CBT – Community Based Training

by Vickie
Again, no photos but we'll add them when we can.

We survived Community Based Training.

 The bad thing about community based training is that everything we’re doing is not real – it’s just practice. It’s important and I learned a lot, but it was a time to endure.  The living conditions were pretty terrible because the kitchen and bathroom were dirty-make that filthy, our host family refused to buy the clean, sealed water we’re supposed to drink, hand washing did not exist in their home, and in the filthy bathroom, there was no toilet seat. Jim lost 15 pounds and I lost 10 as a result of consistent diarrhea. My thigh muscles are pretty strong now from 5 weeks of squatting over the toilet, so with every awful thing, I guess there is something good.

The other good thing about CBT is that we had an excellent trainer and a great group of 12  trainees, working together in El Seibo for 5 weeks.  During the very first week, we had to complete a mini-Community Diagnostic. This is where you talk to complete strangers in their homes about who the heck you are, what a Peace Corps volunteer is – and then asking these strangers questions about resources, problems, leaders, education, civic groups, etc. etc. – in the community.  This is done with a level of Spanish that is really inadequate to the task.  We also, spent time observing in the elementary school, and making informal observations about the pueblo (small city) – like how many and what kinds of stores they have,  how do people get around, where do they get water, what social agencies exist, etc. etc. 

At the end of the week, we each had to develop a  10-15 minute presentation in Spanish – outlining strengths and weaknesses in the community – especially in the area of education – and then develop possible projects we might undertake in the community – IF we were going to be there. Very stressful, but this is what we’ll be doing for the first three months of service in our real community. Mostly this is called “compartiendo”or sharing.

 Domincans talk to each other a lot. They always say hello and ask after your family when they see you on the street or sitting in the galleria – that’s kind of like the front porch. You’re always invited to come in and sit down and you’ll get the best seat in the house – even if it’s only a plastic chair. If they can afford it, you’ll get a fruit drink or un chin’de café – a little coffee. This is true, even if they don’t know you.  If you smile and say hello, you will be invited in.

After the first week, we spent lots of time giving and receiving charlas (workshops) on education programs that volunteers are involved in here in the DR. The thing is – until this year, there was no education sector in the DR – it was ICT – Information and Communication Technology – it’s what all 12 people in our group thought they were signing on for. When we got here – we were told that the literacy level of the students in the DR is so low that the volunteers in ICT were spending most of their time teaching literacy skills – so – the PC hired a new leader and we are in the process of creating a new program – Education. 

I’m thrilled of course – and everyone in the group is so positive and ready to take on this new program – but with very little background in Education. We spent time in elementary schools learning how to assess reading levels and how to work with students who are both above and below level in reading – in Spanish.

So the first three months after we are sworn in as volunteers (in 2 more weeks) are spent talking, asking questions, learning everything we can about the community, in conjunction with our project partners. Our project partners are people from the community and we will each have two partners. 

These are people who volunteered to help us integrate into the community by talking with us and introducing us to key people they may know. They may also end up working with us, but not necessarily.  Heaven knows why they would volunteer to work with strangers from the US for two years – probably to find out why the heck people from the US would choose to live in a poor country working with strangers  for 2 years away from their family and friends. Maybe we can all help each other out with some self-analysis. Maybe 6 months from now, I’ll be able to explain why I’m here!

A living fence. A branch is planted. Then each year the new branches at the top are cut off and used as new fence posts by planting them. This way the wood is always living and never rots. Also provides some shade. Cool!

The house where we lived for 5 weeks. Upstairs is an apartment the family rents out. Downstairs includes a small clothing shop - part time business for the family.

Meeting with our youth groups.

The local elementary school where we worked.

Jim is  teacher now!

No - not modern art. A water container (tinaco) fell off the roof of the school and shattered. The kids played in it all day. 

The alley behind our house. The tin is a fence.

Food!

by Vickie
Sorry there are no photos yet, but they don't load up fast enough -- we'll add them later, si Dios quiere.

