Hiking LaSoufriere Volcano

On Sunday, my family hiked LaSoufriere--St. Vincent's active volcano.

(Volcano in the distance!)

Up until this point, the sun had been elusive, and with the exception of a brief appearance on Saturday, it had been raining everyday.

(View from my uncle's house.)

(My grandfather's house.)

Sunday was no exception and my grandfather, the worrier of the family, almost canceled our trip.

(After the heavy rains, this is dirty river water rushing into the sea.  This picture is from the Windward side of the island, where my father is from.)'

Thankfully, my family is pretty tough and we plodded on, in spite of the rain.

(My uncle works for the Board of Tourism and was the one who spearheaded having these log "steps" put in, to facilitate hiking the volcano.)

As a result, it was pretty foggy and cold, but it was good hiking weather.

It was also very wet, but like I said, we are troopers and we pressed on!

Unfortunately, once we reached the summit, the winds were so strong that hiking became dangerous.  There was no way for us to safely look over the edge of the volcano into the crater, without getting blown over.

(Hiking up through gravel at the summit.  These are my two hiking buddies, who had to help me more than once.)

Instead, we stopped about 5 yards short of the crater, before hiking back down again.

Then, we spent the next 5 days trying to walk normally and ignoring our aching muscles.  Thank goodness for the beach.

(I love you, beach, but seriously, I've never swam in rain so much in my life.)

Asking a Girl Out: How to Avoid Getting Hustled By a 10 Year Old

“I’ve got a secret,” my cousin announced, distracted.

I was walking around my grandfather’s front yard, sipping my breakfast mug of Milo, while my 10-year old cousin, Mark, hit a ball around me with his cricket bat.

“There’s a boy who likes you,” he continued.

 “Oh, yeah.  Who’s that?,” I asked him, intrigued.

“His name begins with a D,” I was informed.

I had no idea who my cousin could be referencing, since the only people I had met were on our weekend hike up the volcano.  Not only were most of them babies (ages 19-21), but none of them had a name that began with a  “D.”

“Give me another clue,” I prompted him.

“He plays dominos with Daddy and Grandpa,” Mark told me.  “It’s David!”

On Saturday night, my Grandfather had hosted the weekly domino game as his house.  Several men—none of whom I knew—crowded into the downstairs of my grandfather’s house.  As dominos slammed loudly, though, I was having stomach cramps (there will be no more bragging about drinking tap water and eating street food, thank you very much) and I was in the kitchen making some hot tea.

Since the kitchen is in close proximity to where the men were playing in the dining room, when Mark came in and announced, “David is going to lose!,” I indulged him.

I let Mark carry me by the hand into the dining room, before loudly asking, “So, which one is David?”  Then, I smiled at the unfortunate victim—some non-descript Indian guy--and said to my cousin,

“Why don’t you go help him, so that he won’t lose?”

Save for a second trip to the kitchen—this time when it was much later and I was wearing boxers and an oversized Yankees t-shirt inherited from a college boyfriend—this was my only interaction with David.

Fortunately, the story got better.

After telling me that David wanted to know my name, in order to friend me on Facebook, my cousin proudly declared,

“Now David owes me $10!  Yes!”

“Did you charge David money to relay the message to me?,” I asked him.

“Yes.  I made him pay me $10,” he told me.

Ha!  Don’t kid yourself about Indians being natural businesspeople.

I was both amused and appalled, so I did something that I shouldn’t have.  I told my mother and one of my older, female cousins about Mark hustling this poor schmuck.

Well, news spread like wildfire and before I knew it, everyone in my family was making jokes about David.  My mother forced me to tell several other family members about my little extortionist cousin’s slick move, and after finding out that David is a trained pastry chef from one of the best resorts on the island, my uncle asked me to ask him to make me a cheesecake.

“Make sure it’s big enough for the whole family,” Mark’s older sister chimed in.

