On my favorite kids!

If you ask just about anyone who knows me, they will tell you that I am not a kid person. I don't know what to say to youths, babies scare me, and I don't have enough energy to entertain masses of children. However, this is the first time I am admitting publicly that I think I'm starting to really like them. Here, it's impossible to separate myself from children, babies and youth. I have had to face my fear head on...and I'm doing a pretty good job I think! Here's is a collection of some of my favorite neighborhood children!

My niece, Carismel, on her 2nd birthday!

Carismel and Melvin Daniel coloring in a book from America! It's rare that they get to do fun creative activities like this so I was happy to provide the crayons and pages!

My other niece Elianny showing off for the camera. She helped me so much during my first few weeks here, taking me around town and introducing me to anyone and everyone!

Elenne and Satchel, two girls who keep me going! Always positive attitudes!

Melvin Daniel, my nephew, inventing his own game of baseball with a stick from a nearby tree and a bottle for a ball. (Nevermind that the bases are in the middle of the street, we're working on safety!)

There are some kids that make me feel like my job is worth it, these are four of them!

I love ALL of the children in Cecilia's preschool class, and I've learned that when they get a little too loud and rambunctious, I just take them outside and make them dance!

Andrea Nicole is always smiling, dressing up, and giving hugs and kisses. What's not to love?

This is the regular neighborhood crowd celebrating Luis' 5th birthday!

Haydee is a sassy 2 year old who makes me laugh more than anyone else here. She's always saying, "Bea, mi amor, tranquila, no te preocupes" or "Bea, my love, don't stress out, chill out!"Sometimes it takes the perspective of a child to remind you that the hard parts of life aren't really that big of a deal!

The child I want to adopt and bring back to America with me. Jisaury's being raised by her grandma and aunt and is the kindest little gem. She needs some serious TLC as she's often called "stupid" by her family members. 

My regular youth group members, only 10 years until they can actually participate!

My nephew from the campo, Adrian. It actually looks like I'm enjoying being with this baby...the times they are a changin'

Ceylis, the most motivated youth I have in my group, with her cousin!

Sassy Haydee dressing up for Carnival!

Jisaury, the one I'm taking back with me, eating breakfast in my home. After this cup of hot coco, she traveled on the back of my bike while we did errands around town. When people who ask who's kid she is, I would say mi'ja, my daughter!

The neighborhood troublemaker, Luis, dressing up for Independence Day celebrations back in February!

I even take selfies with kids, what!?

My youth group from the town of Copey....each and every one of them I have learned to love!

Here's to children, babies and youth!!! They are continually teaching me life's valuable lessons...patience, kindness, breathing deeply, having fun, not taking myself too seriously, humility and always having candy in my backpack!

On the simple joys

¡Buenas tardes!

I was reading my best friend’s best friend’s blog the other day (thegallivant.net) and it’s all about her take on living in Pensacola, Florida as a newlywed to a Navy pilot in training. I love following her blog because she’s a great writer, so elegant and way cooler than me. I find that I am taken into an alternate and beautiful universe when I read her blog and this week she had a post about the simple joys. So, taking a page from her book (or blog if you will), I shall share compilation of simple treasures. It's been a great week and I'm simply living, working and loving, feeling more fulfilled than I ever have here before! 

The Simple Joys

Caribbean sunrises.

Waking up excited.

Morning runs on the beach.

Good coffee.

Great coffee.

An afternoon spent reading.

Movies during rain storms.

Sharing a cold, cold beer with a fellow American.

Spending a day on the beach.

Drinking guava juice on my grandma’s porch.

A really good story.

My mom.

My bike decorated with flowers.

Being my own boss.

Internet that works.

Living in the Dominican Republic.

Riding on the back of a motorcycle.

  

A cockroach-free night.

People who know where Idaho is.

Yoga.

Being clean.

Taking time for myself.

Sharing time with neighbors.

Peanut butter.

Finding air conditioning.

Speaking another language.

Feeling fulfilled.

Caribbean sunsets. 

It always helps to remember the best moments, the things that keep me here when the going gets tough and finding the beauty in the chaos. I have come to seriously crave, love, cherish and admire the simple joys. Hope you can find some today, too. Oh and happy birthday Momma Taina, love you!

Until soon,

Bea 

Good morning!

