll be walking long distances under the hot sun. Remember to leave your comments and email us about your life!
Farewell to Wayne...
Last Sunday night, when we returned home from our weekend away, Wayne (one of the foreign
teachers) called us. We assumed that he was in his apartment on the first floor of our building, but as the conversation continued on, we realized that he had flown the country. He was at home in Canada... he had quit! We were shocked and sad because we really liked Wayne and wanted to continue to get to know him. As it turns out, he had just gotten fed up with the nonsense at school and had decided that enough was enough. He packed his bags on Friday night and flew out early Saturday morning, unbeknownst to any of us. He left a bottle of wine outside his apartment door and told us to have a drink on him - so on Sunday night, we all toasted to Wayne - farewell! (See the picture.) He had emailed and faxed the big kahunas at school and expceted them to find out sometime Monday morning... We all went to school with bated breath that day to watch and wait until the you-know-what hit the fan. Wayne had asked us not to say anything, but he wanted us not to be in the dark when everyone found out. As it happened, when the you-know-what hit the fan, it happened somewhere in an office, out of the watchful eye of teachers and students. But there were signs...
That day, Holly informed us that some of the more rediculous formalities and expectations that had been put on us had been removed. That was the first sign. The second sign was the way members of the administration looked at us with concern in their eyes and asked, "How are you doing?" The third sign was a meeting that got scheduled with all the foreign teachers directly after school the next day with all the big kahunas.
A Meeting with the Big Kahunas
In that somewhat awkward meeting with the heads of St. Michael's, we addressed certain parts of Wayne's letter that contained "we" statements. The night before, we (Sonya, Becky, John, and I) had all decided through a pow-wow on the roof what we were going to bring up in the meeting and what we were going to let slide. We also decided that we were going to back Wayne 100% - after all, we had all talked about the reasons he left many a time after school or on the weekends. We agreed with everything he had to say.
So, I won't go into specifics on the world wide web, but as a result of the meeting, and ultimately
of Wayne's departure, we now have a not-so-rediculous job, and a few new things in our apartments. One of Wayne's complaints (and all of ours) is the complete lack of working space in our apartments. The kitchen table is the only flat surface we have, and it's in a very dark corner of the apartment - and because of the way things are arranged, it's the only place for it to be. So - we now have a desk in our spare room (see the picture) and a light installed over our kitchen table! I have already gotten tons more school work done at home because the desk is in a room with light and breeze, and the TV is not in the same room!We also got a new super-turbo fan. We had previously only had one fan in the whole apartment, and you can guess how that was going judging by our blogs about the heat. We also may be getting screens installed on all of our windows to keep out the swarms of mosquitoes. That was another one of Wayne's complaints; he was shocked that we didn't have screens to protect us from the mosquitoes since there has been an outbreak of Dengue Fever recently.
We are still really sad that Wayne left, but thanks to him, our lives are going to be a little bit more enjoyable at school and at home. Here's to you, Wayne!
The World Series in Santo Domingo - Or Not...
On Tuesday night, we decided to go see one of the World Series games at a sports bar that has a huge big screen TV. We figured that since everyone here is so crazy about baseball, it would be a big deal. Well, it rained on Tuesday afternoon and evening, and when it rains, EVERYTHING stops. Traffic is a mess, no one goes out, and the city just soaks in water. Luckily, we thought, the rain stopped in time for us to walk a 1/2 mile to the sports bar.
We learned something: don't go out even after it has rained. The streets and sidewalks were
completely flooded... but we trudged on. When we got close to the bar, we saw that there was some big thing going on a few blocks further - huge spotlights in the sky, a fireworks dislpay... Wow - we need to check this out! So we walked further until we got to where all the hullabaloo was taking place. (See picture). As it turns out, it was a car dealership. You can't see much from the picture, but there were men in dark suits with ear pieces guarding the whole place, and people were really dressed up. It was weird. So, back to the bar we went, and asked them to change the channel to the game - but something didn't get communicated. The game was not on the TV. Eventually, a manager came up and mumbled something about
"lluvia" which means rain. We were sitting at the only table that wasn't soaking wet from the rain, and there were hardly any other people at the bar because of the rain. Later, we figured out that he meant the game had been rained out in St. Louis. We all felt like idiots because we had kept asking for them to change the channel to the baseball game. Oh, well. We had a nice conversation and then walked home through the flood after asking the waitress to take our picture. Nothing seems to work out the way you plan here - ever.A Date on Friday Night
We always like to go out on a date on Friday night - or at least go out to dinner because we've had a long week of work. Well, as soon as we got home yesterday night, it started to pour. You
know from a few paragraphs above what happens when it rains here. So, we ended up waiting and waiting for the rain to stop, getting hungrier and hungrier... but the rain didn't stop. At th end of the week, we don't really have any extra choices for food because we buy just enough to last the week. We have to carry it home, so buying extra just causes problems. We had a Verch (my mom's family) family favorite: noodles and ketchup. A few hours later, the rain did stop, and we went out just to get out of our apartment. We found a delightful ice cream shop that recently appeared close to our apartment. It's just like Cold Stone Creamery in the USA. We got some ice cream and had a mini-date. It cost us a lot less than going out for dinner would have. Eating out here is very expensive.
