el capital: Santo Domingo

La zona colonial is the oldest part of the city in Santo Domingo. These ruins are of an old hospital over 500 years old.
This interesting graffiti translates into: When you were born, your mother gave you milk, not drugs, ok?
Lots of beautiful art for sale on the streets of Santo Domingo.

So--as you can see, yesterday we took a day trip to Santo Domingo, the capital of the DR. We left at 7 and arrived around 10 15 or so. Our resident director, Lynne, is an anthropologist and historian, so she was well equipped to give us a tour of the zona colonial. Not to mention she had lived in Santo Domingo for 7 years before moving to Santiago. If you look at my album on facebook you will read some interesting stories she told us about the buildings here!

After walking around for what seemed like forever in the baking heat, we finally got to have lunch!! I also got to see my amiga ALLISON! But she had class at 2 so we only got to see each other for about half an hour, but it was great to see her, she is SO tan! I also will get to see her this saturday because her program is coming to see Santiago!

After a delicious lunch (as usual) we went to el taller manos creativos, an art studio. We each received a miniature decorative herb masher hand painted, a tour of the studio, and then we got to make our own art piece. I left mine on the bus (but im getting it back!) so I dont have pictures of that stuff yet.

Today I had my first day of class, but only one. It lasted about 15 minutes because it was the first day so yeah, so far, so good!

clases, charlas y más

Something I forgot to mention that I did yesterday was register for classes! I tested into Advanced Spanish II, which I am very proud of (there's I, II and III but no one got into III so yay!). So as of right now I am taking: Sculpture (but I am going to do painting instead), TESL (teaching english as a second language) and after lots of theory and methodology I get to teach english classes at PUCMM wtf! And, another cool thing about that class is after the semester you receive a certificate that is basically a free pass to getting a job teaching english anywhere in latin america because if is from PUCMM which is considered one of the top latin america universities, which is awwwesome! Then all of us have to take spanish class (duh), procesos, which is social and political processes of the dominican republic (i think), and then as of now I am taking dominican and haitian relations, which I find fascinating, more about that later in this post. BUT, I might switch it for another class called la Realidad Dominicana (Dominican Reality), which is a direct enrollment class into the university. The other classes, while taught in spanish, are taught by professors in the "spanish for foreigners" department, so basically they know that the ppl in the class are not native spanish speakers and therefore cater to that a bit more than direct enrollment classes which are just normal, full of dominicans, etc. My art class is direct enrollment too. So we shall see...I start thurs!

Then, today we met to discuss how our host families were working out so far. Mine is good. I live with all girls and two of them are younger so they are always out with their friends or talking on the phone with their friends, etc so I dont see them too much. My mom is really nice and sweet and she is always on the phone too (dominicans are veeeery social). But yeah, I have a great set up in my room: fan, TV, desk, mirror, lamps, wireless internet, mosquito net...que bueno.

After that we had la clase de baile!! (dance class) Where we were taught merengue, bachata, and salsa by los estudiantes del apoyo. They are all great, of course, because they have been dancing since they were babies. But it was really fun.

Then I just got back a little while ago from la charla sobre la raza e identidad en la república dominicana. Chat about race and identity because it is very very different here than in the United States. First of all, they have never had a civil rights movement, womens rights, no dr martin luther king, no gay pride, none of that. The history of the dominican republic has made it so that anyone who is black is thought of as haitian. And there has been a very rocky history with haitians. Basically, dominicans describe themselves as what haitians aren't. This results in dominicans emphasizing their spanish heritage, and ignoring their african heritage. Since haitians are thought of as black, no dominican can be black. Thus, they have many words to describe the colors of skin. No dominican, even if they are very very black, will ever call him/her self "negro/a" they will be called moreno oscuro (dark brown) or indio oscuro. If you want to know more, email me, because this is barely scratching the surface and I cant really explain it very good here...