My lifesaver!

Ahhhh, a rainy day!

What an expansive collection!

And a beautiful sunset!

On being a (bad?) feminist

Hey there ho there!

Hope y’all are doing well in your respective corners of the world. I sure am, gee I’ve had a great week! Last week I started (well continued but “officially” started) my two women’s and youth groups, gave some presentations at a friend’s Escojo Mi Vida workshop in which I got to blow up condoms like balloons and teach kids how to use ‘em, talk about homophopia and open the door to a tough conversation youth here seldom have, and educate some youngins on STI’s and such. Then, it was my birthday and I celebrated on the beach with fellow volunteers who came from all over for the festivities and a much needed break from our sites! And on Sunday, it rained all day and I used the time like my friends in the northeast have been using their abundance of snow days (sorry dudes, hope you’re staying warm and have enough hot choco for the wild weather y’all have been having)...to catch up on work and watch Harry Potter with a BFFL who was visiting from her rural campo (love ya Gray!).

And today, one of my English classes is throwing me a surprise birthday party (I overhead them planning it but how stinkin’ nice is that?) and then more tasks to finish tomorrow before I head to Santiago to plan an environmentally focused youth conference! Oh, and many a friends have been sending me beautiful and encouraging emails/poems/quotes/thoughts and I really really appreciate them. Your words are now taped all over my room and serve as inspiration throughout my days. So thank you!

So, yes, I’m doing very well with my work. Chugging along, trying to find creative ways to teach women how to wash their hands and put bleach in their water so as not to get diarrhea. Then I must use concepts from the movie Inception to subtly plant the idea deep in youth’s heads that they should have high self-esteem and make good decisions (good news is that next week I get to draw all the reproductive man and lady bits and explain those to a bunch of 15-year-olds, yippee!) And as great as everything is going, got stuck in an intellectual rut that I’m having a hard time working through. As I said to my BFF, Emily, back stateside the other day: I think I’m a bad feminist. 

Here’s why: The other day I was sitting around with some other volunteers and I said something along the lines of “Yes, because I’m a feminist and I believe women are are not treated appropriately here and it’s just sick watching men here tell women they can’t do anything and seeing how awful the domestic violence is!” Another volunteer looked at me shocked and said, “Wait, you’re not a feminist.” I said...”WHAT?” And she looked at me and said, “And neither am I.”

I was shocked that a major part of my identity that is immediately apparent to people who know me in the US has been hidden/not adequately expressed in this culture, even in front of fellow US volunteers. After a few minutes of discussing with her what I consider a feminist to be and telling her that perhaps she would not consider herself a feminist because it has been turned into a dirty word that scares people, she agreed that indeed she is a feminist. After my outraged rant (that admittedly was probably not the most effective way of presenting a feminist platform), she timidly said, “Yes, I do believe that women and men should have equal opportunity so I guess if you wanna call me a feminist I’d be okay with that.”

And that got me thinking, am I being a bad feminist when I don’t say anything in response to the fact that Dominican youth (my age) say, “Las mujeres no sirven” or “Women can’t do anything”? Am I being a bad feminist because I don’t have good enough internet to read all the articles/watch all the videos/follow all the debates I would like to in order to satisfy my craving for feminist things? Am I being a bad feminist if I put makeup on and shave my legs more than I did in America (my real mother begged me to keep shaving my legs and washing my undies even if I was joining the Peace Corps but I didn’t actually think to be taken seriously I’d actually have to)? Am I being a bad feminist if I don’t encourage every single girl here to set goals for her future and pursue an education?

On the flip side of all this beating myself up, it’s hard work to continuously be shut down by Dominicans on the merit of me being female-identifying and self-respectin’. So, is it good enough that I’m trying really hard to be conscious of the way I speak to young girls, and the ways in which I try to encourage them to be leaders in their community and work hard to pursue a career and not just a family by the age of 20? Is it enough that I say, “Hey, women are responsible for the health of our communities because they are the heads of our families and therefore we need to focus on educating them” even when my doña says, “Well, according to God, women are not the heads of households, God has said, because men are stronger and more confident than women, says God and He also says that men should work and women should raise families”?

