I really want a boat

95% of the people who build boats don't finish them.... except boat builders of course.  

I have no ambitions of ever building a boat, but I do love to be on them and row them.  I live by a bay here, on my side of the river the streets are paved, the majority of the houses are concrete and there is running water in most of the houses.  My projects are hard, because the mostly involve motivating and re-motivating people to do things that will improve their lives, but maybe not enough to make it worth the effort to them.  That doesn't mean we don't do things, and I don't find things to love about living in this town.  It just means that every once in a while I feel like staying here is equal to hitting my head against a wall continuously. 

On the other hand and back to boats... My outlook changes when I cross the river.  The first part is the boat ride across, and I do look forward to it.  Cacon is the boat taxi man, and it's a really simple little lola.  I love it because I'm pretty sure Cacon sees me get on the boat and immediately signals me to row the boat.  This is AMAZING exercise, and reminds me dearly of my days in Crew.  The town across the river is a challenge, it has a tiny dirt access road that no one takes.  The majority of people just take the lola across with Cacon.  It has a tiny school with a teacher that crosses the river and gives class in the morning, however most of the kids are pretty far behind.  I finally gave up on the hope of recruiting a water volunteer to build an aqueduct when I realized that everyone there is just waiting to sell their land to whatever resort/company comes in and pays them enough.  I go once a week and give a small class to 4-5 kids in literacy and math and when I can organize it I do an outdoor activity (visiting the beach, or hiking to some cave) with a group of older kids.  Then I get to row the boat back.

I have a special place in my hear for those little kiddos.  

On a different note I'm pretty sure I want to own a house boat someday.  

Also I killed my housemate the mouse with poison... I knew he was dead cause I could smell him but it was Archer (my hero of a dog) that pointed out that he was inside of a mattress.  I had to cut the mattress open and remove him with my gardening gloves.  (#thingsIneverimagineddoing)

 

Here's to the good life :)

Ok it's a new year... and I'm back!  I enjoyed an amazing visit from my bff Alana... who was a sweet heart and cared for me through my first amoeba in the DR... Luckily the medicine worked and I was able to get rid of it by my second day in the USA... Where I enjoyed washing my hands with hot water... lots of food, the company of some of my favorite people... and my amazing family.

Upon getting home I realized that I had house guest while I was out... rats!  They left me little gifts and I saw one hiding in the spare bedroom... Determined to get rid of them I went to town today to get some poison and other supplies...I just have to say it was slightly comforting to jump in the guagua on the way home and be the 20th person squeezed into a 12 person van... There is always room for one more :)....
My women's association had our first meeting of the year and we set some good goals to lead up until April... I have the feeling I'm going to be mad busy...
...Later today,  my stove broke, and I jerry-rigged (is that the saying?) it so that it will not leak from that burner if I turn the gas on and kept on cooking... I might invest in a new stove soon... as I do not want to test my luck...

I'm pretty sure that I killed at 2013! There was nothing left of it after I got done with it... I hope that 2014 is as awesome and brings me as much luck.  Life's good in the DR, once you get used to the water and kill the amoebas...

Saturdays are the New Long Run Days... centipedes, run, and laundry... gross but productive day...

 Today is mostly going to be a photo blog...
So today I had planned on getting up at 6 AM and running until 8... I slept in until 7:30 and ran from 8-10ish...While I was getting dressed I got surprised by this little guy on my pants... I proceeded to kill him.  I'm sorry I don't usually like to kill bugs, but when they break my bubble things change...
 and no I did not wear those pants afterwards...


The run did get off to a good start and I will show some photos of happier things now...

 This is the view of the ocean from about 100 ft from my house.

 Archer says hurry up mom!!
Also the just paved this part of the road :)









If you look closely you will see some interesting birds that Archer loves to terrorize on the reg...

In between this photo and the next there was a dead horse on the trail... I thought it best not to put a photo of a dead horse on this blog...









...And we go further


                   It rained a little...






 This is the swimming hole that I should be swimming in more often!