I think that the jokes that David is going to have to endure from his domino partners will be humiliating enough, without me calling in favors for desserts.  Still, when I told my little cousin to just tell David to call me if he wants to “befriend” me, I added my own entrepreneurial stipulation.

“And, make sure you charge him another $10 to deliver my message.”

I’d hate to discourage a kid with so much potential.

The Baby Daddy Story

Her voice was just like my grandmother’s, but her face was darker and more wrinkled.  She was sitting in a plastic lawn chair when my uncle’s jeep made its steep ascent to the top of the hill where she lived.

“Is she going to recognize your vehicle?,” my mom asked my uncle.

“Yeah, she knows it’s me,” he replied, before shouting her name.

The last time that I saw my great-aunt, I was a kid.  She was wiry and tough and had scooped my 100 pound body up into her arms to prove her strength.   Now, she was old and ill.  She didn’t know me, but I introduced myself, kissed her cheek, and accepted her invitation to sit in the plastic chair next to her.

As is very common in this country, we had paid her a visit unannounced.  My mom (the “rich” foreigner) brought money, and we showed up at her house with the intention of making old talk (talking about the “good old days”) and inquiring about her health.

After several minutes of basic conversation, she turned to me and said,

“So, you’re the one who should have gotten married.”

This country is a small place, and she lives in the same village as much of Rich’s family.  None of this was unexpected.

Even if she hadn’t have been from the same place, I knew that what happened last summer was huge gossip around the world.  Word spread like wildfire through Canada, England, the Caribbean, and the US, as our international guests had to be notified that wedding was called off.  The jeweler’s rich son who was marrying the smart, American medical student was big news when we got engaged.  The fact that it never happened was even bigger.

“You know, I saw that white girl he was dating,” she continued, referring Rich’s first ex-fiance.  “I saw her in church and I came home and told my husband that that girl looked pregnant.”

She looked at me, as if waiting for a reply.

“Then, another time in church, his [Rich’s] mother was talking and she started crying.  Hard.  We had to wait.  Then, when she stopped, she looked at him and said, ‘I’m sorry, Rich.’  She looked like she felt guilty.”

“What was she talking about when she started crying?,” my mother interjected, intrigued.

The answer wasn’t clear, but my great-aunt paused again, as if waiting for confirmation from me.

“No, I don’t think that she was pregnant,” my uncle chimed in.

As she continued talking and pausing, and looking in my direction, I said nothing.

I know how these things works.  In the old country, people love to “commess” (gossip).  She had likely heard Rich’s family’s version of why our wedding was called off.  Now that I was in the country, sitting on her front porch, she wanted the breakup story directly from me—and maybe a little more.

When we got into the car, my uncle said to me,

“She definitely knows something.  But, did you notice that she dropped just enough of the story to get you to answer?  She wanted you to fill in the details.”

“Yeah, but I’m not stupid,” I told him.  “When people start gossiping, it’s smart to listen to as much as you can and not open your mouth.”

Besides, if there was truth to the story about Rich’s first ex-fiance—a homely redhead from California—being pregnant, this wasn’t the first I’d have heard.

Several years before Rich and I started dating, my family ran into Rich’s family when vacationing one summer.  He had brought his girlfriend down to the Caribbean with him and when the wind whipped up the flowy sarong covering her bikini, it revealed a belly that looked very…pregnant.  I remember my sister and I looking at each other and sharing a silent, “Oh, crap!” look.

I would have forgotten about this incident, but a few months later, when Rich’s sister (whom I was friends with) was glibly telling me something about going to California to visit the girlfriend, she stopped short, catching herself.  She refused to continue and I never really ascertained the purpose of the visit to California.  I remember surmising that, based on something she said, it was probably related to an abortion or losing the pregnancy, but again, it was just stupid, idle speculation about some guy that I didn’t even know.  At the time, it was just commess.
I did ask Rich about it once when we were dating, but he claimed that he had never even slept with his California girlfriend.  (Good Adventists, you know.)

