Back from Mañana: D.R. 2010-An Asynchronous History

(Note: this entry is my asynchronous journal of my trip to the Dominican Republic, with the Dirigo International Service Club. It was begun on a porch overlooking an organic coffee plantation(Finca Alta Gracia), high on a mountainside in Los Marranitos, Jarabacoa, D.R.[19˚o4'13.15"N, 70˚44'10.95"W, elev. 1002m])From where I sit, I can just barely see the house next to the school in Los Marranitos. It is about 500 feet above us, through this coffee plantation at about 1000m. above sea level. This is where the beans grow. We are one day removed from la playa, Punta Rucia, where we spent three days on the north coast, living like royalty amidst the poverty, beachcombing, reading, swimming, shopping at the beach market, looking at plants, and meeting the locals. Oh, and listening to loud Dominican music, compliments of Luisito's tocayo (person who shares the same name).
We had no hot water, nor reliable electricity, yet no one complained. Well, maybe a few of us did. Luisito and his crew took care of our needs, which, beyond food, were few. Life there was loud, with motorcycles revving, loud, jovial voices hollering and motorboats from the German tourist company Paradise Island, roaring. Waves against the shore, a mere forty feet from the beach house, were drowned out by the cacophony during all but a few hours late at night and early in the morning. And no one seemed to mind too much.
Punta Rucia is a place of contradictions: the locals are poor--very poor. Their shacks line the road following the beach line, crumbling, leaning, not gripping the shore, but decaying into it. The locals mostly drive "motors"--either dirtbikes or scooters--though the infrequent late-model SUV can be seen when the rich city-folk weekenders come to town, or when a bank has been foolish enough to overextend the erstwhile "owner". For the most part, it is a hand-to-mouth existence in Punta Rucia, but with the sea handy, no one goes hungry.
The other major form of transportation in the tiny village is the tour bus. From our spot on the beach right next to the Paradise Island company, we saw at least ten boatloads of tourists leave for Cayo Arena (renamed "Paradise Island" by the company, and it has more or less stuck) each day we were at the beach. The village has attempted to remake itself as an eco-tourism destination, and has met with some success. Most of the men in town work for one, some, or all of the four tourist companies, for anywhere from $7-12 dollars a day. Their wives are generally housewives. They have little: their shacks, their few possessions (some have televisions, but more catch their t.v. at the local shop), their motors, huge hair curlers for actually straightening their hair, some everyday work clothes, and some really nice clothes for going out. And going out may consist of heading to the dance hall on Saturday night, along with about 200 other locals. They see the same clothes on their neighbors every Saturday night, and they always look good.
On Saturday, after our trip to Cayo Arena (not with the big company, but with a locally-owned business that also runs the biggest, nicest restaurant in town) we stopped at the restaurant for a nice meal of salad, beans & rice (ubiquitous in Dominican cuisine), fried plantanos, fried chicken, and fried carite, a type of catfish that tasted very much like swordfish. The meal was fantastic, and the family who runs the business did a great job of making us feel at home.
At the counter of the bars stood a blond woman with glasses, who looked suspiciously un-Dominican. Within a few minutes she was sitting near one of our group's tables with a young mother and her baby, talking in what seemed to be fluent Spanish. Soon she was conversing in English with the adults at the table, and it came out that she is a Peace Corps volunteer being hosted by the family that owns the restaurant. Her name was Samantha Dillman from Oregon, and her main project in Punta Rucia is sex education for the teenagers. She has also been involved in the continuation of projects begun by previous volunteers, including trash collection and a town library.

We invited Sam back to the beach to talk with the kids and to join us in a big cookout of burgers, dogs, pork and beef. Sam was excited to talk to the kids, and she ended up staying and talking with the adults until much later in the evening. We learned much about the Dominican Republic from this American here by choice, who has assimilated to the culture and has a passion for making the world a better place.
On Sunday we left Punta Rucia, after our final dips in the tropical waters, after a large, sumptuous lunchtime feast, after a tour of the school and library with Sam, and after procrastinating--and finally pulling it together enough to get packed and leave at about 4 pm. The big scenes on the way home were: the Punta Rucia "gas station", where the proprietor drives into Isabella twice a week to fill glass rum and beer bottles with gasoline to sell in the remote village; a large purple-party parade and rally in Isabella; the flamboyant trees (that's their name, really); and a DVD on the bus that had such great video hits as "We Are the World" (original version), "Careless Whisper", "Hotel California", "Making Love (Out of Nothing At All)" and UB40's "Kingston Town" (?!?)

At around 6:30 pm we rolled into Santiago once more, and in lieu of a big, cooked meal we ordered pizza. the next day would be our real purpose for coming: Los Marranitos, the village in the mountains.

