ay mamasita

ay mamasita! sums up the past week. that has also been one of our most commonly used phrases.

we had a group of americans come to visit this past week. it was an interesting contrast. i´m an american so i was part of their group, but i was also a host so i was part of the dominican group. milagros has finally let me help her, so we spent a lot of time preparing food, etc for them. i saw patients for the first time this week. things have been different. we go to people´s houses, people come to our house, we go to a friends house. we sit down with the patient and just talk to them. in the country we saw patients sitting at a table outside with a wonderful view of palm trees and mountains in the background with chicken around our feet.

this has also been a week of contrasts. we went to santo domingo, the capital, to do siteseeing. it almost reminded me of a combination of antigua and new york city as weird of a combination as that is. the contrast to san pedro where i´m living was interesting. it seemed much more modern, and much less dirty. also, there were a lot of beautiful historicla buildings (we´re hopefully getting internet in my apartment this week so i can post pictures). we also went to la romana where there are many tourists. we visited a tourist hang out that´s a remake of an italian village. it was absolutely gorgeous. eating in a restaurant there the only dominicans in the place where the workers and the dominicans with our group. it was so weird. hard to look at how much money ahd been spent on that after seeing the rest of life in the dominican. to imagine that tourists only see beauty. we also visited the sugar cane plantations. a friend of our group´s father in law is an old boss in one of the plantations. seeing his house next to that of the hatian workers in the bateyes. the clinic there was surprisingly beuatiful. funded by the sugar companies so that their workers don´t miss to much work. we ate fresh sugar cane and coconut. yesterday we went to see the house and out to dinner with a brother of the family here.....another startling contrast.

my favorite part of the week was returning to samana that part of the country on the northern coast that i visited last week. the kids welcomed me back with hugs. our trip was horrendous. we got flat tires in both of the vehicles that we travelled in and then when we got there a flat tire in the another truck. three flat tires in one day. milagros renamed us the pinchagomas....tire flattners is the rough translation. on the way there we sat on the front of the boat and got absolutely soaked through and through by waves, but it was so much fun. the americans stayed with one family and milagros and i with another. i love the family i stay iwht. the one thing i hate is that my bed moves at night, but i´m the only person in it.....i try and convince myself that is´just their pet dog.....i hope. also, the shower-toilet are in a sectioned off portion of their kitchen area. we went to a river and played in slash climbed a waterfall....so cool, like a hot tub that´s cold. we also had a picnic on the beach with many of the members of the community. one of my favorite parts. there were lots of people. the kids kept running up and introducing friends and family to me. i had the kids playing hand clap games, doing sparkles, and running races. one of the girls pushed me into the water.....so much for not wanting to get wet. they had a small church service on the beach. i don´t know it was a crazy experience to become part of a community in something that´s so foreign to you. at least the kids never change.

ít´s been good. i´ve enjoyed having the americans around. i functioned as a translator....imagine that. a very rough translator. although i´m very ready to start getting to work and starting my spanish classes. i now feel as though i´ve got some feel for this area. this week i hope to really start working....you all know me and how i liek to stay busy.

i´ve made friends with people here. with some of the americans. i now have a place to stay when i visit philly and also with the dominicans. i ride around in the back of a car blasting reggaeton music (for those that went to guatemala think gasolina) and an 18 year old kid singing at the top of his lungs and screaming randomly for no reason. the culture is different here. watching the baseball community is intersting. every kid here dreams of playing baseball. i´m reminded of ballet. that has been the excitement of the week. hopefully, i´ll get pictures up soon. i miss you all.

rachel