Now that my elderly, almost stranger great-aunt was sitting on her porch mentioning a pregnancy that I thought only my sister and I had had speculations about, I couldn’t help wondering.

“Something definitely happened,” my uncle told me in the car.  “Those old people don’t make up stories like that.  She’s close with that family and she knows something.  I don’t know what, but she wanted you to talk.”

It’s of absolutely no consequence now, of course, except to prove that Rich lied about fathering some bastard child with the woman he was dating before me.  But, you’d better believe that I told my mother (who will be here for an additional two weeks longer than me),

“If you have a chance to find out from Auntie what really happened, do it.”

And, without missing a beat, my mother responded,

“Oh, I’m definitely going back.  And, I’m taking a gift to bribe her.”

Tap Water, Street Food, and Other Things to Make You Sick

Well, I'm here in St. Vincent.  (And, I have wireless internet when I'm at my uncle's house...woo!)

On the way to the beach, my cousin asked my uncle if we could buy coconuts from a roadside stand.  He agreed, but I think everyone forgot, until we were sitting in our wet, salty suits on the way back home.

"Aren't we getting coconuts?," she reminded him.

Then, as my uncle picked which coconuts he wanted, my cousins yelled commands of what else they wanted through the open car windows.

"Roasted corn!"
"Sugarcakes!"
"Dad!  Did you get me any sugarcakes?"

And, just like that, I was consuming mass amounts of street food and sipping from a water bottle filled with tap water.  Ha!  Pretty much the opposite of the Dominican Republic.

Granted, there isn't a cholera epidemic in St. Vincent and my uncles are more relaxed than my aunts.  The uncle buying us street food may be my aunt and mom's brother, but he didn't once mention "danger" or "safety."  He also let my little cousins eat sugarcakes right before they went home and got dinner.

I have no pictures to show for my day, because it started out more emotional than I hoped it would.  The last time that I was in St. Vincent was with Rich.  It suddenly occurred to me how small our world really was.

I could see his parents' house as my plane landed; saw his sister's wedding invitation in my grandfather's house, and shuddered at the thought that my cousins and I were going to the same beach this afternoon that Rich and I used to go to everyday on vacation.  Instead of snapping photos of roasting breadfruit, the waves at the beach, or the roadside stand where we bought snacks, I spent the day feeling overheated, headachey, and distracted.  Despite the problems that I write about here, I really want my mom here and I kind of can't wait for her flight to get in tonight.

I was just starting to feel better tonight, after taking a hot shower, and playing with the two puppies that my little cousins have.  After all, how can you not feel better with street food, hot showers, and puppies?

Then, my uncle walked into the house and said,

"Red, you won't believe who I just ran into at the fish market!"

I immediately blurted out,  "Rich?"

He laughed and then said,

"No, but good guess."

Instead, he ran into my father.  This would be the same father that disowned my sister and I, caused us a great deal of financial hardship, and whom I have not seen in 15 years.

"I didn't recognize him at first," he said.  "But, he came up to me and started talking.  I didn't tell him you were here."

Well, thank heavens for that.

Between Rich's ubiquitous family around and now my own estranged father being on the same tiny island, things could get interesting.  I made my uncle promise not to tell my sister, because make no mistake, she would change her Saturday flight and cancel her vacation if she knew that running into my father would be a possibility.

All I need is to see Rich tomorrow at church and my world will be complete.

This is How Single People End Up Bitter & Jaded

(I am posting this from the Antigua airport, where I have free Wifi!  Woo!  Thank you, Antigua.  Now, please don’t give my computer a virus.)

I knew something was wrong when he hadn’t called.  It was 8:00 p.m. after all, and at 6:10 p.m., he had said that he would be home in “10 minutes” and then be heading over to pick me up right afterwards.

I played it cool in front of my aunt, saying that he was probably being a typical Dominican man who takes long to get ready, but behind the closed door of my bedroom, I was brooding.  I knew that he was going to stand me up.