I got chocolate ice cream with strawberries and walnuts. John got chocolate with bananas and chocolate syrup. It was a nice treat. Itn't John a goof?
Here's John with a new food item. We don't know what it's called, but it was kind of like a tamal. It had chicken and plantains in it wiht corn meal, was wrapped in some sort of large leaf, and had one tiny raisin in the middle. We decided that every week, we're going to get some new strange thing from the grocery store to try. We'll keep you posted on what we find.
Today is Saturday, and we're going to go shopping to try to find some new swimming trunks for John. The elastic on his has given out, which is a very dangerous thing. That means we'll be walking long distances under the hot sun. Remember to leave your comments and email us about your life!
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Getting Away From It All...
We had a nice weekend away from it all. It was great to get away from the noise of the city and 
the perpetual heat. The hotel we stayed at is called the Barcelo Talanquera, and I suppose we got what we paid for. It wasn't the kind of place you'd want to stay for a week, but it was perfectly fine for the weekend.
The hotel was full for the weekend - full of Dominican families and very overweight European tourists who like to go topless on the beach. Needless to say, by the end of the weekend, we had had quite enough of badly behaved children. I (Claire) have never really liked children in large quantites, but here, I really can't stand them. It seems they're all spoiled bratts - it's socially okay to let your kids act like Tazmanian devils.
Here we are having a game of Dominoes waiting for dinner time on Friday night. Dominoes is the game of choice here in the DR, and people play if often even out on the streets.
Besides the fact that the hotel was full and the food was less than memorable, everything else was pretty much fine. Our room was located right outside the area where the nightly show was held, and the entire show could be heard perfectly from inside our room. That means we couldn't possibly go to sleep until after the show was over. The music here is always very very loud.
Here's John climbing out onto a palm tree. It rained a bit on Saturday, but that was fine with us - it scared some of the people away from the beach. Otherwise, the weather was great!
On Saturday night, we had dinner at an "Italian" restaurant in the resort. It was fine, but not too memorable. After dinner, we played some cards while watching the first game of the world series.
This is my new pink swimming suit, which is fine but for one thing: when it's wet, it turns everything pink. I discovered this last week when I wrapped my suit in my white towel in order to bring it home. The towel was bright pink. So, I thought that after that first time getting wet, everything would be fine - not so. The hotel's green beach towel had pink splotches on it by noon. Later, I accidentally sat on John's shirt. Oops. Now it's pink, too. It's too bad I like the suit so much...
Now, we're back in the city, ready to start another week.
More pictures from the weekend are on our "Pictures and Short Videos" site.
the perpetual heat. The hotel we stayed at is called the Barcelo Talanquera, and I suppose we got what we paid for. It wasn't the kind of place you'd want to stay for a week, but it was perfectly fine for the weekend.The hotel was full for the weekend - full of Dominican families and very overweight European tourists who like to go topless on the beach. Needless to say, by the end of the weekend, we had had quite enough of badly behaved children. I (Claire) have never really liked children in large quantites, but here, I really can't stand them. It seems they're all spoiled bratts - it's socially okay to let your kids act like Tazmanian devils.
Here we are having a game of Dominoes waiting for dinner time on Friday night. Dominoes is the game of choice here in the DR, and people play if often even out on the streets.
Besides the fact that the hotel was full and the food was less than memorable, everything else was pretty much fine. Our room was located right outside the area where the nightly show was held, and the entire show could be heard perfectly from inside our room. That means we couldn't possibly go to sleep until after the show was over. The music here is always very very loud.
Here's John climbing out onto a palm tree. It rained a bit on Saturday, but that was fine with us - it scared some of the people away from the beach. Otherwise, the weather was great!
On Saturday night, we had dinner at an "Italian" restaurant in the resort. It was fine, but not too memorable. After dinner, we played some cards while watching the first game of the world series.
This is my new pink swimming suit, which is fine but for one thing: when it's wet, it turns everything pink. I discovered this last week when I wrapped my suit in my white towel in order to bring it home. The towel was bright pink. So, I thought that after that first time getting wet, everything would be fine - not so. The hotel's green beach towel had pink splotches on it by noon. Later, I accidentally sat on John's shirt. Oops. Now it's pink, too. It's too bad I like the suit so much...
Now, we're back in the city, ready to start another week.