After I ran today I decided that anytime there is a centipede in the clothes it's time to do laundry so I spent the rest of the day cleaning and doing laundry...
Today I ate a banana pre-run, a Cliff protein bar during the run, and a smoothie and coffee while doing the laundry.... I made chili for dinner... This chili was amazing and cost me $200 RD but it will last me at least 2 days :)  Ohh and that fruit is papaya... Interesting note about papaya, I had never tried it before coming to this country... upon tasting it the first time I thought it tasted like puke... but if you ease it into your diet with smoothies one can develop quite a taste for it...DON'T think of puke when you try it for the first time!

Mosquitoes

Ok, I get it... the underlying theme of this blog is really about how much I hate mosquitoes.  It just goes to show how much I think about them on a daily basis.  For instance recently I've been thinking of how I could do a comparison of blood loss during all of the times I've donated blood in my life... every 4-6 months from the ages of 19-24... to the amount of blood stolen from me by mosquitoes in this country.  I mean really I kill at least 3-6 a day, but I get bit about 3x an hour during the day double that at night.  Those are conservative estimates... Also I think if I going to go into biology (which I hate) I would try to develop a mosquito virus to kill all mosquitoes... this would inevitably backfire and lead to zombies (I know I should not be a biologist). On that note, life does go on in this mosquito filled world...

Today I was rather lazy. I probably ran about 1.5 miles and walked a lot.  I went to la Romana to get my secret santa gift for the Women's Association christmas party, and picked up a few gifts for some special people back home :)  On my way I tried to read more of the book 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.  Which is an interesting enough book most of the time, however like most self-help type books I think I would get just as much out of it if it were 50 pages, as opposed to 358 pages... I hate the feeling of reading the same thing repeated 10 times, just to fill some space. On the other hand it is interesting to look at development work through the perspective of the core paradigm shifts he discusses.  All too often we try to improve our lives through an outside in perspective (changing our environment, and expecting a real change in our live)  as opposed to focusing on changing from the inside out (focusing on improving ourselves and habits to change our lives).  And then come the development workers... and that whole dependent, independent, and interdependent thing comes into play... and I won't bore you by going into it.
After the trip I went and traded more books with kids and ended up playing card games until it was dark and the mosquitoes made me go home...
Today's diet- papaya & banana smoothie & coffee in the morning, grapefruit for dessert
Today's diet failure- I was hungry on the way to la Romana and I bought a slice of pizza $50Rd (it was the worst looking pizza I've ever eaten but I conquered it of course...) and then I was hungry on the way home so I bought a chicken and corn empanada and my favorite empanada place $50 + $20 RD coke (so delicious, and worth it).  Finally I was relatively cheap and fried a platano to make toastones drenched in tabasco sauce and ketchup, ~$20RD + $10 Rd grapefruit... so all in all I spent about $180RD  which is $4.50 US :(

Day 6 of 12 day count down until Alana arrives!

It has been cooler these days... ~70*, which has it's benefits, I don't start sweating just walking down the road or even just sitting in my chair,  I can sleep at night if the lights go out and I don't have a fan pointed at me, when I wear jeans I don't feel like I'm suffocating my legs.  On the other hand, taking cold showers, which in the summer can be surprisingly pleasant, is dreadful, it's also not cold enough to kill all the extra mosquitoes that have come to life with all the rain.  Well with the change of weather I get to see how little water I need to shower, as I boil a small pot on the stove and mix it with 3/4 of a pitcher, when the warm water runs out I am done...

Today I went on a 2 mile run/walk... mostly walk... During which I had an inspiring idea for a side project I want to do next year during my free time... Mostly walking around and taking photos of the oldest and most interesting houses/buildings in the East, and interviewing some of the oldest and most interesting people.... We'll see if I can keep the motivation up.  I think I'm going to start with my town... and just try to do a small spotlight/tourist booklet on my town.  I love my runs :)

Then I spent the rest of the morning studying for GRE and preping to make Christmas cards with the kindergarten.
We made Christmas cards for their moms... and the organization in this photo speaks to the total organization in the classroom during the project... however it was pretty fun :)

Today's diet:
1 smoothie, 1 coffee
left over rice, and chinola juice
1pan dulce- $5, 1 kola real -$10
1 more pan dulce $5
Then for dinner I at 2 breads-$10 and $25 in cheese and a banana... so all in all I spent about $65 on food plus ~$40 on food I already owned... so pretty close.  Still so much bread!  but it tasted so good.

