On being neither Dominican nor American

Hi!

Well, February 21^st marked my six-month anniversary in the DR!! It also happens to be Independence Month (they celebrate the whole month) with the final hurrahhhh being this Thursday the 27^th. The day will be full of parades, kids dressing up in costumes and running around like locos, people whipping each other with cow bladders in the middle of the road, and drinking (of course!). It's been a fun month here, with the flag raising ceremony in the high school every day at 8am and the lowering at 4pm. I'm also one stanza closer to memorizing the Dominican National Anthem!

Here’s a recap of my last few weeks!

After spending three months creating and conducting a community diagnostic with my Dominican project partner/sister, fast forward to IST! In-service-training. My whole health sector met up for four days in a weird, sterile Catholic convent in the middle of Santo Domingo off a random highway teasingly close to where we spent five weeks in the campo for pre-service training. For four days, the volunteers and project partners sat through informational lectures about how we should plan, develop, implement and succeed with our healthy communities projects. This training came at the perfect time in my service. It was nice to reflect on the work I have already done here and plan for the implementation of my next year and a half worth of projects. Also, I got to play some kick ass icebreakers and win a scavenger hunt (my project partner is just as/more competitive than I am, we’re a perfect match!).

Highlights from the week of training:

• Finally completing the diagnostic phase of my service and making a plan for how to continue.
• Getting the resources to start an environmentally focused youth group, constructing stoves, and starting a young girls group focused on empowerment, kachow, it’s right up my alley!
• My boss asked me to help a Dominican who lives close to me start a national NGO to promote sustainability of Peace Corps projects after we/I leave our communities (Ah! This is a big project!)
• Seeing my host family from the campo! It was so nice to be reunited with Mamí, Ani and Viji even if only for a few hours one afternoon during our training. When I arrived back to El Portón, I was greeted with all the love, hugs and cariño I’ve been desperate for these past three months.There’s no one like my campo family and I will always feel best when I am with them. Especially when they make the best espagettis and tostones and gave it to me in one huge delicious heap.
• Three early morning Insanity workouts with my man Shaun T. And after the 6am workouts, we’d run to be the first in line for breakfast and heaping platefuls of pineapple and papaya.
• Eating fruits and vegetables and only the occasional piece of fried cheese.
• Creating a vision with my community partner that I am very proud of. In Spanish: “Queremos un día en el cual nuestra juventud esté completamente capacitada en salud sexual, protección del medio ambiente y en como construir un hogar sano y armónico para tener una mejor sociedad y mundo compartido.” In English: “We wish for a day in which our youth are completely trained in sexual health, protection of our environment and in how to build a healthy and harmonious home in order to create a better society and shared world.”
• Feeling proud to be where I am in my work and knowing that I have a lot left to do, but I am on the right track and now with a schedule, monetary support, and ideas galore!

So I got back to Manzanillo on a Saturday and spent the week catching up with work, applying for a grant, teaching in the local schools, and visiting a really cool monument in a town called Capotillo with a group of 100 hormonal high schoolers (Yes, thanks for asking, I did survive!). This week, I’m continuing with my youth and women’s groups, English (and more English!) classes, going shopping at the Haitian market in Dajabon, and celebrating my big 23rd birthday! And next week, I will be helping with an Escojo Mi Vida (youth group) workshop in Montecristi then it’s off to Santiago to plan an environmental youth conference called Brigada Verde, or Green Brigade. 

But this blog wouldn't be complete without some fun commemoration of my six month anniversary, so here’s a fun list or DR/America cultural comparisons.

You know you’re Dominican when:

1. You find yourself wishing the cheese on top of your nightly dose of viveres (carbohydrate dense root vegetables) were fried.
2. You join the women’s softball team and two practices later they stop meeting.
3. The first song you put on when you get to the peace and quiet of your room is bachata or dembow.
4. You find yourself scrunching your nose and wrinkling your forehead to ask, “what?”
5. Fitting seven people in a car for five doesn’t faze you.
6. You blame Haitians for everything (eugh! comes down to a serious lack of education/compassion/understanding but that's a blog post of its own)
7. You say “saludos” or “greetings” whenever you enter a crowded building, public transportation, or arrive late to a class/meeting.
8. People tell you you’re “bien aplatanada” or “banana-ed” and mean to say that you’ve become a Dominican.
9. You’ve starting greeting people you haven’t seen in a while commenting that they are fat, skinny, pale, dark, tan, ugly, pretty or any other physical/irrelevant/offensive by American standards attribute.
10. You can have an entire conversation by using non-verbal communication with your face and hands.
11. You crave white bread.

You know you’re still American when:

1. You arrive 45 minutes late because you know the meeting will start on “Dominican time” but you’re still early.
2. You crave peanut butter, nutella, spicy food, and mustard on a daily basis.
3. You eat peanut butter and bananas while people stare and question your tastes.
4. You drink coffee black, no sugar.
5. You tell people they should probably not put a pound of sugar in their gallon of juice but getting a blank look in return.
6. You still get irrationally angry that your classes get interrupted by people being late and saying “saludos” when they enter.
7. You feel the need to plan a geography lesson whenever people ask you what country of New York you’re from (America does not equal New York and New York does not equal a country).
8. You’re still offended when people call you fat after they haven’t seen you in a while.
9. The lack of education and critical thinking leaves you craving a deep conversation about anything other than weather and gossip.
10. The more time you spend in the DR positively correlates to the amount of pride you feel to be an American. 
11. You crave spinach and kale.

You know you’re neither Dominican nor American when:

1. You’ve lost the ability to speak in full English sentences without throwing in a few words of Spanish.
2. You don’t really know what to do when faced with cultural problems such as men saying women “no sirve” or “can’t do anything” or when they say “those Haitians are all liars” and realizing it’s cultural but extremely uncomfortable for you to hear and do nothing about. (Suggestions?)
3. You don’t mind taking bucket baths and cold showers but you really wish the toilet would flush on it’s own.
4. You make $300/month but can still afford to do/buy more than the majority of Dominicans. 

Well, that's it for now! Until next time. 

Sending sugared-up coffee and juice, Independence Day thoughts, and cow bladders made for whipping. 

Wishing for granola, kale, dried mangoes, and quinoa. 

Love, 

Beya