Comfort and the Black Pearl

This one is a long one...

To feel at home is to feel safe and to be comfortable enough to be yourself. I think I have found this in Cabrera in a little less than two weeks. In town, I still get stared at sometimes but it has not become a big deal. I simply say Hola and often am greeted with a smile in return. I can walk into any colmado and know exactly what I can get, basically everything. I am comfortable communicating with the locals, for the most part, despite minor bumps and bruises along the way in Spanish. I know where to go if I want to use the internet. I have a place to go if I want a bottle of gatorade. Surprisingly, I am also comfortable sharing a beer with friends on the park bench in the town square people watching like most of the locals here. I also walk the streets at night without light. Sure, it is a little scary from time to time walking in the dark but I know I am safe--people here seem to look out for one another. I was also graced with the pleasure of going for a walk with my host mother the other night. She invited me on a walk with her towards the ocean and I thought it would be just that. We ended up driving to the walk, which was interesting to begin with, but also visiting a few of her friends along the way. The network of communities that I came to notice that night was incredible. I was greeted with smiles and great conversation (as much as we could have in Spanish, haha) and tons of food, desserts and soups alike. I saw life not as a priviledged tourist but in real terms, I got to see what happens everyday. Cabrera may be small, but it already feels like home.

At school, I am also becoming very comfortable. Another week with the kids has been amazing. From a place where I was called ´China Man´at the pre-school, I now go to school and high-five one of the kids almost daily. For a bit, I played games such as -Con Helado- and -Tiki Tahinki-, which I might have previously mentioned, with the kids. They would call me invincible because I literally had a part of my body crossed ALL THE TIME, even when I was walking around. On a different note, kids ask me to help them with their music poster and ask for my opinion on how a dance looks for the talent show. I must say, reading with the kids and just hanging out with them has allowed me to appreciate Cabrera´s diversity more. Connections like those make me feel like I am a part of the larger picture, no longer an outsider looking into a school system.

From a more academic standpoint, Winston the donkey was getting his testicles removed this week so Anthony had to be away for some of the mornings. It was from this that I had been given the opportunity to lead a session with the morning kids. I worked with them, with the help of Miss Holly, in an activity called Sound Detectives where they were to listen for similar sounding parts of a word. I also led a lesson teaching them about rhyming words and how they have the same sounding end combination in a word. But all this learning is not one sided, haha. When helping kids write in their diary, I was reminded that my concept of the sound A was not accurate. I take that seriously and with humility that although I have a good grasp of the English language, I am still faced with the reality of tricking myself into thinking I know something, sometimes. I feel comfortable at school, both academically and socially--it has become a place of learning for both me and others. I have come to love Cabrera inside and out.

Yet I know I do not want to stay in a place of complacency and become TOO comfortable with my surroundings and I want to challenge myself throughout the experience. I guess a lot of it will happen when the rest of my host family returns from the states on May 29th and between the two sessions of summer camp that have yet to begin.

Truth be told, however, I was smacked hard in the face with the reality a few days ago. I came home from lunch, sat down and started eating. I don´t know what came over me but I just started crying. It was inexplicable, and I couldn´t stop. In retrospect, I think I know how it started but am still not sure. I´ve talked about my mosquito bites briefly and as little as they are, they have become a big part of my life. In a crowd of people, I am one of the few that get bitten, and many many times. I have to wear long sleeves at night and I am constantly hitting my legs or moving somehow in order to avoid them. It has consumed a lot of my energy and simply it has gotten annoying and a bit overwhelming. I guess my crying stemmed from a sense of helplessness and the fact that there really is NOTHING I could do. I put on insect repellent 3 times a day and now probably have over 100 bites total. Others who do not put any repellent on are unscathed. This overwhelmed me and I became vulnerable to all the other missing comforts. It was like an avalanche of emotions, one that I did not think I would ever have. I thought I would be fine having lived alone in Quebec last summer for 3 months. The culture shock of it all really hit me.

-- The Incident with the Black Pearl --

I don´t think I was originally going to blog about this but mentioned it a few times as a joke along the way. After the events of last night, however, I think it is important to write about it.