When people tell me it’s strange that a beautiful girl like me isn’t married with kids yet, I take a deep breath, pull out a plastic chair, and begin to explain that in my culture (or at least the culture I grew up within in the US) people wait until they have their professional degrees and then look to start families. And then I add the anecdote people find unbelievable...that my very own mother gave birth at age 40. “That can’t be true!” they reply, “So, is your brother retrasado (disabled)? It’s exhausting, but it’s something that people cannot even begin to imagine another way of life, much like I couldn’t before I arrived. At least now, I have the patience and vocabulary to tackle this topic head on.

And when I have friends visiting and my local barrio boys ask me to “consigámela” or “obtain her for me” I tell them, “Look, she’s more than an American, more than a visa, more than someone for you to hook up with. She’s an intelligent, wonderful, creative human being and let’s please treat her and all other women with respect.” When people I know hiss at me on the sidewalk, I’ve started to yell back, “You know my name, use it.” It’s subtle and little, but it’s the best I’ve got.

In this culture, I feel so judged if I walk outside in a tshirt and jeans not giving a peso about my look or appearance. My grandma here tells me on a daily basis to redo my hair, put on makeup, throw away my ugly clothes, and wear high heels (and even gave me sexy red lingerie for my birthday, WHAT?). And when I go out looking pretty, my host sister makes a play on my name and says, “Wow, the Bella Bea (Beautiful Bronwen) has arrived, goodbye to the Fea Bea (Ugly Bronwen).” I remind myself, it’s cultural. I don’t have to wear t-shirts four sizes too small and red undies under white lycra to be beautiful. But, it is the most frustrating thing that if I do give into DR standards of beauty, ironically, I am taken more seriously when I teach in my local high school and youth and women’s group. It’s a catch 22 and I’m trying to find the balance.

But ya know what? I’m learning and I’m trying to be my own kind of feminist in another culture and it’s damn hard. In the US, we have the luxury to be able to fight the great fight for pay equity and opportunities to “lean in.” But here, where the culture is, oh I don’t know, more than thirty years delayed, sometimes just reminding men to be human is as far as I can get. So I’m gonna stop beating myself up and just keep making a concerted effort to be me, a creative, intelligent feminist who has to learn to use new tools to fix the same problem.

And at least all of my pre-Peace Corps identitfy hasn’t been lost. At the end of the conversation I had with my fellow volunteers that inspired this blog post, I said, “Oh my god, what else have I been hiding/covering up/not telling you? Do you even know that I’m a Democrat?” The chorus from all was “Oh my god, yes, Bronwen, we know you’re a Democrat, don’t worry, that’s more than obvious.”

Off to fight the good fight. May the force of feminism be with you.

Xo,

Bella Bea no matter what I’m wearing

Just a few of Manzanillo's future feminist leaders!

My favorite niñas enjoy the breeze!

Best feminist crew around! 

On love and loss

Hello all,

I hope this post finds you well. January was a strange month. Unfortunately, three community members died in Manzanillo and I spent quite a lot of time deep in reflective conversations about love and loss. Back stateside, two friends from home and college tragically passed away, and a pseudo-brother underwent brain surgery. In the spirit of honoring those who have passed, I want to take a moment to thank each of you for the role you play in my life. I wouldn’t be where I am without you, so I am sending you gratitude, slobbery kisses, and bear hugs. I remind myself to savor the moments I spend with my neighbors, host mothers, siblings, kid-friends, and talking on the phone to you all because...well, life is precious. In reflecting, I also want to be more conscious of the service I am providing here and the ways in which I can do more for myself and others daily. 

Yesterday I found myself in the midst of what I’ve come to call “A Peace Corps Day.” A Peace Corps Day, as I have coined, is a day in which I wake up feeling like I can conquer the world, then around ten o’clock “the worst thing in the world” happens. Examples include: finding out I will have to live with my host family indefinitely because rent in Manzanillo ($80/mth) is too expensive for me to move out on my own, the hospital presentation I’ve been preparing for a week doesn’t happen because the lights go off and 75% of the women speak only Creole, the high schoolers talk during my entire sex ed class on self-esteem, my host mom gives me fried bananas for breakfast and I haven’t pooped in six days, I can’t find the lizard that crawled into my bed with me last night, etc.