Tomorrow we go on a day trip to Santo Domingo and I get to see Allison!!!

Dominicans=nicest people ever

The more I am here, the more examples I get of how welcoming and nice Dominicans are. Saturday night I went with three friends on my program and a host brother to a discoteca. The host brother, Bolí (short for Bolívar) has an uncle with connections to the club, therefore we got to go in the VIP section, woo woo! Except it is raised up from the dance floor aka easy for people to stare at you...Met some of Bolí's friends who were of course very nice and great dancers. All of the dominicans were surprised when I actually knew some of the reggaetón songs.

Didn't go out until 11 got home at 3! Also something funny is on all of the T.Vs in the discoteca they just were playing normal TV, so american football was on instead of in clubs in the US when they usually play music videos at least.

Then on Sunday my family was invited to my mom's sister's house, which is HUGE. Very nice neighborhood and beautiful home. Example of niceness: they kept saying, you know this is your house too, it is your house too. They wanted me to go lay down in a bed if I was tired, etc,etc. They always ask if you have had enough to eat (definitely). Lunch consisted of yellow/orange looking rice with mussels and shrimp in it, chicken, glazed ham, other rice, el guineo dulce (basically a fried banana with sweet syrupy stuff). Yes, all delicious of course. Then a little while later cake and coffee. We stayed there for quite a while just chatting and I could actually follow most of the conversation!! Some topics of conversation were how hard it is to learn a language, Chile and how different a culture it is from dominican (but still nice, dont worry!), the beaches and how much a family member spent to go there to a very nice hotel, etc (9 thousand pesos) and the military.

Below you will see a picture of the apartment building I live in. The bottom window to the left is part of my house, and the little window about to be cut off on the left is the window to my room! I am five minutes walking distance to my university. There is Puerta II and Puerta I (door 1, door 2) and I live basically right in between them, so I am really happy about that because most other people have to take conchos, which would add up if you went everyday.

hola mis amigos y familia!

Hi Everyone! So, things are going good. Last night all TWENTY of the people in my program went out which in hindsight was kind of a bad idea because, first of all, we stick out like sore thumbs especially with los rubios (the blondes) in our group. So, basically everywhere we went they would start playing american music, it was pretty funny.

Second of all, twenty people is a lot of people to organize and keep track of. So, there was a bit of drama about sticking together and all that. But not lasting, everyone was fine today so I am glad because I did not come here to get caught in the tangled web of he said she said.

Today we had una búsqueda de tesoro which is a scavenger hunt, around Santiago. It was actually really really fun. We split into five groups of four and we had a list of things to do. Like go to the medical center and ask how much being treated would cost, go here and buy this, go here and find out what the name of this is. It was so we could become better associated with the city as we had to travel por concho which are like taxis but cheaper and crazier in that they stuff four people in the back city and two people in the front seat! We also became more comfortable with the people. What I learned today is dominicans are literally the most helpful people EVER. One guy literally walked us to the post office. Other people tried to answer all the questions for us. This one guy read all of the directions to us even though obviously we had already read them, etc, etc. We had to actually tell one guy that we had to do it ourselves because I think if we had let him he would have walked us everywhere, it was ridiculous!

About to go out to una discoteca del merengue! Adios mis amigos!

hi

hey everyone should look at the album I just put up on facebook. It is a few pictures of the city and of my new university campus! here is a little sneak preview (even though they are already up so it isnt really a preview...)

hay mucha lluvia hoy

One of the perks of reading my blog is that you get to learn some words in spanish! The heading means there is a lot of rain today. Last night my host mom comes in to tell me I have a phone call and I was incredulous. Turns out, some people on my program had decided to go to a nearby bar called "el fogón" where a lot of university students go to (i live literally a 2 minute drive away from PUCMM) hang out. And one guy's host brother and his brother's friend came along. They were really nice and could speak really good english, so that was convenient but we switched between spanish and english the whole night.

