Week 1

Downtown

Nancy's last night

 I have been here for a full week now! Nancy departed this morning for Blacksburg. I am genuinely sad to see her go. She hugged us all one last time saying “Ohh, my baby! Be good!” She was a great Dominican mother. She left us with an online Spanish learning program called Tell Me More, which we will complete over the course of the semester. This week has been about getting into the routine of things. I’ve finally scouted out a 5-mile loop and it only circles a small part of the property. It is so scenic- I go through a neighborhood of ridiculous mansions, down a street that is entirely canopied by trees and orchids, along the beach sidewalk, pass Tortuga Bay, and circle back through the golf course until I get back to the forest trails behind the Foundation. I’ve started to recognize some of the garbage men, security guards, and gardeners that I pass and they always wave and cheer for me. I was running the other day looking out at the water when I realized I had the cheesiest grin on my face. No one was out yet since it was early and I could not get over how beautiful everything looked. Spanish has been intense- we had to pack so much into one week together but Nancy pulled it off. We had class from 9:00-12:00. Then we went to lunch and part of our daily assignments was to converse with the employees in Spanish. Dominican Spanish is very fast, very loud, and they cut so many words in half. There is a lot of slang to get used to. Nancy said “Out of all the Spanish speaking countries, the Dominican is the worst.” One of my favorite things is when you ask people how they are, many people respond with “Tranquilo”, meaning “I am at peace.” I like that so much better than “Fine.” Another thing I love about Dominican culture is their view of race. There are Dominicans that have very black skin, all the way to Suzanne, a Dominican woman who is light tan with blue eyes and blonde hair. Nancy said if she meets another Dominican, they may not look like her at all, not know each other at all, but they are already best friends because they are Dominican. She said there is no black, brown or white here- everyone is labeled Dominican. Simple as that. Unfortunately this rule of racial acceptance excludes Haitians. One day I ate with this guy because he was eating alone. I found out his name is Daniel and he is from Haiti. He was on his last semester at University when the earthquake happened. His school collapsed and he was unable to graduate. His family is still in Haiti and he works as a segway tour guide here and is sending it all back to his family. He told me that he enjoyed his job, that he got to meet interesting people from all over the world who come here for vacation. But can you imagine coming from his circumstances and then spending your days with wealthy people who are on luxury vacations? I think that would be difficult for me but he is so positive and upbeat. Another favorite is this very old man Christian. He was also helping me with Spanish when he told me that he was fluent in 14 languages. He’s worked on ships his whole life and was even the captain of a cruise ship for 19 years. He’s been to 61 countries and hundreds of islands so he said he picked up the languages over the years. He retired here out of all of those places and is one of the gardeners! Turns out I will be learning introductory Turkish and Sinhala in preparation for my summer trip so I am hoping he can help me out! He's so wise and has these piercing blue eyes. I think he should be the next Dos Equis guy. The people here are so interesting and I love how quickly they befriend us and tell their life stories in a matter of seconds. It’s the best. Anyways, after lunch is another hour of Spanish and then Scuba lessons from 3:00-5:00. We have our last pool session today so our next dive will be in the ocean! I find it so relaxing. You sink underwater and chill there and breathe real slowly. The only thing I hate are the mask skills. In a partial and full mask flooding you fill up your mask underwater and then you have to inhale with the regulator and blast out all the water by breathing sharply out of your nose. In a mask removal, you have to take off your mask and breathe just with the regulator. I kept inhaling water and gagging. It was really attractive. Yesterday we had a controlled emergency ascent and Paul turned off all of our air tanks so we could feel what the resistance felt like when your tank runs out of air and need to ascend. It felt like drinking a Frosty with a straw and made me so claustrophobic. The scuba assistants love us- even me, who burped up pool water in front of them. Adelle said it is normally impossible to get them to come out for pool sessions but now that there’s a group of seven girls we have at least one guy per person and they freak out if we try to carry any of our stuff. I’ll take it. After another Spanish lesson and dinner we finally have time to relax. Last night was particularly fun. It was Nancy’s going away party and she taught us Rumino’s, the Dominican version of Domino’s. Dominicans love this game and slam down the dominos and yell a lot. It was hilarious and we all go into it.  We also went downtown one night and had a good time. My favorite nights are the ones we hang out on the beach. I don’t think that will ever get old. We are becoming a little family and I feel so lucky that we mesh so well. Now that we’ve got the ball rolling, we’ve had some orientations to our service projects. We’re all pushing to get our certifications done ASAP, as we want to get out for some coral restoration. Only two of us can go at a time, so I will probably get to do that once or twice a week. Victor found out I love painting and after I showed him some of my stuff he asked if I would illustrate this children’s book he is writing about coral devastation in the DR and the restoration process. I said absolutely, but I have no idea what that will even entail. I’ve talked to Sabine a lot about Peace Corps (she’s so awesome) and she invited me to help out with a mural painting project at the elementary school next Saturday. I’m so pumped. And happy. And exhausted.