Here is a link to our photo album from the Dominican Republic. It is missing a few photos from the hike up Pico Duarte and they are a bit out of order, but I thought to publish it before more time passes. Especially since soon, we will leave Ecuador and I will have to send out those pictures. I am also sending the link via email, as a forward from my account.
When you click on the link or the email that says "view this album," you will have to log in. If you don´t have an account, it is free and easy to create one. If you can´t see the photos from either source, and want to view them, email me and I will invite you directly from snapfish.
Happy picture viewing.
http://www1.snapfish.com/share/p=921281162055852120/l=217221443/g=5671161/otsc=SYE/otsi=SALB
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Monday, October 23, 2006
Heart Isle
"27 dollars?" I repeated the slender woman's words incredulously, wondering how many days worth of food that would be for John and me. "That's really expensive. Isn't there a way to go and visit the island more cheaply?"
The woman looked up from the magazine she had returned to flipping through and tossed her long dark hair over her shoulder. "No." Her voice was flat and her face unsmiling. "You are sure to get lost if you are not from Bahía de Caraquez. You will need a guide."
I sighed heavily. Same old story, different place. It seemed as though that going on your own anywhere in Ecuador was impossibility. I was positive there had to be a cheaper way to see the Mangroves, the only question was how.
"Psst," I heard from behind me and turned to find a young, unshaven man sitting at the small round table on the other side of the travel agency's office. "You can go on your own," he continue whispering out of one side of his mouth, "I know how." He winked and then stood to address the woman reading the magazine about his own travel adventures.
I nodded and sat listening to the two of them discuss the dry forest that grew in the area, flipping through the binder displaying the various tours offered in English by the agency, all at prices that could feed a family of four for a month in this small coastal town. He extended his had to shake the woman's and I stood smiling my good bye, unsure if this was someone to be trusted.
Outside on the sidewalk, my new friend Javier from Alicante, Spain, explained to me that at his hostal, Coco Bongo, the owners, Suzi and Tony had given him explicit instructions on how to visit la Isla Corazon, the land of the mangroves, independently. We agreed to meet back up in two hours time and went our separate ways.
Later that morning, John was quiet as we sat on the benches at the end of the pier waiting for Javi to arrive. "Javi seemed really nice John. I am sure he'll show and we'll find the mangroves." "No, I'm fine," he assured me, "it's not Javi. It's my stomach. Something is strange in my stomach." Concerned, I began to ask him exactly what was wrong with his stomach, but before I had time to inquire further, there was Javi and we were off, donning our life jackets, paying our 30 cent fare and boarding a small motorboat/taxi bound for the other side of the bay.
Across the bay in San Vicente, nothing much had changed. Like Bahía, San Vicente's run down buildings, bicycle cabs and street vendors completed the dusty scene. We stood chatting on the side of the road, waiting for our bus, "Es que aquí, no hay paradas," Javier muttered as we watched a bus about half a mile down the road pull over three times before reaching where we stood. He was right, busses stopped wherever there were people to get on or off. Unfortunately, this one was not our bus.
After fending off a soldier, an elderly woman, two small boys and a man with one leg all in need of our money, we finally boarded an overcrowded bus bound for Chone. We squeezed ourselves into the masses of humanity, bags of potatoes and wicker baskets, wedging parts of our bodies between the people, seats and window ledges to prevent ourselves from flying forward when, inevitably, the bus stopped short.
The bus whizzed by shrimp farms, former sites of thousands of mangroves along the river Chone. The destruction of these amazing trees, designed as a natural water filter and habitat to thousands of species of local birds was incomprehensible. Like so many places, the shrimp farmers had destroyed thousands of hectares of mangroves in exchange for the profit of the shrimping industry. What remained . . . a mere fraction of the graceful mazelike trees and the black and white frigate birds that made the mangroves their homes.
The bus dropped us at the beginning of a dirt driveway leading up to two small houses, one a short squat structure next to a dock along the river bank, the other built high above us, a wooden staircase leading up to what looked like an oversized tree house. As we stood on the banks of the Chone, a green island in the shape of a heart was clearly visible, la isla corazón.
We quickly found Francisco, the recommended guide for the tour, and after some negotiations and explanation of our current financial situation due to the recent pick pocketing events, we were able to settle with the town's president what we felt was a reasonable price: $20 for the three of us.
"Hurry up," Francisco yelled down to the three mostly naked boys that had stopped splashing around in the water and were now bailing out what I could only assume to be our mode of transport to the island. One, around ten years of age, disappeared inside the house, came out in a t-shirt and shorts and placed small wooden chairs with seat cushions inside the rickety canoe. He motioned for us to come closer and one by one, we hiked up our pant legs and sat ourselves in the inch of water still on the boat's floor. The now dressed boy positioned himself at the bow of the canoe, thick paddle in hand and Francisco pushed us off into the murky waters of the Chone, toward the island. "Too bad you didn't come an hour ago,” he mused, "tide would have been higher then. Easier to navigate. Don't worry. We'll manage."
We weren't worried. We were entranced. As Francisco and the young boy paddled, Javi, John and I sat in awe, snapping pictures as we listened to Francisco's descriptions of the reforestation of the island in front of us. We moved slowly toward the island watching as fish jumped around us and frigate birds, pelicans and cormorants dove for their lunch on either side of the canoe.
Javi, a marine biologist in Spain, was dumbfounded by the beauty, his incessant questions keeping Francisco on his toes. "How long had the mangroves been reforested? Who did the reforestation? Did the shrimping industry still destroy the mangroves? Did they need help to plant more?" On and on until we reached the edge of the island.
As we entered the first tunnel of mangroves, a hush fell upon the group as we looked. . .left, right and then up -- the branches, leaves and roots of the mangroves forming a roof over our heads. "Wow. . ." I heard John sigh behind me, stomach ache monetarily forgotten. "Amazing."
Francisco indicated the three types of mangroves, the white with small delicate flowers, the black with long dark leaves and the red, the most resilient of the bunch that accounted for over 90 percent of the trees on the island. He showed us how some of the trees breathe through their roots stuck up to 10 feet deep in the mud of the island, while others took in oxygen through their leaves. All around us, trees intertwined, own swirling around another until it was impossible to distinguish one from the next. Bright, red crabs scurried along the branches as floated down the canal into a section where the water very quickly became un-rowable mud.
"It's the tide," explained Francisco hopping down off the boat and indicating that the boy in front should do the same, "Would have been easier an hour ago. But don't worry, we'll make it." I had my doubts as our young friend sunk to his thighs in mud and began to push with all of his might to propel the canoe forward.
As we came around the corner, mud once again gave way to water and grabbing their paddles, Francisco and son steered us deftly out of the old growth and into the reforested section of mangroves, haven to hundreds of thousands of frigates. Long slender birds with curved feet swarmed the trees overhead, the air lit up with their mating songs.
"See the male birds?" Francisco inquired indicating the scarlet, pouch protruding from some of the birds' throats. "That's how he entices his female companions. Up to four a day feed and spoil him, vying for his affection, but only one wins his courtship. The rest build their nests and protect their egg alone. How's you'd like to be a frigate Javi?" Francisco laughed from the back of the boat and I rolled my eyes at John, knowing he too would find the joke un poco machista.
We continued around the lake, mesmerized by the elegance of the pure white ibis, the skill of the pelican with his large fish trapping beak, watching as cormorants lazed on top branches sunning themselves to dry their wet feathers before taking flight once again. Fish jumped playfully around the edges of the boat as we reached a wooden dock with a small foot path that would take us deep inside the enchanted mangrove forest.
Surrounded on all sides by giant mangroves, Francisco leaned down to pick up mangrove seeds that lay strewn on our wooden footpath. "See this tip?" He scoops up the long slender branch to shop us a small brown edge in the shape of an arrow. "This tells the mangrove how far to throw its seed. It's a detector. Watch!" He walked to the railing leaned over and let the seed plummet to the ground 8 feet below us. The seed stuck upright in the mud, a young mangrove planted. Javi, John and I planted three more, watching them as they each took root in the island.
Standing among the beauty and wonder of the magnificent trees, the magnitude of this island with its natural water filtration system, thousands of species of shellfish, birds, fish, plants all around us, it is difficult to imagine wanting to destroy any of it, even for the inevitable profit the shrimping industry will bring. Francisco agrees and explains how after years and years of watching the precious mangroves disappear; he and a group of local fisherman became fed up with the destruction. Feeling the power of a group, they banded together and began to replant the trees in danger of disappearing from the River Chone completely.
He sighs deeply, content with what he sees all around him, "Six years ago, this island was but a dream in our minds. Now it is a reality."
A quiet, reflective trip back in our makeshift canoe, now filled with significantly more water than when we started four hours earlier that day, gives time for reflection on the efforts of a few determined individuals, determined to make a difference in the world. We float by two barebacked teenagers, one fishing rod made of sticks, a small handmade net tossed out into the sea, creating waves that ripple out toward our boat. They wave as we go by, a slow friendly salute.
The island gets smaller and smaller as we approach the shore, and I turn around to take one more look at the island, reminded of how each and every one of us can truly make a difference.
The woman looked up from the magazine she had returned to flipping through and tossed her long dark hair over her shoulder. "No." Her voice was flat and her face unsmiling. "You are sure to get lost if you are not from Bahía de Caraquez. You will need a guide."
I sighed heavily. Same old story, different place. It seemed as though that going on your own anywhere in Ecuador was impossibility. I was positive there had to be a cheaper way to see the Mangroves, the only question was how.
"Psst," I heard from behind me and turned to find a young, unshaven man sitting at the small round table on the other side of the travel agency's office. "You can go on your own," he continue whispering out of one side of his mouth, "I know how." He winked and then stood to address the woman reading the magazine about his own travel adventures.
I nodded and sat listening to the two of them discuss the dry forest that grew in the area, flipping through the binder displaying the various tours offered in English by the agency, all at prices that could feed a family of four for a month in this small coastal town. He extended his had to shake the woman's and I stood smiling my good bye, unsure if this was someone to be trusted.
Outside on the sidewalk, my new friend Javier from Alicante, Spain, explained to me that at his hostal, Coco Bongo, the owners, Suzi and Tony had given him explicit instructions on how to visit la Isla Corazon, the land of the mangroves, independently. We agreed to meet back up in two hours time and went our separate ways.
Later that morning, John was quiet as we sat on the benches at the end of the pier waiting for Javi to arrive. "Javi seemed really nice John. I am sure he'll show and we'll find the mangroves." "No, I'm fine," he assured me, "it's not Javi. It's my stomach. Something is strange in my stomach." Concerned, I began to ask him exactly what was wrong with his stomach, but before I had time to inquire further, there was Javi and we were off, donning our life jackets, paying our 30 cent fare and boarding a small motorboat/taxi bound for the other side of the bay.
Across the bay in San Vicente, nothing much had changed. Like Bahía, San Vicente's run down buildings, bicycle cabs and street vendors completed the dusty scene. We stood chatting on the side of the road, waiting for our bus, "Es que aquí, no hay paradas," Javier muttered as we watched a bus about half a mile down the road pull over three times before reaching where we stood. He was right, busses stopped wherever there were people to get on or off. Unfortunately, this one was not our bus.
After fending off a soldier, an elderly woman, two small boys and a man with one leg all in need of our money, we finally boarded an overcrowded bus bound for Chone. We squeezed ourselves into the masses of humanity, bags of potatoes and wicker baskets, wedging parts of our bodies between the people, seats and window ledges to prevent ourselves from flying forward when, inevitably, the bus stopped short.
The bus whizzed by shrimp farms, former sites of thousands of mangroves along the river Chone. The destruction of these amazing trees, designed as a natural water filter and habitat to thousands of species of local birds was incomprehensible. Like so many places, the shrimp farmers had destroyed thousands of hectares of mangroves in exchange for the profit of the shrimping industry. What remained . . . a mere fraction of the graceful mazelike trees and the black and white frigate birds that made the mangroves their homes.
The bus dropped us at the beginning of a dirt driveway leading up to two small houses, one a short squat structure next to a dock along the river bank, the other built high above us, a wooden staircase leading up to what looked like an oversized tree house. As we stood on the banks of the Chone, a green island in the shape of a heart was clearly visible, la isla corazón.
We quickly found Francisco, the recommended guide for the tour, and after some negotiations and explanation of our current financial situation due to the recent pick pocketing events, we were able to settle with the town's president what we felt was a reasonable price: $20 for the three of us.
"Hurry up," Francisco yelled down to the three mostly naked boys that had stopped splashing around in the water and were now bailing out what I could only assume to be our mode of transport to the island. One, around ten years of age, disappeared inside the house, came out in a t-shirt and shorts and placed small wooden chairs with seat cushions inside the rickety canoe. He motioned for us to come closer and one by one, we hiked up our pant legs and sat ourselves in the inch of water still on the boat's floor. The now dressed boy positioned himself at the bow of the canoe, thick paddle in hand and Francisco pushed us off into the murky waters of the Chone, toward the island. "Too bad you didn't come an hour ago,” he mused, "tide would have been higher then. Easier to navigate. Don't worry. We'll manage."
We weren't worried. We were entranced. As Francisco and the young boy paddled, Javi, John and I sat in awe, snapping pictures as we listened to Francisco's descriptions of the reforestation of the island in front of us. We moved slowly toward the island watching as fish jumped around us and frigate birds, pelicans and cormorants dove for their lunch on either side of the canoe.
Javi, a marine biologist in Spain, was dumbfounded by the beauty, his incessant questions keeping Francisco on his toes. "How long had the mangroves been reforested? Who did the reforestation? Did the shrimping industry still destroy the mangroves? Did they need help to plant more?" On and on until we reached the edge of the island.
As we entered the first tunnel of mangroves, a hush fell upon the group as we looked. . .left, right and then up -- the branches, leaves and roots of the mangroves forming a roof over our heads. "Wow. . ." I heard John sigh behind me, stomach ache monetarily forgotten. "Amazing."
Francisco indicated the three types of mangroves, the white with small delicate flowers, the black with long dark leaves and the red, the most resilient of the bunch that accounted for over 90 percent of the trees on the island. He showed us how some of the trees breathe through their roots stuck up to 10 feet deep in the mud of the island, while others took in oxygen through their leaves. All around us, trees intertwined, own swirling around another until it was impossible to distinguish one from the next. Bright, red crabs scurried along the branches as floated down the canal into a section where the water very quickly became un-rowable mud.
"It's the tide," explained Francisco hopping down off the boat and indicating that the boy in front should do the same, "Would have been easier an hour ago. But don't worry, we'll make it." I had my doubts as our young friend sunk to his thighs in mud and began to push with all of his might to propel the canoe forward.
As we came around the corner, mud once again gave way to water and grabbing their paddles, Francisco and son steered us deftly out of the old growth and into the reforested section of mangroves, haven to hundreds of thousands of frigates. Long slender birds with curved feet swarmed the trees overhead, the air lit up with their mating songs.
"See the male birds?" Francisco inquired indicating the scarlet, pouch protruding from some of the birds' throats. "That's how he entices his female companions. Up to four a day feed and spoil him, vying for his affection, but only one wins his courtship. The rest build their nests and protect their egg alone. How's you'd like to be a frigate Javi?" Francisco laughed from the back of the boat and I rolled my eyes at John, knowing he too would find the joke un poco machista.
We continued around the lake, mesmerized by the elegance of the pure white ibis, the skill of the pelican with his large fish trapping beak, watching as cormorants lazed on top branches sunning themselves to dry their wet feathers before taking flight once again. Fish jumped playfully around the edges of the boat as we reached a wooden dock with a small foot path that would take us deep inside the enchanted mangrove forest.
Surrounded on all sides by giant mangroves, Francisco leaned down to pick up mangrove seeds that lay strewn on our wooden footpath. "See this tip?" He scoops up the long slender branch to shop us a small brown edge in the shape of an arrow. "This tells the mangrove how far to throw its seed. It's a detector. Watch!" He walked to the railing leaned over and let the seed plummet to the ground 8 feet below us. The seed stuck upright in the mud, a young mangrove planted. Javi, John and I planted three more, watching them as they each took root in the island.
Standing among the beauty and wonder of the magnificent trees, the magnitude of this island with its natural water filtration system, thousands of species of shellfish, birds, fish, plants all around us, it is difficult to imagine wanting to destroy any of it, even for the inevitable profit the shrimping industry will bring. Francisco agrees and explains how after years and years of watching the precious mangroves disappear; he and a group of local fisherman became fed up with the destruction. Feeling the power of a group, they banded together and began to replant the trees in danger of disappearing from the River Chone completely.