More pictures from the weekend are on our "Pictures and Short Videos" site.
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
No electricity...
As you know, if you faithfully read our blog, laundry day is Wednesday. Most weeks, however, something occurs to prevent us from finishing our laundry. Today is no different.
Every day, when we come home from school, we figure we have a 50-50 chance of having electricity. Most of the time, when we don't have electricity, it's no big deal. We don't open the fridge and leave it open, and we don't have electricity in the bedrooms or bathroom, but we do have enough through our inverter batteries to run the computer, TV, lights in the living room, and a fan.
Today, when we got home, there was no electricity, which means we can't run the washer. This is a normal occurance... usually the juice comes back on between 3:30 and 4, so we just put the washer in the tub, filled 'er up, and put in a load of whites to bleach and wash. It's now 5:30, it will be completely dark in an hour, and the whites are still "soaking" because the juice is not on.
This small glitch in the day's schedule has also cause another problem: I was going to give John a haircut on the roof today, but since the washer is in the tub, full of water and towels, there is no way he could take a shower after receiving his haircut... so the haircut will have to wait until tomorrow - again.
In spite of those frustrations, thought, it's nice to live here. We're going to the beach in less than 48 hours - we just need to hang on to those thoughts. Today was a teacher-only day, and those are almost always discouraging: more rediculous amounts of work with rediculously high expectations. Tomorrow will be a better day. I think I smell dinner burning in the oven, so I need to stop writing - our oven is either on or off - no degree mark, no in-between, so many things end up burnt. I hope you can successfully get your laundry done when you have time to do it.
Every day, when we come home from school, we figure we have a 50-50 chance of having electricity. Most of the time, when we don't have electricity, it's no big deal. We don't open the fridge and leave it open, and we don't have electricity in the bedrooms or bathroom, but we do have enough through our inverter batteries to run the computer, TV, lights in the living room, and a fan.
Today, when we got home, there was no electricity, which means we can't run the washer. This is a normal occurance... usually the juice comes back on between 3:30 and 4, so we just put the washer in the tub, filled 'er up, and put in a load of whites to bleach and wash. It's now 5:30, it will be completely dark in an hour, and the whites are still "soaking" because the juice is not on.
This small glitch in the day's schedule has also cause another problem: I was going to give John a haircut on the roof today, but since the washer is in the tub, full of water and towels, there is no way he could take a shower after receiving his haircut... so the haircut will have to wait until tomorrow - again.
In spite of those frustrations, thought, it's nice to live here. We're going to the beach in less than 48 hours - we just need to hang on to those thoughts. Today was a teacher-only day, and those are almost always discouraging: more rediculous amounts of work with rediculously high expectations. Tomorrow will be a better day. I think I smell dinner burning in the oven, so I need to stop writing - our oven is either on or off - no degree mark, no in-between, so many things end up burnt. I hope you can successfully get your laundry done when you have time to do it.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Sherezade: An Aromatic Feast
On Saturday, we took a four mile walk in and around the area surrounding our apartment. On this walk, we saw the first music/video store we had seen the entire time we've lived here. We went in and looked around. As we browsed the new releases in the DVD section, we were shocked to see that a pricetag said "34" - meaning a little more than a dollar US. We thought we should definitely buy some DVDs if they were so reasonable. We almost couldn't believe how good the price was - too good to be true - and it turns out that we were right. For some strange and unknown reason, all the new release DVDs in the store were priced in $US. Nothing here is in $US - why DVDs in some random store in the middle of the city? We still have no idea.
On our walk, we saw many restaurants that we want to try out. One of them was a Mediterranean place called Sherezade. Luckily, we found out that it has a buffet on Sundays for lunch. We decided we wanted to try it out.
This picture is terrible - it's taken from a bad angle, and we look like sweaty pigs, which is pretty much what we were by the time we walked about a mile to get there for lunch. If only we weren't too cheap to take a cab! If only we knew the name of the road the restaurant was on so could conceivably take a cab!
Oh well. All things considered, it was a WONDERFUL experience! Airconditioning, roses on the tables, cloth napkins, good waiters, finery... and great food. The food was of fabulous quality, with many very expensive ingredients that we wouldn't buy on our everyday trip to the grocery. They had hummus, couscous, risotto, freh herb salads, and so much more. A pianist played music while we had lunch. The layers of taste in the food made me (Claire) happy to be alive. I really miss food that tastes good - I mean GOOD like gormet good... food that has a complexity to its taste and texture. My desires were all fulfilled at this marvelous meal.
It is a little difficult to feel cultured and sophistocated when you've just sweat buckets walking to a restaurant, and when you have to do the same on the way home, but it was a nice break from the norm for us. It also cost a pretty penny. The buffet cost only $14 per person, but the tax on restaurants here is so crazy, plus the "tip" that is automatically added onto the bill (if you want your server to see any tip at all, you have to leave extra), that we ended up spending around $45 when all was said and done. We don't do that very often.
