This Week

There is no such thing as a ho-hum routine week for me in the D.R. In the past week the following has happened:

Dominican Wives Only an Email Away!

• I went kayaking in the ocean at a friend's site - my life here is sooo tough.
• I saw a 10 year-old students run naked in front of his house - not the first time I have seen him do this.
• A Dominican friend asked for my opinion on a job offer she received to become a mail order bride in Europe. I told her that the type of men who need to buy a wife are typically not the kind you want to marry.
• My power went out, outside of its normal schedule, leaving me in the dark for a few days. I also got to see sparks fly out of the transformer in front of my house, and learn new vocabulary: candela - spark, prestando - flickering, as in the lights are flickering.
• A teacher painted my fingernails...during class.
• A boy climbed up a coconut tree and shared the coconuts he knocked down with me, other volunteers, and a security guard who left his rifle lying in the sand while he ate with us.

  

  Climbing for Coconuts

• I saw an ostrich while at a teacher training conference at a one room school house. The ostrich is a pet. It is the second pet ostrich I have seen in as many months. You can also buy peacocks from a guy in town.
• My girls youth group has decided that they want to go to the national book fair in the capital. So far this week they have held a raffle for a gallon of oil, and sold habichuelas con dulce (sweet beans) on the side of the road, just like kids in the States sell lemonade.
• It didn't happen this week but, while I was traveling the outside of my house was painted!

  

  Romeo Guarding Our Newly Painted Home

Literacy in the D.R.

When I received my invitation to serve in the D.R. I initially thought I was going to be teaching English. It took me a second read-through to realize that the literacy Peace Corps wanted me to help improve was Spanish not English. Others are often confused as well, when I say I am helping to improve literacy rates in the D.R. they assume I mean English literacy. It is such a simple assumption to make, of course a country so close to the States and dependent on tourism would consider English literacy a top priority. It shocks us, fortunate enough to have grown up with the U.S. Public School System, that a nation so close and intertwined with our own could have so many difficulties educating its youth.

Basic literacy in the D.R. is a huge problem, currently the D.R.'s literacy rate is 133 out of 205 countries (from the CIA Work Factbook). What does that number represent?

It represents nine year-old kids in the second grade who can't write their names. It represents the two shift school day, which means students have class for three to four hours a day. It represents the lack of textbooks and workbooks in the classroom (forget computers). It represents the poor pay and poor training of teachers. It represents the days of school lost because rain has made the dirt road too muddy.

The number 133 and all it represents, makes me feel like, at times, the work I am doing is a drop in the bucket. But there are moments that warm my heart, that let me know that my work is important to those I reach. Like when my students smile when they read a word on their own, or when a teacher arranges for students to come to both sessions of school.

I always knew that teachers had a tough and under-appreciated job, but I never realized how hard they have to work until I started working alongside them. If you are a teacher you have my utmost respect. Thank-you for all the work that you do.

Now onto random, non-sentimental thoughts:

• My grant (that I originally submitted in September) has been funded! I now have a whole $5,000 to put to use. Hopefully the news will get my library committee energized enough to begin building repairs.
• There was a nation wide commercial strike. All businesses were supposed to be closed for two days to protest rising costs and a potential tax increase. Samaná didn't take things too seriously, most corner stores were open the whole time and nothing closed on the second day.
• School is tiring me out! I want to be in bed by 10pm at the latest.
• Last time I was in town the power was out aka no internet fun for me. The town of Samaná is supposed to have power 24/7 but like everything in the D.R. it is not a guarantee.
• Someone from Majorca asked if I was from Spain. I felt great, until that evening when my project partner gave me a book on Spanish grammar.
• Things I can't find in town: pot holder, can opener, wine opener, large bowls (for mixing and popcorn), and grape jam (I can find orange, pineapple,  guayaba etc).
• My 10 year-old neighbor said I was her best friend! So exciting because I think of her as my best friend too. We read and play a lot together, including making karaoke videos to Prince Royce songs. |'ll eventually have good enough internet and post a video of the two of us singing into hairbrushes.