He sighs deeply, content with what he sees all around him, "Six years ago, this island was but a dream in our minds. Now it is a reality."
A quiet, reflective trip back in our makeshift canoe, now filled with significantly more water than when we started four hours earlier that day, gives time for reflection on the efforts of a few determined individuals, determined to make a difference in the world. We float by two barebacked teenagers, one fishing rod made of sticks, a small handmade net tossed out into the sea, creating waves that ripple out toward our boat. They wave as we go by, a slow friendly salute.
The island gets smaller and smaller as we approach the shore, and I turn around to take one more look at the island, reminded of how each and every one of us can truly make a difference.
Saturday, October 14, 2006
They say. . .
They say, bad things happen in threes. They say, you reap what you sow. They say, what comes around goes around. They say that for every door that closes, a window opens. They say, you have to take the good with the bad.
I have always wondered, who exactly are they? And how the heck do they know so much about life? Haven´t you?
Well for what it´s worth, in our experience during these last few weeks, we have discovered that "they" know what they are talking about.
For example, take the old addage that bad things happens in threes. Now, I am not particularly supersititious, though I do throw salt over my shoulder if I spill it and I do from time to time, knock on some wood. I mean, really, it can´t hurt right? I guess you could call me an agnostic when it comes to the oral traditions. It´s not that I am a staunch believer, yet at the same time, I am not completely willing to say ok, I don´t believe in fate or destiny or that things happen for a reason. But, I digress. I must return to things that happen in threes. I am sure you all remember the story of the mustard bird that got us on the streets of Quito? Well I guess we would have to call that number one, right?
It happened, nothing to major, upsetting but for the most part, we got off scott free. No money to speak of was stolen, no documents, we weren´t hurt physically. . .you get the picture. So you can imagine our surprise the following day when we went to pack up to leave Quito and lo and behold, there´s good ole number two. . . John´s ipod is gone. Poof. Disappeared. We searched high and low (and while I searched through my things and John pulled apart his own, I remembered him distinctly saying to me, "You know Jen, I am just not going to bring it. I don´t want to risk it getting damaged or lost or stolen." My response of course that changed his mind, "Then why do you own it if you aren´t going to bring it?" Ahh, hindsight). Anyway, back to the search. We looked and looked and looked everywhere we could think of, but for the life of us, there was no ipod to be found. Bad thing number two.
But again, really after being disturbed for the better part of half an hour, what could we do. An ipod is expensive. It´s valuable, sure. But really in the large scheme of things, not that important. So words of Buddah and the Dali Lamma in our heads, we let the ipod go, right along with John´s camelback and blissfully returned to our life on the road.
Of course, number three wasn´t far behind. That´s the way these addages and good ole Murphy´s law works. You know, when it rains it pours. The bread always fall butter side down etc. etc.
We had left La Chimba (the town that took me from city to country girl in a matter of minutes) for a few weeks after having met with the teachers and deciding that it was better for them if we started the English courses later in the month to give the municipality time to certify their time, and since we really have no binding plans, we readily obliged. So we set off for La Esperanza, another tiny village about two hours from La Chimba, thinking we would hike this great trail over a volcano to a volcanic lake back to the small market town of Otavalo. It sounded perfect. But after two days of rain and a sore throat and swolen glands on my part, we gave the idea up and decided to head down the mountain into the city of Ibarra.
Back in a relatively big city again, we headed down one of the main streets to find ourselves a hotel for the night. The sidewalks were crowded and thin and as we wove our way in and out of the throngs of hummanity, and before long five or six people separated me from John, our humongous backpacks making it impossible to walk two abreast.
That´s when I heard it,"Shit! Jen! Help me! Help me!" It had to be John. Not just because I heard my name, but really because who else would be yelling help me in English. I whirled around to see John throw his backpack on the ground and frantically begin to pat all of his pockets. "Shit. Shit. Shit. They got it. I can´t believe they got it. Shit."
"Got what? Got what? Calm down. I can´t understand you. What did they get? Who?
"Shit. My wallet. They got my wallet. There was a woman with a baby and I bumped her. Some guy bumped me and then I bumped her and now my wallet is gone. I cannot believe this shit!"
Still unsure if John had actually been pickpocketed or if he had put his wallet somewhere different, I stood there dumbly blinking, "Are you sure?"
"Yes!" he shouted already on his way back down the street to see if he could locate the guy who had stolen his wallet. (There it is, number three in the series in case you hadn´t been paying attention).
By then a small crowd had gathered and as I leaned up against a wall holding John´s bag, they began to talk all at once. "Las espitufas." "Sí claro, siempre lo hacen." Shaking their collective heads, wondering how once again this group had pulled it off.
"Subió al autobus." a young guy in a red jacket shouted, pointing to the bus pulling away from the curb.
"John," I yelled stopping him from going further down the street, "He´s on the bus. The bus. Go! Go! Go!" And just like that, John was off, like the wind chasing the bus. I wondered briefly how John would communicate with the alleged theives if they were really on the bus and if in fact, John recognized them, but dismissed it quickly since by now, the group gathered included three police officers who wanted to take a statement of what had happened.
Apparently from the comments going on behind me as I described what I knew of the events that had transpired, the event was well witnessed by every local shopowner and passerby. As it turns out, a small boy had cut John off in his path and upon stopping, a teenager had crashed into him from behind, shoving him into a woman with a baby in her arms. The woman gave John a dirty look and while John apologized and tried to explain what had happened, she lifted his wallet. Talk about irony. He apologizes to her as she steals from him. Good karma that is not. And I don´t think it is good things come to those who wait, nor what comes around goes around. But again, I digress.
John returned huffing and puffing, empty handed. They, along with his wallet, $50, a credit card, an ATM card and his driver´s liscence were gone. Poof. Like the camelback, like the ipod. Things happen in threes.
They say, bad things happen in threes. And frankly I believe them. But as I mentioned before they also say, when one door closes, a window opens and of course, you gotta take the good with the bad.
So we had taken the bad. (Three of them, to be precise, and really John had taken all three of them, though for the most part what happens to him, tends to affect me too.) And we were about ready to swear off all cities over 300 in size when our luck began to change. We were about to be offered the open window, the good that comes with the bad, the ying that goes with the yang.
That´s when our luck began to change. Initially, we didn´t get it. We didn´t realize that it was the universe´s attempt to restore our faith in humanity, or possibly in Ecuadorian city dwellers. The guy in red, who we later discovered to be called Edwin, offered to take us in his truck to look for the alleged "robbers," yet at that moment, throwing my backpack in some guy´s open pick up and having him drive us around a city we didn´t know to find a pair of thieves didn´t strike me as the most responsible thing to do in the world. The police seemed to think it would be a good idea, but even so, I resisted and defered to that small voice inside of me that said, "WHAT? Are you isane? He is probably one of them!"
So we didn´t go with Edwin. Instead, he went on his own and we proceded to get in a cab with another one of the witnesses. (We´ll call him William. We are not actually sure of his name, as he told it to us while we were still in shock, and later were too embarassed to ask again.) William took us to a local hotel where we stored our bags and then proceded to play tour guide for us the rest of the day. First, he helped us pick out fanny packs (I know, lame and too little too late, but heck if we were going to get robbed a fourth time.) Then he took us on the bus to a local laguna with a 10K path around it and some hiking trails leading up to the patron saint and guardian angel of Ibarra, Gabriel. He even paid for our taxi and bus fare. Of course, in the back of my mind, I couldn´t help but wonder, "OK, when´s the part where he takes out the knife, demands the rest of our money and kills us?"
But despite my cynical bouts of paranoia, that never materialized. What did happen instead was that he tooks later that evening over to Edwin´s bakery, where Edwin told us that he had been unable to get our cards back, despite the fact that he had spent time trying. He thought maybe they would return our cards for a reward, but the thought of paying the people who had stolen from us, to get our own things back didn´t really compute in our minds, so we just cancelled the cards and chalked it up to one of those things you just can´t control.
By then, William had left to go to work (turns out, he had forgone sleep to play tour guide for us and worked from 10 pm till 7 am that night.) We sat in Edwin´s bakery, recounting the rest of our day to Edwin and told him that in the morning we thought we would go back to the lake to go running. "I´ll take you. What time do you want to go?"
A million thoughts raced through my mind at once, "Are you kidding us with this? Were these guys for real? Were people actually this nice? Or was this still a scheme to get the gringos?" It was too hard to figure out, so we agreed to meet at 6 the following morning to go running around the lake.
So we took the good too. Why not? Sometimes, you just have to take that leap of faith and trust that the universe is taking care of things. Luckily for us, this time, it was. Edwin turned out to be one of the nicest people I have ever had the good fortune to come across. He didn´t just take us running, and then pay for our orange juice and then invite us to his bakery for free coffee and breakfast. Which would have been more than enough (Dayenu). Over and beyond what a stranger does for another stanger. (And still that nagging voice in my mind whispering, "No one is this nice. What does he want from us?")
No, the running, the juice, the coffee, the breakfast were just the beginning. Apparently, the running for me was not meant to be and after 20 minutes, I was in pain again, limping around the trail with Edwin, as John continued on. I told Edwin the on and off two month long story of my sore leg, and he insisted that after breakfast we go to get it x-rayed. He of course, accompanied us first there, then to the orthepedist,and then later, to the pharmacy to fill the large dose of anti-inflammatories, muscle relaxers and rest he had prescribed me. (Turns out, there are no fractures, but there will be no running or hiking for jenny for the next three weeks). He insisted on us staying with him and his family that night and, as if that wasn´t enough, he insisted on taking us to lunch and then to visit the crater lake in the middle of Volcano Cotacachi, Lago Cuicocha, over an hour´s drive from Ibarra. This guy was really too much.
This morning, on our way out of town, we stopped by the bakery to say good bye and he insisted on feeding us more coffee and breakfast (on him) and told us that he could give us a ride back up to La Chimba the following week when our job started. Seriously?
Just now while typing this, our cell phone rang. It was William (turns out, his name is William. Good for us for remembering correctly.), wanting to know how everything had gone yesterday and if we needed anything.
They say, what comes around goes around. They say, when one door closes, another opens. They say, you take the good with the bad.
You know what I think? I think, whoever they are, they´re right.
I have always wondered, who exactly are they? And how the heck do they know so much about life? Haven´t you?
Well for what it´s worth, in our experience during these last few weeks, we have discovered that "they" know what they are talking about.
For example, take the old addage that bad things happens in threes. Now, I am not particularly supersititious, though I do throw salt over my shoulder if I spill it and I do from time to time, knock on some wood. I mean, really, it can´t hurt right? I guess you could call me an agnostic when it comes to the oral traditions. It´s not that I am a staunch believer, yet at the same time, I am not completely willing to say ok, I don´t believe in fate or destiny or that things happen for a reason. But, I digress. I must return to things that happen in threes. I am sure you all remember the story of the mustard bird that got us on the streets of Quito? Well I guess we would have to call that number one, right?
It happened, nothing to major, upsetting but for the most part, we got off scott free. No money to speak of was stolen, no documents, we weren´t hurt physically. . .you get the picture. So you can imagine our surprise the following day when we went to pack up to leave Quito and lo and behold, there´s good ole number two. . . John´s ipod is gone. Poof. Disappeared. We searched high and low (and while I searched through my things and John pulled apart his own, I remembered him distinctly saying to me, "You know Jen, I am just not going to bring it. I don´t want to risk it getting damaged or lost or stolen." My response of course that changed his mind, "Then why do you own it if you aren´t going to bring it?" Ahh, hindsight). Anyway, back to the search. We looked and looked and looked everywhere we could think of, but for the life of us, there was no ipod to be found. Bad thing number two.
But again, really after being disturbed for the better part of half an hour, what could we do. An ipod is expensive. It´s valuable, sure. But really in the large scheme of things, not that important. So words of Buddah and the Dali Lamma in our heads, we let the ipod go, right along with John´s camelback and blissfully returned to our life on the road.
Of course, number three wasn´t far behind. That´s the way these addages and good ole Murphy´s law works. You know, when it rains it pours. The bread always fall butter side down etc. etc.
We had left La Chimba (the town that took me from city to country girl in a matter of minutes) for a few weeks after having met with the teachers and deciding that it was better for them if we started the English courses later in the month to give the municipality time to certify their time, and since we really have no binding plans, we readily obliged. So we set off for La Esperanza, another tiny village about two hours from La Chimba, thinking we would hike this great trail over a volcano to a volcanic lake back to the small market town of Otavalo. It sounded perfect. But after two days of rain and a sore throat and swolen glands on my part, we gave the idea up and decided to head down the mountain into the city of Ibarra.
Back in a relatively big city again, we headed down one of the main streets to find ourselves a hotel for the night. The sidewalks were crowded and thin and as we wove our way in and out of the throngs of hummanity, and before long five or six people separated me from John, our humongous backpacks making it impossible to walk two abreast.
That´s when I heard it,"Shit! Jen! Help me! Help me!" It had to be John. Not just because I heard my name, but really because who else would be yelling help me in English. I whirled around to see John throw his backpack on the ground and frantically begin to pat all of his pockets. "Shit. Shit. Shit. They got it. I can´t believe they got it. Shit."
"Got what? Got what? Calm down. I can´t understand you. What did they get? Who?
"Shit. My wallet. They got my wallet. There was a woman with a baby and I bumped her. Some guy bumped me and then I bumped her and now my wallet is gone. I cannot believe this shit!"
Still unsure if John had actually been pickpocketed or if he had put his wallet somewhere different, I stood there dumbly blinking, "Are you sure?"
"Yes!" he shouted already on his way back down the street to see if he could locate the guy who had stolen his wallet. (There it is, number three in the series in case you hadn´t been paying attention).
By then a small crowd had gathered and as I leaned up against a wall holding John´s bag, they began to talk all at once. "Las espitufas." "Sí claro, siempre lo hacen." Shaking their collective heads, wondering how once again this group had pulled it off.
"Subió al autobus." a young guy in a red jacket shouted, pointing to the bus pulling away from the curb.
"John," I yelled stopping him from going further down the street, "He´s on the bus. The bus. Go! Go! Go!" And just like that, John was off, like the wind chasing the bus. I wondered briefly how John would communicate with the alleged theives if they were really on the bus and if in fact, John recognized them, but dismissed it quickly since by now, the group gathered included three police officers who wanted to take a statement of what had happened.
Apparently from the comments going on behind me as I described what I knew of the events that had transpired, the event was well witnessed by every local shopowner and passerby. As it turns out, a small boy had cut John off in his path and upon stopping, a teenager had crashed into him from behind, shoving him into a woman with a baby in her arms. The woman gave John a dirty look and while John apologized and tried to explain what had happened, she lifted his wallet. Talk about irony. He apologizes to her as she steals from him. Good karma that is not. And I don´t think it is good things come to those who wait, nor what comes around goes around. But again, I digress.
John returned huffing and puffing, empty handed. They, along with his wallet, $50, a credit card, an ATM card and his driver´s liscence were gone. Poof. Like the camelback, like the ipod. Things happen in threes.
They say, bad things happen in threes. And frankly I believe them. But as I mentioned before they also say, when one door closes, a window opens and of course, you gotta take the good with the bad.
So we had taken the bad. (Three of them, to be precise, and really John had taken all three of them, though for the most part what happens to him, tends to affect me too.) And we were about ready to swear off all cities over 300 in size when our luck began to change. We were about to be offered the open window, the good that comes with the bad, the ying that goes with the yang.
That´s when our luck began to change. Initially, we didn´t get it. We didn´t realize that it was the universe´s attempt to restore our faith in humanity, or possibly in Ecuadorian city dwellers. The guy in red, who we later discovered to be called Edwin, offered to take us in his truck to look for the alleged "robbers," yet at that moment, throwing my backpack in some guy´s open pick up and having him drive us around a city we didn´t know to find a pair of thieves didn´t strike me as the most responsible thing to do in the world. The police seemed to think it would be a good idea, but even so, I resisted and defered to that small voice inside of me that said, "WHAT? Are you isane? He is probably one of them!"