This weekend, we're off to the beach again. We're going to Juan Dolio, which is the closest beach to us, since all we require is a beach and halfway decent food. We're staying at a new place this time: La Talanquera. Here's a website if you want to know about it: http://www.holidayhotels.com/hotel.php?HID=20040820144829756333
It's by no means a wonderful hotel, but it will do for us for the weekend.
Today, after school, we went to pay our cell phone bill, considering that we got our bill yesterday, and it was due the 13th. That's the way everything works here. But at least on the way to the Multicentro, we got some fresh-squeezed orange juice from a street vendor - there's nothing like it in the world - the ambrosia of Santo Domingo.
Tomorrow, we have a teacher day - we have one of those per month - and the day will be filled with meaningless meetings in Spanish. Oh, boy! But, at least we have the weekend to look forward to!
On our walk, we saw many restaurants that we want to try out. One of them was a Mediterranean place called Sherezade. Luckily, we found out that it has a buffet on Sundays for lunch. We decided we wanted to try it out.
This picture is terrible - it's taken from a bad angle, and we look like sweaty pigs, which is pretty much what we were by the time we walked about a mile to get there for lunch. If only we weren't too cheap to take a cab! If only we knew the name of the road the restaurant was on so could conceivably take a cab!
Oh well. All things considered, it was a WONDERFUL experience! Airconditioning, roses on the tables, cloth napkins, good waiters, finery... and great food. The food was of fabulous quality, with many very expensive ingredients that we wouldn't buy on our everyday trip to the grocery. They had hummus, couscous, risotto, freh herb salads, and so much more. A pianist played music while we had lunch. The layers of taste in the food made me (Claire) happy to be alive. I really miss food that tastes good - I mean GOOD like gormet good... food that has a complexity to its taste and texture. My desires were all fulfilled at this marvelous meal.
It is a little difficult to feel cultured and sophistocated when you've just sweat buckets walking to a restaurant, and when you have to do the same on the way home, but it was a nice break from the norm for us. It also cost a pretty penny. The buffet cost only $14 per person, but the tax on restaurants here is so crazy, plus the "tip" that is automatically added onto the bill (if you want your server to see any tip at all, you have to leave extra), that we ended up spending around $45 when all was said and done. We don't do that very often.
This weekend, we're off to the beach again. We're going to Juan Dolio, which is the closest beach to us, since all we require is a beach and halfway decent food. We're staying at a new place this time: La Talanquera. Here's a website if you want to know about it: http://www.holidayhotels.com/hotel.php?HID=20040820144829756333
It's by no means a wonderful hotel, but it will do for us for the weekend.
Today, after school, we went to pay our cell phone bill, considering that we got our bill yesterday, and it was due the 13th. That's the way everything works here. But at least on the way to the Multicentro, we got some fresh-squeezed orange juice from a street vendor - there's nothing like it in the world - the ambrosia of Santo Domingo.
Tomorrow, we have a teacher day - we have one of those per month - and the day will be filled with meaningless meetings in Spanish. Oh, boy! But, at least we have the weekend to look forward to!
Friday, October 13, 2006
BLTs, Platanitos, and Brugal
Sorry we haven't been posting as often as normal. The truth is that almost everything here is "normal" to us now, so we don't think as many things are worthy of posting. We're going to do a
better job now, of keeping up on things.
This first picture of John deals with the first thing in the title of this post: BLTs. There's nothing quite like a good BLT, but bacon is hard to come by here. We had both had a craving for a good BLT, and when we went to the grocery store to try to buy bacon, it was nowhere to be found, and we didn't know the word for bacon in Spanish. So, we started looking at the butcher section where they keep all the huge slabs of raw meat and I (Claire) saw something that I thought might look like bacon. After talking to the meat cutter guy for a little while, I decided to go for it. We got a half pound of mystery meat.
Come to find out, it's the best bacon John has ever had. He went on and on about how good the bacon was and how much he liked it. It was a little saltier than bacon in the USA, and it was cut much more thinly with less fat, but it tasted like bacon. We had some great BLT sandwiches for dinner! (By the way, it's still so hot here that having dinner with a shirt on is not really an option for John.)
Another favoite food of ours here is platanos chips - "platanitos" - which are kind of lik
e potato chips, but made from plantains. I (Claire) like them better than all potato chips, and John likes them better than plain potato chips, but not better than cheddar cheese Sun Chips. We have them for snacks on a pretty regular basis. They taste GREAT with a glass of cold Coke. By the way, the Coke here is super carbonated for some reason. It's like that in all Latin American countries. Here is a picture of a bag of platanitos wth two little platanitos out to the side. I think you can probably buy them in the USA at Mexican grocery stores.
