Christmas, Classes, Canal, Cholera?

(from Monday 10/25/10 and Tuesday 10/26/10)

No worries - just a long update...in that order.

I have been shivering on and off all day at school, wearing long jeans, and even made tea to warm up this morning. The temperature’s dropping, there’s a cool breeze this afternoon, and it’s one of the coldest days I’ve had here. So chilly, that I figured it must be about 60 degrees outside. Though just now weather.com tells me it is only but a brisk 86º F in Mao. And I am freezing. Really? Most New Englanders are supposed to be a little heartier than this. Entonces, catching colds in 80º weather - looks like that’s where I am now. I’m going home for Christmas though, so Winter, please have mercy.

Speaking of Christmas, it’s Christmastime in the DR. Actually, it has been Christmas since about the beginning of October. There are Christmas decorations everywhere - colored lights, fake Christmas trees, wire reindeer, plastic snowmen, those little village sets with the snow on the roofs...you name it, it’s here. Recently, in La Sirena (Target/Walmart-like store), “Feliz Navidad” was playing over and over and over... And I thought that we started Christmas early in the States. Normally, I feel bad when holidays are skipped over but, I am in complete favor of the early Christmas movement. It makes sense here - there’s no Thanksgiving, and Halloween without the trick-or-treating and costumes isn’t really Halloween, so why not start Christmas in October? I like it.

My neighbor is ready for Christmas

Art of one of my students in English

The school's tree all set up - October 28.

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Something else that’s been going on in October (besides decorating for Navidad) - English classes. Still a lot of students at the culture center, and still people asking to inscribir and sign up, with only a few weeks left. This session will finish at the end of November, before Thanksgiving, since after that things are busier with Peace Corps stuff. It’s been fun, though and interesting - just yesterday I translated a Spanish love letter a student’s writing to someone in the States. It was sweet. Not so sure that my basic English class is the best place to learn to write fancy love poetry...but still, too cute, right?

Then at the school in the mornings, I’ve been working one-on-one with some students who need extra practice in computers. Right now its a group ranging in age from 8-16, and mostly, we’re working on identifying letters and spelling their names on the keyboard. Once they write their names on the screen, we do questions such as “How many J’s are in your name?” etc. to practicing counting and remembering which letter is which. In general, mostly everyone recognizes the letters of their names, but the letters they don’t use as often are more difficult to identify. Today I was working with one boy typing out all the letters of the alphabet, trying to get him to say the letters and recognize them on the keyboard. “What letter comes after Q?” We eventually decide it’s “R” and he starts looking for “R” on the keyboard. “R is not here,” he says. “Don’t worry, R is definitely there.” “What does “R” look like?” he asks. We draw “R.” He looks again. “R is here!” Exito.

So I’m at the school all morning, at the culture center most afternoons - but one place I haven’t been a lot lately is with my old neighbors. But the days I’m able to go back and visit in my old barrio are my favorite days. I cook something with a neighbor, bring the dish around for the other neighbors to sample and probar, and hang out with all the kids. It’s nice because there everyone knows me, I don’t have to listen to anyone hissing at me or calling me dumb names like rubia/Americana/America/linda/mi amor/preciosa/princesa etc, etc, etc, for infinity. One day while visiting, out of the blue, Jose Miguel, he’s one year old and Simon’s baby brother, said my name without anyone provoking or teaching it to him. I was about to walk home and then heard a little voice yell “Emma!” I turned around and there’s the youngest Jose (every male in their family is Jose) standing at the gate. I was shocked, because he’s just a baby, but kids are smart and he knows. I tried to get him to say it again with no success - he stood there silent and smiling.

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Here are some photos from a French exhibition at the cultural center (where I teach English) one evening. My friend, a volunteer from France who’s here for 2 years in a program similar to Peace Corps, set it up. Its about the moon and Tin Tin, a character from French books. I’ve heard of Tin Tin, but always thought he was called Rin Tin Tin. (He’s not; it’s just Tin Tin without the Rin). Anyway, here’s the exhibit of Tin Tin, really cute, and even featured a meteorite that was found in Jarabacoa in the 1960’s/1970’s.

Meteorite!

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The days are busy and are going by way too quickly, so I run when there’s time which is usually in the late afternoon or early morning. More often than not - in the morning so I see a lot of sunrises. :) Here are some photos of a canal trail where I run - on occasion, bringing a camera along, ya tu sabes.

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One final note, because of the cholera outbreak in Haiti, all volunteers are consolidating for an info. session in the capital later this week. Any 90‘s kid like me who has played Oregon Trail is aware of cholera as a deadly disease, but hundreds of people are actually dying of this seemingly “old-fashioned” illness. And its awful, because with access to clean water, it wouldn’t be happening at all. Cholera is a waterborne illness, meaning you get it from contaminated water or food that hasn’t been washed/prepared properly...and yes, I recently learned that. I read one report that blames the current epidemic in Haiti on a contaminated river, which after thinking about it, I can imagine how it got that way.

I don’t know about Haiti, since I’ve never been there, but here on the eastern half of this island, people throw trash away literally wherever they want to. There is zero shame in throwing a single empty plastic cup on the ground, or a whole garbage bag of trash. And a river is a perfect place to do both - you toss in your garbage, the water carries it away, you don’t have to see it ever again. Problem solved, at least temporarily. The pretty canal pictures above? Yup, I’ve seen people throw their trash right into those waters - the same water where I’ve also witnessed people bathing/swimming in further downstream, and since its a canal - the same waters that I assume irrigate their fields. So a contaminated river isn’t hard to imagine. And then access to clean water isn’t exactly universal - you can’t turn on the tap and have drinkable water. For clean water, you have to buy a botellon (big blue bottle) of water from a store for 35-40 pesos (about a dollar), which isn’t a lot of money, but for someone it might be, and what if you don’t have the money that day? Or what if there aren’t any botellons available to buy when you need it? That happened to me yesterday, which doesn’t really matter for me, since I’m just one person and can get it later today, but what if it were a family that needed it? So with trash thrown out wherever, polluted natural rivers, and filtered water available - but at a price, clean water is an issue in the DR, and I can only imagine how it is in Haiti where conditions are already strenuous without life-threatening illnesses added to it.

Whew, this was a long entry... Thanks for reading. Have a safe Halloween! All’s well here - see you at Christmas. Take care.

Peace,

XO