So we didn´t go with Edwin. Instead, he went on his own and we proceded to get in a cab with another one of the witnesses. (We´ll call him William. We are not actually sure of his name, as he told it to us while we were still in shock, and later were too embarassed to ask again.) William took us to a local hotel where we stored our bags and then proceded to play tour guide for us the rest of the day. First, he helped us pick out fanny packs (I know, lame and too little too late, but heck if we were going to get robbed a fourth time.) Then he took us on the bus to a local laguna with a 10K path around it and some hiking trails leading up to the patron saint and guardian angel of Ibarra, Gabriel. He even paid for our taxi and bus fare. Of course, in the back of my mind, I couldn´t help but wonder, "OK, when´s the part where he takes out the knife, demands the rest of our money and kills us?"
But despite my cynical bouts of paranoia, that never materialized. What did happen instead was that he tooks later that evening over to Edwin´s bakery, where Edwin told us that he had been unable to get our cards back, despite the fact that he had spent time trying. He thought maybe they would return our cards for a reward, but the thought of paying the people who had stolen from us, to get our own things back didn´t really compute in our minds, so we just cancelled the cards and chalked it up to one of those things you just can´t control.
By then, William had left to go to work (turns out, he had forgone sleep to play tour guide for us and worked from 10 pm till 7 am that night.) We sat in Edwin´s bakery, recounting the rest of our day to Edwin and told him that in the morning we thought we would go back to the lake to go running. "I´ll take you. What time do you want to go?"
A million thoughts raced through my mind at once, "Are you kidding us with this? Were these guys for real? Were people actually this nice? Or was this still a scheme to get the gringos?" It was too hard to figure out, so we agreed to meet at 6 the following morning to go running around the lake.
So we took the good too. Why not? Sometimes, you just have to take that leap of faith and trust that the universe is taking care of things. Luckily for us, this time, it was. Edwin turned out to be one of the nicest people I have ever had the good fortune to come across. He didn´t just take us running, and then pay for our orange juice and then invite us to his bakery for free coffee and breakfast. Which would have been more than enough (Dayenu). Over and beyond what a stranger does for another stanger. (And still that nagging voice in my mind whispering, "No one is this nice. What does he want from us?")
No, the running, the juice, the coffee, the breakfast were just the beginning. Apparently, the running for me was not meant to be and after 20 minutes, I was in pain again, limping around the trail with Edwin, as John continued on. I told Edwin the on and off two month long story of my sore leg, and he insisted that after breakfast we go to get it x-rayed. He of course, accompanied us first there, then to the orthepedist,and then later, to the pharmacy to fill the large dose of anti-inflammatories, muscle relaxers and rest he had prescribed me. (Turns out, there are no fractures, but there will be no running or hiking for jenny for the next three weeks). He insisted on us staying with him and his family that night and, as if that wasn´t enough, he insisted on taking us to lunch and then to visit the crater lake in the middle of Volcano Cotacachi, Lago Cuicocha, over an hour´s drive from Ibarra. This guy was really too much.
This morning, on our way out of town, we stopped by the bakery to say good bye and he insisted on feeding us more coffee and breakfast (on him) and told us that he could give us a ride back up to La Chimba the following week when our job started. Seriously?
Just now while typing this, our cell phone rang. It was William (turns out, his name is William. Good for us for remembering correctly.), wanting to know how everything had gone yesterday and if we needed anything.
They say, what comes around goes around. They say, when one door closes, another opens. They say, you take the good with the bad.
You know what I think? I think, whoever they are, they´re right.
Monday, October 09, 2006
City Girl
I have always thought of myself as a city girl. Not that I have always lived in a city. As a matter of fact, I didn’t live in a big city for the first time until I was 20 years old and moved to Seville, Spain during my last year of college. But being there that year confirmed for me what I always knew. I was a city girl. I loved the fast pace, the accessibility, the anonymity of it, the diversity of people, smells, sights and foods . . . I would live in a city. And pretty much since then (with a small digression back to Delaware in my early 20´s), I have lived in cities. No they weren’t New York City, but the populations were large and the conveniences of being in a city were all there. From our door to the nearest coffee shop is 200 steps, the nearest bar 150, the nearest place to purchase a bite to eat 100, a bagel is maybe 110 steps away. You get the point.
And yet, despite the ease of being in a city, I do love to visit small towns or even communities that can’t even call themselves villages due to their small size and relative lack of every convenience imaginable. Especially when travelling abroad. I love the hillside village in the middle of nowhere where everyone knows everyone else’s name and "Good morning" is a matter of course rather than a cause for alarm.
John and I, after 10 days in the capital city of Quito, had had enough of the city life. Perhaps it was the bird spewing mustard incident, or perhaps we were just tired of having our choice of 15 internet cafes, of breathing in the intense smell of the diesel fuel, of knowing that at any moment we could be approached by someone wanting to take advantage of us. So after a little under two weeks time, we packed up our backpacks and trekked up to the Pan-American highway to catch one of the buses headed to Cayembe, a smaller town of only 20-30,000 people settled in the shadow of snow-capped Vulcán Cayembe.
While Cayembe was no Quito, 30,000 people is nothing to sneeze about and we quickly dismissed our guidebook’s summary that there was only one internet cafe and two restaurants of note. What we did notice was that we were the only non-Ecuadorians in town. It is possible, though not likely, that we might not have so quickly made that observation, were it not for the fact that every passer-by literally did a double take upon seeing us and alternately snickered or stared as if we were from outer space rather than the United States.
Cayembe, famous for its bizchochos (small, crunchy breadsticks served warm) and queso de hoja (freshly made string cheese) is not a major tourist destination for "gringos," however it is a fantastic place from which to explore the larger region, also called Cayembe. After securing a map from the very helpful tourist information center and filling up on sautéed potatoes, French fried potatoes and a version of potato pancakes, John and I were ready to embark on our adventures for the weekend.
We first set out in the town of Cayembe to find the Temples of the Sun and the Moon, ruins left over in the green space at the far end of town. Remembering my experience in Peru, I began to imagine the types of ruins we would find there, but after searching through the local cemetery for the better part of half an hour and finding only homage to people that had passed on, I began to wonder. Finally, we decided to ask for help and located what appeared to be a grounds keeper putting his tools back into the tool shed.
"Ven acá," he motioned to us as he shuffled off, over toward one of the cemetery walls. We followed closely, exchanging curious looks over top of his head. He brought us to a section of the wall that had been knocked down and indicated a small pathway between a set of run down shacks and the outside of the cemetery wall, indicating that we should follow the path up.
"What about the barbed wire fence?" I asked. But he just shook his head, smiled and assured us that the news people had brought back confirmed what he already knew, the ruins were at the top of the hill. So, we went. Climbed through the wall, under the fence, greeted the man cutting his toenails in the shack and walked up the grassy dirt path to an open field. And there is where we found, absolutely nothing.
We stood in the field, bewildered looking at each other under the threatening sky and shrugged. "Do you think this is it?"
John laughed, "I guess this is why no one in town knew where the ruins were?"
I guessed so too. Later, back in the tourist office, she told us that the pre-Incan ruins were in the process of being restored (to what I am not sure) and that we were better off going to explore some of the local communities and "touristic sites."
Determined to prove our guide book wrong, we set out the next morning on a bus bound for Paquistancia, a community about 30 minutes up the dirt road leading out of Cayembe. As usual, I attracted the one drunk old man on the bus and despite my insistence that he stay on the bus, he got off when we did, the bus kicking up dust into the sunny morning air. We stood in the middle of the dirt road, old, drunken man, John and I weighing our options. We knew that there was an old growth forest on the map near here . . . only if we knew where.
To our right, a family congregated around an outdoor sink, chopping cilantro and washing a bowl of already chopped potatoes. "I guess we can go ask them," I whispered to John, giving the swaying man a sideways glance. "I hope he doesn’t think he is coming with us."
As it turns out the family was preparing for a local girl’s quinceañera, but the eldest also served as local guide and after a few negotiations, John, Maira and I set out, just the three of us, for El Bosque Primario de Pumamaqui (The Old Growth Forest of the Puma’s Hand. We walked along dusty road, an outcropping of houses dotting the sides of the small road, cows, sheep, goats, bulls and horses grazing the pastures. Through the local church’s "parking lot" and up into the hills for the next 4 hours. As we walked, me huffing and puffing along side of John and Maira, Maira regaled us with her knowledge of local culture, fauna and lore. We learned that one of the volcanoes without snow that could be seen in the distance had become snow less, when her "husband" volcano cheated on her and she cried so much that she was left without water. We learned that the Pumamaqui tree, old growth trees that were near extinction before the forest became protected, got its name in Quechwa because the puma used to hide in its branches and because the leaves of the trees looked like a puma’s paw. We ate local taxo fruit from the trees and learned about the many uses of the plants that grew on either side of the path, with sweeping views of the valley below us, green pastures, volcanoes and small communities growing their own existence, far from the lights, sounds and smells of the city.
Unlike Paquistancia, Oyachachi was not an easy 30 minute jaunt from the town of Cayembe and as we climbed higher and higher up into the clouds of the mountains, I gripped the side of the bus seat that I leaned on, feeling the effects of the altitude with every pitch of the bus. After a while, I gave up and John was gracious enough to let me use his lap as a seat for the remainder of the nauseating ride up over the pass and then back down into the valley on the other side, into the community of Oyachachi. Like Paquistancia, and even the town of Cayembe, John and I were the only non-Ecuadorians in sight as we made our way past the soccer field and the ten houses that consisted of the town toward what the sign indicated were local ruins. We were not jaded by our experience two days earlier, we would see some ruins if there were some. We bundled up against the cold drizzle returning the greetings of the indigenous women sitting in their doorways, brightly colored shawls draped over the shoulders, a lone feather sticking out of their round hat.
Two miles down the road, we discovered the community that had been moved into modern day Oyachachi only 40 years early. A sign invited us to imagine children running in their streets, learning in their schools, families eating in their houses and mourning the loss of loved ones in the remains of the church that still stood in the pasture. Standing there in the field, a soft mist falling from the sky, the river rushing further down the hill, we stood in the remains of what had been a family’s house and I closed my eyes. Could I feel their presence here? Why had they moved their community futher up the hill? What had made them change from these cute little round houses with thatched roofs to the squat, rectangular structures we had seen in town? With no phone service and few possessions, their lives remained simple in the new version of Oyachaci . . .had the move been merely to be closer to the natural hotsprings inside the town, popular with many daytrippers? Or had their been a different reason altogether. Heading back to the new town, we fell silent, the sound of our footfalls absorbed by the dirt of the street, mountains rising up to our right, the river flowing on the far side of the pastures to our left.
Once inside the hotsprings, we were quickly the object of many a curious stares as we lowered ourselves into the volcano fed pools overlooking the town and valley beyond. The water warmed our bones, cold from the walk down to the ruins and before long, we were engaged in a rousing game of tag with a group of young teenagers from a town not too far from Oyachachi. Laughing and playing with the kids, John and I noticed that despite the odd looks we received from the general population, no one felt threatened by our engagment with the children and we tried to imagine how two adults playing tag with unknown children would go over in the States. There was inherent trust from the kids, from the people that sat and swam bathing around us.
After a lunch of beans, toasted corn kernals and fresh salsa in a bag and some fresh watermellon and pineapple from the back of pick up truck, we headed back to Cayembe, once again entertaining the locals´curiuosity about where we were from, what we were doing in Ecuador, how long we would stay and if we liked their country, their food, their customs, their people. The answer . . .of course.
As I said before I am a city girl. I love being able to get what I want, when I want it. So you may find it interesting that John and I today signed on to volunteer in the community of La Chimba, an hour bus ride up the dirt road from Cayembe. For the next two weeks or so, John and I will be giving English, computer and teacher training courses there in exchange for room, hopefully meals and an hour a day of Spanish for John. It may be difficult to reach us as there is no internet and no cell service. No restaurants, no cafes, no bars, no bookstores. In La Chimba, there are houses, school, church, a river and an ex-hacienda (slave owners´house) being converted into a future hostel for people like us, who pass through to help.
I have always thought of myself as a city girl, but for the next few weeks, country girl I will be.
And yet, despite the ease of being in a city, I do love to visit small towns or even communities that can’t even call themselves villages due to their small size and relative lack of every convenience imaginable. Especially when travelling abroad. I love the hillside village in the middle of nowhere where everyone knows everyone else’s name and "Good morning" is a matter of course rather than a cause for alarm.
John and I, after 10 days in the capital city of Quito, had had enough of the city life. Perhaps it was the bird spewing mustard incident, or perhaps we were just tired of having our choice of 15 internet cafes, of breathing in the intense smell of the diesel fuel, of knowing that at any moment we could be approached by someone wanting to take advantage of us. So after a little under two weeks time, we packed up our backpacks and trekked up to the Pan-American highway to catch one of the buses headed to Cayembe, a smaller town of only 20-30,000 people settled in the shadow of snow-capped Vulcán Cayembe.
While Cayembe was no Quito, 30,000 people is nothing to sneeze about and we quickly dismissed our guidebook’s summary that there was only one internet cafe and two restaurants of note. What we did notice was that we were the only non-Ecuadorians in town. It is possible, though not likely, that we might not have so quickly made that observation, were it not for the fact that every passer-by literally did a double take upon seeing us and alternately snickered or stared as if we were from outer space rather than the United States.
Cayembe, famous for its bizchochos (small, crunchy breadsticks served warm) and queso de hoja (freshly made string cheese) is not a major tourist destination for "gringos," however it is a fantastic place from which to explore the larger region, also called Cayembe. After securing a map from the very helpful tourist information center and filling up on sautéed potatoes, French fried potatoes and a version of potato pancakes, John and I were ready to embark on our adventures for the weekend.
We first set out in the town of Cayembe to find the Temples of the Sun and the Moon, ruins left over in the green space at the far end of town. Remembering my experience in Peru, I began to imagine the types of ruins we would find there, but after searching through the local cemetery for the better part of half an hour and finding only homage to people that had passed on, I began to wonder. Finally, we decided to ask for help and located what appeared to be a grounds keeper putting his tools back into the tool shed.
"Ven acá," he motioned to us as he shuffled off, over toward one of the cemetery walls. We followed closely, exchanging curious looks over top of his head. He brought us to a section of the wall that had been knocked down and indicated a small pathway between a set of run down shacks and the outside of the cemetery wall, indicating that we should follow the path up.
"What about the barbed wire fence?" I asked. But he just shook his head, smiled and assured us that the news people had brought back confirmed what he already knew, the ruins were at the top of the hill. So, we went. Climbed through the wall, under the fence, greeted the man cutting his toenails in the shack and walked up the grassy dirt path to an open field. And there is where we found, absolutely nothing.
We stood in the field, bewildered looking at each other under the threatening sky and shrugged. "Do you think this is it?"
John laughed, "I guess this is why no one in town knew where the ruins were?"
I guessed so too. Later, back in the tourist office, she told us that the pre-Incan ruins were in the process of being restored (to what I am not sure) and that we were better off going to explore some of the local communities and "touristic sites."
Determined to prove our guide book wrong, we set out the next morning on a bus bound for Paquistancia, a community about 30 minutes up the dirt road leading out of Cayembe. As usual, I attracted the one drunk old man on the bus and despite my insistence that he stay on the bus, he got off when we did, the bus kicking up dust into the sunny morning air. We stood in the middle of the dirt road, old, drunken man, John and I weighing our options. We knew that there was an old growth forest on the map near here . . . only if we knew where.
To our right, a family congregated around an outdoor sink, chopping cilantro and washing a bowl of already chopped potatoes. "I guess we can go ask them," I whispered to John, giving the swaying man a sideways glance. "I hope he doesn’t think he is coming with us."
As it turns out the family was preparing for a local girl’s quinceañera, but the eldest also served as local guide and after a few negotiations, John, Maira and I set out, just the three of us, for El Bosque Primario de Pumamaqui (The Old Growth Forest of the Puma’s Hand. We walked along dusty road, an outcropping of houses dotting the sides of the small road, cows, sheep, goats, bulls and horses grazing the pastures. Through the local church’s "parking lot" and up into the hills for the next 4 hours. As we walked, me huffing and puffing along side of John and Maira, Maira regaled us with her knowledge of local culture, fauna and lore. We learned that one of the volcanoes without snow that could be seen in the distance had become snow less, when her "husband" volcano cheated on her and she cried so much that she was left without water. We learned that the Pumamaqui tree, old growth trees that were near extinction before the forest became protected, got its name in Quechwa because the puma used to hide in its branches and because the leaves of the trees looked like a puma’s paw. We ate local taxo fruit from the trees and learned about the many uses of the plants that grew on either side of the path, with sweeping views of the valley below us, green pastures, volcanoes and small communities growing their own existence, far from the lights, sounds and smells of the city.
