Local Flavor

What is uniquely Dominican?
What do we miss most?
What are we the most glad to have gotten away from?

Phoebe here: Through this unique experience we are learning more and more about love. There is love and compassion for every human being in the DR. There is so much grace in their love that indirect communication is the norm, not to be rude, but to be considerate. The action of love is even more shocking then the emotion of love. For example, even the town “loco’s” are taken in, given coffee and sometimes food. We have been living from a primarily ego-centric society and now have come to a strongly eco-centric society and within this assimilation comes a fuerte love. It has been awkward at times. For example, we noticed in our host family in Constanza, we ate first and then whatever leftovers we didn’t eat always went to the children of our host brother. It took us a few weeks of eating the food on the table to notice that the kids always dropped in after meal times looking hungrily for leftovers.

Dan here: We are wanting to come from an appreciative lens with this information. Presenting some of our experiences and perceptions could be perceived as stereotyping, which is what I’d like to avoid. What I’d like you to keep in mind while reading this is that not all Dominicans are a certain way, not all Dominicans think in a certain way and in many ways the culture is evolving. I am also likely missing something, like usual, so keep the questions coming.

What is uniquely Dominican?
We left our host family in Santo Domingo for five weeks and our Dona rented a space in her courtyard to a guy who had been selling empanadas, fried chicken and chicharonnes from a cart across the street. Within five short weeks, he built a space where you can now sit and drink beer, a coke and chill out with you’re greasy food. His shop stays open late so folks leaving from the bar half a block away can come down and grab a bite. I’m not 100% certain where he gets his electricity, however I’m pretty sure his electricity is flojo, aka, he’s stealing it from the lines. It’s also unlikely that he needed to get a license, go through any type of zoning process or what not to be able to sell food or liquor. I’m sure all he had to do was sign a rental agreement with my Dona here and viola, instant restaurante. Pretty wildly cool, entrepreneurial and driven to make this happen. My Dona is now collecting rent and her new tenant has a great location for his business. I also didn’t participate in the weeks or possibly months of negotiation for this new business nor do I have all the information from my host mom.

The style of clothing is very unique…guys wear bedazzled shirts, jeans and hats. Let me clarify, often times the butt pockets are bedazzled on guys jeans and their hats are wild. If I wore pants like this in the states I think it would be a spectacle. We’ll see, maybe I’ll pick up a pair. The hats are like plastic on the top front part and mesh on the back. Some of the hats are bedazzled too. My host brother in Constanza wore a bedazzled hat with a New Orleans Saints logo. Women tend to wear tight clothing, lots of colors, bedazzled jeans, yellow, pink, neon blue, white, black jeans, heels, and are generally very stylie and matching from nails to ear rings, pants, heels, and shirts.

Dinstinclty Dominican: Fitting five people on a motorcycle (motoconcho). This includes babies, toddlers and grandma. People fit all sorts of stuff on motoconchos because it tends to be the primary form of transportation. For example, people will carry propane tanks, groceries, cakes, 2 x 4’s, tools, concrete blocks, and other random stuff. Phoebe and I recently rode on a motoconcho: The driver had my computer bag on the steering column, Phoebe had her bag strapped on her left and I was wearing Phoebe’s backpack and sitting on the back of the moto and squeezing onto Phoebe for dear life. Think we looked funny, just imagine that we were also wearing our Peace Corps issued helmets while sitting on the back of the moto. Our driver was a 60ish year old man wearing a Yankees ball cap.

Throwing toilet paper in the trash, not in the toilet. This took a while for me to get used to and I have made the mistake of tossing a couple wads in the water (oops). This probably isn’t distinctly Dominican, more developing world.

Throwing trash in the street and not in the trash. Trash is just generally all over the place. It’s on the beaches, in the street, on the sidewalks, in the rivers, streams and hillsides. Our new host family piles the garbage in their back yard. Most Dominican’s don’t see this as an issue and part of my cultural immersion process may bring me to the point of throwing my trash on the ground. I’ve definitely considered it.

Loud music everywhere, often and all times of the day…trucks driving around with blaring speakers trying to get people to come to their restaurant, bar, party, dance or show. Today on my walk home in the capital, a car blaring music drove by and set off the car alarm of a car parked nearby.

Food: plantains, coffee, fried cheese, rice, beans and lots of oil. It’s pretty darn good food and I think I’m packing on the pounds. I miss my Good Food Store peanuts and raisins, granola, and dried fruit. There is access to fruits and veggies, but they’re pretty spendy and their prices vary depending on the season.

Miss most: talking to family and friends on a regular basis. Familiarity of “Americanness” whatever that means…I guess it means being able to drive and know with almost 100% certainty that there will not be a pothole in the highway, a red light means red and the lines on the road delineate the number of traffic lanes (not the case here). “Americanness,” might be a new cultural term, knowing that you can drink tap water or flush toilet paper down the toilet. (where does that tp go in the states by the way?) Knowing what is expensive, middle of the road and what is a fairly good price to pay for food, travel, clothing, etc. That value of money and cost of products barometer hasn’t completely set in yet. I struggle with this more so than anything. I don’t want to be seen as a tourist or a volunteer tourist who comes in and can be taken advantage of by the community. Although, I’m I want to be seen as a part of the community and be friends. If my buddy gives me a ride to the airport, I don’t tend to pay him. Living in a poorer community where my neighbor is my friend and makes money by giving rides to people; I pay him a fair price. Asking what price is fair is difficult too because just about everyone assumes that we have money, are here for a short time, and well, this just takes time to figure out. I’m also finding that a fighter with the taxi drivers and money collectors. I’ll argue the price down from 300 pesos to 200 pesos for a taxi, and five pesos to me is measurable because that’s my skim ice on the public transport.

We miss our family and friends, mixed green salad, yoga class, our Jetta, and having a decent conversation on the phone without the internet cutting out.

Glad to have left behind: eh…rigid expectations for time…although we never were very good at that…think we’d rather spend time with people than stick to a routine schedule anyway. Speaking in another language a majority of the time is difficult and learning to really express ourselves clearly and thoroughly in Spanish is difficult.

That's all for now. Phoebes and I are swearing in tomorrow and will officially be Peace Corps Volunteers!! Then we head to Creole Training for a week!! Love you. Checking out with love, excitement, joy.