The brother, Bolí (short for Bolívar) said he liked speaking in english because with the way dominican culture is everyone knows everyone so it is less easy for people to eavesdrop on him. I thought that was funny. I learned some new words in spanish including "chular" which means to make out. It was also karaoke wed which was pretty hilarious except everyone was actually really good. But this one guy would sing american rock songs like I want to live forever haha.

Also, just in case you were wondering, although drinking is very much a part of the culture, it is seen as ugly and shameful if you are visibly "borracho" so dont worry I will not be making a fool of myself! What else...oh I took the level exam today I feel like it was pretty easy but I dont know.

Tonight I am going to the first exhibition of my host sister's dad's art! Oh, and yeah I was caught in a HUGE downpour like I seriously looked like I had jumped in a pool it was loco.

Love everyone, miss everyone, and remember I am on East Coast time!!

El número de teléfono!

Hi Everyone!

Today we first had a seminar on "living and learning in the DR" which was fine. Oh, but before that I had a delicious breakfast of hot chocolate (yes in like 90 degree weather) a sandwich with melted cheese and some time of thin meat, and TWO mangos, but mind you they were tiny like not even fist size. Then went home for lunch, which was also deliciosa.

After that we met up with los estudiantes de apoyo, which are students from the PUCMM who help exchange students. They were super nice and we got split up into smaller groups to tour Santiago. We went to la calle del sol, which is the main street with all the shops, we also went to plaza internacional which is where a lot of students go because it has wireless internet, air conditioning plus lots of shopping and a movie theater. We got cell phones there for like 16 bucks. MY NUMBER IS: 809-924-3806. If you get a calling card for latin america it is pretty cheap to call, like maybe 18 cents a minute...and it is free for me. So MOM call me por favor! After that we went to the monument which is huge in the middle of the city and also exchanged money.

Tomorrow is the language level exam. I dont really care if I get placed into level I but I would prefer level II. Okay, love everyone I hope my phone rings...

hola

So far my impression of la repúblia dominicana is very good. On my flight out of JFK almost all of the people on the plane were dominican. I sat next to a mother and daughter and later figured out that the abuela was sitting across the aisle from me. She basically forced me to take the candy she offered me and definitely less wary of body contact than americans. When we landed the plane erupted in applause, it was pretty cool.

There were four other people on my program that were on the flight, we got picked up and off we went to Casa Club in la Vega, a town 30 minutes from Santiago. Casa Club is an environmental co-op run by the people of la vega. There are signs saying things like "plant a tree when you can" etc etc. Went swimming, met people, talked about the DR. There was a lightning. Next day, (today) had lots of orientation stuff, really exciting. Met even more people. There are twenty people in all on our program. Oonly three guys though.

Met my host family today!! They are really nice. There is Germania who is 73, Fanny who is 40 something and Prisila who is 19 and also goes to PUCMM! Can't understand half the things they are saying. Oh, also, weird thing: no throwing ANY toliet paper in the toliets. They have smaller pipes + dont have the money/means to purify and clean the water with all that paper in it. So literally nowhere in the DR can you do this. Anyways, tomorrow tour of the city, ill hopefully get a cellphone so I will post that number. People should call me, not me them. It is cheaper if you guys buy a phone card. Incoming calls/texts cost me nothing. And it would be more expensive if i called you guys with a phone card.

Warning though, this blog might not be as successful as I wanted it to be (as in lots of updates,etc,etc) because they really emphasized the importance of "cutting the wire" to America. It makes sense, if i am reading and writing in english once a day that will really hurt my spanish learning. So maybe once a week, we shall see.

Muchos besos

Today is the day

Well, today is the day. Getting out of the shower I realized I had almost forgotten to pack any bras! Off to LA first, then NY, then DR. AAAAAAAAH. ok, just wanted to do a test run of this. I can't exercise my brain enough to think of anything clever, I had enough trouble with the title of the blog...BYE