Unlike Paquistancia, Oyachachi was not an easy 30 minute jaunt from the town of Cayembe and as we climbed higher and higher up into the clouds of the mountains, I gripped the side of the bus seat that I leaned on, feeling the effects of the altitude with every pitch of the bus. After a while, I gave up and John was gracious enough to let me use his lap as a seat for the remainder of the nauseating ride up over the pass and then back down into the valley on the other side, into the community of Oyachachi. Like Paquistancia, and even the town of Cayembe, John and I were the only non-Ecuadorians in sight as we made our way past the soccer field and the ten houses that consisted of the town toward what the sign indicated were local ruins. We were not jaded by our experience two days earlier, we would see some ruins if there were some. We bundled up against the cold drizzle returning the greetings of the indigenous women sitting in their doorways, brightly colored shawls draped over the shoulders, a lone feather sticking out of their round hat.
Two miles down the road, we discovered the community that had been moved into modern day Oyachachi only 40 years early. A sign invited us to imagine children running in their streets, learning in their schools, families eating in their houses and mourning the loss of loved ones in the remains of the church that still stood in the pasture. Standing there in the field, a soft mist falling from the sky, the river rushing further down the hill, we stood in the remains of what had been a family’s house and I closed my eyes. Could I feel their presence here? Why had they moved their community futher up the hill? What had made them change from these cute little round houses with thatched roofs to the squat, rectangular structures we had seen in town? With no phone service and few possessions, their lives remained simple in the new version of Oyachaci . . .had the move been merely to be closer to the natural hotsprings inside the town, popular with many daytrippers? Or had their been a different reason altogether. Heading back to the new town, we fell silent, the sound of our footfalls absorbed by the dirt of the street, mountains rising up to our right, the river flowing on the far side of the pastures to our left.
Once inside the hotsprings, we were quickly the object of many a curious stares as we lowered ourselves into the volcano fed pools overlooking the town and valley beyond. The water warmed our bones, cold from the walk down to the ruins and before long, we were engaged in a rousing game of tag with a group of young teenagers from a town not too far from Oyachachi. Laughing and playing with the kids, John and I noticed that despite the odd looks we received from the general population, no one felt threatened by our engagment with the children and we tried to imagine how two adults playing tag with unknown children would go over in the States. There was inherent trust from the kids, from the people that sat and swam bathing around us.
After a lunch of beans, toasted corn kernals and fresh salsa in a bag and some fresh watermellon and pineapple from the back of pick up truck, we headed back to Cayembe, once again entertaining the locals´curiuosity about where we were from, what we were doing in Ecuador, how long we would stay and if we liked their country, their food, their customs, their people. The answer . . .of course.
As I said before I am a city girl. I love being able to get what I want, when I want it. So you may find it interesting that John and I today signed on to volunteer in the community of La Chimba, an hour bus ride up the dirt road from Cayembe. For the next two weeks or so, John and I will be giving English, computer and teacher training courses there in exchange for room, hopefully meals and an hour a day of Spanish for John. It may be difficult to reach us as there is no internet and no cell service. No restaurants, no cafes, no bars, no bookstores. In La Chimba, there are houses, school, church, a river and an ex-hacienda (slave owners´house) being converted into a future hostel for people like us, who pass through to help.
I have always thought of myself as a city girl, but for the next few weeks, country girl I will be.
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
It´s been too long
I hate when this happens. When it´s been too long and the thoughts about what to write just keep piling up. Every day a new story to write. It´s hard to live your life and find the time to write the parts of your life you want to share as well. But tonight seems to be the night for sharing. And then after a while, the one exciting story feels like it needs to become part of list of things that have happened during the past two weeks to catch up and move on. Also, my email inbox is simply overwhelming right now. That is not to say that I don´t love each and every one of the messages. It´s just taking me a while to get through them. Have patience my friends, I will respond.
Anyway, enough of my babbling. Let´s see if I can makes sense of what has happened since we survived our Pico Duarte adventure. . .
After our mountain experience, we headed back to Cabarete (the town where Jen C is volunteering this year) and ended up spending a little over a week there. We set up a deal with the Dream Project that in exchange for some volunteer work ourself, they would put us up at a local hotel. Turned out to be quite a hotel actually, nothing John and I would normally stay at but the air conditioning was a welcome change to what we had been experiencing with the 90 to 100 degree days, so we didn´t complain. We spent the week giving workshops to the Dream Volunteers, most of whom do not have education experience, so while they want to help in the schools, are not really sure where to start. We did a series of workshops for them on setting up the classroom, setting clear behavioral expectations and the basics of teaching reading and writing. I also had the opportunity to go to a number of the schools and do some observing, some modeling, some coaching which I always love doing so the week was work but fun work. Jen even set up a workshop with the Dominican teachers at her school, which was quite an interesting experience, to say the least.
For a little over a week now, we have been in Quito, Ecuador. Quito is an interesting place and about as different of a city than anywhere in the Dominican Republic and I have to say any of the major cities that I have been to in South and Central America. My typical M.O. in a major city when traveling, is quick and dirty. Get in and get out. While there are typically some sights to see, the cities are often crowded, polluted, dirty and somewhat dangerous. Quito, while it does have the polluted and somewhat dangerous rep, is very clean and has tons to offer.
We have been staying at Casa Paxee, a family house in the foothills of the city. Martha, the owner of the "hostal" rents out her upstairs to travellers, provides tons of travel advice and allows them use of the kitchen. So for the last week, for a mere $6 a night, John and I have been in the "penthouse" at Martha´s, a rooftop room with a private bathroom and spectacular views of Cotopaxi (a snow capped Volcano over 19,000 feet tall), the old and the new city and all the other mountains and volcanoes that the eye can see on a clear day. A funny side note is that we had chosen Casa Paxee for the fact that it was small . . .only 5 bedrooms, and as it turned out, the place got even smaller as John and I have been the only tenants all week. Talk about a bargain. $6 a night for our own house! ;)
This week has been about as full as you could imgaine. We decided to stay in Quito for the accessibility to phone and internet as we have been trying to set up a volunteer situation for the next month or so. So we alternated between our "chore days" as we called them where we mostly did internet, phone and business related things and our "fun days," where we got to see all that Quito and the area had to offer.
Since the chore days weren´t that interesting, even for John and me, I will stick to a couple of the other days instead.
The Saturday Market in Otavalo
Otavalo, a city about 2 hours by bus from Quito, should definitely not be missed if you ever come to Ecuador. It is famous for it´s Saturday marked and after visiting it last Saturday, I understand why. John and I headed up in the early morning, following Martha´s advice to walk up, up, up where the cars came down till we came to a foot bridge and then flag down one of the buses bound for Otavalo. We did just that and while we were actually let off about 2 miles past Otavalo (this seems to happen to us quite a bit), we did make it to the market by 10 and by 10:30, were amazed by the colors of the local handicrafts.
From handwoven sweaters, hats, socks and blankets, to brightly colored paintings depicting local scenes to as many types of fruits and vegetables as you could possibly imagine, this was a place to get lost in. Andean men with long braided hair invited us into to look at their shops, "Ven amiga, a tu orden amiga." Short women in brightly colored clothings, babies tied to their backs in shawls, sat weaving, nodding their heads, smiling, inviting us in to see their hardwork, thanking us whether we bought something or not. And of course, there is the bargaining. No price is ever set. For you, there is always a discount, a special price for the first sale of the day, for today only.
Mitad del Mundo
Obviously the equator is in Ecuador. It probably wouldn´t be called Ecuador otherwise. But honestly, before visiting the "middle of the world," last Sunday, I wasn´t really that interested in actually going to see the Equatorial line. I mean what would be there - would there actually be a line? Sounded like a tourist trap to me. But after Martha told us to go and to go on Sunday, we went. You don´t really argue with Martha, she is sort of a cross between a grandmother and a Jewish mother. Honestly, I don´t know what I expected, but the scene we experienced on Sunday was definitely not it.
We got to la mitad del mundo (which is the name of the town, meaning middle of the earth) at around 1 in the afternoon, just in time to catch the Sunday show taking place in their central square. There in the middle of the square were 6 or 7 women in traditional Andean dress, two men and a little girl around 5 years old. We stood at the edge of the square with the rest of the visitors, Ecuadorians and toursits alike, spellbound as the women and men (and little girl) twirled around to the traditional sound of Ecuador, their brilliantly colored shawls, bandanas and skirts flying in the air. Song after song, dance after dance, they invited onlookers into the circle, people danced, sang, laughed all around the equitorial line under the bright sun of the afternoon. There actually was a line painted on the ground, which while cools, was kind of silly when you thought about it.
El Teleferico
Yesterday, we headed up to a Gondola (teleferico in Spanish) which took us up over Quito. Quito, already over 9,000 feet is quite a high city. So heading up another 3,000 feet in what feels like a ski lift, is no small feat. And when we disembarked at 4,100 meters (about 12,500 feet), you can imagine how cold it was. Even from the first overlook down over Quito, the view was amazing, the new city with it´s skyscrapers and busy streets, the old city with it´s colonial style Cathedrals and winding cobblestone roads and off in the distance, layers of clouds and mountains.
Of course, as is our custom, the weather left something to be desired. So while it didn´t rain (wonder of wonders), some of the bigger more impressive mountains were obscured. And clearly, our hike up to the summit ridgeline at over 15,000 feet (4,700ish meters) was done as rapidly as possible with our diminishing oxygen to avoid what looked like a repeat of Pico Duarte. Nevertheless, the days was beautiful, the storm held at bay with dark, menacing clouds as we hiked up and around the volcano, past thistle like orange, purple and yellow flowers, Quito becoming a tiny version of itself in the distance, until it was nothing more than little while dots on the horizon.
The last part of the hike was as always, a scramble, not up rocks, but up slippery volcanic ash that slid from under your feet with every step up. So it went something like, two steps up, two steps back, three steps up, one step back. You get the picture. Not a whole lot of fun in the freezing cold with the threat of rain or hail or worse. But we made it and I 4 minutes behind John, had a view of the fog that had rolled in, my favorite view from every summit. (Actually my typical view is more like it.)
Duped
One bad thing happened today during one of our chore days. . . .we were walking down calle colon so John could do his long run and i could amuse myself around town (I am not running right now for those of you that didn´t know that) John had his camelback and i had my purse and my backpack with a change of clothes for John for later. All of a sudden, I look down and there is what appears to be bird poo on my shoe.
"Ew!" I yell and John stops to get out the toilet paper stored conveniently in his camelback. It´s then that he notices that he too has some on his shirt and his backpack. He takes out the toilet paper, hands me some and begins to clean himself up.
Just then a man comes with some toilet paper and starts to indicated that the bird had been up there. "Alla, alla" he is saying and pointing as I continue to wipe off the yellow stuff off my shoe.
"Hey¨" John muses aloud, "This is mustard, not bird poop." Someone had thrown mustard at us? Hmm. .. that seems weird. And then even as it dawned on us, "Shit! Jen! Where´s my bag?"
Gone! just like that. Down on the sidewalk to wipe off the mustard off his shirt for two seconds, the man indicating where the supossed bird had gone and boom, they had us, hook line and sinker. How stupid are we? Luckily nothing except John´s compass, $3 and the bag itself was worth much. Imagine how disappointed they were when they got around the corner and realized they had just stolen 70 oz of water! he he.
So you live and learn. . .we learned to keep walking when we get sprayed with mustard and we learned to let go of the things that really aren´t all that important. And while, very thirsty, John was still able to do his long run in el Parque Metropolitano (a park even larger than Central Park).
So sorry to have crammed all that into today´s entry. But I wanted you all to be caught up. We head out of Quito tomorrow and I believe I will be able to return to smaller, more manageable and more fun to read, entries in the future.
Anyway, enough of my babbling. Let´s see if I can makes sense of what has happened since we survived our Pico Duarte adventure. . .
After our mountain experience, we headed back to Cabarete (the town where Jen C is volunteering this year) and ended up spending a little over a week there. We set up a deal with the Dream Project that in exchange for some volunteer work ourself, they would put us up at a local hotel. Turned out to be quite a hotel actually, nothing John and I would normally stay at but the air conditioning was a welcome change to what we had been experiencing with the 90 to 100 degree days, so we didn´t complain. We spent the week giving workshops to the Dream Volunteers, most of whom do not have education experience, so while they want to help in the schools, are not really sure where to start. We did a series of workshops for them on setting up the classroom, setting clear behavioral expectations and the basics of teaching reading and writing. I also had the opportunity to go to a number of the schools and do some observing, some modeling, some coaching which I always love doing so the week was work but fun work. Jen even set up a workshop with the Dominican teachers at her school, which was quite an interesting experience, to say the least.
For a little over a week now, we have been in Quito, Ecuador. Quito is an interesting place and about as different of a city than anywhere in the Dominican Republic and I have to say any of the major cities that I have been to in South and Central America. My typical M.O. in a major city when traveling, is quick and dirty. Get in and get out. While there are typically some sights to see, the cities are often crowded, polluted, dirty and somewhat dangerous. Quito, while it does have the polluted and somewhat dangerous rep, is very clean and has tons to offer.
We have been staying at Casa Paxee, a family house in the foothills of the city. Martha, the owner of the "hostal" rents out her upstairs to travellers, provides tons of travel advice and allows them use of the kitchen. So for the last week, for a mere $6 a night, John and I have been in the "penthouse" at Martha´s, a rooftop room with a private bathroom and spectacular views of Cotopaxi (a snow capped Volcano over 19,000 feet tall), the old and the new city and all the other mountains and volcanoes that the eye can see on a clear day. A funny side note is that we had chosen Casa Paxee for the fact that it was small . . .only 5 bedrooms, and as it turned out, the place got even smaller as John and I have been the only tenants all week. Talk about a bargain. $6 a night for our own house! ;)
This week has been about as full as you could imgaine. We decided to stay in Quito for the accessibility to phone and internet as we have been trying to set up a volunteer situation for the next month or so. So we alternated between our "chore days" as we called them where we mostly did internet, phone and business related things and our "fun days," where we got to see all that Quito and the area had to offer.
Since the chore days weren´t that interesting, even for John and me, I will stick to a couple of the other days instead.
The Saturday Market in Otavalo
Otavalo, a city about 2 hours by bus from Quito, should definitely not be missed if you ever come to Ecuador. It is famous for it´s Saturday marked and after visiting it last Saturday, I understand why. John and I headed up in the early morning, following Martha´s advice to walk up, up, up where the cars came down till we came to a foot bridge and then flag down one of the buses bound for Otavalo. We did just that and while we were actually let off about 2 miles past Otavalo (this seems to happen to us quite a bit), we did make it to the market by 10 and by 10:30, were amazed by the colors of the local handicrafts.
From handwoven sweaters, hats, socks and blankets, to brightly colored paintings depicting local scenes to as many types of fruits and vegetables as you could possibly imagine, this was a place to get lost in. Andean men with long braided hair invited us into to look at their shops, "Ven amiga, a tu orden amiga." Short women in brightly colored clothings, babies tied to their backs in shawls, sat weaving, nodding their heads, smiling, inviting us in to see their hardwork, thanking us whether we bought something or not. And of course, there is the bargaining. No price is ever set. For you, there is always a discount, a special price for the first sale of the day, for today only.
Mitad del Mundo
Obviously the equator is in Ecuador. It probably wouldn´t be called Ecuador otherwise. But honestly, before visiting the "middle of the world," last Sunday, I wasn´t really that interested in actually going to see the Equatorial line. I mean what would be there - would there actually be a line? Sounded like a tourist trap to me. But after Martha told us to go and to go on Sunday, we went. You don´t really argue with Martha, she is sort of a cross between a grandmother and a Jewish mother. Honestly, I don´t know what I expected, but the scene we experienced on Sunday was definitely not it.
We got to la mitad del mundo (which is the name of the town, meaning middle of the earth) at around 1 in the afternoon, just in time to catch the Sunday show taking place in their central square. There in the middle of the square were 6 or 7 women in traditional Andean dress, two men and a little girl around 5 years old. We stood at the edge of the square with the rest of the visitors, Ecuadorians and toursits alike, spellbound as the women and men (and little girl) twirled around to the traditional sound of Ecuador, their brilliantly colored shawls, bandanas and skirts flying in the air. Song after song, dance after dance, they invited onlookers into the circle, people danced, sang, laughed all around the equitorial line under the bright sun of the afternoon. There actually was a line painted on the ground, which while cools, was kind of silly when you thought about it.