Jim and I got back to Santo Domingo Saturday, April 28^th, at around noon. We are very happy to be back with our first host family, in a clean house, a toilet with a seat, running water, and absolutely delicious food! Did I mention in the last post that Jim lost 15 pounds in the 5 weeks we were gone and I lost 10? We are now happily eating our way back to our former plumpness.

Speaking of food, I’ll tell you a little about the local specialties. Of course there is the daily rice and beans with maybe a little chicken or beef on the side.  But there are lots of really tasty foods, too. One of my favorites is fried platano. The platano is very sweet and when lightly sautéed in a little olive oil, it is like eating dessert. 

We just finished eating a tasty soup called “chambre” which just means vegetable soup. It’s a mixture of pumpkin, cabbage, carrots, white beans, and other  vegetables (like tayota) that we don’t have in Kentucky.  We eat lots of viveres—(vee-ver-es) which include all root foods and bananas – I guess generally any white, starchy food is a vivere. When mixed with herbs and topped with a little fried salami or cheese and sautéed onion, it can be quite delightful.  At the very least it fills you up pretty quickly.

One of my favorite treats has been a sort of sweet cornbread – but more like a cake in texture and sweetness.  It is cooked on top of the stove in a huge cake pan with a big hole in the middle. This is absolutely wonderful with a cup of steaming coffee in the mornings.  They do use the oven here – to store pots and pans in. Everything is cooked on top of a gas stove.  We are definitely purchasing a cake pan. The Peace Corps provides  a small 2 burner cook stove like the ones we use for camping.

But the absolute best thing about eating here in the Dominican Republic is the fruit. Fruit trees are everywhere: cherry trees, mango trees (and there are probably 20 varieties of mango – some for every season),  papaya, avocado (and you’ve never tasted an avocado like the ones here – AND they are huge), guayábana (sweet and tart at the same time – amazing), tamarindo (tart and refreshing). Esperanza just made us a papaya, pineapple mix with crushed ice. Heaven! We also get batidos – something like a milkshake – the best is lechosa-ca. That’s papaya mixed with Carnation and ice. Carnation is big here, but so is leche de vaca. That means cow’s milk straight from the cow. Of course, they have to boil it – but you should taste it in oatmeal with a ton of sugar and cinnamon.  Another early purchase will be a blender.

Everything here has a ton of sugar added and so I’ve stopped asking for café amargo – bitter coffee – because sweet coffee truly is so good and people look at you really funny if you drink bitter coffee. Everyone here uses a greca, which is what Jim and I have been using since we learned about it from our friend Karen. Wisely, we brought ours from home, so with a greca, blender, and cake pan, I think I can be pretty happy here.

I do miss some foods though. Granola for breakfast is unheard of. French fries, crackers,  cheese sandwiches,  fried viveres, Ramon noodle soup – those are pretty common – but granola or any kind of cereal really – except Corn Flakes (pronounced  CorFlakies) – not done.  No one eats peanuts or peanut butter, chocolate (even though the DR is a major exporter of cacao to countries like the US and Switzerland (Cadbury and Nestle are big buyers). 

Wine and beer are rare. People here actually drink El Presidents light – I guess it’s probably akin to Miller Light or Bush light – pretty awful. Jim has taken a liking to rum – which is cheap and plentiful – but I’d just as soon drink my Listerine – pronounced Leestereenie.)

What they do eat for dessert here is abichuela con dulce – that’s black beans with sugar and milk. I do not like abichuelas con dulce and I’m positive that I never will.  So, in light of this, one of my favorite things to do here is to go to a big box store like Walmart orTarget – here they are La Sirena and Jumbo – and walk up and down the food aisle imagining all the things I will be able to eat once Jim and I get our own place to live. 

Meanwhile, every day I can look forward to sweet coffee, fried platanos and a fruit drink or two!

Why the Cock Crows

by Vickie

So, roosters. 

They are beautiful in the sun.  The one beside the house has feathers that are a shimmering mix of copper, jade, gold, and ruby hues. He resembles, if for one moment he stands still, the masterwork of an artist. He stands, not in the austere space of a Paris museum, but surrounded by trash and dirty water and naked children.

