Carnival

Carnival came to Punta Cana for the first time this year.  It is usually only in February, every Sunday in February to celebrate Dominican independence.  Their actual day of independence is on the 27th of February.  We were hoping to go to the carnival parade in La Vega because that is supposed to be the really elaborate one, but we could not figure out how to get there.  La Vega is four hours away and it would be expensive to get a hotel for everyone.  We also heard a lot of stories about carnival being really scary.  People having jewelry stolen off of their body and getting hit by the performers.  Luckily we found out that carnival was coming to us.  It was definitely a "touristy" carnival because of the location, but it was still amazing.  and we still got hit by the performers with these things that looked like balloons.  Traditionally they are made out of goat stomachs and filled with rocks.  I was hit a multiple times with the "balloons" but it was never too hard.  The parade was awesome, there were so many insane costumes.  Some of them reminded me of mardi gras costumes and some were really abstract.  native american, painted body, bone necklaces, glitter, colors, newspaper costumes.  drums and horns.  the celebration went all the way into the night and a band began to play.  it turned into a concert and everyone was dancing the the street.  fireworks were going off and we started to walk to our friend Henry's house.  he lives a few blocks from where carvinal was held.  we had a cook out at his house, i had grilled corn and a baked potato with salsa.  Henry is randomly an amazing magician.  He did a magic trick for us where he had me pick a card in front of everyone and show everyone while he was turned around.  I put it back in the deck and wrote the card on a napkin, it was the five of diamonds so we wrote "5D".  he was stilled turned around and  he told us to light the napkin on fire and it turned to ashes in an ashtray.  he turned around and picked up some of the ashes and rubbed them on his arm and "5D" appeared on his arm!! another trick he did was someone picked a card, showed us, and put it back in the deck with out Henry looking, then he threw the entire deck against glass door and the correct card appeared on the other side of the glass!!! i really dont know how he did it! I felt like i was watching David Blaine or something.   

Santo Domingo

We took a field trip to Santo Domingo from Monday Feb 18 to Thursday the 21.  Since Heyddy has left us, Colleen came with us.  She knows about the city and she is fluent in spanish.  SHe was our personal translator.  We would have been lost without her.  Our hotel was in the colonial district near the Parque Colon and Alcazar Colon, once the house of Diego Colon, Christopher Columbus' s son.  

On our way to Santo Domingo we stopped at a sugar cane plantation near Higuey.  It was massive, going on for miles in every direction.  We pulled up to a cluster of workers in the field. They were using machetes to cut the sugar cane and filling up a huge cart with oxen hitched to the front.  We drove through the plantation to the small communities where the workers live.  Most of the workers are Haitian who are very uneducated and will most likely spend their whole life working the fields.  They spend their life indebted to the company and basically become indentured servants.  There were 5 workers filling up the cart and they said they receive about 400 pesos to split for the whole cart.  In US dollars they end up making about $2.35 per day.

On Tuesday morning we met with several union leaders and Kathy Fiengold the director of AFL-CIO in the Dominican Republic and Haiti.  It was very personal, just us and the union leaders.  We asked them questions about their work and the conditions of worker in the DOminican Republic.  I was very impressed with their passion.  We actually all were having such an enthralling exchange, we decided to skip going to lunch and order in to the meeting.  We talked a lot about globalization of the world economy and its affects on workers around the world, specifically in the Dominican Republic.  I was loved talking about developing countries and the effects of development on laborers.

After the meeting with union workers, we went to a Macadamia Nut factory called La Loma.  There was an adorable little man from Costa Rico who owned the factory and showed us around.  La Loma makes packaged macadamia nuts, chocolate wafers with macadamia nuts, and their nuts go into the macadamia ice cream flavors in BON! ice cream, a Dominican company.  It is a very small company with only 8 employees and one small machine.  He showed us the process of separating the big ones for packaging and the small ones to make into ice cream or cakes.  The most amazing part of the factory was its environmentally friendly techniques.  The macadamia nut trees are grown in local communities and they are grown organically.  All of the waste products from the nuts are sold for things like mulch and pig food.  Nothing is wasted.  And macadamia nuts contain omega 3 and omega 9! The cute little man gave us all samples.  The amaretto cookie was sooo delicious.  At the end he said he wanted to show us his little tree but he was embarrassed because it was really small.  It was really small but it was adorable, he was the cutest little guy ever.