El Teleferico
Yesterday, we headed up to a Gondola (teleferico in Spanish) which took us up over Quito. Quito, already over 9,000 feet is quite a high city. So heading up another 3,000 feet in what feels like a ski lift, is no small feat. And when we disembarked at 4,100 meters (about 12,500 feet), you can imagine how cold it was. Even from the first overlook down over Quito, the view was amazing, the new city with it´s skyscrapers and busy streets, the old city with it´s colonial style Cathedrals and winding cobblestone roads and off in the distance, layers of clouds and mountains.
Of course, as is our custom, the weather left something to be desired. So while it didn´t rain (wonder of wonders), some of the bigger more impressive mountains were obscured. And clearly, our hike up to the summit ridgeline at over 15,000 feet (4,700ish meters) was done as rapidly as possible with our diminishing oxygen to avoid what looked like a repeat of Pico Duarte. Nevertheless, the days was beautiful, the storm held at bay with dark, menacing clouds as we hiked up and around the volcano, past thistle like orange, purple and yellow flowers, Quito becoming a tiny version of itself in the distance, until it was nothing more than little while dots on the horizon.
The last part of the hike was as always, a scramble, not up rocks, but up slippery volcanic ash that slid from under your feet with every step up. So it went something like, two steps up, two steps back, three steps up, one step back. You get the picture. Not a whole lot of fun in the freezing cold with the threat of rain or hail or worse. But we made it and I 4 minutes behind John, had a view of the fog that had rolled in, my favorite view from every summit. (Actually my typical view is more like it.)
Duped
One bad thing happened today during one of our chore days. . . .we were walking down calle colon so John could do his long run and i could amuse myself around town (I am not running right now for those of you that didn´t know that) John had his camelback and i had my purse and my backpack with a change of clothes for John for later. All of a sudden, I look down and there is what appears to be bird poo on my shoe.
"Ew!" I yell and John stops to get out the toilet paper stored conveniently in his camelback. It´s then that he notices that he too has some on his shirt and his backpack. He takes out the toilet paper, hands me some and begins to clean himself up.
Just then a man comes with some toilet paper and starts to indicated that the bird had been up there. "Alla, alla" he is saying and pointing as I continue to wipe off the yellow stuff off my shoe.
"Hey¨" John muses aloud, "This is mustard, not bird poop." Someone had thrown mustard at us? Hmm. .. that seems weird. And then even as it dawned on us, "Shit! Jen! Where´s my bag?"
Gone! just like that. Down on the sidewalk to wipe off the mustard off his shirt for two seconds, the man indicating where the supossed bird had gone and boom, they had us, hook line and sinker. How stupid are we? Luckily nothing except John´s compass, $3 and the bag itself was worth much. Imagine how disappointed they were when they got around the corner and realized they had just stolen 70 oz of water! he he.
So you live and learn. . .we learned to keep walking when we get sprayed with mustard and we learned to let go of the things that really aren´t all that important. And while, very thirsty, John was still able to do his long run in el Parque Metropolitano (a park even larger than Central Park).
So sorry to have crammed all that into today´s entry. But I wanted you all to be caught up. We head out of Quito tomorrow and I believe I will be able to return to smaller, more manageable and more fun to read, entries in the future.
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Pico Duarte
Pico Duarte should have never been a real adventure. Sure it was going to be challenging. Challenges we liked. Challenges were something we wanted during our travels. But it was not going to be something to write home about. And that´s houw the first day and a half of the journey felt. Yeah, day 1 had had 5,000 feet of elevation gain, but Abelito, our young guide, had insisted on letting the mules carry our packs, so John and I were excited for the cardiovascular challenge of some altitude. Sure it was 90+ degrees and we were climbing up what looked like river washes, possibly what had previously been flat sandstone trails, deeply rutted out by years (or possibly just a few hard weeks) or torrential rain and flooding, but still, it wasn´t going to be any sort of "serious" aventure. "Serious adventures" were dangerous, life threatening or difficult to the point of tears, and honestly for all intents and purposes, Pico Duate just didn´t have it in ém.
Don´t get me wrong, I was tired that first day. We had hiked over 12 miles and over 5,000 feet the first day, the sides of the wash rising up above our heads at times, rocks strewn across the trail making footing precarious at times. It had been steep and sweaty and tiring. We had slept tentatively on hard wooden slats in the Park Refuge, one ear open for the society of hungry rats waiting to eat our food, our backpacks or crawl across our faces as we attempted sleep. We slept fitfully hoping as we tossed and turned that the heavy rain that had begun to fall that evening would cease long enough for us to summit. We had risen in the pre-crack of dawn, the half moon lighting our way, rain all but a distant memory, headlamps in place, sleep still encrusting our eyes, hiking by intuition on the rock strewn path to the sunrise and the sweeping vistas of the Pico Duarte summit. Peanut butter and crackers had never tasted so delicious. A delicacy beyond delicacy. We had been lucky, Abelito told us and his 9 year old brother who had come along on the journey via mule. People just didn´t get summit views like this from Duarte. John and I had laughed, my stigma as "little miss raincloud" momentarily banished to a far off land. Pico Duarte had been fun and exciting. . .but it had not been an adventure.
But. . .yep, there it is the BUT we´ve all been waiting for. Pico Duarte had not been an adventure, should not have ever been a serious adventure, but then at mid-day on day 2 as we headed back down from the summit, the skies opened up and it began to rain. No rain is not really what began to happen. Rain implies a series of drops or even, if it´s pouring, a torrential downpour of water, wetting the ground, the trees, the humans walking around on the paths. No this was not rain, no drizzling rain or a shower of rain, or even pouring rain. It cannot even be classified as a mere torrent. What began to fall, first soaking, then blinding us, was a deluge. It was as if the sky had opened up and began to dump every last drop of moisture it held down onto us and the trails upon which we now slid, sloshed and smushed our way through. And just when you thought you could get no wetter, you did.
Rain? A rain storm? I can hear the incredulity in your voices as you try to fathom how rain is what turned our experience from sheep grazing peacefully in green pastures on a bucolic hillside to tazmanian devils tearing through trees and ripping up mountainsides.
Honestly it hadn´t been the rain. Oh the rain, falling in incessant sheets from the deep, gray sky above had been a nusance. It had made me wish at least three times in ten minutes that I hadn´t turned down my rainjacked from Abelito at the reststop La Laguna, nonchelantly commenting, "I´m already drenched. How much more soaked can I possibly get?" Little did I know what it really felt like to be truly soaked to the bone. It was no ordinary wet and cold. It was a penatrating dampness, deep inside, into your bones, your muscles, your blood. It went beyond cold, stikcy and uncomfortable and entered into the realm of ridiculousness.
Yet even as I sloshed my way down the mountain, slip sliding away reverberating in my ears, I told myself over and over again how lucky we had been that morning. Ok it was pouring now, but we had seen the sweeping views of La Cordillera Central. "A little rain never hurt anyone!" a positive upbeat voice sang in my head. "You are doing just fine." it continued as I wrenched my left leg out of a mud sucking puddle up to my knee. "Fine, just fine. Oh fine."
I felt myself relax. It was raining. Abelito and his younger brother were no where to be found, but I could see John not too far up in the distance. We were fine, fine, fine.
Honestly, I am not sure how long it had been lightening ad thundering as the rain fell incessantly. I am sure I noticed it before John ordered me down onto the ground. I am sure I did and yet, thinking back or even then, I couldn´t remember. My heart thudding in my throat, I squatted next to John. "What are we doing?" I whispered. It felt like whispering was appropriate, though no one was around and with the storm all around us, he could barely hear me.
"Move over. Don´t sit so close. We´re bigger that way and more liable to be hit by lightening. Get out of that puddle, don´t stand in the water. Move away from the roots." His voice too was a strained whisper, but it did nothing to calm my overactive heart rate. Hit by lightening? I did not want to be hit by lightening and as we sat crouched inches apart, I began to feel very, very cold.
"John, this is silly. We are not going to be hit by lightening. Come on. Let´s go." The lightening lit up the sky all around up, thunder following less than a second behind it.
"The storm is HERE Jen. It´s right here. This is not good, not good. Not Good."
"Ok, I get it. Not good. But I am cold and if the storm is here, we should go - right?" It made sense to me. What were we going to do? Sit there waiting for the lightening to strike us or one of the huge trees surrounding us? John got up and shrugged and I followed suit.
"Quickly," he hissed and we were off, no longer worrying about the terrain. Down, down down, the wash, now understanding how the trails had gotten like that. The water rushed under our feet as we jostled for a position that wouldn´t send us careening down the wash into the water and to certain death by drowning or electricution. "If you feel your hair stand up on end, scream and jump left. OK? And I´ll do the same. Really we shouldn´t be moving with the thunder less than 5 seconds after the lightening." Flash, the sky lit up. "One one. . ." BOOM, the thunder followed.
I swallowed and nodded, numb from the cold, my shirt and pants stuck to my body. I wondered if I would really notice my hair standing on edge as it was platered to my head an face and wondered what hair would stand up on edge for John. "I don´t want to die today."
John turned around, forcing a smile. We practically flew down the next kilometer of the hill, lightening and thunder all around us. Twice John ordered me down on to the ground and I crouched praying to God, Jesus, Allah, my mom, to get us out of this alive. Lucky my foot.
And then without warning, the storm stopped. Not the rain. That continued to fall, though slower now, without as much energy, without as much umph. But all of a sudden I slowed my pace and looked around, it had been minutes since I had heard lightening. Whole minutes. We had travelled over 8 kilometers and the exhaustion of the adventure caught up with me. "Where the heck is Abelito?" I practically screamed as we reached the first of the river crossings, the bridge´s left side submerged in water. "Isn´t this why we had to have a stupid guide in the first place?" John, always calmer and more level headed, agreed. We crossed the bridge tentatively, balancing, holding hands, praying.
"I´m gonna kill ém. And we´re not paying for today. No way. We almost died. Died." We rounded the corner and there were the mules tied to a tree by the side of the second river crossing, the bridge reaching slightly past the middle of the bridge. "Uh-oh. How we crossing that?"
Abelito and his little brother hovered, across the river underneath a park provided shelter and Abelito jumped up as he saw us waving and screaming something we could not hear. They had crossed the river. How?
Abelito waded his way across the rushing wated to a large bolder at the edge of the bridge and lifted himself up. "Wow, you guys got here fast!" He exclaimed, no trace of remorse on his face. "The river expanded." He gestured to the water and we nodded. I didn´t trust myself to speak yet. I was cold, hungry, tired and ready for this adventure to call itself a day.
We crossed the river, first John, then me, straddled between Abelito on the rock and John almost at the shoreline on the other side. The mules could not cross in this kind of rapids. We would have to wait. But as I sat on the edge of a bench, underneath the structure, shivering and listening to the thunder in the distance getting closer by the minute, I knew we wouldn´t be waiting for long.
"Abelito," I stood, "We´ll meet you at the ranger station."
He nodded, knowing we were pissed. Knowing he had not been the guide he had promised. We would cross that bridge when we came to it, in dry clothes hopefully.
Four kilometers later, two more bridges and a brief conversation about the merits of doing your job well, John and I sat underneath the Park´s sheldter with the park ranger, cooking pasta and shivering in the only dry clothes I had, shorts and my rain jacket.
Pico Duarte had been something to write home about after all.
Don´t get me wrong, I was tired that first day. We had hiked over 12 miles and over 5,000 feet the first day, the sides of the wash rising up above our heads at times, rocks strewn across the trail making footing precarious at times. It had been steep and sweaty and tiring. We had slept tentatively on hard wooden slats in the Park Refuge, one ear open for the society of hungry rats waiting to eat our food, our backpacks or crawl across our faces as we attempted sleep. We slept fitfully hoping as we tossed and turned that the heavy rain that had begun to fall that evening would cease long enough for us to summit. We had risen in the pre-crack of dawn, the half moon lighting our way, rain all but a distant memory, headlamps in place, sleep still encrusting our eyes, hiking by intuition on the rock strewn path to the sunrise and the sweeping vistas of the Pico Duarte summit. Peanut butter and crackers had never tasted so delicious. A delicacy beyond delicacy. We had been lucky, Abelito told us and his 9 year old brother who had come along on the journey via mule. People just didn´t get summit views like this from Duarte. John and I had laughed, my stigma as "little miss raincloud" momentarily banished to a far off land. Pico Duarte had been fun and exciting. . .but it had not been an adventure.
But. . .yep, there it is the BUT we´ve all been waiting for. Pico Duarte had not been an adventure, should not have ever been a serious adventure, but then at mid-day on day 2 as we headed back down from the summit, the skies opened up and it began to rain. No rain is not really what began to happen. Rain implies a series of drops or even, if it´s pouring, a torrential downpour of water, wetting the ground, the trees, the humans walking around on the paths. No this was not rain, no drizzling rain or a shower of rain, or even pouring rain. It cannot even be classified as a mere torrent. What began to fall, first soaking, then blinding us, was a deluge. It was as if the sky had opened up and began to dump every last drop of moisture it held down onto us and the trails upon which we now slid, sloshed and smushed our way through. And just when you thought you could get no wetter, you did.
Rain? A rain storm? I can hear the incredulity in your voices as you try to fathom how rain is what turned our experience from sheep grazing peacefully in green pastures on a bucolic hillside to tazmanian devils tearing through trees and ripping up mountainsides.
Honestly it hadn´t been the rain. Oh the rain, falling in incessant sheets from the deep, gray sky above had been a nusance. It had made me wish at least three times in ten minutes that I hadn´t turned down my rainjacked from Abelito at the reststop La Laguna, nonchelantly commenting, "I´m already drenched. How much more soaked can I possibly get?" Little did I know what it really felt like to be truly soaked to the bone. It was no ordinary wet and cold. It was a penatrating dampness, deep inside, into your bones, your muscles, your blood. It went beyond cold, stikcy and uncomfortable and entered into the realm of ridiculousness.
Yet even as I sloshed my way down the mountain, slip sliding away reverberating in my ears, I told myself over and over again how lucky we had been that morning. Ok it was pouring now, but we had seen the sweeping views of La Cordillera Central. "A little rain never hurt anyone!" a positive upbeat voice sang in my head. "You are doing just fine." it continued as I wrenched my left leg out of a mud sucking puddle up to my knee. "Fine, just fine. Oh fine."
I felt myself relax. It was raining. Abelito and his younger brother were no where to be found, but I could see John not too far up in the distance. We were fine, fine, fine.
Honestly, I am not sure how long it had been lightening ad thundering as the rain fell incessantly. I am sure I noticed it before John ordered me down onto the ground. I am sure I did and yet, thinking back or even then, I couldn´t remember. My heart thudding in my throat, I squatted next to John. "What are we doing?" I whispered. It felt like whispering was appropriate, though no one was around and with the storm all around us, he could barely hear me.
"Move over. Don´t sit so close. We´re bigger that way and more liable to be hit by lightening. Get out of that puddle, don´t stand in the water. Move away from the roots." His voice too was a strained whisper, but it did nothing to calm my overactive heart rate. Hit by lightening? I did not want to be hit by lightening and as we sat crouched inches apart, I began to feel very, very cold.
"John, this is silly. We are not going to be hit by lightening. Come on. Let´s go." The lightening lit up the sky all around up, thunder following less than a second behind it.
"The storm is HERE Jen. It´s right here. This is not good, not good. Not Good."
"Ok, I get it. Not good. But I am cold and if the storm is here, we should go - right?" It made sense to me. What were we going to do? Sit there waiting for the lightening to strike us or one of the huge trees surrounding us? John got up and shrugged and I followed suit.
"Quickly," he hissed and we were off, no longer worrying about the terrain. Down, down down, the wash, now understanding how the trails had gotten like that. The water rushed under our feet as we jostled for a position that wouldn´t send us careening down the wash into the water and to certain death by drowning or electricution. "If you feel your hair stand up on end, scream and jump left. OK? And I´ll do the same. Really we shouldn´t be moving with the thunder less than 5 seconds after the lightening." Flash, the sky lit up. "One one. . ." BOOM, the thunder followed.
I swallowed and nodded, numb from the cold, my shirt and pants stuck to my body. I wondered if I would really notice my hair standing on edge as it was platered to my head an face and wondered what hair would stand up on edge for John. "I don´t want to die today."
John turned around, forcing a smile. We practically flew down the next kilometer of the hill, lightening and thunder all around us. Twice John ordered me down on to the ground and I crouched praying to God, Jesus, Allah, my mom, to get us out of this alive. Lucky my foot.
