Monday, July 26, 2010

Pics from July 4th

Finally, here are a few pictures from the 4th of July beach trip.

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Playa San Rafael, from the San Rafael House porch.  I never wanted to leave this place.

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Clayton’s project site in Paraiso (Paradise).

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Pool, beach, camping.

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Catching a ride in the back of a construction truck from San Rafael to Paraiso.

Friday, July 23, 2010

Friends Without Borders

On Thursday, I had about 25 middleschoolers from New Jersey visit my site.  It was a Friends Without Borders trip, organized by Tours Trips Treks & Travel.  I gave them a tour of the CTC, and talked about what Peace Corps is like, what we do, and a bit about Dominican culture. We played some games, and then a girl got locked in the bathroom.  We spent a few minutes with a knife and pen trying to pry it open, but eventually freed her. Then, I took them on a tour of the Taino pottery workshop in my town.  Some kids were selling limoncillo (small tangy sweet fruits), so I bought some and passed it out—very popular.  I also scored some Dominican points by bringing in tourists, and American points for showing them less-touristy stuff. 

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Outside the CTC.

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Playing “Espalda a Espalda”

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Inside the pottery workshop

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My friend Yndira making sun god figurines.

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

house and pottery

Alright!  I have two options for living on my own.

Here is option 1. 

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It would need a lot of work—bars on the windows, lots of cleaning, etc.

This is option 2:

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It is the right half of a duplex in a government housing project, freshly painted and with new metal window bars and slats.  My project partner lives across the street, and I have a few friends nearby. 

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Pottery! They make it in my town. 

Monday, July 19, 2010

Around Yamasa

I realized that I haven’t posted any pictures of my actual site… So, here we go!

Here is my host family’s house! The top is my host sister’s one-room apartment, the bottom right part is the little store my host dad runs, and the bottom left part is the actual house.

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This is my room in my host family’s house.

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My lightbulb, towel, and clothes line

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This is the bathroom. To shower, you just splash some water from the blue drum. 

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My host dad’s little store. You can buy a cap-full of oil, thirty cents of sugar, half a can of condensed milk, etc.

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The neighborhood:

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Here is my CTC! Above it is the blue aqueduct building, where some houses in the town theoretically get their water.

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Notice the bright colors, odd shapes and textures, use of bars, disregard for meaningful use of space, and complete out-of-place-ness. Remember: these centers used to be SHIPPING CONTAINERS.

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More around the town:

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CHICKENS

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That about covers half the town.  The other half is more colmados and little stores, and the town park.  I’ll take some more pictures next time I’m out that way. We are about an hour outside the capital, so pretty much everything is oriented that way.  Things are expensive, and the nearest supermarket is in the capital (Villa Mella). To go anywhere else in the country, you have to first go through Santo Domingo.

I’ll be here for the next two years!

Friday, July 16, 2010

sandwiches

I am showing my project partner pictures of sandwiches online.  Delicious sandwiches, gyros, subs, paninis, and sliders.  With tomato, lettuce, cucumbers, spinach, peppers, ham, turkey, bacon, roast beef, salami, avocado, mustard, spicy mayo, onions, pineapple, all kinds of cheeses, and different types of bread.

Sandwiches here are not sandwiches.  One typical attempt is to slather lots of butter on the inside of a roll, put in a piece of unmeltable cheese, and then smash it as flat as you can in a pan with some blunt object, like a can of shaving cream or the base of a mortar.  When the bread is paper thin and saturated with butter (but most of the butter is unmelted), it is ready to serve. Sometimes there are big pieces of uncooked salami inside.

During training in El Seibo, we discovered a sandwich stand in front of the LINCOS.  The LINCOS sandwiches had ham, tomato, ketchup, and mayo, and if you pulled out the diarrhea-causing lettuce, were the closest thing yet to a real sandwich.  Squished flat, naturally.

There is a colmado (quickie mart) near the Peace Corps office in Santo Domingo that sells similar sandwiches, and they make up about half my diet while in the capital.  The other half is usually ice cream.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Who is crying now?

 

Kudos, Argentina. Here is an article (below) that I originally posted on Jim Neal’s blog.

 

A Dirty War, Crisis, and Human Rights

In voting to extend the full and complete rights of marriage and adoption to same-sex couples, the Argentine government has taken another step away from the nightmare of military bureaucratic authoritarian regimes, and has opened a new chapter in South American Human Rights. It is an astounding accomplishment just 27 years after the return to democracy, and a direct defiance of the acerbic campaign rhetoric of the Catholic Church in a country that is 91% Catholic. Equally striking is that the measure was supported by an estimated 70% of the population. To understand what happened, let’s look at two major historical periods which continue to shape Argentine society: the military regime of 1976-1983 and its dirty war, and the economic collapse of 2001. These pivotal events shed light on the thought processes that lead to Wednesday’s legislation, and show that Argentina’s Human Rights debate is leapfrogging not just its neighbors’, but our own.

The military regime waged a war against its own people, “disappearing” thousands of the opposition, labeling them “subversive” members of society. This complete disregard of Human Rights is etched in Argentine memory. Rights aren’t taken for granted to the extent that they are in the States, because older generations of Argentines know what it is like to lose them. The Madres de la Plaza de Mayo(Mothers of the May Plaza) marched for decades to protest the disappearance of their children, and singer Mercedes Sosa was converted into a folk hero after her exile. Millions of footprints circling thePlaza de Mayo, the adrenaline of prolific protest drums, and the formation of dozens of political parties are testament that in Argentina, Human Rights discussions are not hypothetical, nor are they taken lightly.