I was honored to be able to ride up to the village with Luis, along with Jenn and Diane. Along the way we were treated to invaluable insights on Dominican culture, history, government, politics, ecology, botany--you name it, Luis schooled us in it. The time spent with Luis was so incredibly valuable and interesting.

After about 1.5 hours we encountered Jarabacoa, a good sized city to the south and west of Santiago. Another 45 minutes or so outside of Jarabacoa, over winding mountain roads and with stunning views of the Yaque Norte river, we came to a cobblestone turnoff, with about a 45% pitch. I knew we were almost there. The vehicles ground up this road slowly and carefully, and in about ten minutes we were at the front gate of Finca Alta Gracia. The air was cooler and drier there, like a midsummer's day on Tumbledown. At the gate we met Ari, an Indian woman who is a volunteer with OXFAM.

Ironically, Ari nearly worked herself out of a job by helping to re-open the village school this past fall, after ten years of being closed. She adapted, however, and moved on to adult education and literacy. The illiteracy rate here is around 75% among adults. There is much to do.


One narrow road runs through the village of Los Marranitos and any vehicle that passes (not many do), comes within two feet of the school's front porch. As Luis pulled the Chevy SUV into a grassy spot just above the school, a small army of children began to wiggle out of the woodworks. First came two little girls and a little boy from the house next to the school. Two appeared to be of school age, and one tiny, beautiful girl, a bit younger. I wanted to hug them, but just smiled and quietly said "hola!" They smiled and giggled, huddling up to each other in that shy manner endemic to small children. Just the right reaction to this big gringo.

Soon we were offloading paint and equipment, moving desks, and figuring out where to begin. Coral, Deidre and Jess got to work re-painting the map of the D.R. on the exterior wall, a group got started indoor (after first figuring out our approach to a bat on the wall, who we affectionately referred to as "Stellaluna"). We decided to leave her where she was until she needed to be moved. Turns out she moved on her own when she realized we weren't leaving any time soon.

After our group had finished about half of the job, we went about the job of meeting the kids. Nothing says diplomacy like jumproping, and the small group of about 8 kids soon turned into nearly the entire school population of 16, each waiting to take a turn at jumping the rope. One little boy named Diego was the first to break the ice, and soon was taking every other turn. I suspect Diego gets spoken to about sharing and taking turns every so often.

It was deceptively hot on the mountain. We felt much hotter on the beach, where things were more humid. But the sun was more direct in Los Marranitos. Unfortunately I didn't really catch on to the fact that I was becoming dehydrated and heat exhausted until it was too late. By the time the painting was done for the day and the donations passed out, heat exhaustion had set in. Physically, I could hardly move and I was apathetic and listless.

That didn't mean there wasn't fun and hilarity on the way home, though. The highlight was at the coffee factory in Jarabacoa, where I learned from Luis that the word for "whole bean" coffee, granos, is the same as the Dominican slang for testicles. I asked Luis if I should order granos grande for the bags of whole bean coffee. He said "only if you want to ask for big balls". I learned that one should ask for un livre de granos, or tres livres des granos. Context is important.

As we entered Santiago city limits that night, the heavens opened up and traffic crawled. As we exited the bus at La Isleta, the Catholic retreat where we were staying, I experienced full-body, uncontrollable shivering as the first raindrops hit me. Normally that might have been a great feeling at the end of a hot day, but this felt wrong. When I got inside, the uncontrolled shivering continued. I went to bed at 7:30, under a sheet, even though the temperature was about 85˚ in the room. I didn't take in anything other than water or orange juice until about 3pm the next day.

Our last two days in Santiago were really more about the city culture. The group was perceptibly tired, and smaller issues were obviously bothering them. During that time we visited the PUCMM, where Luis, as well has his wife and his son, teach. It is called, phonetically, "Poo-ka-mai-ma". We also visited a large mall where I was able to get on iChat with my wife for the first communication we'd had in a week, and where I was finally able to eat some KFC (the best it's tasted in years) and a Baskin-Robbins shake.

The following day we visited the Museo Central, a Dominican cultural and art museum, a tobacco factory/museum, an open air market, and a supermarket that looked like any clean, well-kept supermarket in the U.S. We also stopped in a couple of places to drop off some of our donations: medical supplies at a Catholic relief organization and baseball equipment at a youth activity center.

On our final night we ate at a restaurant located at an equestrian center high above Santiago. It was a beautiful location, and since we had the place to ourselves it was a great way for the kids, the adults, and our hosts to celebrate our week together. Our accomplishments were great, and something to be proud of: we dropped off over 800 pounds of humanitarian aid and supplies to over five locations. We painted a school. We met people who have committed to similar actions over the course of their lives. We learned that we can all live on less. We taught. And we'll continue to do so.