And then without warning, the storm stopped. Not the rain. That continued to fall, though slower now, without as much energy, without as much umph. But all of a sudden I slowed my pace and looked around, it had been minutes since I had heard lightening. Whole minutes. We had travelled over 8 kilometers and the exhaustion of the adventure caught up with me. "Where the heck is Abelito?" I practically screamed as we reached the first of the river crossings, the bridge´s left side submerged in water. "Isn´t this why we had to have a stupid guide in the first place?" John, always calmer and more level headed, agreed. We crossed the bridge tentatively, balancing, holding hands, praying.
"I´m gonna kill ém. And we´re not paying for today. No way. We almost died. Died." We rounded the corner and there were the mules tied to a tree by the side of the second river crossing, the bridge reaching slightly past the middle of the bridge. "Uh-oh. How we crossing that?"
Abelito and his little brother hovered, across the river underneath a park provided shelter and Abelito jumped up as he saw us waving and screaming something we could not hear. They had crossed the river. How?
Abelito waded his way across the rushing wated to a large bolder at the edge of the bridge and lifted himself up. "Wow, you guys got here fast!" He exclaimed, no trace of remorse on his face. "The river expanded." He gestured to the water and we nodded. I didn´t trust myself to speak yet. I was cold, hungry, tired and ready for this adventure to call itself a day.
We crossed the river, first John, then me, straddled between Abelito on the rock and John almost at the shoreline on the other side. The mules could not cross in this kind of rapids. We would have to wait. But as I sat on the edge of a bench, underneath the structure, shivering and listening to the thunder in the distance getting closer by the minute, I knew we wouldn´t be waiting for long.
"Abelito," I stood, "We´ll meet you at the ranger station."
He nodded, knowing we were pissed. Knowing he had not been the guide he had promised. We would cross that bridge when we came to it, in dry clothes hopefully.
Four kilometers later, two more bridges and a brief conversation about the merits of doing your job well, John and I sat underneath the Park´s sheldter with the park ranger, cooking pasta and shivering in the only dry clothes I had, shorts and my rain jacket.
Pico Duarte had been something to write home about after all.
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
Adventures before the Adventure
There is no way that either of the previous two guagua trips could have prepared me for what we would experience on the way to La Ciénaga. After sitting on our backpacks for the better part of an hour, a tall, thin man with dreadlocks and a wide smile approached us indicating that we should bring our backpacks over to the back of the pickup truck, “Llévense los bultos. Ya nos vamos.”
I stood watching as the driver threw first my, then John’s backpack into the back of the truck. “No way that’s gonna stay,” John whispered and I nodded, waiting to see what plans he had to secure our belongings.
Next to us an older man with deep lines etched into his tanned face, argued emphatically with a middle aged woman in a bright pink top and tight, white Capri pants, a pink portable CD player in her hands. “You, your just a young girl. A tiny little thing. Me, well. Now that’s a different story,” he pleaded, his words slurred together cutting off all s’s, “I am an old, old man.” She moved a sack of rice to the other side of the pick up truck ignoring his pleas and the driver moved it back, placing it atop the two enormous cans of Crisco oil.
“¡Ya! ¡Vámanos!” he cried and the throng of people hanging around the pick up began to pile into the cab. One, two, three, four in front. One, two, three, four, in back leaving six more, including John and I to contend with a spot in the back. The woman in pink, having lost the fight with the elderly Dominican, settled atop the burlap rice bag, her CD player in her lap. A younger Haitian man hopped up onto John’s backpack and John wedged himself in to his left, his right hand securing himself on his backpack, his left on my thigh. I sat perched on the edge of the back door, both hands gripping the lip, surrounded on both sides by young men in their late teens who laughed as I looked wide eyed around us thinking, “My father would kill me if he saw me right now.”
Now fourteen of us in the pick up, a container of propane, the two backpacks, two 3-gallon cans of cooking oil, 50 pounds of rice, various plastic and burlap bags, a strange metal object that looked like a vice grip, a number of large plastic gas cans, a strangely shaped rock that initially I thought was quartz, but later realized to be rock salt, set out down the road. My heart was in my throat. Thump, thump, thump in went in rhythm with the truck’s engine. And just like that, three blocks later, we stopped.
“More passengers?” I joked aloud, surveying the already over packed truck bed, limbs and packages in every conceivable crevice.
“There’s always room in the guagua,” laughed the boy to my right as he nodded at two tall, Haitian brothers appeared. One squeezed miraculously into the back of the cab as the other one, leaped effortlessly onto the side of the pickup and perched himself on the edge of my backpack. We lurched forward and once again headed out of Jarbacoa to begin the 23 kilometer trip to La Ciénaga.
We drove slowly along a two-lane, paved road out of town, stopping briefly at a store where a few of the riders from inside the cab got out and went inside, leaving those of us in the pick up to die of sunstroke.
“What do you think? We’re waiting in the shade out here? Get a move on!” The woman in pink cried.
The young Dominican man in his cub’s jersey jumped down off the pick up, shaking his head, and sat down on a chair outside of the store, tipping it back till the top edge of the chair touched the wall, his toes the only part of his feet touching the ground, “Aquí, hay sombra.” The woman in pink glared at his shady spot, fanning her face furiously with her sweaty, upturned hand.
“¡Ya, venga, vamos, ya!” the driver cried getting back into the pick up and beginning to blare a horn that sounded like the Duke’s of Hazard. The old man inside the colmado, nodded, wished the cashier a good day and sauntered out to squeeze into his place inside the cab, tipping his hat at the woman in pink.
We jolted forward and with the weight of sixteen people and easily as much cargo, it seemed improbable that we would go anywhere fast. Up, up, up and around, swerving to avoid potholes, ruts and sections of the road where the grass had grown over the lane, we began our ascent into the mountains, the load slowing us to almost a slow stroll as we hit the steeper sections of the mountain.
Banana trees, grape vines, coffee plants, avocado and a local, light green fruit we later found out was called toyata lined both sides of the street as we left city life behind us. Make shift shacks dotted the fields and the sides of the road, the occasional rooster, goat or cow making its way across the street, causing the driver to once again swerve, his horn a constant song in our ears.
I felt and then saw the road change from paved to rocky dirt, as the pickup bounced from side to side, my grip tightening on the back of the truck door, my quick prayers to save me from impending doom running through my mind.
One by one, players and items on our strange drip dropped out. A block of salt here, some printer papers there, the young Dominicans, first one to the a house on the right, the other jumping off and waving his good byes as the truck continued through town. The woman in pink, her mother from inside the truck’s cab then departed, and with her the strange metal vice grip, the empty gallon bottle and the pink portable CD player. Then both Haitian men, until finally we stopped in front of a small shack by the side of the road, another wooden structure visible behind the first. I looked around at eh remaining passengers, wondering who would get off here. The driver got down out of the truck and began to untie my backpack, “Aquí, niña. Esta es la casa de Chano.”
“Oh? Nosotros?” I asked surprised pointing to my chest. I searched for a sign of this so called Chano, but saw only a woman in her late 30s, her strong arms dark around the basket she carried.
“Está es la mujer de Chano.” He indicated to the woman standing there and the woman nodded her head, extending her hand and introducing her self as Maria, Chano’s wife.
And just like that, the ride was over. Safely on the ground again, we donned our packs and followed Maria and a herd of children all under the age of ten to a porch with two plastic chairs on it. A young man took out a third wooden chair and motioned for us to sit down.
“Chano won’t be back for a few days,” Abelito, the young man explained. I’m his cousin, Abelito and I too can take you to el Pico.”
Of course he was his cousin. And even though Amado had recommended Luis before a member of Chano’s family, we couldn’t really see getting up and excusing ourselves at this point. So we began negotiations and ended up with a reasonable price, the obligatory park mule and a plan to shop at 4 that afternoon.
Chano’s wife offered a bed at their house and for the low price of $5 for the two of us, would even cook us dinner and make us coffee in the morning. So we stayed, and for the next few hours were entertained by the seemingly never-ending quantity of children belonging to Chano and his wife and some of the neighbors.
A few hours later, exhausted from the school books and Barbie show and tell, John and I decided to take a walk through La Ciénaga. If Jarbacoa is a small mountain town, then La Ciénaga can best be described as a mountain community, sprung up along the unpaved river at the base of el Pico Duarte and along the River Yanque. We walked through the “center” of town where two small stores advertised to travelers in Spanish and English all their Pico Duarte necessities. Crossing the river that barely fit under a bridge flush with pavement, we stood watching 5 bare chested boys float in inner tubes, navigating around rocks down the rushing river. We passed three cows lying on the side of the road and a various tiny houses with strings of colorful clothing hung out to dry. A toothless man in a rocking chair picked up his hand in greeting, a bemused look on his wizened face. And all around us, sweeping views of the mountains jutting up into the afternoon sky, dotted with thunderheads, green valleys stretching out for miles and miles below us.
That night after homework by candlelight, a visit to the very pregnant pig and a necessary trip to the outhouse, we retired into the only double bed in the house, what could only have been Maria and Chano’s. The bed barely fit inside the tin room, a curtained door giving the semblance of privacy for the room’s inhabitants.
It was that night, before beginning our climb up Pico Duarte that I learned that roosters do not only crow at dawn. Take it from me, they crow all night long.
I stood watching as the driver threw first my, then John’s backpack into the back of the truck. “No way that’s gonna stay,” John whispered and I nodded, waiting to see what plans he had to secure our belongings.
Next to us an older man with deep lines etched into his tanned face, argued emphatically with a middle aged woman in a bright pink top and tight, white Capri pants, a pink portable CD player in her hands. “You, your just a young girl. A tiny little thing. Me, well. Now that’s a different story,” he pleaded, his words slurred together cutting off all s’s, “I am an old, old man.” She moved a sack of rice to the other side of the pick up truck ignoring his pleas and the driver moved it back, placing it atop the two enormous cans of Crisco oil.
“¡Ya! ¡Vámanos!” he cried and the throng of people hanging around the pick up began to pile into the cab. One, two, three, four in front. One, two, three, four, in back leaving six more, including John and I to contend with a spot in the back. The woman in pink, having lost the fight with the elderly Dominican, settled atop the burlap rice bag, her CD player in her lap. A younger Haitian man hopped up onto John’s backpack and John wedged himself in to his left, his right hand securing himself on his backpack, his left on my thigh. I sat perched on the edge of the back door, both hands gripping the lip, surrounded on both sides by young men in their late teens who laughed as I looked wide eyed around us thinking, “My father would kill me if he saw me right now.”
Now fourteen of us in the pick up, a container of propane, the two backpacks, two 3-gallon cans of cooking oil, 50 pounds of rice, various plastic and burlap bags, a strange metal object that looked like a vice grip, a number of large plastic gas cans, a strangely shaped rock that initially I thought was quartz, but later realized to be rock salt, set out down the road. My heart was in my throat. Thump, thump, thump in went in rhythm with the truck’s engine. And just like that, three blocks later, we stopped.
“More passengers?” I joked aloud, surveying the already over packed truck bed, limbs and packages in every conceivable crevice.
“There’s always room in the guagua,” laughed the boy to my right as he nodded at two tall, Haitian brothers appeared. One squeezed miraculously into the back of the cab as the other one, leaped effortlessly onto the side of the pickup and perched himself on the edge of my backpack. We lurched forward and once again headed out of Jarbacoa to begin the 23 kilometer trip to La Ciénaga.
We drove slowly along a two-lane, paved road out of town, stopping briefly at a store where a few of the riders from inside the cab got out and went inside, leaving those of us in the pick up to die of sunstroke.
“What do you think? We’re waiting in the shade out here? Get a move on!” The woman in pink cried.
The young Dominican man in his cub’s jersey jumped down off the pick up, shaking his head, and sat down on a chair outside of the store, tipping it back till the top edge of the chair touched the wall, his toes the only part of his feet touching the ground, “Aquí, hay sombra.” The woman in pink glared at his shady spot, fanning her face furiously with her sweaty, upturned hand.
“¡Ya, venga, vamos, ya!” the driver cried getting back into the pick up and beginning to blare a horn that sounded like the Duke’s of Hazard. The old man inside the colmado, nodded, wished the cashier a good day and sauntered out to squeeze into his place inside the cab, tipping his hat at the woman in pink.
We jolted forward and with the weight of sixteen people and easily as much cargo, it seemed improbable that we would go anywhere fast. Up, up, up and around, swerving to avoid potholes, ruts and sections of the road where the grass had grown over the lane, we began our ascent into the mountains, the load slowing us to almost a slow stroll as we hit the steeper sections of the mountain.
Banana trees, grape vines, coffee plants, avocado and a local, light green fruit we later found out was called toyata lined both sides of the street as we left city life behind us. Make shift shacks dotted the fields and the sides of the road, the occasional rooster, goat or cow making its way across the street, causing the driver to once again swerve, his horn a constant song in our ears.
I felt and then saw the road change from paved to rocky dirt, as the pickup bounced from side to side, my grip tightening on the back of the truck door, my quick prayers to save me from impending doom running through my mind.
One by one, players and items on our strange drip dropped out. A block of salt here, some printer papers there, the young Dominicans, first one to the a house on the right, the other jumping off and waving his good byes as the truck continued through town. The woman in pink, her mother from inside the truck’s cab then departed, and with her the strange metal vice grip, the empty gallon bottle and the pink portable CD player. Then both Haitian men, until finally we stopped in front of a small shack by the side of the road, another wooden structure visible behind the first. I looked around at eh remaining passengers, wondering who would get off here. The driver got down out of the truck and began to untie my backpack, “Aquí, niña. Esta es la casa de Chano.”
“Oh? Nosotros?” I asked surprised pointing to my chest. I searched for a sign of this so called Chano, but saw only a woman in her late 30s, her strong arms dark around the basket she carried.
“Está es la mujer de Chano.” He indicated to the woman standing there and the woman nodded her head, extending her hand and introducing her self as Maria, Chano’s wife.
And just like that, the ride was over. Safely on the ground again, we donned our packs and followed Maria and a herd of children all under the age of ten to a porch with two plastic chairs on it. A young man took out a third wooden chair and motioned for us to sit down.
“Chano won’t be back for a few days,” Abelito, the young man explained. I’m his cousin, Abelito and I too can take you to el Pico.”
Of course he was his cousin. And even though Amado had recommended Luis before a member of Chano’s family, we couldn’t really see getting up and excusing ourselves at this point. So we began negotiations and ended up with a reasonable price, the obligatory park mule and a plan to shop at 4 that afternoon.
Chano’s wife offered a bed at their house and for the low price of $5 for the two of us, would even cook us dinner and make us coffee in the morning. So we stayed, and for the next few hours were entertained by the seemingly never-ending quantity of children belonging to Chano and his wife and some of the neighbors.
A few hours later, exhausted from the school books and Barbie show and tell, John and I decided to take a walk through La Ciénaga. If Jarbacoa is a small mountain town, then La Ciénaga can best be described as a mountain community, sprung up along the unpaved river at the base of el Pico Duarte and along the River Yanque. We walked through the “center” of town where two small stores advertised to travelers in Spanish and English all their Pico Duarte necessities. Crossing the river that barely fit under a bridge flush with pavement, we stood watching 5 bare chested boys float in inner tubes, navigating around rocks down the rushing river. We passed three cows lying on the side of the road and a various tiny houses with strings of colorful clothing hung out to dry. A toothless man in a rocking chair picked up his hand in greeting, a bemused look on his wizened face. And all around us, sweeping views of the mountains jutting up into the afternoon sky, dotted with thunderheads, green valleys stretching out for miles and miles below us.
That night after homework by candlelight, a visit to the very pregnant pig and a necessary trip to the outhouse, we retired into the only double bed in the house, what could only have been Maria and Chano’s. The bed barely fit inside the tin room, a curtained door giving the semblance of privacy for the room’s inhabitants.
It was that night, before beginning our climb up Pico Duarte that I learned that roosters do not only crow at dawn. Take it from me, they crow all night long.
Juxtaposed
As you walk the two kilometer “main street” of the town of Cabarete, a bit of sensory overload sets in.
“Enterprise Rent-a-Car”, “Learn to Kite Board!” “Happy Hour: 2 X 1 from 5-7”; the billboards and signs scream out, lining both sides of the street, one seemingly on top of the next, attempting to entice the myriad of toursists to relax with a swedish massage, shop to their hearts content or drink tropical rum drinks at their bar in comfy chairs on soft sand, palm trees swaying in the breeze, blue skies, the slow, comforting lap of Carribean Ocean waves lapping the shore. Here you have landed in “paradaise.” Or what the corporations would like to package as paradaise for the weary, wayward traveller.