Well, we sure had an interesting experience tonight! Before I proceed to relate the story to you, I need to explain to you that alcohol is viewed completely differently here in the DR than anywhere I've ever been. It's legal to drink and drive here. In fact, gas stations sell alcohol by the case. All you need to have a party here is a little piece of sidewalk and a bottle of alcohol. Alcohol is also really inexpensive here, and I think it's the people's way of coping with life. EVERYONE drinks. The most popular kind of alcohol here BY FAR is rum... that kind of goes along with the whole Caribbean thing... and the most popular kind of rum in the DR is called Brugal. It's everywhere. People drink it every hour of the day and night.
So - yesterday, we got a text message from our friend Roger who has lived here for six years. He really likes to drink, so he fits in well with the culture here. He said we needed to go to this place called "Carre Four" because Brugal was doing a promotion there. After some confusion and a few more text messages, we figured out that Carre Four is a grocery store, and they were having a sale on Brugal and other alcohols. Roger was still really excited about it. We thought we'd go along for the ride just to see what he was talking about
.
As it turned out, inside the huge grocery store (like a Super Walmart), there was a tent that had "Brugal" written all over it! They had merengue music playing in the tent and tons of different kinds of alcohol set up. There was a little booth thing in the center of the tent, and they were giving away free drinks! Free alcoholic beverages in the grocery store! What is going on here!?!? Brugal sure was having a promotion!
What an interesting experience. Here we are in the back of the tent with part of the wine selection. It was crazy. After the people we came with finished looking at the alcohol to their heart's content, we shopped around the store. They had some great food options that we aren't used to - like blackberry jam. So, we picked up a few things that we can't get close to our apartment. I also got a nice pair of shoes that were on sale. I love shoes!
Overall, it was an experience we woudln't want to miss. How many other times in our lives are we going to go to a grocery store for an alcohol sale as a Friday night activity? (Probably never again.) We'll chalk one up to bizarre experience!
better job now, of keeping up on things.
This first picture of John deals with the first thing in the title of this post: BLTs. There's nothing quite like a good BLT, but bacon is hard to come by here. We had both had a craving for a good BLT, and when we went to the grocery store to try to buy bacon, it was nowhere to be found, and we didn't know the word for bacon in Spanish. So, we started looking at the butcher section where they keep all the huge slabs of raw meat and I (Claire) saw something that I thought might look like bacon. After talking to the meat cutter guy for a little while, I decided to go for it. We got a half pound of mystery meat.
Come to find out, it's the best bacon John has ever had. He went on and on about how good the bacon was and how much he liked it. It was a little saltier than bacon in the USA, and it was cut much more thinly with less fat, but it tasted like bacon. We had some great BLT sandwiches for dinner! (By the way, it's still so hot here that having dinner with a shirt on is not really an option for John.)
Another favoite food of ours here is platanos chips - "platanitos" - which are kind of lik
e potato chips, but made from plantains. I (Claire) like them better than all potato chips, and John likes them better than plain potato chips, but not better than cheddar cheese Sun Chips. We have them for snacks on a pretty regular basis. They taste GREAT with a glass of cold Coke. By the way, the Coke here is super carbonated for some reason. It's like that in all Latin American countries. Here is a picture of a bag of platanitos wth two little platanitos out to the side. I think you can probably buy them in the USA at Mexican grocery stores.Well, we sure had an interesting experience tonight! Before I proceed to relate the story to you, I need to explain to you that alcohol is viewed completely differently here in the DR than anywhere I've ever been. It's legal to drink and drive here. In fact, gas stations sell alcohol by the case. All you need to have a party here is a little piece of sidewalk and a bottle of alcohol. Alcohol is also really inexpensive here, and I think it's the people's way of coping with life. EVERYONE drinks. The most popular kind of alcohol here BY FAR is rum... that kind of goes along with the whole Caribbean thing... and the most popular kind of rum in the DR is called Brugal. It's everywhere. People drink it every hour of the day and night.
So - yesterday, we got a text message from our friend Roger who has lived here for six years. He really likes to drink, so he fits in well with the culture here. He said we needed to go to this place called "Carre Four" because Brugal was doing a promotion there. After some confusion and a few more text messages, we figured out that Carre Four is a grocery store, and they were having a sale on Brugal and other alcohols. Roger was still really excited about it. We thought we'd go along for the ride just to see what he was talking about
.As it turned out, inside the huge grocery store (like a Super Walmart), there was a tent that had "Brugal" written all over it! They had merengue music playing in the tent and tons of different kinds of alcohol set up. There was a little booth thing in the center of the tent, and they were giving away free drinks! Free alcoholic beverages in the grocery store! What is going on here!?!? Brugal sure was having a promotion!