The story goes that roosters crow at dawn. This, I can verify, is not true. As far as I can tell, every rooster in the Dominican Republic begins crowing at 4:15 and stops when the sun comes up, about 2 hours later. The sound – and I mean the sound of a rooster who sleeps about 12 inches from your  bed on the other side of a wall that has a window covered by only iron bars – my bedfellow almost – the sound is like a bolt of lightning that shoots through your head, into your heart, and out through your stomach.

I am almost always asleep when he begins and you’d think my vital organs would remember and not contract in shock each and every time. But they don’t remember and I never go back to sleep so I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on the cock’s crow.

First, they’re all a little different. The smaller ones are high-pitched and not so loud and scary. The big ones have powerful, terrifying crows – and my bedfellow is a whopper. Yes, the sound is terrifying – because he sounds as if he is crying out in abject terror while in the jaws of one of the hounds of the Baskervilles. I am convinced that the cock’s crow is the result of fiendish nightmares coupled with mass hysteria.

A cry escapes….

ERRRRR….

The hound squeezes his jaw tighter and there is a pause – you can almost hear the gasp for breath…then..

Eeeerrrr…..eeeerrrrr   

a  pause  - then a small, puny

errrr

a longer pause, a deep breath and the final plea flung out to his rooster god for salvation

errrrrrrr000000000000000000000

There is no cock-a-doodle-do about it.

His fellow roosters hear him, near and far, and call out in sympathy and terror, imagining themselves in the jaws of the hungry dogs – mass hysteria throughout the pueblo for a couple of minutes. Then, I guess they fall back to sleep until another wakes in terror and screams into the night.

 ERRRRR….

Eeeerrrr…..eeeerrrrr   

Errrr

errrrrrrr000000000000000000000

There are variations in the pattern. I hear one old guy every night. I imagine that he is quite old because he only has three ERRRRRR’S left in him, and they all sound a little shaky.

ERRR

Long pause

Errr…gasping for breath

Er..r…r.r.r.er

I admit that there are some roosters who don’t actually sound terrified – they actually sound like they’re crowing just for the pure joy of it. I imagine these are the youngest ones – who haven’t been around long enough to be haunted by the terrors that surround them in the night and the fragility of their lives.

Good bye!

By Jim Wheatley
April 7, 2012

     She is seven, almost eight, and she can read. Not bad considering what I’ve seen in some of the schools here. But  this pueblo has better schools than most. She lives in the house across the street from where I’m staying, a tin shack, pitiful really. I’ve been inside. There are three tiny rooms.  I’m not sure how many people live there, 8 to 12, three generations. They do the cooking outside on some rocks.

     The Peace Corps wanted me to catch a couple of kids from the street and test their reading levels. So that is what I’m doing here. And, I notice she smells.  I think how terrible that is and I judge her mother.

     Her mother says “good bye” to me every day. She really means hello but good bye is the only English she knows.

     Later I see mom walking down the street carrying two five gallon buckets of water. And , later I see her again, and then again. I realize then that there is no water in the house and every drop has to be carried home from god knows where, for all those people, to cook, to clean, wash clothes, and flush the toilet. Daily baths are an extravagance. It is Semana Santa (Easter Week) and all of the relatives will be stopping by later and mom is cooking on the rocks. The kid will have her bath, mom is just too busy right now and probably needs to walk back to the water with the buckets again.

She sees me watching from across the street. She waves. “Good bye” she says.

La Música

March 5th 2012

by Jim Wheatley

     It’s a long story, but last night I found myself sitting on the patio at Domingo’s house, playing bachata.

     How did I get there? I had followed the music the day before. He saw me listening from the street and invited me in. People here are like that.

