Officially a Volunteer!
Hey everyone! Soooooo, a lot has happened since I last posted. Again, as always, sorry for the long wait. Let´s play a little catch-up. Where we last left our heroes, I’m pretty sure we were in El Seibo, which is a medium-sized town in the easter region of the country, for CBT (community-based training). To sum it all up, CBT consisted of technical training sessions in the mornings at the local high school (which included presentations on education; formal, informal, and non-formal teaching methodologies; how to set up a computer lab from scratch; how to clone hard drives; teaching English; teacher training; and much more), and Spanish language classes in the afternoons at their host familie´s houses.
My first Spanish teacher’s name was Ailyn, and about two weeks into CBT she found a full time job in the capital with another organization. She was a great teacher, very energetic and fun, and we were sad to see her leave. But our second teacher, Cecilia, was also great and I learned a lot from her. Another girl from Arkansas, Heather, was in my class with me. We both had the lowest Spanish levels of the group when we started, so I guess they figured we needed a smaller class to work closer with the teacher. Other Spanish classes had anywhere from three to five students. It turned out to be great! Heather and I became good friends with both of the teachers as well as the host family they were living with. And we´ve both come a long way with our Spanish! I´m pretty proud of us. To give you some kind of perspective, upon arriving at Santo Domingo at the beginning of March, I was placed at a 2.5 on a language scale of 10. During the last day of training I was placed at a 6! Behold the wonders of immersion.
So El Seibo was a blast and I couldn’t have asked for a better group of people to go through training with. My fellow ICT volunteers are all so great and we got to know each other very well during the five week CBT. My host family in El Seibo was also pretty amazing. I actually had a really nice pink house with a huge bathroom, a ceiling fan, running water, and an outside dog named Puppy. I lived with one of the language teachers, Juana, which was great for my Spanish. We would hang out on the porch and sing old 80′s soft rock ballads (Brian Adams anyone?), then she would help me read the national newspaper. She actually speaks English pretty well but still wanted practice so we set up a conversational system where she asked me questions in English and I had to answer in Spanish and vice versa. Then we would correct each other and laugh at our horrendous grammar. She´s good people. We had a great host mom named Altagracia, two older host brothers who lived at the house with us and two other host siblings who are engineers in Santo Domingo. They were all very nice and hospitable and let me come and go as I pleased, and for Easter they took me to visit their family in the campo (countryside) and swim in the river.
During CBT nights the other trainees and I would hang out around our barrio and play card games, go out to eat, hang out at the park, or go to the local discotec called “Club Wow.” Wow is an interesting place to say the least. It´s got two floors with the dance floor in the middle on the bottom floor surrounded by high wooden tables and the bar, and the upstairs has more tables, the DJ, and a see-through floor where you can conveniently spy on the dancers. Wow is where most of us made complete fools of ourselves in an effort to perfect our merengue and bachata dance moves. But they were also kind enough to play some American music (e.g. -¨Barbie Girl” by Aqua) so that we could make fools of ourselves in our usual ways. After we were tired of dancing and/or dripping with sweat, we got some street food (empanadas and chimis) and walked back to our respective barrios.
We also went to one of the most beautiful beaches in the country, Playa Esmerelda, two times and got incredibly tan/sunburned/tan and sunburned at the same time. There´s a photo of all of us at the beach in the last post. If or WHEN you come to visit me, this will be our relaxing getaway destination! The beach is clean, the water clear blue with a hint of green, and huge palm trees hang overhead and drop coconuts every so often. It´s surrounded by private land and armed (but friendly) guards all the time. Definitely an awesome time.
So after CBT, we all packed up and headed back to our host families in the capital. We had a couple more days of training where we reunited (and it felt so good) with the environment volunteers we came into the country with, we had one last Spanish class, and then we found out our permanent site assignments! And wouldn´t you know it – El Seibo just hadn´t had enough of me. Towards the end of CBT, I had heard a rumor that they had requested a male volunteer for El Seibo, but I didn´t think it would be me. I was hoping I´d get something a little smaller up north or in the mountains. But while in CBT during interviews with my APCD (Assistant Peace Corps Director, who is a well spoken and ready-for-retirement Dominican man) I was asked several times “how I liked El Seibo.” And I had responded politely that I did indeed: not too small, not too big, really nice people and not a lot of traffic or crime. Then I heard they were looking for someone to work in El Seibo´s CTC (Community Technology Center), and a few days before I got my site assignment, I was told I would be working at a CTC, just not specifically where. So by then I was pretty sure that my permanent site would by El Seibo. And not three days after I get back to the capital, my prediction was confirmed and I had to turn around and head back for my first official visit as the El Seibo volunteer. Don´t get me wrong, I´m not unhappy with my site assignment. It´s a great town, there are currently two youth development volunteers living there, I already know my way around, and I already know some of the local people.
So it was easy when I went for my initial week-long site visit. I basically walked around and got reaquanited with my old host family and my friends´host families and the CTC workers. I had actually already taught a powerpoint class there to some kids during CBT. So I hung out at the community center and observed the classes and also spent time with my new host family, who are all awesome. I have a very dedicated and involved host mom who works with the First Lady´s Office (which also funds the CTC). I have one 20-year-old host brother named Marcos who lives at the house and likes to show me around town. One night I went with Marcos and his cousin Miguel (who also lives at our house) to see a Dominican singer, Juliana, at a street concert. It was good times. Then I have two host sisters who live in the house as well and one of them has a husband and a two-year-old named José. There are neighbors and family members and random street children coming in and out all the time – basically the typical Dominican household.
After the El Seibo visit, I came back to the capital for our official swearing-in ceremony and one last week of training for a new literacy project they want to start here. All the ICT volunteers in my group were required to attend. I stayed with my first host family again and made several “last” trips to grocery stores, American restaurants, and other exclusively big city places with the other volunteers. During this time we also had an all-volunteer conference where we got to meet other current volunteers and introduce ourselves to everyone and try to get a feel for how these next two years are supposed to work out. We also had our first annual Peace Corps Prom at a swanky little bar in downtown Santo Domingo where we all spent the night in a hotel. And for our last night in the capital, our ICT training group all went out together to a car wash (which double as discotecs at night) and stayed in a hostel. If anything can be said about our training group, it is that we are a dedicated bunch and we know how to have a good time! That was Friday, May 21. The following day we all said our goodbyes and headed in our own directions to start our lives as official volunteers. I´m in El Seibo right now at my CTC waiting on the kids in my class to arrive (yes, I´m already teaching – more on that in the next post). So I will leave it at that for now. I´ll try not to wait so long for the next post. It´s been raining a lot here, which means no one does anything, so there will no doubt be a lot of downtime where I can blog more frequently. Thankfully I have Internet here in my center. I hope everyone is doing great and enjoying these first days of summer freedom! Hasta luego, vaya con dios!