The morning progresses and I’m still upset, angry and on the verge of tears. I eat a nice big lunch of rice and beans and things start shaping up. I look at my watch hoping I have time to pop into bed for a siesta, but then, I remember I have something scheduled (a meeting, an English class, a women’s group, a neighbor to visit, a presentation to prepare) and can’t get out of it. So I call a friend to vent before heading to the meeting where low and behold, my day starts shaping up again. I take charge of the meeting, plan something awesome in my youth group, teach two hard lessons in English class, meet a new doña who gives me candy and coffee, or generally just feel the sense of kicking ass coming back. I keep going about my day feeling great. I have a productive conversation with my project partner, take a walk around town and realize that my life is, in fact, amazing. I finally get to eat some mashed platanos for dinner and settle into a peaceful slumber around ten o’clock.

In twelve hours, I’ve managed to feel a ridiculous combination of happy, sad, angry, frustrated, fulfilled, satisfied, and motivated. Looking back on the entire day, it’s a net positive. It’s a Peace Corps Day. It’s a day where I feel thankful to be exactly where I am...living, breathing, serving. While I have minutes and hours where I feel so small, meek and beaten down, at the end of the day I’ve learned something. I’ll be a better person tomorrow because of the challenges I faced today (and in the Peace Corps, I’m finding myself struggling (for better and for worse) more than I ever have before). I can deal with not having water for bathing, reliable electricity or vegetables for weeks at a time because getting carried away with the small frustrations leaves me little time to think about what I really want to accomplish. Life is made of small steps, but taking too many small steps never gives us the chance to leap, bound or make strides. Much of this I have learned from the people here. 

This is a country of riches, not wealth. A country where money is only worth counting when it can be measured by the beans and rice one can buy and the coffee one can toast to her neighbors. I am in a country where the people are smiling, even on a bad day. When even though you can’t buy a bigger house or nicer phone, you always have your family and you always have enough oil to fry some plantains. And if you don’t have enough oil, you’ve got plenty of neighbors who will lend you some.

Time here is not measured or kept in minutes, but in how many chairs one can add to add to a growing group on the street and how many stories you share with friends in a long, lazy afternoon. This is a country where yelling from across the house is the only way to call someone’s attention and whispering should never be done. One can scold a friend’s child herself, or take said child for a walk, motorcycle ride, or ice cream at any time of day without warning. I can show up at a neighbors, friends, grandma’s or the mayor’s house unannounced, and if I don’t stop by at least once a day, I’m in trouble. The sum of these small parts creates a beautiful reality - one I am thankful to be living. 

As my pseudo-brother and three time brain surgery survivor wrote in a recent blog post: "May we always see this world for what it is and truly appreciate whatever we may be so fortunate to find within it."

I hope to hear from you soon, if only to know you're well. Know that I've been thinking about you all in the wake of one of the more challenging months I've been through. 

Sending all kinds of love! 

On my point of view

What do I see on a daily basis? Porches, children, panties hanging, beaches, boats with bananas, plastic chairs, wooden shacks, latrines, cement houses half-finished and so much more. Here's a glimpse into my point of view.

The surrounding area:

An abandoned ship and a beautiful sunrise view on the beach two minutes from my house.

The road I run on, conveniently located parallel to the beach!

The beach and a view of the dock where bananas are exported

An old/used to be nightclub that's since been vacated and left as a beautiful piece of art on the beach.

Views of porches:

The porch at Chuchi's.

My back porch at Chichi's

The back porch at Tita's (my personal favorite and where I spend a lot of time)

My room decorations thanks to generous support from friends and family back home:

Thanks to Henry for the lovely room decoration! Miss ya buddy!

No room would be complete without a ginormous Idaho flag flying!

Collage of friends!

On culture and granny panties

¡Hola! 

I’ve been here now for 85 days and counting. It’s almost the three month mark! I think it’s time for a bit of reflection on Dominican culture, and of course some story telling.

