O.K., we love it here on the north coast of the DR. It seems that we have a different adventure unfold amost every day. And almost always it's a "pinch me, I can't believe I'm here moment". But to be honest there are some things here that are difficult.
#1 Poverty - while many Dominicans are really poor, at least by US standards, they are very happy. Seeing these truly happy people (both kids and adults) makes me sick about how materialistic we really are. Matt and I have given up almost all our possessions to live this life style, yet comparing what we own to what most Dominicans own makes us seem very wealthy. But as long as a Dominican family has a home (no matter how crowded) and food and clothing, they seem very happy. However there are many Dominicans and even more Haitians in this area that don't have enough to eat, or clothing for their kids. On my way to yoga I pass by the home of a Haitian family. The kids (not sure if there are two or three) are usually naked; The mother, father and the kids sit and stare as I walk by. The mother is pregnant again.
#2 Education - during the short amount of time I've been helping teach English at the local school, I can truly see how much Dominican education is lacking. There are private schools around, but obviously many can't afford these. The local schools that I've seen are one room school houses with three or four grades of kids at each session. Unfortunately each sessions is only three hours I believe the "high school" level goes to school in the early morning, then the third to fifth grade kids go to school from 9:00 to noon. In the afternoon, after the siesta, the littlest kids go to school\. So hard to learn much with just a three hour \school day. And then with several grades in the same room, it's difficult to teach to individual levels. The kids wear uniforms to school each day, and in the class I help with there is usually only one boy who breaks the rules and wears whatever shirt is handy. And that boy is the son of the teacher The last two days at school I've taught, there has been a very young boy of about five years of age, hanging around the classroom. The teacher isn't working with him to help him learn anything, she just lets him wander. Today I gave him some papers to color; otherwise he would have just been causing a distraction. Then today during class a boy of about 14 just walked into the classroom He wasn't there to learn, seems he just showed up to try and drum up a conversation.....and disturb the class. One of my favorite kids is Juan Raphael. He's the oldest in the school, and should have moved up to another class by now. Lynn, the English teacher I help, thinks he's smart but maybe a little lazy because he doesn't put out much effort.; But I've noticed he does know the practical things better than most of the kids. He knows colors and numbers in English really well. And we played a dice game the other day in school to help learn numbers in English, and he adds up the dice much quicker than the other kids. I have ridden horses several times with Franklin, and Juan Raphael is Franklin's cousin. I was talking to Franklin about Juan Raphael one day and Franklin told me that it's very important that Juan Raphael "learn English so he can hook up with an American woman". This leads me to my next dislike.....
#3 Prostitution - At first Matt and I were disgusted by the men in their 60's or older proudly walking around town with a 20 year old holding their hand. But we've come to understand that it's just a way to survive for some women. They're not drug addicts, they're just poor and have no other work available to them. Some have children and only come to the tourist areas a couple of months a year to earn enough money to care for their kids What's sad is how so many of these men think this is such a romance. They often bring the girl to stay with them during their vacation, take her out to dinner, horseback riding, whatever the guys do the girls do. It's like the geekiest guy in high school gets to take a cheerleader to the prom. Same goes for the guys, only not to the same degree There are a lot of young men here who would gladly entertain a woman....no matter her age......but for a price. There are also a lot of Dominican men and women whoes main goal is to marry a wealthy tourist.....although the tourist doesn't need to be that wealthy just have more money than the Dominican.
#4 Dogs - Way too many homeless dogs here. There are a lot of beach dogs that seem to take up residence at restaurants at the beach. The same dog or two is there all the time and they run off any other dogs...that's therir place. These dogs are well fed. The ones on the streets and Dominican villages aren't. There are always a ton of little skinny pups on the street. Often they have a bad leg...probably from a run in with a motor cycle.
#5 Driving - It's awful. No way around it, Dominicans seem to be terrible drivers. The roads are two lanes, so you would think one car coming and one car going at the same time. Not in the DR. It's not uncommon to see a car passing a motorcycle, while another car is passing the first car, and they are all heading straight for another car of motor cycle. Also when you step into a road, you generally look to your left to make sure something isn't coming, right? Well, here you always look both ways because just as likely as not a motor cycle will be driving on the wrong side of the road headed right for you. The main strip of shops in Cabarete is maybe one mile long. In 2012 there were 28 fatalities in that one mile and a lot of them were pedestrians.