Also, the world lost a great man today. When I read about Nelson Mandela's passing I started crying.  His life is an inspiration in an often confusing and overwhelming world.

Dogs love to bark

Today I was woken up at 6:30 by Sirens...  No there are no fire men in my town... but these guys had come from the town over at 6.30 AM because a light/ electrical post had caught on fire... just another way to be woken up these days.

So today I did not go for my typical run, instead I did yoga.  Then I spent the majority of the day making christmas presents for people I hope to see soon :)  And answering emails.  Now I have to admit that I have always been a slacker... especially in HS.  However as I listened to an NPR Health podcast about how stressed High Schoolers are these days, I really just did not have any sympathy.  There is no reason a kid needs to be taking 4 Honors classes in HS... and if you want to do that to yourself or your parents are telling you to do that, than you're a darn fool (or you're parents are...).  It's high school, get over yourselves and relax a little.
Archer had  a visit from his bff Toby today... Toby tends to come when Acher is barking super loud at other dogs running by... Toby comes and tries to calm him down, or eat his food.  It's adorable.

Today I didn't have my typical smoothie... as the electricity was out due to a fire on the pole... I had yogurt, grape nutes, and a banana... followed by a tasty salad for lunch.   Sparkles (dominican rip off skittles), and bread and juice as a snack.  For dinner, I tried something new.  I cooked rice for the first time in this country... Usually I figure that I get enough rice from Dominicans that I don't need to actually make it... Dinner was pretty tasty.  Washed down with chinola juice :)

Enjoying day 4 in 12 days of december before Alana Arrives!

I was so close to sleeping in... I was dreaming of this hot guy... and we were flirting in some dominican- american mixed world (maybe at a renaissance fair, I feel like we were in line for a turkey leg... I know I'm weird).. and then Archer broke down the door, and decided it was time to wake me up by running all around the bed... I guess I know why I can't sleep past 7:30 these days.  At first I thought it was cool and funny that he could open doors if he hit the handle just right... it really isn't.

Anyhow... back to the real world.  Today I ran 2 miles (as usual), then studied GRE flash cards... I tried to make someone a christmas gift, but I didn't like it so they will probably never get it... After lunch I made a weird christmas tree with letter ornaments, and brought it to the preschool.  We read books, practiced counting, and numbers for a few hours.  Then I walked around and traded books, until I wound up at a dona's house were people were playing dominoes... I ended up drinking coffee and watching dominoes for an hour.
On a good note for the day... A guy on a motorcycle carried my huge bottle of water back to my house... this is one of the chores I loathe most, and often think during these long walks that I would consider shaking up with a Dominican guy if I could just get him to carry my water bottle home... then I come back to reality.
Then I took a moment and called my first favorite dona... Pancheta... I missed her a lot but I have to admit if I were her real child she would have disowned me by now for never calling.  I'm horrible.  She was so happy to talk and I made plans to stop by the house on the 13 as I go up to see Sabine.

Today I ate a smoothie and coffee for breakfast.  Post run I made what I would describe as an asian dish.  There were noodles, cabbage, tomato, onions, and cucumbers cooked in a pot with teryaki  sauce, honey, and crushed red peppers.  It didn't taste bad... After my preschool class I ate cheese, bread, and a tamarindo juice.  As I was watching Dominoes, I got gifted plantanoes, so for dinner I boiled one plantano, fried one platano and boiled two eggs.  All washed down with a banana smoothie.  This will sound like a weird dinner... but it was greatly enjoyed... I love fried plantonoes and boiled ones too, but I've never allowed myself to fry them before... All and all today I spent about $110 RD.