Last Friday, I was feeling awesome. I felt as if I finally had a grasp on the layout of this town, that I was meeting people left and right, that all was going well and I hadn’t had a mishap, communication error, or problem in almost a week. But like all things I think I know, I usually don’t. After a long day of power walking all around up and down town from meeting Guatemalan missionaries in the primary school, eating lobster salad with my host aunt, rice and beans with another doña and locrio de ayuama with my own doña, to visiting the primary school and playing with kids, attending a social security beneficiary meeting of townsfolk, sitting in a meeting of leaders from critical groups in Manzanillo, to running to the Evangelical church to watch my friend Elenne in a danza, I was so relieved when I plopped down at home at ten o’clock to eat my mashed plantains and fried salami. And remember that I was feeling great about myself and all the people I met and all the places I saw and the things I did to integrate. It was such a relieving feeling, knowing I can do this.

And then out of nowhere pops my host mom Chichi to ask me a “sensitive question.” She asked me why I left three pieces of meat on my plate Thursday night. Just when I was starting to feel comfortable at home, kicking it with my doña, and here she is thinking I am starving myself. But I can’t tell her, “Well doña Chichi, I just ate a bowl of rice and beans at doña Julia’s house then doña Alex invited me in for lobster salad, so I’m kinda full and as much as I love you, I don’t want your boiled pig intestines mixing with all that in my barriga.” Or maybe I just should have. But it got worse. She followed up with, “Do you like my cooking?” Now I can’t quite tell her that I don’t really eat mystery meat/chewy pig intestines because they really gross me out and that a salad every once in a while really won’t kill me, so I said, “Lo siento mucho, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to leave it, I promise I am enjoying eating your food. I love it!” But after that I felt guilty. It’s a cultural thing. And like all cultural things, I feel like I’ll never get them all right.

For instance, church. I have been going to the Evangelical one because my three precious host cousins (with basically the same name: Elenne, Iliany, Eliana) invited me and I’m on a mission never to say “no” to anything here, so I go. It’s pretty intense. There are people who speak with God and lift their hands up in and scream “Amen, Dios nos bendiga, God bless us, hallelujah.” I actually really love it. I don’t associate very strongly with the connection to God and rarely feel the Spirit in the room, but I appreciate their enthusiasm and willingness to show me what’s up and welcome me warmly into their congregation. Its fun in that there’s lots of applause, stomping feet, sitting down, standing up, singing, and watching people communicate their love for God in various other interesting ways, like crying, yelling, walking around in circles murmuring under their breath. Like this one time when four high school girls performed an emotional dance with their eyes closed the whole time. They finished and left out a side door and mere minutes later I hear the sounds of human sobbing outside. Someone opened the door and there the four of them are sitting in a circle on their knees rocking, crying, holding hands and looking more or less possessed. I was pretty curious though, because I simply didn’t understand what was going on and I didn’t know if it was appropriate to ask them what was up when they came back in – so being me, I did! Turns out they felt an overwhelming love for God and the only way to let out their sentiments was through tears and song. Power to ‘em.

Another example, schools. I don’t understand how schools get anything done during a school year. I went to visit the small elementary school and just wanted to present myself to the director and let her know I am in town for a while. Well, we got to chatting when the kids were in recess, and an hour later, they still had recess and the director and I were still talking. I thought I might have missed something, maybe they got a free day to play, maybe they had been dismissed already. Nope, the teacher just interrupted her class and let them play for an hour so she could talk to me about my role in the community. When I walked out of the room she said, take five more minutes and then we’ll learn about math for ten minutes before class is over. Much appreciated, Martina, but them poor kids got ripped off on their math time.

Other cultural differences that shock me:

1) White pants and neon colored granny panties.

I suspect the concept of thong underwear has yet to be introduced down here. That or women don’t like wearing underwear up their butts because we wash our undies in big buckets that are also used for mopping floors and cleaning toilets. Okay, to be fair, maybe it’s a hygiene thing. But it’s bad. You’ll see women in snakeskin/floral lycra wearing bunched-up-two-sizes-too-big-granny panties popping out of the top of their skintight lycra, often reading “PINK” or “SEXY” or “MARTES (TUESDAY).” You’ll also see women going out in tight white dresses looking hot as hell and then they turn around and boom!...red granny panties in your face showing through that sexy see-through slip that doubles as a party dress just like that. By no means am I a fashionista but even I know better than that.

2) Babies. Everywhere.