     Domingo is one of those guys you read about in National Geographic or see when someone posts an ultra cool video on youtube. He is the genuine article. He plays an old guitar that is always a little out of tune. Actually it is a piece of crap and can’t actually be tuned. He uses a pencil and string for a capo. But, he has these monster 3 fingered picking chops like nothing I’ve ever heard before. Also, he sings. He sings high, thin and full at the same time, fragile and strong (think Ibrahim Ferrer).  And I’m playing all these bachata licks and we are rocking out and I’m thinking this is incredible, how did I get so freaking lucky, and where in hell did I learn to play bachata? Maybe it is because I’ve heard it nonstop, day and night for 6 weeks.

     The scene is important, too. The house is made of rusty tin and unfinished block. The patio is just a small broken slab of concrete with a partially fallen down roof above. This would constitute a pretty rough barn in Kentucky. Here there are five kids, 4 with clothes on, playing under one dim bulb hanging from a rafter. There is a small TV.

     In the night sky Venus and Mars seem so close the sky looks three dimensional; like you could reach past one and touch the other; like you could almost triangulate yourself and for once understand your position in the universe. But of course you can’t and I digress.

So there we sit, two guys that have absolutely no common experiences. He’s never heard of Kentucky and thinks New York is a country. He has a strong dialect and it is difficult to communicate. But, we really don’t need any of that. We just play the old style bachata, one song after another in the star light, occasionally congratulating ourselves when we know it was a really good one. And, both of us thinking the exact same thing – This is too much fun! 

Water, water everywhere, but....

by Vickie

El Rio

El Tinaco

     So, when it rains here, the river floods, causing the latrines and underground systems to overflow, contaminating the water source. The water that normally runs through the tubes to gigantic black plastic containers on the rooftops- tinacos - is shut off because "El agua esta sucio." (The water is dirty -- and by dirty, they mean full of poop.)
     So, it has been raining for two days.

La Tuberia

     This morning before 6:00, Roberto, Maria's husband was up, had found a guagua-ita (little truck) to haul buckets and 5 gallon containers of water to the house for bathing, cooking, and cleaning. He pulled up and unloaded the water. Gloria - the doña - or female head of the household (his mother-in-law) dragged the water down to the bathroom for us to use for bucket baths and flushing the toilet.
    Flushing the toilet with water is an art form. You need just the right amount of water: too much - a geyser; too little - no results. AND, you have to aim for the hole with just the right amount of force: too much -- a geyser; too little - no results.

Gloria

     While I'm worrying about flushing the toilet, Gloria has made our breakfast, washed up after our breakfast, gotten ready for work - nice dress and heels -- flagged a moto concho and headed off to the campo for work, from 8-12, where she is a teacher supervisor. She'll be home to fix our lunch, clean up after our lunch -- which is the big, hot meal of the day with rice, beans, meat, vegetables, and fruit. Once or twice a week she does our laundry out back with a sort of wringer-washer thing. Then, back to work for the afternoon session which runs from 2-6.
     In the end it's all about the water.
     
   

 
   

Fatalism

by Vickie

     Middle of the afternoon, sol fuerte, close to 90 degrees, hot, humid, grimy. Everything in this city is grimy. Crammed into a guagua with a backpack  and motoconcho helmet on my lap, breathing the unregulated black exhaust from the hundreds of cars, busses, and motorcycles trapped in yet another tapon (traffic jam), sun glaring into my eyes, unable to move. The chofer and cobrador (person who hangs out the door of the guagua calling out the route, jumping off occasionally to round up customers, and making sure everyone pays) arguing vehemently – yes while driving – with lots of arm waving and backwards looks – careening crazily across lanes of traffic, cutting off old men on motoconchos whenever possible and laying on the horn when foiled in the attempt, I suddenly realize my only thought is, “Oh, we’re approaching the overpass. How nice, a few moments of shade.” Really, this isn’t like me. But I was returning from a 4 day trip to a batey.

This is NOT a batey --it's the beach, seen from the bus!