Last night, we went and stayed over at the beach to celebrate Holly´s birthday, another volunteer at the school. It was a big event that was planned all week long, 15-20 people were going, we had great food, many drinks, music, tents, the whole sha-bang. We were all really excited to go and Carissa, Brittany and I were making a cake for Holly at Brittany´s house. However, school ended at 4 and we wanted to leave at around 6. After all the prep and getting ready, last minute purchases and whatnot, we didn´t think there would be enough time for the cake to bake, cool and to finally ice it. We seemed rushed a bit with everyone else wanting to go and ended up getting a ride with Dan, who was leaving a bit later. The cake incident was a semi-disaster: temperatures here do not really let a cake cool fast enough to ice and it stuck to the pan, and was pretty much impossible to ice... we ended up pouring the icing over top.

Brittany ended up going to the beach first with her host family and Carissa and I stayed back and headed to the beach with Dan in the Black Pearl. Now, let me tell you about the Black Pearl. It is a truck made in 1987 that has been sitting in the field for a bit because it wouldn´t really start. Somehow, it started the other day and we got to borrow it to transport us and a lot of the equipment to the beach. It doesn´t accelerate very well, probably going 20-30ish mph max, which was fast enough, I guess. On the way, however, it was extremely difficult to see through a mixture of the blinding sun right in our eyes and the dirty windshield from both inside and outside. There was about 9 km left till we got to the beach, I remember commenting on the road sign when the car seemed to stop working--we were out of gas. I also remember joking at this point about blogging about this--only in the Dominican would we actually run out of gas. Fortunately, we had brought some gas to help start the fire and also for this very purpose. Dan hopped out of the car, filled the tank a bit and we were off... 30 seconds or so in, we hit a mound of sand and rocks on the side of the road on the right side, go over it and head off the side of the road and into a ditch. We were stuck and I guess the car was angled into the ditch. Fortunately, we were all okay except for a few nerves. There was no way any of us could have seen the mound in the conditions, and to be honest, none of the 3 of us did. We are fortunate, in a way, that the car had stopped working or the speed at which we would have hit this random pile of dirt would have made everything a lot worse. We all climbed out of the car from the driver´s door and were unsure of what to do.

Nearly everyone who passed by stopped their cars to help, trying to find rope, a suitable truck and enough people to comfort us and help push the truck back onto the road and out of the ditch. Probably 10-15 minutes later, the car was out of the ditch with the help of many people.

One of our friends saw us on the road and stopped by as well and she offered to drive the rest of the way. The night continued, and everyone had a great time. It was a surreal night to enjoy great company, food and music on the beach and to actually sleep on the beach, tents and all. I am glad it all happened and that everyone was safe. This morning, however, I must have had the scariest ride back. I don´t think I have ever felt so unsure in a car before simply because we didn´t know what would happen with the car, and whether it would make it. We made sure to clean the windshield thoroughly from both sides before driving. The car wouldn´t start for a bit too when we wanted to leave.

We made it most of the way before the car ran out of gas, again. We were literally 10 m away from the turn we had to make back into Cabrera and could even see our friends´ house. This time, we were out of gas because the rest of it had been used to help with the fire. Fortunately, again, the same friend that drove us the rest of the way to the beach was driving by on her pasola and offered to take me to the gas station to get gas. It was the first time I sat on a pasola with 3 people, and let me tell you, it was thrilling and a bit scary. We ended up making it back safe and sound.

--

I tell that story sort of to let you know about events of my life and the realities of life. Most of all, however, I think I wanted to tell that story because of what had happened. The capacity for human compassion in the DR has been amazing. Sure, one or two people may have stopped to help in North America when our car went into the ditch but I think we would have waited to call CAA to help us get out. Here, nearly EVERYONE stopped to help us, not expecting anything in return and genuinely concerned with our wellbeing. I think this speaks wonders about the community that exists here and how everyone does in fact look out for one another. I was blessed to have been helped out and am grateful for all those kind men and women who stopped by to make sure we were alright. There is not always a lot here, but here in the Dominican, people have each other. I think my last week, both from this event and from my visits to people´s houses have showed me that people are truly hospitable and are willing to give of themselves, without asking for anything in return.

This place gives me hope. This place opens my eyes. This place is home.