Grandparents are usually the ones taking care of babies. It’s like the raising of the kids skips a generation, because 16, 17, and 18 year olds are having kids and when you’re 18, it’s not cool to change diapers, it’s cool to drink shitty beer and flirt. Which is the lesser of the two evils in my opinion. They shouldn't be popping out babies and giving them to grandma (who is usually like 34 years old). While it kills me to see so many teenage mothers, and a lack of concern over the alarmingly high hates, I then have to remind myself, culture runs deep. Socialization can’t be undone and what’s normal where I come from can’t be normal everywhere. Most children are so loved, even if raised by grandparents, extended relatives, single parents. Most days it still shocks me, but it's a beautiful thing to watch the metaphorical village raise these children.

3) 23 year olds who don’t graduate from high school.

I would say (as my research findings have thus far adequately represented) that 50% of teenagers who start high school don’t finish. In first year, there are around 120 students who enter the local high school and this year, only 51 graduated. Some take more than four years to complete high school, but the majority either drop out to find work, have babies, or just chill. They call these people “vagas” which doesn’t really directly translate in English but is aptly described as a mix between “lazy and leeching off one’s parents.”  Some young mothers go back to school, but most don’t. Think about it, it’s embarrassing to go back to school if you’re 23, mingling with lame 15 year olds who take selfies in History class. So most just quit, and sit around on the porches of their parents. My host sisters and host brother never graduated from high school and when I ask them what they do all day they say, “Nothing, just trying to get rid of boredom.” I want to shake them and tell them to get their asses to high school, especially because it’s only from 8am-12pm everyday, but then again I have to realize that culturally, they aren’t raised with an expectation to go finish high school (much less to go to college), but rather the expectation to find someone they like alright and then pop out babies, help around the house, and maybe get a job. 

But while these things are hard to overcome, wrap my head around, and deal with, there are plenty of cultural aspects I am so happy to have found here.

1) The friendliness.

If I don’t stop by Tita, Alejandrina, Lourdes, Wendy, Billerca, Addis, and Chichi’s house everyday, I’m in big trouble. I’m always being offered juice, coffee, rice and beans, dulces, and soda. And even those these people are poor and live peso to peso, sharing with your neighbors is just what you do. A lot of this is based in their deeply rooted Christian beliefs in giving those less fortunate and a lot of it has to do with this culture of compartir (sharing). Even the poorest people have company to share, they say.

2) The yelling.

The most productive way to get ahold of someone is to just show up at their house. And if they’re not sitting on their porch out front in plastic chairs, odds are they’re cooking or cleaning. So you yell. “CHICHI! CHICHI! VEN ACA!” That usually does the trick. And if not, you walk right on in, maintaining a loud yelling voice the entire time. Then you’re greeted by kisses on the cheek, a plastic chair to sit in (no one likes to talk to someone standing up), and a nice cup of juice or coffee.

3) The pace of life.

I love my days here. If I feel rushed to get to a 4pm meeting, I just have to remind myself that the meeting isn’t actually going to start until 5pm, and I can get away with arriving even at 5:30pm if I want. Although it makes my life so much less productive because I am usually a pretty punctual person, I just have to let go of the stress and remind myself that here, people forgive you for being late, interrupting a meeting to say hello or buenos dias, answering your cell phone in the middle of a meeting, and leaving early. Everything is chill. Tranquillo, tranquillo.

And there you have it! As a student of Dominican culture, I keep reminding myself that culture is about perspective and attitude. Keeping perspective and realizing that this culture is not better, or worse than the one I come from, just different. And maintaining the right attitude in that I shouldn’t judge an entire country for the beliefs and values they’ve deemed important. It's permeated too deeply and who am I to judge? We do weird things in America, too!

Off to observe a sex ed class in the high school. Sending love, dulce de maní, and abrazos del pueblo.

Missing my family, a great IPA, and the third season of Scandal with Kerry Washington.

Xoxox,

Bea

On Manzanillo: it's not an apple, it's my home!

Guess what?!?! I found out my site and home for the next two years! It's a small pueblo (town) in the province of Monte Cristi in the northwest corner of the Dominican Republic in a site called Manzanillo. It's situated on the edge of a quiet beach with an unbeatable view of Haiti and an abundance of seafood. It's a port town with huge shipping boats entering and leaving with bananas on the daily (The next time you bite into a banana, think of me down here in Manzanillo because odds are it came from here!). We have minimal electricity and unreliable running water - but it's home!!!!! 