What an interesting experience. Here we are in the back of the tent with part of the wine selection. It was crazy. After the people we came with finished looking at the alcohol to their heart's content, we shopped around the store. They had some great food options that we aren't used to - like blackberry jam. So, we picked up a few things that we can't get close to our apartment. I also got a nice pair of shoes that were on sale. I love shoes!
Overall, it was an experience we woudln't want to miss. How many other times in our lives are we going to go to a grocery store for an alcohol sale as a Friday night activity? (Probably never again.) We'll chalk one up to bizarre experience!
Sunday, October 08, 2006
October in the Tropics
It's amazing what effect warm weather has on our internal clocks. My mind and body think it's still August, but indeed, it's October! What happened to the time? We've been living here for two months already - two months exactly as of October 7th. Things here are pretty normal to us now, which has driven home the point that no matter where we go, no place will be new and exciting forever. No matter how new and exciting everything is in the beginning, we'll get used to it and it will all become normal with a little bit of time.
It's Sunday morning right now, and we've had a bit of trouble finding an English speaking church. It's very difficult to get around, especially when you don't know exactly where it is you'd like to go. So, this morning, I did a little online searching to see if I could find a good sermon for us to listen to, and lucky me, I found one. Thank goodness Fellowship Missionary Church in Ft. Wayne, Indiana puts their sermons online! If you want to get a sample of what we're listening to, visit their website: http://www.fmcfw.org You can find all the sermons by clicking on "downloads" and then you can choose which one you want to hear. My best friend, Jamie Bennett, goes to FMC, and the pastor there is an excellent speaker with his heart and mind in the right place. I've just made coffee in our weird little coffee pot, and I'm waiting for John to wake up. Then, we'll have church in our apartment.
If you read the previous post, you know that we had planned to go to the beach this weekend,
and that it didn't work out. We ended up staying here instead, in the city. Friday night, we went with the other foreign teachers to Marte's club to swim and relax until about 7:30. (Marte is a friend who teaches at St. Michael's.) After we had relaxed to our heart's content, we went out to the parking lot to leave the club, and Marte pulled about 10 pounds of juicing oranges out of his trunk. He gave them to me saying that he has a friend that owns an orange farm, and he will be getting another batch soon - he was wondering if we would like to try fresh squeezed orange juice. I was excited and gladly took the oranges. When we got home, I squeezed every one of them by hand (hard work) and it was sure worth it. We only got a small pitcher of juice, but it was better than any juice you can buy at the store. It's 100% natural and organic, too.
Saturday, we left home at about 10 am and headed to a shopping center with Sonya and Wayne. We ended up staying there until about 3 pm. During our shopping trip, we noticed a few unique cultural norms that people here exhibit while shopping:
1. If some one is looking at something, it's okay to walk up right next to them, or in front of them, stand so that you are almost touching, and look at the same thing.
2. It is perfectly acceptable to sing along very loudly with whatever music is being played in the store, even if you are tone deaf.
3. If some one says, "excuse me" (in Spanish, of course), there is no need whatsoever for you to move out of their way.
4. Children are aloud to do anything and everything they want, even if what they are doing is extremely disruptive or bothersome to other people.
I don't think it's necessary for me to say that we got a huge dose of Dominican culture - perhaps too much for one day. Another funny thing that we thought we'd report is that in all the stores here, they have employees on rollerblades who spend their working hours rollerblading from the cash register area to get necessary items from the store. For example, if an item doesn't have a price, the rollerblade guy takes the item and zooms to the back of the store and back with the price. That seems to make good sense, although it could be a saftey hazard. They really fly on those things.
I'm not sure what today holds, but I know we'll be listening to a good sermon and relaxing a bit more - although today requires some time to be spent on school work. Don't forget to leave a comment about what's going on with you!
It's Sunday morning right now, and we've had a bit of trouble finding an English speaking church. It's very difficult to get around, especially when you don't know exactly where it is you'd like to go. So, this morning, I did a little online searching to see if I could find a good sermon for us to listen to, and lucky me, I found one. Thank goodness Fellowship Missionary Church in Ft. Wayne, Indiana puts their sermons online! If you want to get a sample of what we're listening to, visit their website: http://www.fmcfw.org You can find all the sermons by clicking on "downloads" and then you can choose which one you want to hear. My best friend, Jamie Bennett, goes to FMC, and the pastor there is an excellent speaker with his heart and mind in the right place. I've just made coffee in our weird little coffee pot, and I'm waiting for John to wake up. Then, we'll have church in our apartment.