Jake Kheel's Party

Jake Kheel is the director of the Punta Cana Ecological Foundation.  His grandfather founded the ecological preserve years ago.  He really seems like a "most eligible bachelor" kind of guy.  He is 30, relatively good looking, has money from his family, and makes more while doing a lot of good things for the Punta Cana community. All the girls are always all over him, but i personally don't think he is that interesting or friendly to talk to.  His brother actually decided to have his bachelor party at Jake's house, which is in walking distance from the foundation where we live.  Jake invited us to the party.  I was amazed when I stepped into his house.  It looked like the set of a movie, or something from disney world.  It was not that big but it was so beautifully designed. There was one huge room with gorgeous light green spanish-looking tile floor.  some of the walls were just open to the outside and there was a walkway that was semi-outside surrounded by tropical plants leading to another room that was filled with sand on the floor and hammocks hanging from the ceiling.  to get to the upstairs there was a big winding wooden ramp.  the upstairs was just a platform with no walls, except for the doors to bedrooms. you could look down to the tile room one side and look down to the backyard on the other.  the sand room led to the backyard with an open bar and lots of good food.  there was a live band playing merengue/salsa in the big tile room and everyone was dancing.  We all had an amazing time.  It felt like I was in a party scene from a movie.  i have never been to such a fancy party at someone's house before.  There were definitely a lot of guys there that seemed to have too much money though.  they looked like they eat a lot of meat, drink a lot of beer, party a lot, and are still single, even though they are 30.  There were also supposedly diplomats and other important people at the party.  We felt pretty honored to be at such a swanky party but everyone was very inviting and friendly.  after talking to people at the party i feel like the virginia tech program here is well known and respected.  We are doing great things for the community and we are promoting the ecological foundation with the projects we do.  I am so glad to be here studying and helping people.

Valentine's Day

Definitely one of the best valentine’s days I have ever had.  Valentine’s Day is a big deal in the Dominican Republic, although it is more of a “friendship day” than a "couples’ day" like in America.  A lot of people were wearing pink and red around punta cana village and veron.  People were out and about partying and walking around Veron.  The kids from the barrio in Veron threw a little dance party and invited us.  It was so heart warming, all of the kids came up and hugged us as soon as we got there.  One of the girls from the barrio even made Katherine a valentine’s day card in school.  They set out little trays of homemade cookies and pieces of ham and cheese.  It was a really special occasion for them.  They danced on their makeshift basketball court with music from a stereo.  There was only one light shinning on the court and when they boys had to turn it off to fix the stereo, they showed us into Colleen’s house for light so we wouldn’t get scared.  That made my heart melt; they are so thoughtful.  As soon as they got the music working, they brought us back out.  They were so excited that we were there with them.  They played a lot of reggaeton music, which is very popular in the DR.  They also played current popular American hip-hop songs.  It is amazing that kids living in extreme poverty in this tiny barrio in the Dominican Republic know what songs American kids are currently listening to…now that’s globalization!  They also loved free-styling and a lot of them were amazing dancers. Before we left the kids wanted to perform something for us.  They sang a rap song in Spanish about “putting trash it the right place for the future.”  That was my favorite part of the night.  These people are so genuinely thoughtful, I love hanging out with them.  Everyone had so much fun dancing and singing with each other, celebrating friendship in the barrio with a warm night under the stars.

Veron playground

Tuesday was probably the most rewarding experience of my life.  We worked with a girl from the peace corps to build a playground for kids from Veron.  Veron is basically a collection of barrios (shantytowns).  When we arrived in the barrio it felt unreal.  I had only read about places like this in books and seen them on tv, but nothing could have prepared me for the real thing.  I have always had a passion for helping people around the world and this has reinforced my pursuit of a career in international development.  I had never seen so much trash and dirt in one place in my life, and it is their home.  There is desperation and signs of extreme poverty all around the barrio.  But the children were so happy and playful.  they seemed out of place.  how could people living in these conditions be so full of life?  they enthusiastically helped us as we cleaned out a small abandoned lot to make their play area.  years and years of trash piled up in this one tiny yard. broken glass, plastic, animal feces, syringes, rusty nails, bottles.  tiny kids run around without shoes and play here everyday.  they play with trash because they have no toys.  their parents do not watch them when they go outside to play, even the babies.  

