Below are some of Laura’s journal entries from the trip, to give you an idea of what the experience was like. Author’s note: because in my spoken language I was switching back and forth between English and Spanish, my journal entries did too. I’ve tried to include English translations wherever necessary, while still maintaining the “flavor” of the mix of languages.
Day One
In the DR! I’m sitting on an iron bench in a gravel courtyard with rough cabanas for sleeping: concrete floors, wood frames with painted plywood walls that do not reach the floor, covered by fencing and corrugated tin roofs. (Someone told me they are based on designs for chicken coops.) There are mosquito-netted bunk beds, but I’ll still spray myself with stinky DEET before bed. REALLY hoping I don’t get malaria!
Flying into Santiago over the country was amazing and beautiful. We rode our should-have-been-2-hour van ride in a bus with a kind of crazy driver. We got a flat tire and waited for it to be fixed by the driver, who would not let us help or get off the bus.
After dinner (yummy rice and veggies and beans, plátanos y una ensalada de vegetales variadas) I sat and talked with some of the other volunteers for a little while, and then we went over to see the kids.
The ingenuity I’ve seen so far in this developing country is the ingenuity of children everywhere: two poles—pipes coming out of the ground, about 2 ½ feet apart. Each has a small rod sticking out, conveniently placed to hold a knotted broken jump rope: a makeshift swing that two small girls, Francesca and Lise, argue over in their non-verbal way; small sounds and jockeying for position about whose turn is next.
Now I’m in bed, under mosquito netting, fresh from my “navy shower” and then spraying myself with DEET. I used bug spray when I first got my bunk (about 5:30) and I already have 5 or 6 mosquito bites. I guess they just really like me.
I’m putting in my earplugs for bed, even though I want to hear the sweet cacophony of chickens and roosters. There was a goat wandering the playground area before dinner, rust-colored with little horns and minding his own business. And a skinny dog named Scooby rolling in the dirt.
There is a cricket singing merrily in the (otherwise unoccupied) bunk next to mine. So far I have been warned:
- Close your luggage at night and put your shoes in there, too, to keep out the bugs.
- If you hear a scream in the night, someone in the ramada found a bug.
- Oh yeah, the ramada lights are on timers (so now I’m writing this in the dark)
- There’s a guard at night and you’ll see him if you get up to use the bathroom.
- The roosters begin crowing at 4 AM at least.
Day Two
Sunday at the Orphanage. Quiet, unscheduled. I’m taking a siesta now.The day began with a bell ringing at 7:45, 15 minutes until breakfast. I heard roosters through my earplugs at 6 AM.
Breakfast was pancakes, a fruit salad (of pineapple, mango, and cantaloupe), and hard-boiled eggs served warm. There was also coffee, but I didn’t have any—it’s too hot to drink anything hot.
We had an orientation including some get-to-know-you activities (there are lots of volunteers here from all over the USA and Canada, so it’s good to get to know them) and a walking tour of the town. The walking tour included a stop by the baseball stadium, which had goats wandering between home plate and first base. We got a tour of the orphanage and volunteer quarters. A neat part: they are working on becoming energy independent (they call it “project green”) so there is a small wind turbine, solar panels on the roof. They’ve installed an electric water pump and a manual water pump, asking each volunteer to pump about 2 minutes (10 gallons, or 100 pumps) per day to offset their water use.
Then was lunch of very crunchy fried chicken (without batter), sweet fried plantains, rice and beans. After that, an English orientation and group planning time, and a 20-minute walk into town for helado (ice cream).
Day Four
Yesterday was our first day at school. My team teaches second graders in the morning and fifth graders in the afternoon. We taught colors in the morning including a song the kids loved, to the tune of “Frere Jacques.” The song goes, “Red is rojo, red is rojo, blue azul, blue azul, yellow amarillo, yellow amarillo, green verde, green verde.” I helped two seven-year-olds with their worksheets, Mariali and Bladimir. (Who names their kid Bladimir? He’s pretty cute though.) There are 11 kids in the morning class.
In the afternoon, there are only 8 or so kids in the class (all boys and one girl). We taught body parts—pelo, boca, cabeza, hombros, ojos, orejas, rodillas (hair, mouth, head, shoulders, eyes, ears, knees). We included the song, “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes” and after that the kids wanted to sing the Hokey Pokey.
After dinner was movie night—they show a DVD for the volunteers and kids from the orphanage, in Spanish with English subtitles. It was “Herbie the Love Bug,” with Lindsey Lohan. It was cute, but also kind of ridiculous—she couldn’t have been more than 16 but we were supposed to believe she just graduated from college. And oh yeah, she likes skateboarding and drag racing. Please.
Siesta time.