The irony of course of globalization and capitilism is not on the main street of Cabarete, nor is it in the happy hour prices on the pristine Carribean coast, but rather just one or two kilometers down the road. Just one left turn off the main, paved road down into “El Callejón” or “the alley” where not a trace of this so called “paradaise” exists. Paradaise lost or never found for these locals of Cabarete.
Pick up trucks, motos, cars, bikes and pedestriansts all jostle impatiently for a spot on the unpaved, deeply rutted dirt road that leads in the dominicans’ barrio, past the locals’ residences, work places and churches. Small children run barefoot with ease over the rocky surface of the street, women carry large bundles on their heads, their strong necks holding them up. The road that leads out of the tourist section of town and down to the local neighborhood schools. This is where the corporate globalization has gone very very wrong.
As the most popular destination in the Carribean, hundreds of thousands of visitors descend on the shores of these pristine beaches every year, bringing with them their excess cash and desire to indulge themselves to their hearts’ content for their week to ten-day vacations. Yet, this influx of tourism, here in the Kite Surfing capital of the world, (or in the other tourist destinations in the D.R.) does not mean new books for the children, consistent, clean running water or electricty for the local community. It does not mean Domincan owned businesses or increased revenue or higher literacy rates for the citizens of El Callejon. It is the contrast of “the haves” and “the have nots” in the most obvious of places, and yet this is the Domincan Republic most tourists never see.
The DREAM Project school, La Colonia Nueva, where Jen C volunteers is one such school. The students dressed in their blue shirts and tan bottoms are starved for a book to read, for a classroom with enough chairs, for the bare necessities of paper and pencils. They come to school for a mere 3-4 hours a day to allow the school to be used twice, for two different groups of students. Maximizing their space in this way, more students can be “educated.” The lines have long since faded from the paper they use to copy from the board. Nothing hangs on the walls odfd their classrooms.
At recess time, students press their noses and fingers between the slts of the library’s closed window, staring eagerly at the meager supply of books inside. “Dáme un libro, por favor.” One student whines, his bright black eyes pleading for anything resembling a book. But the library remains closed for organization and clean up three weeks into the school year, the DREAM volunteers attempting to make sense of the 200 some books strewn on the shelves.
“Those books are old anyway,” a third grader scoffs shaking her head bitterly. I shrug, but before I can answer, she has my hand and is dragging me toward a group of boys and girls standing in a circle. “Don’t you have any new ones teacher?”
Sadly, I don’t. I shake my head, “Not with me sweetie.”
She sighs heavily and then shrugs. “Oh well. At least they’re books. Come on teacher! Let’s go play Chonchon.” Eager faced children encompass me in their circle, ready to teach me a domincan game. “Chin Chin. Chon Chon.” They chant their voices joining together to make one.
Two communities. Two Realities. Juxtaposed.
Together, yet worlds apart.
If you would like to make a monetary donation to the DREAM project, go to http://www.dominicandream.org/donate-and-join/monetarydonations.html and click on the “donate now” button.
If you have Spanish language materials or school supplies to donate and are in San Franciso, contact Jen Collet at jencollett20@yahoo.com. She will be in the Bay Area the week of September 25th accepting donations.
Otherwise you can mail books, posters, poetry or other school supplies to:
The DREAM Project
Plaza de Patio
Cabarete, Puerto Plata
Domincan Republic
Just be aware, that the mail is spotty at best. To talk to someone in the DREAM project office, call 809-571-0497.
“Enterprise Rent-a-Car”, “Learn to Kite Board!” “Happy Hour: 2 X 1 from 5-7”; the billboards and signs scream out, lining both sides of the street, one seemingly on top of the next, attempting to entice the myriad of toursists to relax with a swedish massage, shop to their hearts content or drink tropical rum drinks at their bar in comfy chairs on soft sand, palm trees swaying in the breeze, blue skies, the slow, comforting lap of Carribean Ocean waves lapping the shore. Here you have landed in “paradaise.” Or what the corporations would like to package as paradaise for the weary, wayward traveller.
The irony of course of globalization and capitilism is not on the main street of Cabarete, nor is it in the happy hour prices on the pristine Carribean coast, but rather just one or two kilometers down the road. Just one left turn off the main, paved road down into “El Callejón” or “the alley” where not a trace of this so called “paradaise” exists. Paradaise lost or never found for these locals of Cabarete.
Pick up trucks, motos, cars, bikes and pedestriansts all jostle impatiently for a spot on the unpaved, deeply rutted dirt road that leads in the dominicans’ barrio, past the locals’ residences, work places and churches. Small children run barefoot with ease over the rocky surface of the street, women carry large bundles on their heads, their strong necks holding them up. The road that leads out of the tourist section of town and down to the local neighborhood schools. This is where the corporate globalization has gone very very wrong.
As the most popular destination in the Carribean, hundreds of thousands of visitors descend on the shores of these pristine beaches every year, bringing with them their excess cash and desire to indulge themselves to their hearts’ content for their week to ten-day vacations. Yet, this influx of tourism, here in the Kite Surfing capital of the world, (or in the other tourist destinations in the D.R.) does not mean new books for the children, consistent, clean running water or electricty for the local community. It does not mean Domincan owned businesses or increased revenue or higher literacy rates for the citizens of El Callejon. It is the contrast of “the haves” and “the have nots” in the most obvious of places, and yet this is the Domincan Republic most tourists never see.
The DREAM Project school, La Colonia Nueva, where Jen C volunteers is one such school. The students dressed in their blue shirts and tan bottoms are starved for a book to read, for a classroom with enough chairs, for the bare necessities of paper and pencils. They come to school for a mere 3-4 hours a day to allow the school to be used twice, for two different groups of students. Maximizing their space in this way, more students can be “educated.” The lines have long since faded from the paper they use to copy from the board. Nothing hangs on the walls odfd their classrooms.
At recess time, students press their noses and fingers between the slts of the library’s closed window, staring eagerly at the meager supply of books inside. “Dáme un libro, por favor.” One student whines, his bright black eyes pleading for anything resembling a book. But the library remains closed for organization and clean up three weeks into the school year, the DREAM volunteers attempting to make sense of the 200 some books strewn on the shelves.
“Those books are old anyway,” a third grader scoffs shaking her head bitterly. I shrug, but before I can answer, she has my hand and is dragging me toward a group of boys and girls standing in a circle. “Don’t you have any new ones teacher?”
Sadly, I don’t. I shake my head, “Not with me sweetie.”
She sighs heavily and then shrugs. “Oh well. At least they’re books. Come on teacher! Let’s go play Chonchon.” Eager faced children encompass me in their circle, ready to teach me a domincan game. “Chin Chin. Chon Chon.” They chant their voices joining together to make one.
Two communities. Two Realities. Juxtaposed.
Together, yet worlds apart.
If you would like to make a monetary donation to the DREAM project, go to http://www.dominicandream.org/donate-and-join/monetarydonations.html and click on the “donate now” button.
If you have Spanish language materials or school supplies to donate and are in San Franciso, contact Jen Collet at jencollett20@yahoo.com. She will be in the Bay Area the week of September 25th accepting donations.
Otherwise you can mail books, posters, poetry or other school supplies to:
The DREAM Project
Plaza de Patio
Cabarete, Puerto Plata
Domincan Republic
Just be aware, that the mail is spotty at best. To talk to someone in the DREAM project office, call 809-571-0497.
Saturday, September 16, 2006
Amado Takes Us to Los Saltos de Jimenoa
The mountain town of Jarbacoa is a small village about 75 miles from Cabarete. Of course if you are planning to travel from Cabarete to Jarbacoa, leave yourself plenty of time as the trip takes no less than 5 hours on public transport (a guagua, a bus, a taxi, another guagua. . .you get the point), but once you arrive and get settled in El Hogar Hotel on Mella Street, you will meet Amado, a sweet local who sets you up with a room and is a man of "confianza," someone to be trusted. So Jen, John and I decided, after some food to settle our stomachs and our nerves after the long, hot, stressful trip, that we would go with Amado. We would pay the 1000 pesos (US $34) for him to take us to the local waterfalls, Salto de Jimenoa bajo and Salto de Jimenoa alto.
Amado is one of those people, and therefore, guides, that was well worth the money. Immediately he makes you feel right at home, he allows you to sit back, relax and enjoy the experience. He gives you no reason not to trust him and within the hour, you feel as though you have gained a new, extremely jokey friend.
Of course before heading out to the waterfalls, we informed Amado that we had not yet had our coffee. He assured us to fear not and took us over to a local "colmado"” or convenience store where you could ask for coffee in little, plastic cups for 3, 4 or 5 pesos (less than 6 U.S. cents). Of course we opted for the 5 and gulped down the pre-sweetened coffee quickly, so we could head out into the countryside where the parks entrance is.
He led us over a hanging bridge that swayed precariously across the river and rocks below, commenting, "“El que no sabe merengüe, aprenderá aquí,"” laughing at his own joke. And as we swayed back and forth, our hips knocking on the sides of the pvc piping that served as the bridge'’s railing, I did indeed feel like I was learning to dance Merengüe.
After stopping briefly at the lower falls and taking the obligatory tourist shots, we sat waiting for Amado to finish his breakfast, hoping for a bit of excitement that would make the $11 worth our while. We were not to be dissapointed for long.
We followed Amado ont a trail and up into the mountains where he promised the real "“adventure"” would begin. What I will say about Amado is that he is a man of his word. Once on the trail, we immediately began to climb up, up, up the side of, if not a mountain, then definitely a very steep hill. Using our hands to help us scramble up the root covered dirt trail, before long Amado was showing us how to use the natural ropes that hung from the trees. Â"Canyoning natural!" he cried laughing as he tugged at one of the vines and climbed up the side of the trail. "“Woo-hoo!"” I followed suit, laughing at his enthusiasm and wondering briefly how we would later climb down the slope.
The trail took us continuously up for some time till we reached a river some 10 feet below us, pvc piping hanging over part of the ravine. "“Es facil chicos. ¡Miren primero!" Amado smiled, grabbing hold a blue plastic coated rope attached to the pvc piping. He swung himself down into the ravine, his hands on the rope, his feet against the bank and made his way around the side of the ravine until he could lower himself to the rock jutting up out of the ground. "“See?"” he repeated, "It was easy. Did you watch? Just do what I did and don't ever let go of the rope."” Ok Amado, we won't!
Minutes later, safely on the otherside, the three of us continue on for another 45 minutes to the second waterfall, well worth the walk to reach. Falling over 80 feet into a pool of water below, a spray projecting back up onto the granite walls surrounding the cascade. Completely alone on the rocks surrounding the falls, John was in the water before Jen and I could settle in to eat our peanut butter and crackers with Amado.
For the next hour, Amado regaled us with stories of his six brothers and sisters and parents who had moved to NY, his five children, Domincan history and interesting facts and the logisitcs of how John and I could continue on after Jen went back to work to climb Pico Duarte.
That afternoon, back in Jarbacoa, Jen safely to the Guagua station that would hopefully lead her back to Cabarete, John and I set out for a beer and a bite to eat. As I said before, Jarbacoa is a small mountain town, but you would never know it by the quantity of motos or the noise level in the street. It'’s truly incredible. Close your eyes and your in NYC. Inhale and you know you are no longer in any city in the U.S. With a cheaper version of gas or propane fueling the cars and motos and the seeming lax insepection laws for motorized vehicles with regard to mufflers and pollution, the air here is less than sweetly pefumed with the scent of burning deisle and gasoline.
We wandered back toward the Parque Central (Central Park) or town square of the town and were greeted with a scene we could not have imagined in a major metropolis let alone a town of this size. There on the four corners of the square were every resident of the town and the surrounding towns between the ages of 16 and 24. Hundreds of young men and women, dressed to the nines, lounged sharing bottles of beer or rum at the bars, on the sidewalks, at the edges of the park, spilling out into the streets, making it difficult if not impossible for the equally as many motos and infrequent car to navigate the street that was clearly the local pick up scene. Young mothers and fathers with their children, interspersed with even younger teens looking around to see and be seen. Two small boys hung around the periphery of the street, alternately offering shoe shines and jumping onto the back of the occaisional SUV for a quick ride on their spare tire on the back, before the driver inevitably saw them and chastized them for their behavior. A large minivan with it’s back popped open pumped Spanish rock into the night air and couple danced Salsa on the sidwalk, oblivious to the crownds around them. A man sitting at the bar next to us, eyes closed, belted out the lyrics to songs being played, his hat down low over his forehead.
John and I sat slowly slipping our local pilsner, “Presidente,” taking in the scene as it unfolded in front of us. "“Another?"” he asked after the last drops had been poured into our little plastic cups. I shook my head. I had already seen enough and in my dirty zip off backpacking pants, I certainly was in no postion to be "“seen."”
Amado is one of those people, and therefore, guides, that was well worth the money. Immediately he makes you feel right at home, he allows you to sit back, relax and enjoy the experience. He gives you no reason not to trust him and within the hour, you feel as though you have gained a new, extremely jokey friend.
Of course before heading out to the waterfalls, we informed Amado that we had not yet had our coffee. He assured us to fear not and took us over to a local "colmado"” or convenience store where you could ask for coffee in little, plastic cups for 3, 4 or 5 pesos (less than 6 U.S. cents). Of course we opted for the 5 and gulped down the pre-sweetened coffee quickly, so we could head out into the countryside where the parks entrance is.
He led us over a hanging bridge that swayed precariously across the river and rocks below, commenting, "“El que no sabe merengüe, aprenderá aquí,"” laughing at his own joke. And as we swayed back and forth, our hips knocking on the sides of the pvc piping that served as the bridge'’s railing, I did indeed feel like I was learning to dance Merengüe.
After stopping briefly at the lower falls and taking the obligatory tourist shots, we sat waiting for Amado to finish his breakfast, hoping for a bit of excitement that would make the $11 worth our while. We were not to be dissapointed for long.
We followed Amado ont a trail and up into the mountains where he promised the real "“adventure"” would begin. What I will say about Amado is that he is a man of his word. Once on the trail, we immediately began to climb up, up, up the side of, if not a mountain, then definitely a very steep hill. Using our hands to help us scramble up the root covered dirt trail, before long Amado was showing us how to use the natural ropes that hung from the trees. Â"Canyoning natural!" he cried laughing as he tugged at one of the vines and climbed up the side of the trail. "“Woo-hoo!"” I followed suit, laughing at his enthusiasm and wondering briefly how we would later climb down the slope.
The trail took us continuously up for some time till we reached a river some 10 feet below us, pvc piping hanging over part of the ravine. "“Es facil chicos. ¡Miren primero!" Amado smiled, grabbing hold a blue plastic coated rope attached to the pvc piping. He swung himself down into the ravine, his hands on the rope, his feet against the bank and made his way around the side of the ravine until he could lower himself to the rock jutting up out of the ground. "“See?"” he repeated, "It was easy. Did you watch? Just do what I did and don't ever let go of the rope."” Ok Amado, we won't!
Minutes later, safely on the otherside, the three of us continue on for another 45 minutes to the second waterfall, well worth the walk to reach. Falling over 80 feet into a pool of water below, a spray projecting back up onto the granite walls surrounding the cascade. Completely alone on the rocks surrounding the falls, John was in the water before Jen and I could settle in to eat our peanut butter and crackers with Amado.
For the next hour, Amado regaled us with stories of his six brothers and sisters and parents who had moved to NY, his five children, Domincan history and interesting facts and the logisitcs of how John and I could continue on after Jen went back to work to climb Pico Duarte.
That afternoon, back in Jarbacoa, Jen safely to the Guagua station that would hopefully lead her back to Cabarete, John and I set out for a beer and a bite to eat. As I said before, Jarbacoa is a small mountain town, but you would never know it by the quantity of motos or the noise level in the street. It'’s truly incredible. Close your eyes and your in NYC. Inhale and you know you are no longer in any city in the U.S. With a cheaper version of gas or propane fueling the cars and motos and the seeming lax insepection laws for motorized vehicles with regard to mufflers and pollution, the air here is less than sweetly pefumed with the scent of burning deisle and gasoline.