I guess that this was partially my fault anyway.  Richard was just some random guy that I met in the same bar with Eduardo and my cousin on Saturday night.  Telling my aunt and uncle that he was my “cousin’s friend,” was a gross exaggeration of his relationship with anyone in my family, but a necessary untruth to solicit agreement for him to pick me up from the house.

When my cousin surprisingly came home at 8:10 p.m., I followed him into his room and closed the door behind us.  With him as my confidant, I whispered (so that my aunt wouldn’t hear),

“What the HELL?  This guy says that he can’t come anymore and that he’s out of money because his dad is having surgery tomorrow.”

My cousin gave me his signature smirk.

--

In the midst of the highly talked about date in the house (Red Stethoscope almost done had herself a Dominican novio, you guys!), I was also dealing with a dramatic nightmare involving American Airlines.

If you remember here, I bragged about how I was going to use my honeymoon credit from last summer to finance my summer travels.  It would be cathartic and bittersweet and a symbolic middle finger in Rich’s direction.  However, when I tried to book my return ticket to the US, I found out that my flight credit had expired.  Two days earlier.

I am nothing if not tenacious, though, so after talking to multiple people in the US and out of it, I finally got a response to an email that I sent to Customer Relations.  They had extended the expiration date and given me an e-voucher. 

When I tried to use the e-voucher online, though, the website said that you had to call the US Reservations line.  Which I couldn’t access from Santo Domingo.  This led to a frantic phone call to my sister in the States, her wasting 45 minutes on hold, and my reservation expiring because it got past midnight.  The next day, I put a different flight on hold and called Reservations in Santo Domingo.  This time, I was told that I had to go in person to an American Airlines ticket counter before the end of the day.  Except…one cousin was at work, the other cousin was at school, and my uncle was at one his churches.

Ack!

I was stranded at home with no car.  But, I had a date with Richard.

“Richard’s not going to fuss if I tell him that we have to make a pit stop on our way out,” I confidently told my aunt.

This was the same man, after all, who had been thoughtfully calling me for the past two days. Just the night before, as I sat on the floor in my cousin’s room at 1 a.m., he had called to ask what time I was getting up the next morning.  At 8:30 a.m., when the sun was already too bright and I was only lazily stirring, he had called from his desk at work to say good morning.  I was completely confident that when he said that he wanted to see me before I left, he meant it.

--

“I need to get to this American Airlines counter before 9 p.m.,” I told my cousin.  “Can you take me, or can I borrow the car?”

“If you can drive stick, take the car and go,” he told me.

Since I haven’t driven stick shift since I was 16 years old, I figured that the streets of the DR were not the ideal place to revisit that.  Instead, I waited for my cousin to take a shower, told my aunt some vague story about how Richard was going to meet us at my cousin’s restaurant, and held back the tears that were welling up.

As soon as I slammed the passenger door shut in my cousin’s car, I started with,

“Why are men such douchebags? I don’t even have a problem with the fact that I’m not seeing this guy.  I have a problem with the fact that he’s a liar!”  


(And yes, I realize the irony in this situation, since every venture out of the house with my cousins has involved some degree of lying.  Ugh.  Sorry, God.)

When Richard finally called after 8 p.m., he had given me some story about how his father was at the hospital and was going to have a (scheduled) surgery tomorrow.  He said that he had had to pay a lot of money up front (a legitimate occurrence in the DR) and that now, he was completely broke.  


Except, if you knew that your dad was having surgery, wouldn't you have known ahead of time that you'd be dropping a lot of cash up front?  And, why are you the one paying for the surgery?  Richard also claimed that he didn't get home until after 8 p.m. from the hospital, but if he knew that he was at the hospital, why wouldn't he say as much at 6:10 p.m.?  And, why did he ask me out, if he knew that I'd he'd be broke?