Day Five
Yesterday was un buen día. Breakfast was eggs, toast, and fresh fruit salad (papaya, pineapple, and cantaloupe). At school in the morning, the teacher stayed in the class and helped, which was nice. We taught numbers to the little ones including a song in which we used “masks” (construction paper circles, attached to popsicle sticks, with faces like cats drawn on them). The song went, “one, two, three gatos, four, five, six gatos, seven, eight, nine gatos, ahora hay ten gatos.” (Translation: 1, 2, 3 cats, 4, 5, 6 cats, 7, 8, 9 cats, now there are 10 cats.) It was very cute.
Then Tom, the executive director, came and found us when it was time for recreo (recess). The backyard was wet (and being nothing but a walled bit of dust to begin with…) so the kids had recess in a roped off area of the sidewalk in front of the school. We didn’t really have room to do much at recess other than let the kids hang on us, talk to them and take pictures. I have a new favorite, a little girl named Kate (pronounced “KAH-tay”) who wore jeans, a denim jacket and her white polo shirt yesterday, with three pigtails, each with three braids coming out of them and yellow ribbons. She is very shy and serious.
After recess, Tom took us on a walking tour of Monte Cristi. Across the street, there is a museum memorializing José Martí and General Máximo Gómez and the Montecristi Manifesto, which was for Cuban independence from Spain. Some really neat murals in the museum. Then he showed us a supermarket, where we’ll have the opportunity to go again and buy coffee, honey, or vanilla before we leave. Then we went to the clock tower, which the town bought and brought over from Europe (it’s actually an Eiffel tower, albeit much smaller than the one in Paris) We also saw a park dedicated to one of the freedom fighters married to one of the Mirabal sisters (I’m forgetting his name, but he was from Monte Cristi). We also stopped by the English Institute—it’s a converted hotel that OO has set up as a school for English instruction.
The afternoon class was a handful. They’re all around 10 or 11, I’d guess. We were teaching about clothing, so we brought a memory game (with English and Spanish words), and dolls called “Betty Spaghetti” (I’d never heard of them before, but I guess they’re from the USA). They’re all in parts and you snap them together. They have heads (with stringy “spaghetti” type hair), t-shirt, arms, hands, skirt, legs, shoes. We’d taught body parts the day before so it was a good review. All the boys were excited to have muñecas for new “novias” (dolls for girlfriends) and many were kissing them—oy—and la chica wanted everything in rosada (pink). She braided her doll’s bright neon pink pigtails and showed her sister during recess.
Around dinnertime, it rained—poured—for about an hour. This is supposed to be the rainy season, but they’d only had a tiny bit (maybe an inch or less) in the past three weeks. Now this morning it’s cool (blissfully so) with a bit of dew still hanging around.
Day Five (Later that day)
Today we taught formas (shapes) to the little ones. Kate and Mariali were not in class today but unas chicas lindas, Karla y Issis, were. The favorite activity was when we gave each student a half-sheet of construction paper, and cut-out shapes of other colors. The kids then glued the shapes—luna, estrellas, rectángulo, círculo, triángulo, cuadrados (moon, stars, rectangle, circle, triangle, square)—to create a picture of a gato. Each gato was a little different, with slightly different sizes of shapes and placements. Juan Raúl glued his corazón-shaped nariz (heart-shaped nose) on sideways, showed us proudly and laughed. Karla’s gato had a small head (un círculo) and a disproportionately large corazón nariz, which gave the impression it was a very happy gato, smiling with its big nose. Each child picked colors from a large bag of crayons and drew on whiskers, ojos, the insides of the orejitas (little ears—triangles), and colas (tails).Otro buen día en la escuela.
One of the dogs, Scooby, followed us to school, so a few volunteers had to walk him home.
I talked with Tom a few days ago about the “Why teach English?” question. The government here in the DR has mandated that English education be provided in all the schools. But here in the more rural areas, they have a very hard time getting good English teachers—there just aren’t enough folks who can teach it out here. So OO can provide quality English education at no cost to local schools, giving students a boost when it comes time for them to be looking for jobs. Students who were in our classes this week will have the opportunity to attend the English Institute and/or summer camps to gain a more advanced English proficiency.
Day Six (last day in the schools)
Antes de la escuela, (before school) we got up very early to get on the bus at 5:30 AM for a sunrise hike and swim at El Morro. The hike is about a mile, at times steep, up a mountain. I took some great pictures of the lovely but anticlimactic sunrise (“oooh, aaaah, behind a cloud.”) After that we walked down to the beach, another ½ mile or so from the trailhead. What a beach! It was secluded with water just the right temperature, waves that weren’t too big but still big enough, clear water with no seaweed, and very smooth, soft sand. It was a pretty good start to the day.
Today at school, we reviewed colors and shapes, with one of the activities as a color by numbers with a rainbow. I have a cute picture of shy and serious Kate and her completed rainbow, as well as the front row girls and boy (Kate, Issis, Karla, and Raul) working on a coloring worksheet. After that was recess, where I got lots more good pictures—especially of Kate and her brother with the pipe cleaner anteojos (glasses) that another teaching team made. (They were reviewing ropa, y los niños se encantan! [reviewing clothes and the kids loved them!])
