This week has been pretty fun. In my Dominican Haitian relaciones class, we had guest speakers both days. Last week we watched a movie called the serpent and the rainbow, which was about haitian voodoo. The portrayal of voodoo in the movie was less than pleasant. However, the movie itself is very entertaining, just don't believe everything you see if you choose to see it. On monday a Haitian-Dominican student came to a interview type session in our class. He was born in the DR, so he is technically Dominican, but he identifies more with his Haitian ancestry even though both of his parents were born in the Dominican Republic too. This is perhaps because he grew up in a Batey, where most of the community is Haitian. However, he "knows nothing of Haiti" and when he first went to Haiti, couldn't understand anyone. He had interesting things to say in respect to color. He is very dark-skinned, thus, people immediately identify him as Haitian. But, he pointed out, in the capital, Santo Domingo, there are more people of color and nobody knows if you are Haitian or Dominican soley based on color. But Santiago is a city where there is a bigger number of lighter skinned people, people assume more about you based on color. He is also of the opinion that people discriminate not based on nationality, the fact that he is Haitian, but on color of skin. He used two examples to illustrate this: he has a Haitian friend who is very light skinned, but is obviously Haitian by his accent, yet Dominicans do not call him Haitian, but because of his dark skin, people will automatically call him Haitian. Another example is he has a Dominican friend who had two Haitian girlfriends. The first was lighter skinned and no one had a problem, the second was darker, and so it was a problem. When asked who has more ignorance about the other, his answer was dominicans towards haitians. When asked how to better relations with each other he said, more talking, more working together, getting to know each other better, accepting each other, forgiving the past.
The other guests came to talk about voodoo. It was very interesting because he talked about the balance of catholicism and voodoo. They coexist together. I can't say that much about it because I had a hard time understanding a lot of what they were saying after the official presentation. But basically, the main sentiments I got were that voodoo is often misunderstood by people who do not take the time to actually understand and learn about it. People in Haiti are ashamed to say they are "vuduísta" because there are bad connotations, but really, voodoo is at the essence of Haitian culture because it is not simply a religion, but a "herramienta para la existencia" (tool for living). It is a religion brought from Africa by the slaves in the sugar cane plantations, and so has even longer roots than just in Haiti.
Next, I observed my first english class and am about to teach my first class this evening. I can't really comment much more until that happens.
This morning at 9 30 I went to visit three guardarías (daycares) for workers of la zona franca (i think that translates a free trade zone aka the huge factories of gross american corporations like nike/gap). All of them were basically organized in the same way. There would be a room of 5 year olds (the oldest), 4 year olds, 3 year olds, and then babies! So cute. We would walk into a room and they would all shout BUEN DIA! (dominican buenas dias), I am not sure which one I will choose to volunteer at. But I am leaning towards one in a barrio called cien fuegos (100 fires, intriguing right?) and they have a pretty big playground, which is fun, and I liked the kids there a lot. But we shall see.
Tomorrow I go to the 27 charcos!!! We get to climb up waterfalls and then jump into pools and its going to be awesome!
Tonight I am going to a chocolate chip cookie dough party, we are going to make dough and eat it and then cook cookies and make ice cream sandwiches with the cookies, and eat pizza and watch a funny moooovie!!! It is going to be great. Wish me luck on teaching!
Wow- that does sound like a pretty interesting week! Man that whole race/nationality bluring thing is pretty crazy. I kinda want to learn more about voodoo– basically your Dominican Haitian Relations class sounds like it would be perfect to learn about for a potential Africana Studies double concentrator (me!!! have I mentioned that to you... just a thought I've had, who knows whether it will add up to anything... I guess it will just depend how I feel... as usual).
ReplyDeleteHave you decided upon your volunteering yet? I'll have to remember to ask.
Gotta say- that cookie dough party sounds so much like an American thing- is that something they are into in the DR too (eating straight cookie dough...), or was it with your American friends? I bet it was fun though.