the kids collected a bunch of tires from the dump for us to build with.  we decided to stick some halfway in the ground so they could crawl through them and so water would collect in the bottom and breed mosquitoes since dengue is a huge problem in the Dominican Republic.  We built a bunch of little play things for the kids from the tires and painted the them bright colors.  Two guys from our group built a seesaw.  Other people built benches.  We played basketball with the older kids.  We went around the barrio and picked up trash with some of the kids.  it is literally unbelievable how much trash is everywhere.  there is no waste management so people throw trash anywhere and everywhere.  

there are poor animals everywhere too, especially dogs.  people can barely afford to feed themselves and so the dogs are left with less than nothing.  they all look sick and depressed with their tails between their legs.  they cannot afford to spay or neuter them either and so they are always around.  unfortunately many people abuse the animals.  they kick them and push them around.  there were a few dogs that came over to see what we were doing.  they curled up in dirt piles by a small abandoned building at the edge of the lot.

after a lot of hard work in the Caribbean sun, we had built an area for the little kids to play and they were already playing on the tires.  Colleen's house is right next to the lot and she says that it is now swamped with kids from all over the barrio playing on the colorful tires.

Higuey!

today we took a trip to Higuey, the capital city of the province of La Altagracia, about an hour from Punta Cana.  it is different from every other city i have ever seen.  poverty is visible everywhere.  there are more people riding around on mopeds than cars and there are small disorganized shops everywhere.  there are stray dogs wandering around and sleeping everywhere too. it was so amazing though!  the first thing we did was walk around an open market.  smells of every kind of produce, dirty water, trash, blood, and fresh slaughtered meat. raw meat hanging out and bags of spices, wheat, and corn.  we definitely stuck out as foreigners. people came up to us a few times and asked us if we were from Germany.  Heyddy was with us so she was our tour guide.  next we went to the Basilica de Nuestra Senora ("Basilica of Our Lady") with the famous painting of the Virgin Mary.  the architecture of the cathedral is so strange, the top is a huge arc that is supposed to look like praying hands.  the inside is more traditional and there are stairs to walk up and look at the famous picture of Mary.  from the basilica there is a pathway to the old church in the city.  we followed it and there were random bridges along the way.  there was a small Dominican boy that took a picture with us and someone gave him a little bit of money so he followed us all the way to the old church.  a policeman kept twisting his ear and telling him to stop begging but he kept coming back.  he was so cute.  we ate lunch at Pollo Victorias, a kind of dominican chicken fast food place.  our last stop was a supermarket kind of store.  the store was pretty big and also sold clothes, shoes, and random things, kind of like a walmart.  so many new amazing sights and smells today! 

class on the beach

this morning we had class discussion on the beach.  we talked about the documentary !Salud! that we all watched last night.  it was about the Cuban healthcare system.  Cuban doctors travel to poor areas in other countries where the doctors there do not want to go.  In America people treat healthcare like a commodity and patients like customers.  In Cuba they teach people how to live healthy lives instead of just treating illness after it has manifested.  The doctors actually go door to door to make sure that kids have had their vaccines and teach exercise classes to promote complete healthy lifestyles.  People, especially in America, want to eat whatever they want and not exercise today without thinking about how it will affect them tomorrow.  They think that if they get sick, they just have to go to the doctor and he will "fix" them.  People in poorer countries may not have access to nutritional food or education about hygiene and exercise.  Health needs to be maintained, there is no "quick fix."  Doctors can be selfish because some are only practicing medicine for the money.  They won't go into poor areas because people cannot afford to pay them.  Cuban doctors went into Honduras to help these poor people but the Honduran doctors actually protested their mission.  The Honduran doctors had no shame is saying that they would rather live in the city in  a big house than help the people who need medical attention.  Health is a basic human right like food and water, without it we would die.  If the government exists to serve and protect its people, shouldn't it take care of them when they are hurt or sick?