Argentines know how to use their voices because they were stripped of the things that had let them be silent. During the financial crisis of 2001, 57% of the country was plunged into poverty overnight, something our “Great Recession” hasn’t come close to touching. Families lost everything, and housewives in Buenos Aires took to the streets in the cacerolazo protests, banging pots and pans because they couldn’t feed their families. The pot and pan protesters became the symbol of the crisis, and their image was so strong that they are still invoked today. These protests escalated violently, leading to the president’s resignation, and a string of failed successions right up to Nestor Kirchner, the current president’s husband.

So, what we have is a society that has dealt with terrible Human Rights violations by the state, is suspicious of powerful institutions, and knows that opiates like stability, continuity, and money can fail. The country’s history is punctuated not just by strongmen rulers, but also by strong women (hello, Evita) and minorities with strong voices at the center of protest movements. The first elected female president (sorry, Evita) just asserted that extending rights to minorities strengthens the rights of all, and that the Church’s incursion on civil issues is akin to the Inquisition. Those, my friends, are fighting words. Earlier, her ruling party had shot down a “compromise” civil union bill which did not include adoption—they recognized that you cannot compromise on rights.

What we have is an example of how the US isn’t just behind the curve on debating and supporting Human Rights, but that in this instance, it doesn’t even seem to know what that sort of debate would look like. Get your pots and pans ready, because I feel like taking to the streets.

The author is a volunteer in the US Peace Corps.  This post does not express the views of the US Peace Corps, or of the US Government.

Monday, July 12, 2010

Camp

Look, I got a certificate from the First Lady’s office for attending a camp on how to give a camp! meta?

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Just look at those green green shirts.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Pollo

Chickens.  In the States, we have all these words like “free-range”, “organic”,” and “cage-free.”  In the DR, chickens are one of three animals that replaced all native mammals except for a venomous rat and something i can’t remember right now. The other two are dogs and cats. 

There are no poisonous snakes or spiders to speak of here, just tarantulas that can apparently jump 6 feet.  This is what Wikipedia has to say on that rat thing:

“Considering that the solenodon is a slow moving clumsy runner, with no adaptation to predators and poor means of defense (it didn't need to evolve them given the lack of native enemies), it is accepted that once feral dog (Canis lupus familiaris) and cat (Felis silvestris catus) populations started becoming established, adding to the introduction of the Small Asian Mongoose (specifically subspecies Herpestes javanicus auropunctatus) as a means to control rats in sugar cane fields, its future began to look bleak.”

Wikipedia is starting to sound more and more like the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. 

Back to chickens.  They’re everywhere, and they’re scary. I’ve watched chickens walk, with their weird feet and reptilian scaley parts, and it weirds me out.

I don’t know how chicken ownership works, either.  Lets say that you buy a chicken.  It wanders around your yard, your neighbor’s yard, the street, and wherever else a chicken decides to go.  When you decide to eat it, but can’t find it, can you just grab another chicken from the street?  I’d assume some sort of communal “need a chicken, take a chicken; have a chicken, leave a chicken” arrangement. 

Some chickens are fighting chickens, and have big patches of missing feathers.  I’ve heard stories that the owners boil the front part of the chicken so it won’t feel the pain during cockfights… these suckers are ugly.  On my way to work, I pass a house that always has a few roosters tied up out front, and they try to peck your feet when you walk past. 

Oh, right, they also MAKE A LOT OF NOISE.  Chickens, take off the caps lock, it is not necessary.  Especially at night, when I swear, I’m going to take all the street chickens, put em in a chicken bag, and throw them in the Ozama river.

Friday, July 9, 2010

Birthday, 4th, and CTC training

July has been a whirlwind so far. I went down to San Rafael for my birthday, and then on to Los Patos and Paraiso with the rest of my training class for the 4th.  The southern beaches are almost all pebble beaches, with smooth oval stones that make a really neat noise when the tide goes out.  We got bolas (hitchhiking) from town to town, swam in river mouthes, and ate fish fried in little beach huts.  It was amazing and beautiful, and great to hang out with volunteer friends.

I got back to Yamasa in the afternoon on Monday, and then Tuesday morning headed to Santo Domingo for a CTC training camp.  The First Lady's Office periodically holds these training camps whenever they try to start up a new program at the CTCs, and this was supposed to be on how to run a water conservation summer camp.  It had very little on water conservation, and a whole lot on ice breaker games.  It also lacked information on how to actually... run... the camp, or how it should be set up.  The CTCs were all supposed to send their Peace Corps volunteers, but somehow, only Mas and I ended up going.  I can't complain, though, because the catholic convention center had running water and private bathrooms. Sure, a Motel 6 or Red Roof Inn would have been a huge step up, but running water... can't beat it.

I should mention that no one at my CTC knew what the camp was for, if I was really supposed to go, if anyone else should go with me, or where exactly it was.  That's about how it goes. Crash-course in summer camps, Peace Corps style! ....and this would be alongside the youth groups, diagnostic, and house-hunting that are already going on... busy busy.