I had asked him if he wanted to just go somewhere and walk around and talk (See how incredibly nice and forgiving I am) and he asked if he could just come over to my aunt and uncle’s house instead.  I gave him a modulated version of “Hell to the no, you can’t do that,” and he started apologizing about how sad he was that he wasn’t going to see me before I left.

As you all know, I can’t stand it when people waste my time, so rather than being compassionate, I was seething.  When he called me around 10 p.m. to ask where I was, because he “needed to see me,” my cousin blurted out,

“Yeah, right.  Do you owe him money?  Then, he doesn’t ‘need’ anything from you!”

My cousin’s a champ.

From what little I knew of Richard, he seemed really nice and had the calm, stable personality that I like.  I was really looking forward to seeing him, but when I was left looking like the fool sitting around the house waiting for him, then making up some story about why we didn’t see each other last night, my feelings changed on that. 

As you know from this blog, I can usually shake the losers with very little effort.  But, last night, had my cousin not forced me to stay out with him at his restaurant, then at a friend’s bar, I would have been spending my last night in the DR moping about some fool Dominican man who left me literally waiting by the door.

As it is, I ignored Richard’s text at 2:15 a.m. begging me to call him when I got home, because he “needed to talk to me,” and I also chose not to return the email that I received from him this morning talking about fate, the fact that he can’t stop thinking about me, and how things “must not have been meant to be.”

Because, his chances with this particular hot American?  They also left the island this afternoon with no plans for immediate return.

Con mucho amor,

RS

Mercado Modelo

I don’t like endings--to movies, to dates, to travels.  They always come too soon, before you’re ready to say goodbye.  Usually, the ending leaves me in a dazed state of inertia-- still feeling the warmth of the Caribbean sun on my shoulders or the stubble of his 5 o’clock shadow on my cheek.  

Tomorrow is my last day in the DR, and I don't want to say goodbye.

My heart is aching not only because of what I’m leaving behind, but also because of what I’m going home to.  I’m sure that there is a mountain of bills and medical school drama waiting for me.  I won’t even get started on the fact that I’ll have to clean my own apartment and buy groceries like a grown-up or something.  Whatever. 

Thankfully, just because I’m leaving the DR, it doesn’t mean that my vacation is over.  On Thursday, I’ll fly to St. Vincent for 10 days, and then, I’ll stop in Barbados for three days to visit a friend from college.  It’s the long way home, but hopefully, an effective buffer against the severity of the transition.

St. Vincent is not quite the same as the DR, so it’s questionable whether or not I’ll have internet access, much less a connection that will be fast enough to upload pictures.  But, I’ll do my best and if nothing else, I’ll upload pictures when I get back.

In the meantime, I’ll leave you with pictures from Mercado Modelo:

Today, I had no patients to see, because the surgeons are having some sort of conference.  This meant that I left the hospital early and went to Mercado Modelo (a large, indoor market area with lots of souvenir and other shops) with my uncle.  I was a little bit nervous, because I was buying gifts for friends and family at home and I try to be thoughtful about my choices.  I hate tacky tourist gifts and would much rather find local artisan carvings, paintings, or culinary items.  My uncle kept asking, “What do you want to buy?  What do you want?” and I was all, “I don’t know.  I just want to look.”

I like to look at things and take my time, Tio.  Don’t rush me!

I’ve always loved local paintings, but I usually restrain myself when I’m traveling because of the cost, the feasibility of bringing framed artwork back, and--when I was dating Rich--the rationale that “we should wait until we move into the condo.”

Seriously, though, who cares about waiting until you’re a homeowner?

I bought myself some beautiful Dominican oil paintings and I feel grown-up, well-traveled, and cultured.  Now, if someone would please just clean my apartment, do the grocery shopping, and leave my clean, folded laundry in a neat pile on the bed when I get home, all would be right with the world.  (Future husband, where are you?  Your wife is waiting and she's bringing the wall décor!)

Con mucho amor,

RS

Puerto Plata

Today, my aunt and uncle took me on a day trip to Puerto Plata.