If you read the previous post, you know that we had planned to go to the beach this weekend,
and that it didn't work out. We ended up staying here instead, in the city. Friday night, we went with the other foreign teachers to Marte's club to swim and relax until about 7:30. (Marte is a friend who teaches at St. Michael's.) After we had relaxed to our heart's content, we went out to the parking lot to leave the club, and Marte pulled about 10 pounds of juicing oranges out of his trunk. He gave them to me saying that he has a friend that owns an orange farm, and he will be getting another batch soon - he was wondering if we would like to try fresh squeezed orange juice. I was excited and gladly took the oranges. When we got home, I squeezed every one of them by hand (hard work) and it was sure worth it. We only got a small pitcher of juice, but it was better than any juice you can buy at the store. It's 100% natural and organic, too. Saturday, we left home at about 10 am and headed to a shopping center with Sonya and Wayne. We ended up staying there until about 3 pm. During our shopping trip, we noticed a few unique cultural norms that people here exhibit while shopping:
1. If some one is looking at something, it's okay to walk up right next to them, or in front of them, stand so that you are almost touching, and look at the same thing.
2. It is perfectly acceptable to sing along very loudly with whatever music is being played in the store, even if you are tone deaf.
3. If some one says, "excuse me" (in Spanish, of course), there is no need whatsoever for you to move out of their way.
4. Children are aloud to do anything and everything they want, even if what they are doing is extremely disruptive or bothersome to other people.
I don't think it's necessary for me to say that we got a huge dose of Dominican culture - perhaps too much for one day. Another funny thing that we thought we'd report is that in all the stores here, they have employees on rollerblades who spend their working hours rollerblading from the cash register area to get necessary items from the store. For example, if an item doesn't have a price, the rollerblade guy takes the item and zooms to the back of the store and back with the price. That seems to make good sense, although it could be a saftey hazard. They really fly on those things.
I'm not sure what today holds, but I know we'll be listening to a good sermon and relaxing a bit more - although today requires some time to be spent on school work. Don't forget to leave a comment about what's going on with you!
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
Foiled Again
Today is Wednesday - laundry day; however, at about 2:00, it started to rain, and it's been raining pretty much since then. Foiled again! Even though we didn't get to do laundry today, we really don't mind the rain because the temperature has cooled down quite a bit. We don't feel like we're sweating our brains out anymore! It's great. Perhaps we will have time to do the laundry during the weekend since we aren't going anywhere.
As for weekend plans, we were foiled again there as well. We were planning on trying to get to Juan Dolio, a beach that is somewhat close, to stay at a resort for the weekend. Well, no first class bus goes there, and a taxi ride is $75 round trip. We can't justify spending that much on our transportation for a short weekend trip. When we went before with our foreign counterparts, we all split the cab fare, and it was reasonable, but with just the two of us, it's a bit too much. Our hopes were not dashed after we found out how much a cab would cost because we read in our little travel guide that there is a second class bus that goes to Juan Dolio. It sounds quaint and wonderful in our travel book, but we asked some one who had actually taken that bus, and this is what she had to report:
In order to get to Juan Dolio by second class bus, you have to take a cab to this park somewhere in the city and stand in the place where the bus leaves for Juan Dolio. There are no signs and no bus stations - you just have to stand in the right place. Then, after you get on the bus, you have to try to sit near the bus driver because you have to shout when you want to get off. There are no scheduled stops - you just have to know exactly where you want to get off and shout when the time comes. The bus driver may not stop when you shout, though, according to our friend's experience, because the bus drivers generally stop where they want, not where you want. So, you will most likely end up walking down the highway trying to find the place you want to go. It's a whole different story if you have never been to the hotel you're trying to reach because you won't know when to shout at the driver or when to get off. That would have been the case with us.
When you want to go home at the end of the weekend, you have to take all of your stuff and stand on the side of the highway waving at all the buses that pass. The buses are not marked, so you have to wave down every bus that you see, ask if it goes to Santo Domingo, and get on if it does. This sounds pretty simple, but our friend said that often, the buses don't stop for you, and you have no idea why. If it starts raining, you're in deep doo.
In light of all that and the fact that we will have just taught school all week and will be wanting to avoid extra stress, we decided to wait until we can go as a large group again and take a taxi. We do plan on taking the "scary bus" (which we affectionately call the second class bus system) sometime during our stay here - jus not this weekend. Foiled again.
We are planning a relaxing weekend with some exploration (on foot) of the surrounding areas. We'll update you on that later. It's only Wednesday, and we're obsessing about the weekend. Hmmm....