      In the Peace Corps training, we are learning about some cultural tendencies in the Dominican Republic. One of these tendencies is a sense of fatalism. What will be, will be. Si Dios quire. Americans generally don’t have this tendency. We tend to think we are in control of our destinations as well as our destinies. We drive carefully, following traffic laws, and buckling our seatbelts. We plan our trip, short or long, leaving enough time to get there and we expect that we will not be involved in an accident along the way. If we are involved in an accident, we have insurance. Ha! This sort of thinking is not always part of the Domincan psyche – and of course I’m making sweeping generalizations. But, for a moment, I was not thinking about impending accidents, ignoring feelings of suffocation,  certainly not thinking about what was happening to my lungs, just grateful (a Dios- or fate) for a moment’s respite in the shade.

Tim is calling on one of his neighbors.

So, the batey...

Tim has completed one year in the PC.

Fairly typical housing -- way better than the barracks.

     A batey is a something along the lines of a coal mining town in Eastern Kentucky back in the 30s and 40s – a company town, where everything is set up to take advantage of cheap, almost slave, labor. The sugarcane companies built barracks for Haitian workers which were rounded up by their fellow Haitians and basically sold to the sugar bosses, or they were tricked into coming by the empty promise of citizenship in the much richer Republica Dominicana. Barracks are cement structures with rows of homes, actually just windowless rooms about the size of a stable, with openings – no doors. Well who needs a door in this climate?  In these, whole families lived, slept, and cooked, and existed – and still today live, sleep, cook, and exist. The bateys exist only in Cuba and the Dominican Republic and the one we visited seemed to be mostly Dominican – at least no one we met spoke Kreyol – the Haitian language. Maybe because the batey has been around so long the Haitians have integrated and learned Spanish. For a lot more information, try this link:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batey_(sugar_workers'_town)

Tim's home -- Sarah is a nearby volunteer.

     The sugarcane company near Consuelo, where we were, has been gone since 1998. They just shut down the factory and left, leaving behind the workers and a dead town. The company had taken care of everything:  roads, garbage removal, leadership, and maintenance of any and all systems that existed in the town.  When they left no capacity for leadership or understanding of the infrastructure and how to maintain it existed. When the company left, the jobs left, but the people had nowhere to go.

Sarah and Tim and their new wheels--er...ride.

I'm looking at the latrine and thinking.

     We arrived by motochoncho on Thursday, down a dirt road and over a beautiful river – not bad! Then, Tim showed us his house – well shack – made of wood slats, zinc roof, and crumbling cement floor – latrine and bathing structure out back – more wood and zinc. The 13 year old latrine – a cement cylinder about a foot high, and from what I could tell, pretty full, was separated from the “showering” area by a curtain. The shower is a big bucket of water with a smaller bucket inside so you can pour water over yourself – much nicer in the afternoon when the sun has warmed the water.

     I have to say that at the first sight of the latrine my intestines seized up and everything inside solidified. The happy ending involves a Mexican restaurant, free time, cold beer and an indoor toilet with a toilet seat. I hit the Jackpot – so to speak.

Sarah is making tostones by headlamp light!

We were joined for dinner by the student group!

     Again though, very little control over where I sleep, where or what I eat, when the electricity is on or when it is off, when the water flows and when it does not – Oh and when it will rain in torrents, as it did for 2 days while we were there – adding mud, flooded (dirt) streets, and flowing garbage to the mix. Luckily, during the worst of the rain we were visiting three nuns from Canada and Cuba, who spoke a mix of French, Spanish, and English and served us cookies and tea in Winnie the Pooh cups and saucers. !Que suerte!

Computer center that Peace Corps is helping to get established.

     So, limited resources, limited autonomy, limited choices, mixed with the vagaries of nature, and the occasional good luck – fatalism. For me, a small window into the mindset of those who live very close to the edge.

The elementary school across from the computer center

     I didn’t tell you about those in the batey who work from morning until night to maintain their homes and gardens in beautiful, pristine condition, while working, attending church and civic meetings and looking like a million bucks,  never failing to take time to help a neighbor or just to sit and chat. Always, there are those who resist the awful allure of fatalism, and exert what control they can over their corner of the world.

Volunteers and trainees waiting for the guagua.