We started the day with a ride in the Teleferico, which is a cable car that transports you from the city of Puerto Plata (on the ground) to the side of a mountain with an elevation of 2000 feet.

At the top of the mountain is an extension of the Jardin Botanico...

...as well as spectacular views of Puerto Plata.

After the Teleferico, we headed to the beach.

On the way to the beach, we stopped to pick up my aunt and uncle's former maid, who lives in Puerto Plata.  (It is very common here for middle class families to have live-in maids, although my aunt and uncle only had one when my cousins were little.)

Puerto Plata is a 3 1/2 hour drive north of Santo Domingo, through the interior ("country") of the Dominican Republic.  So, on the way home, my aunt asked my uncle to stop and buy coconut water from a roadside stand:

With the exception of an empanada, my aunt has forbidden me to buy street food (bummer!), because of cholera and other contamination fears (I choose not to point out that I work everyday at the hospital with the largest percentage of cholera patients).  I guess the coconut was different, though, since it gets chopped right in front of you.

After you drink the water out of the coconut, the street guy will split the coconut shell, so that you can scoop out the jelly and eat it.

We also bought roasted sweet potatoes from a street vendor.  The sweet potatoes are roasted in the skin and you pay by the pound.

So far, no one has gotten sick from eating street food. :)

Con mucho amor,

RS

P.S.- Bonus entry below with photos!

My Weekend: The Non-Shady Version

Lest I falsely give the impression that the weekend's main activity was dancing all night in the clubs of Santo Domingo, I figured I should post the rest of the pictures from the weekend!  I had taken a lot of photos on Saturday, expecting that I'd be spending a quiet night at home.  I obviously had no idea that I'd be partying 'til sun up when my cousin casually invited me to a friend's birthday party. (But again, so much fun! No regrets!  Woo!)

This Sabbath, my aunt and I went to one of my uncle's churches in a barrio close to the hospital where I work.

My uncle is the pastor of six different churches, including one that he just built and that we stopped in for a few minutes at:

Then, we went to service at the largest church that my uncle pastors, which is also the home church of the Church Family.

After church, we had lunch at the Church family's house and as per usual, I was the American tourist taking pictures of Dominican food:

Arepa de Maiz y Batata Asada (Corn Pudding & Bread Pudding):  This arepa (left) is not the same as this arepa.

It is made with sweet ground corn, condensed milk, and sugar, which is cooked on the stovetop and then baked.  I've been at Sister Church's house when she is making Arepa and have followed her around (much to her delight) asking questions.  The bread pudding (right) is made the same way as in the US--bread, milk, and sugar gets baked with raisins and spices.

Pastelone de Platano Maduro (Sweet Plantain Casserole):  layers of sweet, mashed plantain and ground beef.  (Delicious!)

It rained torrentially during the afternoon, so we sat on the front verandah for a while, just looking at things happening in the neighborhood.

A plantain truck, with the LOUDEST and most ANNOYING announcement about plantains for two pesos each.  Trucks and street carts with fresh fruits and vegetables drive through the barrios constantly.  Had it not been Sabbath, my family would have been all over this, because hello?  2 pesos  each!

 This is perhaps my favorite picture of my trip so far!  These little kids somehow made a makeshift pool in front of their house in the barrio.  I love it!  Rock on, Dominican children!

Then, on Sunday, after work at the hospital, my aunt and uncle took me to a wedding of their friend's daughter in the Colonial Zone.

It was a gorgeous night (and a very busy weekend)!

Con mucho amor,
RS

Don't Ask, Don't Tell

On the way to the bar, my cousin kept asking me if I was OK. 

I don’t know if he expected me to be more gregarious from watching me interact with his younger brother, or if he was just worried because I had been so taciturn with his boss.  I couldn’t help it, though.