As for weekend plans, we were foiled again there as well. We were planning on trying to get to Juan Dolio, a beach that is somewhat close, to stay at a resort for the weekend. Well, no first class bus goes there, and a taxi ride is $75 round trip. We can't justify spending that much on our transportation for a short weekend trip. When we went before with our foreign counterparts, we all split the cab fare, and it was reasonable, but with just the two of us, it's a bit too much. Our hopes were not dashed after we found out how much a cab would cost because we read in our little travel guide that there is a second class bus that goes to Juan Dolio. It sounds quaint and wonderful in our travel book, but we asked some one who had actually taken that bus, and this is what she had to report:
In order to get to Juan Dolio by second class bus, you have to take a cab to this park somewhere in the city and stand in the place where the bus leaves for Juan Dolio. There are no signs and no bus stations - you just have to stand in the right place. Then, after you get on the bus, you have to try to sit near the bus driver because you have to shout when you want to get off. There are no scheduled stops - you just have to know exactly where you want to get off and shout when the time comes. The bus driver may not stop when you shout, though, according to our friend's experience, because the bus drivers generally stop where they want, not where you want. So, you will most likely end up walking down the highway trying to find the place you want to go. It's a whole different story if you have never been to the hotel you're trying to reach because you won't know when to shout at the driver or when to get off. That would have been the case with us.
When you want to go home at the end of the weekend, you have to take all of your stuff and stand on the side of the highway waving at all the buses that pass. The buses are not marked, so you have to wave down every bus that you see, ask if it goes to Santo Domingo, and get on if it does. This sounds pretty simple, but our friend said that often, the buses don't stop for you, and you have no idea why. If it starts raining, you're in deep doo.
In light of all that and the fact that we will have just taught school all week and will be wanting to avoid extra stress, we decided to wait until we can go as a large group again and take a taxi. We do plan on taking the "scary bus" (which we affectionately call the second class bus system) sometime during our stay here - jus not this weekend. Foiled again.
We are planning a relaxing weekend with some exploration (on foot) of the surrounding areas. We'll update you on that later. It's only Wednesday, and we're obsessing about the weekend. Hmmm....
Sunday, October 01, 2006
The Coffee Pot
This past week, we received an "inventory" list of all the things that are supposed to be present 
in our apartment. Unfortunately, half of it is in Spanish, and our vocabulary does not extend far enough to include specific household items. One thing on the list that was recognizable, however, was a coffee pot. I laughed out loud when I read that one. There is NOT a coffee pot at our apartment.
Later, our foreign teacher counterparts asked about the lack of certain items on the list, and that's when we found out that we really do have a coffee pot in our apartment. It doesn't look like one, and it certainly doesn't turn on automatically in the morning to wake me with the smell of coffee, but it brews coffee. I tried it out today.
As you can see from the picture, it's a very small, three-part contraption. When it's put together, it looks like a messed up mini-pitcher. You put about 3/4 of a cup of water in the bottom, put in the little sifter thing, add some coffee, and then screw on the top, empty. When you put it on the stove, the water in the bottom boils so furiously that it gurgles up through the grounds, through a little spout into the top part where you can pour it into your cup. Unfortunately, though, it only makes half a cup of coffee - but that's all you need to get that caffine rush.
Here, there is no such thing as coffee as you know it in the USA. All coffee here is really espresso, but they call it coffee. It is always served in tiny little tea cups, a little bigger than a thimble. John's parents are going to die when they visit - they enjoy mild coffee. I think they'll just have to ask for half coffee, half water! :) Needless to say, I was successful in my coffee-making venture today, and now I know what that little messed up mini-pitcher is for. We still have about three other mystery items in our kitchen. I'm sure the mystery will unfold as the year goes on.
in our apartment. Unfortunately, half of it is in Spanish, and our vocabulary does not extend far enough to include specific household items. One thing on the list that was recognizable, however, was a coffee pot. I laughed out loud when I read that one. There is NOT a coffee pot at our apartment.
Later, our foreign teacher counterparts asked about the lack of certain items on the list, and that's when we found out that we really do have a coffee pot in our apartment. It doesn't look like one, and it certainly doesn't turn on automatically in the morning to wake me with the smell of coffee, but it brews coffee. I tried it out today.
As you can see from the picture, it's a very small, three-part contraption. When it's put together, it looks like a messed up mini-pitcher. You put about 3/4 of a cup of water in the bottom, put in the little sifter thing, add some coffee, and then screw on the top, empty. When you put it on the stove, the water in the bottom boils so furiously that it gurgles up through the grounds, through a little spout into the top part where you can pour it into your cup. Unfortunately, though, it only makes half a cup of coffee - but that's all you need to get that caffine rush.
Here, there is no such thing as coffee as you know it in the USA. All coffee here is really espresso, but they call it coffee. It is always served in tiny little tea cups, a little bigger than a thimble. John's parents are going to die when they visit - they enjoy mild coffee. I think they'll just have to ask for half coffee, half water! :) Needless to say, I was successful in my coffee-making venture today, and now I know what that little messed up mini-pitcher is for. We still have about three other mystery items in our kitchen. I'm sure the mystery will unfold as the year goes on.