We wandered back toward the Parque Central (Central Park) or town square of the town and were greeted with a scene we could not have imagined in a major metropolis let alone a town of this size. There on the four corners of the square were every resident of the town and the surrounding towns between the ages of 16 and 24. Hundreds of young men and women, dressed to the nines, lounged sharing bottles of beer or rum at the bars, on the sidewalks, at the edges of the park, spilling out into the streets, making it difficult if not impossible for the equally as many motos and infrequent car to navigate the street that was clearly the local pick up scene. Young mothers and fathers with their children, interspersed with even younger teens looking around to see and be seen. Two small boys hung around the periphery of the street, alternately offering shoe shines and jumping onto the back of the occaisional SUV for a quick ride on their spare tire on the back, before the driver inevitably saw them and chastized them for their behavior. A large minivan with it’s back popped open pumped Spanish rock into the night air and couple danced Salsa on the sidwalk, oblivious to the crownds around them. A man sitting at the bar next to us, eyes closed, belted out the lyrics to songs being played, his hat down low over his forehead.
John and I sat slowly slipping our local pilsner, “Presidente,” taking in the scene as it unfolded in front of us. "“Another?"” he asked after the last drops had been poured into our little plastic cups. I shook my head. I had already seen enough and in my dirty zip off backpacking pants, I certainly was in no postion to be "“seen."”
Thursday, September 14, 2006
Waiting for the GuaGua: Sept. 11, 2006
It's a litlle after 10 in the morning as we lean, backs up against our backpacks, journals out, on a side street in the town of Jarbacoa, waiting for the guagua to depart for La Ciénaga where we will spend two to three days climbing the mountain, Pico Duarte. We drain the reminents of our overly sweet coffee in the plastic cups quickly hoping that the toxins won't leech into our system if we can finish the coffee before it cools. Seems no one has told Domincans that hot beverages and plastic don't go well together. The shoe shine guy next to us has finished polishing yet another patrons shoes. . . that is one thing that can be said for people in the D.R. - very polished shoes. Shoe shine guys are a dime a dozen. The pastry cart owner is working slowly through her line of people, oblivious to the lively scenen in the street in front of us: motoconchos (moto-taxis), maneuver to avoid cars, trucks, chickens and pedestriants. Three to a moto, moto with a bedframe, a man on horseback and the pick up in front of us, supposedly our future transport, the "guagua."
"Guaguas," a popular mode of public transport, usually consist of some sort of van, similar to a Dodge caravan meant to hold about 10 or 11 people. But really, why only take 10 or 11 people when really 16 or 17 can easily fit, legs and arms every which way? Three to four people up front, followed by, no less than, four per row after that.
The real beauty of the guagua is that it's extremely cheap and mostly convenient in nature. For under U.S. $3, you can travel hundreds of miles to exactly where you want to go. Don't get out just because you are within blocks of your stop. The guagua will stop again, just blocks from its previous stop for no additional charge. Simply yell, "Aquí, en frente del banco." or "Allá a lado de la casa de María" and the guagua driver will know where to leave you.
Of course the flip side is indeed comfort. Not to say that being jammed like a sardine into a vehicle meant for a third the amount of people inside with no seatbelt and no way of ensuring the guagua driver's capabilities doesn't have its merit. Oh the thrill of the adventure alone is worth the ride.
So we sit on the side of the road, waiting for the guagua to be filled. The guagua does not leave until it seems like it is no longer humanly possibly to squeeze one more person, burlap sack, gas container or block of salt inside. This guagua will prove to be an interesting ride I am sure. The pick up, a double cab toyota, is different than the other vans we have been inside and I can't help but have the sinking suspicion that we will be riding in the back.
"Guaguas," a popular mode of public transport, usually consist of some sort of van, similar to a Dodge caravan meant to hold about 10 or 11 people. But really, why only take 10 or 11 people when really 16 or 17 can easily fit, legs and arms every which way? Three to four people up front, followed by, no less than, four per row after that.
The real beauty of the guagua is that it's extremely cheap and mostly convenient in nature. For under U.S. $3, you can travel hundreds of miles to exactly where you want to go. Don't get out just because you are within blocks of your stop. The guagua will stop again, just blocks from its previous stop for no additional charge. Simply yell, "Aquí, en frente del banco." or "Allá a lado de la casa de María" and the guagua driver will know where to leave you.
Of course the flip side is indeed comfort. Not to say that being jammed like a sardine into a vehicle meant for a third the amount of people inside with no seatbelt and no way of ensuring the guagua driver's capabilities doesn't have its merit. Oh the thrill of the adventure alone is worth the ride.
So we sit on the side of the road, waiting for the guagua to be filled. The guagua does not leave until it seems like it is no longer humanly possibly to squeeze one more person, burlap sack, gas container or block of salt inside. This guagua will prove to be an interesting ride I am sure. The pick up, a double cab toyota, is different than the other vans we have been inside and I can't help but have the sinking suspicion that we will be riding in the back.
Friday, September 08, 2006
A not so soft landing, but safe and sound nevertheless
You know that the landing in a new place is going to be a bit bumpy. No matter how many times you do it. It's like re-entry to the U.S. after having been out of the country for a while. Your from the States. You are familiar with the drill and yet re-entry into society always seems to be a bit of a shock to the system. I guess the same goes for leaving. . or at least for me it does.
I knew when I read my horoscope to John aloud yesterday though that I should have put the paper down as soon as I saw the word travel. Not that I give credit to the horoscope but right prior to embarking on an extended journey seeing the words "travel and difficul" written ominously like a prediction in the paper wasn't exactly settling for the stomach. Any more than the nice JetBlue man that checked us in telling us that we could leave the country without having a return back to the U.S. What? Why not? I mean I can understand the Dominican Republic having a law about entry (which they don't by the way), but a law about exiting? That seems over the top. At least we can rest assured that buying tickets at their airport allows you to purchase the fully refundable/changeable tickets so not to worry, not to worry.
Landing in the Dominican, a bit jostled and unsure of where to find Jen around we wandered outside into the sticky carribean heat and immediately I was reminded of my 3 degree temperture comfort zone. This was definitely warmer than 72 and immediately started to sweat, glad that my bag was smaller than John's, but wishing it to be about half its size. Not knowing if Jen knew that we were landing that day or how to get in touch with her without a phone, we decided that our best plan of action was to find an internet cafe and see if she had emailed us. Immediately we were accosted by fifteen different offers for taxi, carros públicos, motochacos and other forms of transport to leave the airport. "No, gracias, no gracias" John kept repeating as we walked from the information desk to check our email.
Ok no email from Jen. Plan B. . .what exactly was Plan B? Good question. Well, we knew she worked at the Dream Project so perhaps we could look up their information on the web and call them. Luckily, that worked out and so 20 minutes and an argument with the airport taxi driver later (who insisted we couldn't get to the town of Caberete where Jen lives for under $75), we walked out of the airport and flagged a carro público (public car) and headed into the center of Santiago to the bus terminal. Immediately I knew I was no longer in Kansas as I got into the front seat and reached to put on my seatbelt and realized, "hmm guess they don't have seatbelts in the D.R." (sorry dad). So I closed my eyes, said a quick prayer to God, Allah etc and told the driver where to take us.
John later said to me after the insane taxi ride, the bus ride and another group car ride later, "I didn't realize these were multil-lane highways," pointing to the one way each way roads in front of us.
I laughed. "You mean the passing lane in the middle?"
"Yeah," he responded, "passing for both sides at the same time in the same place."
And it was true. Both in the public cars, the busses and as a pedestrian it would seem that anywhere from two to three cars and at least 4 motos can drive abreast on the equivalent of the coastal highway 1 in california. What seems like a an impossibility as a passing lane to you or me is a frequent custom here. . . That became especially apparent in the second public car of the day as we piled in three in the front seat and three in the back heading from Sosua (where the bus left us) to Cabarete (where we hoped to finally locate Jen). And just when you thought there was no way that more people could fit into your taxi, the taxi would pull over and like something out of the Barnam and Baily Circus act with the clowsn in the Volkswagon, two more people would pile in. . . four in front and four in back.
Now in the fading light of dusk after over 12 hours of travel, John and I alternately looked over our shoulders at our bags bouncing around in the open trunk and our intertwined hands hoping that the large spider split in the windshield was not really from someone's head bouncing off it as we raced down Carretera 5 toward Cabarete. The music increased in time with my heartrate as we paced on oncoming traffic, an impossibly full, red moon peaking out above the palm trees along the ocean. We sped through a town and in my head I thought, "Is this it? Hmm. Guess not." Too bad I had said that thought aloud as we came to a stop 5 km down the road in front of what looked to be a resort.
"¿Aquí?" the cab driver asked and it took me a minute to realize that he was talking to us.
"No Caberete." I responded, praying not to hear what I knew he would say.
"Cabarete? Cabarete? No . . .we already passed Cabarete."
Whoops. But there was no convincing this taxista to take us back. We were on our own. To flag another mode of transport or hoof it. So of course, we donned our backpacks, got out our headlamps and began the hour long walk back to where we finally found Jen and a cold beer on the beach.
So yeah, arrived . .though not quite as softly as we had hoped.
I knew when I read my horoscope to John aloud yesterday though that I should have put the paper down as soon as I saw the word travel. Not that I give credit to the horoscope but right prior to embarking on an extended journey seeing the words "travel and difficul" written ominously like a prediction in the paper wasn't exactly settling for the stomach. Any more than the nice JetBlue man that checked us in telling us that we could leave the country without having a return back to the U.S. What? Why not? I mean I can understand the Dominican Republic having a law about entry (which they don't by the way), but a law about exiting? That seems over the top. At least we can rest assured that buying tickets at their airport allows you to purchase the fully refundable/changeable tickets so not to worry, not to worry.
Landing in the Dominican, a bit jostled and unsure of where to find Jen around we wandered outside into the sticky carribean heat and immediately I was reminded of my 3 degree temperture comfort zone. This was definitely warmer than 72 and immediately started to sweat, glad that my bag was smaller than John's, but wishing it to be about half its size. Not knowing if Jen knew that we were landing that day or how to get in touch with her without a phone, we decided that our best plan of action was to find an internet cafe and see if she had emailed us. Immediately we were accosted by fifteen different offers for taxi, carros públicos, motochacos and other forms of transport to leave the airport. "No, gracias, no gracias" John kept repeating as we walked from the information desk to check our email.
Ok no email from Jen. Plan B. . .what exactly was Plan B? Good question. Well, we knew she worked at the Dream Project so perhaps we could look up their information on the web and call them. Luckily, that worked out and so 20 minutes and an argument with the airport taxi driver later (who insisted we couldn't get to the town of Caberete where Jen lives for under $75), we walked out of the airport and flagged a carro público (public car) and headed into the center of Santiago to the bus terminal. Immediately I knew I was no longer in Kansas as I got into the front seat and reached to put on my seatbelt and realized, "hmm guess they don't have seatbelts in the D.R." (sorry dad). So I closed my eyes, said a quick prayer to God, Allah etc and told the driver where to take us.
John later said to me after the insane taxi ride, the bus ride and another group car ride later, "I didn't realize these were multil-lane highways," pointing to the one way each way roads in front of us.
I laughed. "You mean the passing lane in the middle?"
"Yeah," he responded, "passing for both sides at the same time in the same place."
And it was true. Both in the public cars, the busses and as a pedestrian it would seem that anywhere from two to three cars and at least 4 motos can drive abreast on the equivalent of the coastal highway 1 in california. What seems like a an impossibility as a passing lane to you or me is a frequent custom here. . . That became especially apparent in the second public car of the day as we piled in three in the front seat and three in the back heading from Sosua (where the bus left us) to Cabarete (where we hoped to finally locate Jen). And just when you thought there was no way that more people could fit into your taxi, the taxi would pull over and like something out of the Barnam and Baily Circus act with the clowsn in the Volkswagon, two more people would pile in. . . four in front and four in back.
Now in the fading light of dusk after over 12 hours of travel, John and I alternately looked over our shoulders at our bags bouncing around in the open trunk and our intertwined hands hoping that the large spider split in the windshield was not really from someone's head bouncing off it as we raced down Carretera 5 toward Cabarete. The music increased in time with my heartrate as we paced on oncoming traffic, an impossibly full, red moon peaking out above the palm trees along the ocean. We sped through a town and in my head I thought, "Is this it? Hmm. Guess not." Too bad I had said that thought aloud as we came to a stop 5 km down the road in front of what looked to be a resort.
"¿Aquí?" the cab driver asked and it took me a minute to realize that he was talking to us.
"No Caberete." I responded, praying not to hear what I knew he would say.
"Cabarete? Cabarete? No . . .we already passed Cabarete."
Whoops. But there was no convincing this taxista to take us back. We were on our own. To flag another mode of transport or hoof it. So of course, we donned our backpacks, got out our headlamps and began the hour long walk back to where we finally found Jen and a cold beer on the beach.
So yeah, arrived . .though not quite as softly as we had hoped.
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
Waiting till the last minute
There is no excuse for not having written earlier. Well, that's not true. There are a million excuses, reasons if you will, but I will spare you the excedingly boring details. Suffice to say that we leave tomorrow and the summer has been filled with over 6,000 miles in John's VW from San Francisco to Boston. Obviously we took the long route. In my defense, I had planned to use this site as a way to document the many adventures as we made our way across the country, but somehow that never happened.
So I guess you will have to take my word for it that the last month has been quite the adventure.. . from biking in Zion surrounded by orange buttes and impossibly blue sky; to running along the north rim of the Grand Canyon feeling like a Rave Run from Runner's World; to swimming in the turquoise, tepid waters of Alabama's Gulf Shores; to the variety of friends we saw along the way, both intentional and accidental; the stories piled one atop another. Luckily they're mostly documented on film for those of you with the patience to hear them all.
So tonight on this last night before we leave, I sit here in the Newton Public Library, rather than at John's dad's house, where I should be doing laundry and packing. I imagine it will all get done. It always does, doesn't it.
Here's to hoping that Jen Collett gets my email letting her know that we arrive in the Dominican Republic tomorrow, her first visitors in her new home.
So I guess you will have to take my word for it that the last month has been quite the adventure.. . from biking in Zion surrounded by orange buttes and impossibly blue sky; to running along the north rim of the Grand Canyon feeling like a Rave Run from Runner's World; to swimming in the turquoise, tepid waters of Alabama's Gulf Shores; to the variety of friends we saw along the way, both intentional and accidental; the stories piled one atop another. Luckily they're mostly documented on film for those of you with the patience to hear them all.
So tonight on this last night before we leave, I sit here in the Newton Public Library, rather than at John's dad's house, where I should be doing laundry and packing. I imagine it will all get done. It always does, doesn't it.
Here's to hoping that Jen Collett gets my email letting her know that we arrive in the Dominican Republic tomorrow, her first visitors in her new home.
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
whether the weather
And so it begins. . .
By now, I am sure many of you must be wondering when we are going to get started and go already. I know I have been wondering that as of late as I sit in my father's house in Wilmington, De, alone on a Friday night. Not that there's anything wrong with sitting at home alone on a Friday night while my dad and his wife are out at the circus. Yet, there may be those of you who have been patiently awaiting a first installment of my travel ramblings and yet apart from the thunderstorms and the ridiculous heat, I have not a whole lot to say. Alas you (and I both) will have to continue the wait as I have yet to leave the country.
Instead for the last month, I have been up and down the eastern seaboard, from the far corners of Maine to downtown Manhattan, I am quite the mover and the shaker. From cowering in the 3 pound backpacking tent during the torential downpours with lightening and thunder in Acadia to excessive sweating in the sweltering heat of rolling blackouts and subway stoppages in NYC, I have been having quite the east coast adventure.
Besides, who said you needed to leave the country to have a harrowing or life changing experience? Go ahead, you try spending 7 days and nights in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn with my mother's parents. Phew.
Now back "home" in San Francisco, California after a month on the east coast, I wonder why I feel no more comfortable as I expected to feel. Don't get me wrong, I am thrilled to be back in a part of the country where recycling and vegetarian options in a restaurant is a matter of course rather than an anomoly. But that being said, I feel . . .displaced. Perhaps that stems from the fact that while I arrived "home" Monday night to 128 Albion, my home it was not. I am not exactly sure why this surprised me, but it did. As many of you know, my home for the next 12 months (give or take a month) is now the home of my brother and his friend, Chad. Clearly I knew this. John and I asked them to move in. We okayed it with the landlord. They paid July's rent. Yet, on Monday as I slept on my living room couch, I felt out of sorts. And today as John and I discussed where to sleep tonight, I couldn't help but feel displaced. A sensation, I have the feeling that will not be disapating anytime soon.
And so it begins . . .
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