Last week everything happened rey rapido. Monday we showed up to work in the capital and were given folders with information for our future homes/sites! That afternoon I packed up my life and on Tuesday morning I left Pantoja with my two enormous suitcases and met my project partners, two Dominicans who came down from Manzanillo to pick me up and whom I will be working closely with to start education groups, health initiatives, nutrition classes etc. My project partners whisked me away (I made us stop for fried chicken and pasta salad on the go) and we hopped on a bus to my site. Six hours and three bus changes later (nothing happens as planned in the DR), we arrived in Manzanillo and I met my newest host family! And on Wednesday the adventure officially began and I was touted around and introduced to anyone and everyone in my new site. I've been here since Wednesday but am currently writing this on the bus as I head back to the capital to wrap up training and turn into a real Volunteer in three days!

Back to Manzanillo - I can't believe that this beautiful town in the top corner of the DR is my home now. I love my new host mom, Wendy, who is around 40, a great cook, childless, hilarious, a manicurist, and easy to talk to. She's campo married (meaning she's lived with her "husband" for a bunch of years so by default they're considered married) to a guy named Moreno who is chubby and loves to dance. We live in a quiet part of town and we've got awesome digs. Wendy was married to this Danish guy who built them this kick ass modern house then cheated on her and left her with the house and dogs (shes also unbelievably open with this information and doesn't mind that I'm sharing with yall). I have mixed emotions about all this. On the one hand I am glad this woman has a home to herself an a beautiful location especially when the majority of her family lives in shacks in the poorer part of Manzanillo, but on the other hand, she doesn't even have enough money to pay the monthly electricity bill of less than $15/month. Her family members seem to take advantage of her because they have some idea that her wealth is connected to the fact she has nice house. So it's a tough situation for Momma Wendy. But she's a bad ass with a tough character and great energy. She's been introducing me as her to everyone as her daughter but since her ex-husband was white, people actually think I'm her long-lost daughter. Awk. 

Last week was awesome for a number of reasons. 

1- Everyone in Manzanillo is warm and welcoming. 

Like in the campo, I have an awesome host grandma who always gives me juice when I come over! Her family is massive and I've been introduced to most of them so I feel like a welcome part of their home, which gives me a warm tingly feeling and the sentiment that I'm going to enjoy getting used to this place. 

2- I live on the border of Haiti and it's fascinating anthropological stuff up here. 

The majority of Haitians here are people who still live in Haiti and cross the border daily to make a living by selling fruit, clothing, shoes, jewelry etc. They can also be attended to at the hospital and the United Nations gives the hospital $2 for every Haitian seen so there is an incentive for Dominican medics to provide care. I point out this all out because the Haitians I've met so far in the capital and farther inland from the border are actually Dominican Haitians (Haitians born and raised here and haven't been back or set foot ever on Haitian soil). I have found that Haitians who grew up in the DR more inland were almost desperate to associate with Dominicans and reject their Haitian roots (probably because the racism here in the capital is so overt). I haven't encountered nearly as much racism up here by the border but I have yet to figure out if that's because they really are less racist on the border or if its just a different type of relationship. I asked my host dad and he just replied, "Theres not bad relations between us, we are all just people." I hope I find this kind of attitude all over, but we will see though. Up here, it's normal for a conversation to end with, "Okay I'm heading back to Haiti now, see you tomorrow." Casual. 

3- I live on the beach! 

And it's a quiet and tranquil and not tourist beach and it's beautiful! 

4- I understand why I am here. 

This is definitely a town that needs a health volunteer. Many people are overweight, almost every teenage girl I met had a child, none of the mothers had or were breastfeeding their infants, sexual health doesn't seem to be very prevalently taught in the high school, vegetables are extremely difficult to locate, and doñas don't have a great sense of hygiene when cooking and cleaning. And those are just things I've noticed  over the past five days. I've got my work cut out for me!

5- I went to a weekly doñas meeting at the Centro de Madre and felt so welcome!

I asked around and found out that Manzanillo already has a weekly meeting for the women in town. So I went all by myself and was warmly welcomed by women of all ages. They already want me to start teaching then about nutrition, sexual health, breast feeding, HIV/AIDS, hygiene. I feel supported by them already!

While last week was awesome for a lot of reasons, it was also overwhelming for a number of reasons. 