This was my first time hanging out with this particular cousin (after not seeing him in 15 years!) and I couldn’t gauge his temperament.  Also, I had gone with him to the restaurant that he manages.  While I waited for him to close up, I sat with the owner--his boss--who spoke to three comrades in French for an hour and a half.  

I can get by with my mediocre Spanish, but French?  Not so much.  I silently people-watched and awkwardly clinked my glass every now and then with a hearty, "Salud!," at the prompting of the owner.

When we got into the bar just before midnight, it was pretty much identical to a dive in Adams Morgan (albeit cleaner).  Bodies were packed so tightly against each other that my cousin had to grab my hand, so that I didn’t get pulled away during the navigation process.  It was his friend’s 28^th birthday, but once we found his corner of the bar, it was impossible to speak over the deafening American music pumping through the oversized speakers.

If  trying to make small talk in a club is difficult normally, doing this in a language I couldn't hear and could only moderately understand was nearly impossible.  I was a little overwhelmed.

I sat sort of wall-flowerish for the first half hour, people-watching, then getting self-conscious that my cousin would think that his goody-goody American cousin was too uptight to have fun.  Since the birthday boy, Eduardo, spoke perfect English, I figured that this was my way in.

When I noticed him dancing alone a few minutes later, I walked over and said,

“It looks like you need a dance partner.”

“Well, we’ll see if you can keep up,” he teased.

If you ever find yourself in a foreign country, feeling unsure of your language skills, remember this:  booty shaking transcends all language barriers.  You may even deceive foreigners into commenting things like,

“Wow, you know how to dance to a lot of different kinds of music."

Actually, no.  I don’t.  But, I know how to find the beat and shake my booty like a champ!

While I was dancing with Eduardo, I noticed a skinny, attractive, dark-haired guy with a chin piercing looking at me.  I couldn’t tell if he was mocking me (See earlier:  Don’t actually know how to dance properly) or checking me out.  When he made eye contact twice more, though, and then moved closer to me and sat down, I decided that it had to be the latter.

I plopped down next to him and yelled, “Que es tu nombre?” (What is your name?) into his ear.

His name was Richard and within the first few sentences, he was telling me (again, in perfect English),

“You’re so cute!  I’ve been checking you out all night.”

Well, yes.  I noticed that.

Since Richard spoke English, I only had to deal with trying to articulate English words loudly, instead of screaming mangled Spanish conjugations over the bass.

Richard claimed that he was too tired to dance, but when “I’ve Got a Feeling” came on, that man was doing things with his body that I could not replicate if I tried.  If there is a combination of hip hop and Latin dancing, that’s what this guy was doing.  As his hips moved in quick, fluid movements, I tried to complement him, but I just ended up being that flailing American next to the hot Dominican.  

After this song, though, Eduardo leaned over the table separating us to yell, “You owe me one more [dance].”  He reached out his hand and I took it, letting him pull me away from Richard.

When “one more” turned into six or seven more, I started scanning the crowd for Richard.  Not surprisingly, he was standing almost right next to me, eyeing me the whole time.  I excused myself from Eduardo, and yelled into Richard’s ear,

“I’m sorry!  That’s the birthday boy!”

Before I could continue, he was sliding his business card—which he already had out--into my hand and telling me to call him. 

“Are you leaving?,” I asked, surprised.

“Yes.  But, call me.”  Then, with a kiss on the cheek, he added, “Have fun tonight,” and disappeared.

Aww, poor Richard.  But, come on!  You can’t say no to dancing with the birthday boy!  That’s a cardinal rule or something, right?

It had taken some finagling to get out of the house (as per usual) and my aunt kept asking me if I was “OK” to go out with my older cousin, since I’ve been hanging out with his younger brother on the weekends.  I kept telling her that I would be fine and that we would have fun. 

Well, when the lights in the bar flipped on at 3 a.m. for last call,  “having fun” was kind of an understatement.

“Did my parents give you a curfew?,” my cousin asked me.