Then, lunch. After lunch, Tom was looking for volunteers to help at the English Institute, getting it ready for the groups that will be coming in on Saturday. So a bunch of us went over, and I spent the afternoon cleaning plastic tables and chairs, and sweeping the open-air classroom downstairs. A good afternoon’s work. After that, Tom took us to a restaurant on the ocean (on the way to El Morro), where we waited while he picked up the group at our school, then when he returned we got a bunch of refresco y hielo (soda and ice) to share. It was a very cute little beachfront restaurant, with a thatched roof and open walls, out to an open deck that ended in a dropping-off of the concrete slab, into the ocean. I liked the “merengue" flavored soda, which was kind of like a fruity cream soda.
It started pouring on our way home and by the time we were near the orphanage, the street had become a river. We made it back and not too wet, unlike one of the groups walking back—they were drenched to the skin. It probably felt good, though, since it was about 85˚ with 85% humidity!
Then dinner and a presentation by Coco, a long-term volunteer with OO who is now the supervisor at the Orphanage. She’s been here four years! She told us about the orphanage system here in the DR, a little of the stories of the kids here, and the history of orphanages (and why kids are in the orphanages), as well as about adoptions. (Basically, they’re possible but don’t really happen.)
Tomorrow, vamos a Dajabón, one of the border towns.
On the Way Home
Stickers on the broken windshield of our bus back to the airport: there are three with a picture of the Virgen. They say, “Ven con nosotros al caminar, Virgen de Altagracia” (come with us to walk). These three are all on cracks in the glass. That’s one way to fix a broken windshield, I suppose. Just have faith it won’t shatter.
There is another one that says: “Aquí somos Católicos; Veneramos al Divino Niño Jésus y la Santíssima Virgen; Católicos Fueron Nuestros Padres; Católicos Seremos Para Siempre; No Vamos a Cambiar de Religión; No Insista, Gracias!” With a picture to the left of the Divino Niño Jésus, and a picture on the right of the Santíssima Virgen. (Translation: Here we are Catholics; we venerate the divine child Jesus and the Sainted Virgin. Our parents were Catholics, we will always be Catholics, we are not going to change our religion, don’t insist, please!)
I’m sitting in a first-class plane seat, for the first time ever. I got a free upgrade, wahoo! It is very cushy and I like it so far. But I was embarrassed to be here in my seat while everyone else was walking back to theirs. And it feels like a bit of ostentatious consumption after the poverty I’ve seen.
Yesterday morning, we went to Dajabón. It was chaotic and crowded. We walked through the many, many people to the bridge crossing over the Massacre River (a muddy river that separates Haiti from the Dominican Republic). Convergence. Thousands of people rushing past, pushing wheelbarrows loaded with everything and anything or carrying things on their heads. I saw a woman with at least 200 rolls of toilet paper on her head, and men carrying sacks upon sacks (at least 125 lb. each) of rice. Below the bridge, people washing in the muddy water, boys swimming across. People doing laundry.We walked through a market swarming with people, tightly packed and busy is an understatement. You could get anything and people walked around trying to get us to buy things—shoes, food, clothing, straw hats, underwear, jewelry. Bewildering, claustrophobic.
Afterwards we stopped at an ice cream shop before getting on the bus. Swarmed by young Haitian boys, at least 30, wanting to shine my shoes for 10 or 20 pesos—less than a dollar. When I said no, some of them started anyway. They looked so thin and sad. They also tried to sell me Haitian money. It took at least 20 minutes to get my ice cream, felt like forever.
Thinking about those boys in my big leather seat, with a cloth over my airline tray table and underneath my real glass glass, I am a bit heartbroken.
After Dajabón, we went to the grocery store on the other side of the block from the elementary school my team taught at. I brought coffee to bring home. In the store I saw Nicol, one of the girls from the morning class. She was happy to see me, with a big smile and coming over to say hello, hold my hand and introduce me to her mother and older sister.
After that, we went back to the Orphanage to get ready for the beach. Then we went out to eat lunch at a buffet in a small restaurant. It was lots of traditional Dominican food—empanadas, rice, stewed beans, chivo (goat), beef, meatballs, Dominican spaghetti, cake, fruit, fried rice with chicken and a few other things. It was delicioso (especially the goat).
Now I’m on my way home. I’m looking forward to it (my real bed, fewer mosquitoes, a little cooler weather). I still have about another hour and 20 minutes until JFK, then a layover before my flight back to VT. I’ll finally be home tonight, probably about midnight (which puts my travel time at about 16 hours today).
We’re somewhere over the Atlantic and the view out my window is of a blue ocean and waves. The horizon is where clouds meet sea, blending to a blue sky. Un buen día y una buena semana.
Endnote
You can view photos from Laura’s trip by following this link.