#6 Icky Things - Skip this part if you're squeamish, It is tropical here and things never freeze. So bacteria and other things can thrive. It seems most people get sick at some point. I got the "stomach" thing for two days after we'd been here about two weeks. Matt, who generally has a very sensitive stomach, has yet to have a problem - but he's about the only one I've run into who's been here a while with no problems. Seems like the evil amoeba is often the culprit. Our friend David hadn't been feeling well since Christmas. He took a sample of you know what to the local doctor, she sends it to the lab and the next day he gets his results. The amoeba and E-coli. The doctor has a little room in the back of her office with two beds that she uses for treatments. She hooked David up to an i.v. drip of a good antibiotic and he was good as new after a few days. Bob who has been our neighbor for the month of January, got sick about two weeks into his stay. Bea took him to the clinic in Sosua and he had an amoeba. He got to spend two nights of his vacation in the hospital. The doctor told him that it's pretty much unavoidable here, you can expect to get sick every six months -- but usually not to the degree you would need such serious treatment.
Then there are the crawly things. The DR has no poisonous snakes or insects....so that's good. I have never even seen any type of snake here. And we have never seen a bug in our condo other than ants....but they are hard to keep out anywhere, I do think I got a spider bite my first week here. At first I thought it was an infected mosquito bite, but a nurse friend looked at it and she said this was no mosquito bite. It was pretty nasty for about a week, but all better now. Then there was our recent ordeal with another type of crawly....a rat. Matt always has bananas here and he liked to keep them out on our patio so they wouldn't attract ants; We noticed that something was getting into his bananas at night. Since we live on the second floor, we thought it must be a little bird pecking at them. So Matt brought the bananas inside......well since it WASN'T a bird after all, the little bastard decided to come in and get his bananas. He chewed a hole through a screen. We saw him one evening and he ran into the spare bedroom. We shut the door to the bedroom thinking we'd get Benni the gardener to take care of it the next day. Well, the next day it had escaped by chewing a hole through the screen in the bedroom. The next morning, Herm and I were up early and Herm started going crazy, sniffing around Well another hole was chewed in the screen and Matt's bananas had been chewed on. This time we said to send out the cavalry, we wanted this thing gone. We baited a glue trap with cheese and two hours later the cheese was gone and the glue trap was torn apart. They brought a trap baited with a hot dog. The rat ate the hot dog and got out of the trap. We put out some packets of poison corn, and they disappeared so we assumed they were eateon but we couldn't find the body. Finally Jose Luis the property manager came in with a small ball bat and Matilda the housekeeper came in with an umbrella. They found it and beat it to death. OK by me, at least he's gone. But now Matt is afraid to keep bananas in the apartment.
And now the worst, I'm not going into detail, but a dog with a screw worm infestation showed up at the condo a few days ago. YUCK! Poor thing; Luckily it's easily treated. A very kind hearted young woman staying at our condo took him to Judy's Pet Lodge (a no kill shelter in Sosua) and they accepted him. They give him a pill that kills all parasites on his body and then just keep the "areas" clean so they can heal. While they were at it they also neutered him, so hopefully he'll find a good home.
Now, please don't think we aren't incredibly happy here. All the things above or just a trade off for the beautiful place we are calling home for five months. We love the beaches and the mountains. We love the friendly people and having dnner at Cabarete beach with our feet in the sand. We love sitting around the pool at night with new friends. We have met so many kind people who see the poverty here and try to do what they can. Like our friends David and Louise who take chicken, rice and beans to the Haitian family. Like the musician who works in the states three or four months of the year year, so he can follow his passion the rest of the year --- which is to bring water purificatin systems to the most remote and poor villages. We love our friend Lynn who volunteers her time, talent and experience to teach these kids English. And then there is the Mariposa Society that recognizes the need to educate Dominican girls so they can have the skills to work in a good paying job that will support their family without turning to prostitution. I'm amazed that Judy's Pet Lodge can continue to accept homeless dogs. And I'm thrilled that teams of veterinarians regularly come to the DR to spay and neuter as many animals as possible. There are also volunteers that find the dogs who need this surgery and then transport them to the clinic and deliver them back to the Dominican family they came from....or if no family back to the street. There are also volunteers who track these dogs and give them monthly treatments for ticks, fleas and parasites.
So hopefully, some of these not so good things will not always be such an awful problem
From start to who knows what. This will be a blog following our preparation and eventual departure on our retirement to the Caribean, Mexico and beyond.
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