“No, as long as we get home before they wake up, we’ll be OK, right?”

Haha.  Oh, internet.  You know where this story is going.

I mentioned that his parents couldn’t possibly wake up before 5:30 a.m., so we packed up and headed over to The Malecon where the clubs keep pumping ‘til the sun comes up.  As soon as I spotted Eduardo, I yelled, “Round 2!” while my cousin kept an eye on me from a few feet away.

We didn’t stay too much longer, but as the dark skies were lightening with daybreak on our way home, I was hoping that my cousin’s and my guess about when we should get home was right.  As soon as the front door opened, though, I realized that this was not the case.  

My uncle was in the kitchen making breakfast.

In the darkness of the foyer, I hit my cousin’s arm and started mouthing, “Oh no! Oh no!”

If nothing else, this trip is becoming some kind of warped bonding experience with my cousins, while I experience the shady teenage years that I never had.

Making a gesture to follow him, my cousin slowly and calmly walked right past my uncle and started walking up the stairs.  I couldn’t tell if my cousin was cognizant of the fact that we were not invisible, or if this is how this family rolls.  When my uncle made eye contact with us and neither party said anything, though, I realized that my cousin knew exactly what he was doing.  This was some bizarre family rendition of Don’t ask, Don’t tell.  (Which, let me tell you, would never have happened in my own childhood home.)

Later this morning, when I met my uncle downstairs, the ignorance about what had transpired continued.  I said good morning and he reciprocrated with a fervent and enthusiastic reply.  There was no mention of when we came home or questions about what we were doing.  My aunt (sister of my mother!), on the other hand, asked me why we were out so late, where we were, and “what happened.”

 “We went to that birthday party, then to The Malecon afterwards.”

As per my cousin's advice, I provided as few details as possible and this time, my aunt didn't ask for elaboration.  I tried to feel repentant as I was talking, you guys, but I wasn’t.  I'm not sure what's wrong with me, but I'm sure that my circumstances as an excited single foreigner, together with finally having a break from my usually confined, extremely responsible medical student lifestyle are both to blame.

Anyway, who knows what my aunt thought when I blurted out, “We had so much fun!," with a huge, satisfied grin on my face.  I've had trouble getting rid of that smile all day, even when I had to wake up four hours later to go to the hospital.

Oh, DR.  You are going to be missed.

Con mucho amor,

RS

Santo Domingo Cathedral and Other Non-Medical Pictures

On Monday, before Los Tres Ojos, my aunt and I also went to the National Cathedral in the Zona Colonial.

I love how ornate and reverent Catholic churches are, but this was my first time seeing a confessional booth.

 This is a "modern" one that is currently used, but I also saw an old one (not pictured).  Of course, I was fascinated, so I touched it and peeked behind the curtain that covers the priest's chair. (WHAT?  I wanted to know how the confessional booth worked.)  I subsequently got yelled at for touching it by some tour guide in the cathedral.  "Lo siento!  Soy una turista!"  (Also, you guys know that I'm easily excited by new things.)

If I didn't know better, this could be a picture of Miami. It's not, though.  It's a picture of downtown Santo Domingo, where my uncle and I went shopping the other night.

La Sirena is another Wal-Mart type of store, except most things are CHEAPER than Wal-Mart.  The next time I come to the Dominican Republic, I am bringing a bottle of water and the clothes on my back.  You may think that I am kidding, but I assure you that I am not.

And, because Adventists compensate with food for what they don't consume in liquor, here are more food pictures:

These are tostones, a fried plantain dish. You cut the (non-ripe) plantain into 1" rounds, lightly fry them, then remove from the oil, smoosh them down, and refry.  I meant to buy a tostone masher when I was in Puerto Rico last summer, but I didn't.  I bought one at La Sirena this week, though.  (Get excited, roommate!  I will make us tostones!)

Pan de agua- Water bread.  A Dominican staple that is similar to French bread or water rolls in the US.

Con mucho amor,
RS