1- I left my comfort zone. 

To date, training has been pretty fun and very rewarding as I've spent everyday with fellow Americans and on a strict schedule learning technical health skills I knew I would be applying someday soon in the vague future. Since arriving in Manzanillo, I've been the only American around which leaves me exhausted and brain dead from continuously sticking my hand out and introducing myself to crowds of strangers and thinking in another language. The lack of schedule has given me an abundance of free time with which I've gone on runs, done yoga, read two books, sat on doñas' porches and drank more coffee than any human should ever ingest (even more than during finals period in college). It's now up to me to make my own schedule but its proving difficult when being new in town doesn't exactly lend itself to knowing where to go and who to meet. I'm not worried about finding my groove here though, I'm cut out for awkward small talk!

2- I will spend three months exclusively getting to know this community before I start forming groups and teaching official Peace Corps material. 

My first three months at site is meant exclusively for me to assess the needs of my community and built confianza (trust) with the people here. This means for three months I will be going house to house drinking coffee (which is hard because I drink it black without sugar and here they'll serve it to you with loads of sugar and I usually forget to remind them so I might get diabetes after these three months from all the sugar I'm downing on these porches) and conducting informal interviews to question about family, religion, education, environment, health, politics, etc. In these three months, I will be attending as many groups, church ceremonies, weddings, funerals, parties, reunions, etc as I can to show the community that I'm here and really trying to become a Manzaniera. I can teach cooking classes (gulp!), hold English lessons, form an exercise group, or another informal activity to get to know my community but my official projects will begin in February. It's a great system the Peace Corps has- they push for us to achieve true cultural understanding and integration before we try to impart our western/American wisdom into a community. Conducting this interviews and meeting my community members is going to be awesome (and rich, rewarding, fulfilling, integral) but my town is kind of big (5,000 people) so I am having a hard time deciding where to begin. I guess there's a silver lining here in that I can literally chose one of 700 houses to start with! 

3- My project partners rock, but they're super busy. 

As the new kid in town, it's nice to have a helpful friend to show me around. On Day One and Two, Licelot, my 21-year old Dominican counterpart/friend/work partner showed me around town introducing me to the high school principal, town mayor, hospital director, my grandma, the supermarket owner, among other integral community members. Licelot, however, has a 2-year old kid and goes to university in Santiago from Thursday through Sunday, rendering our productivity slightly lower than I had expected. My other counterpart, Richard, is a 21-year old guy who's just about to graduate high school and leave town in a month to study film in the capital rendering his investment in my integration null. But it's cool, I'm just gonna start to channel my internal bad ass/extrovert and start walking up to houses, sticking out my hand, and asking them to let me in for coffee and an interview. 

So, even though I admit I am a bit overwhelmed by this extreme life change I've just gone through (I know that moving to the Dominican Republic which was a whole new country and culture over two months ago might seem like a bigger deal, but to me, moving up here to Manzanillo and finally finally arriving at my site for two years was in fact more shocking to me), I am ready to swear in as a Volunteer and start the work I came here to do! I now have the unique opportunity to put the goals and objectives of the Peace Corps into action and form my own health projects in a small town in the northern part of the DR. And my god did I get an awesome site!!!

Until next time!

On my life in Pantoja, Santo Domingo

They say a pictures worth a thousand words. Well this one's for Ma and Pa who sometimes have a difficult time imagining what my life here actually looks like. Below are pictures of my life in during Pre-Service Training (PST) in a barrio of the capital called Pantoja, Santo Domingo: 

My goofy sister, Kiara, on the porch where we "do yoga" together

The bathroom and bucket using for bathing and flushing the toilet! We're in a drought and the water only comes once a week so I only get one small bucket full for washing hair, body and flushing the toilet. Ah!

The kitchen - check out them dishes! ¿Pero quién va a fregar?

My host sister Kiara putting on a mustache while we make friendship bracelets on the porch!

The back porch doubles as a living room and laundry area

Hello from the porch - doubles as my workout area!

Laundry room and kitchen table

The view of the street. 

Another view of the street! It's a pretty sketchy neighborhood but I've come to enjoy the noise, occasional gun shots and tigueres.

Our neighbors backyard. Looks like the campo!

And just in case you thought I might not make friends, here's proof that I did!