Paz Y Bien 2009

That Guy February 13, 2009

Here is a hypothetical situation, you are a customer in need of some service. That isn´t to much of a stretch for anyones to imagine. You find the long 1-800 number, you call it and you wait for someone, an actual person, to answer your call. When you finally talk to someone you notice, without any difficulty, that this guy has an accent. Let´s assume this guy is from another country. Let´s say the Dominican Republic. This guy is very polite but despite his best efforts he cannot help you. I think that it is safe to assume that most everyone has had an experience similar to this one. Frustrating isn´t it?

That is one perspective. Here is another. This guy works a full shift, finishes late at night then wakes up early in the morning to get to class. He actually paid attention in his foreign language (English) class and taught himself the rest of what he knows. Now it is paying off. He is working hard and is studying for his future career. Sounds good, right?

Yes and yes, it sounds good, but it is still frustrating. My purpose here isn´t to somehow make over-the-phone customer service easy. If I could do that, I would and then I´d make a lot of money.

The next time that you are talking to an over-the-phone customer service representative I want you to, when you get a minute, maybe after you have been on hold for a half an hour, to think about this. That guy who is trying to help you may be a friend of mine and he is probably trying his best to help you; he told me he would.

A Cold Front February 9, 2009

From what I hear, it is quite warm at 50 to almost 60 degrees in Pennsylvania. It has been chilly here. Today it barely reached 70 degrees. On Friday I saw a student wearing an honest-to-goodness winter coat. The weather still hasn´t fallen below 65 degrees.

This cold front started to give me the sniffles. ¿Ironic, isn´t it? The temperature dips a few degrees here, is still warmer than the heat wave at home, but I get a cold anyways. I guess with a new school comes a new batch of germs just like any other, plus I was getting used to the heat.

Anyhow, the sisters here know how to treat the “gripe” (literally means the flu but it is used more or less as umbrella term for colds and other little illnesses). First, they tell you that you need to eat more rice, beans and oranges. This is actually what they say all of the time, but if you have a cold they end their sentences with something like, “para el gripe” or, “for the cold”. Then they make you tea. Before I left the school sister Jennifer made me tea with passion fruit leaves, lemon, honey and garlic, yes, garlic. Then when I got back to the formation house sister Lourdes made me tea with garlic and honey. I know it sounds weird but they were both rather tasty.

The moral of the story is that I have the sniffles, but I am being well taken care of.

Halfway February 8, 2009

I haven´t bothered to count the days exactly, but I think that I have reached the halfway point of my Dominican expereince. Some of me is thinking, “hey, I´m just starting to get the hang of this, I can´t leave now” and then some of me is thinking that it will be good to be home again. Either way, things are still good here. “Paz y bien” to all you on the home front.

Mosquitoes February 4, 2009

My last post was mostly about my not understanding Spanish and in many cases I still don´t understand, but I´d like to focus on what I do understand this time around. Some Spanish words are starting to have meanings of there own or meanings outside of simply having an English counterpart. For example, “sientese” is what I say when I want a student to sit down. I don´t have to translate it before I say it. I don´t think that any teacher who is reading this is going to be particularly surprised that that is one of the first words that has been truly ingrained into my vocabulary. Likewise, “subame” is what the kindergartners say when they want me to pick them up and put them on the jungle-gym. I think that I am on the verge of “thinking in Spanish”.

Another thing that is changing, when I would hear people talking to other people it used to be just white noise. Sister Brigid warned me about this. I am starting to pick out words, not enough words to understand what they are saying, but enough to occupy my thoughts.  I might get to the point that I can actually eavesdrop before I leave.  

I am still never found without my Spanish/English Dictionary too far out of reach. Speaking of which (or rather, writing or typing of which) it will be donated and replaced with a much more comprehensive dictionary. I have looked for too many words that were not there.

OK, so I know that I mentioned that the sisters that I am living with are originally from Brazil and Spanish is their second language as well. I am going to be barbecuingon Sunday and I wanted to know if the sisters had skewers for sish-kabobs. I didn´t know the Spanish word for “skewers” so I looked it up and asked if they had any. The sisters here also didn´t know the Spanish word for “skewers” so they looked it up in their Spanish/Portuguese dictionary. Anyways, that seemingly simple question took close to fifteen minutes to ask and answer.

On an unrelated note, I hate mosquitoes. I would like to know exactly how many I have killed so that I can compare that number to how many have bitten me. Both numbers are not small numbers.

Sometimes I Smile Because I Have No Idea What Is Going On January 29, 2009

Sometimes I smile because I have no idea what is going on. I have to admit that I am learning Spanish, but here is the thing with languages; they are huge. Sometimes despite my greatest efforts I just can´t figure out what people are trying to tell me. Some of my students don´t quite understand that I don´t understand what they are telling me. One little boy in particular, Brayan (pronounced like my name), talks to me like I´ve mastered his language ten times over. I haven´t.

I think that I understand why babies will cry and carry on like they do. They can´t express themselves. I can tell people that I am hungry and when I have to use the bathroom which gives me a one up on babies, but I still have some dificulty in expressing myself sometimes. Not being able to express yourself is frustrating.

The expression that I am writing about isn´t the kind of expression of ones innermost soul, the kind that can only come from highly overpriced abstract art or music that bursts out of suburban garages and irritates neighbors. I simply mean that am stuck using primitave Spanish to say whatever I want to say. If I want to share a thought that includes an important word that I don´t know in Spanish then that means that that thought might need to go unsaid. That is frustrating and so I smile.

Hola, St. Ignatious fourth graders

The Language Known as English January 24, 2009

After another week of attempting to teach English. I am even more astounded as to the strangeness of the English language. I know that every language has its quirks, but right now I am seeing the English ones. How many different sounds does each letter in the English language have. Think about the letter “A”. It has two sounds, right?: Short A as in apple and long A as in train, but that´s not all. What about “boat” where there is a letter “A”, but it has know sound at all. Or what about the word “what”? That has a completely different sound. That is only the first letter of the alphabet and I am sure that I am missing a few sounds. I won´t even get started with “ph” or “gh”.

Please, reply with some other pronunciation quirks from the English language to help me prove my point and, perhaps to prepare me for teaching more of these oddities.

Ha, phonics, my eye.

Cast of Characters And The Languages That They Speak January 21, 2009

Do the nuns speak only Spanish or do some people speak to you in English also? What a good question, Ang.

The two nuns with whom I am sharing a house are not actually Dominican (as in the nationality not the religious order) they are Brazilian. Their first language is Portuguese, but they speak to me in Spanish. Their Spanish is slower and more articulate than most of the native speakers. Brigid is a novice (sister in formation or training) who is also currently staying at the house and she is Canadian. She speaks English, Spanish and Portuguese. She helps translate for me when I don´t understand something which can be quite frequently. Patrick is from Washington state, is also at this house and has a working knowledge of the Spanish language. He also helps me with translations when I am in a bind. Pat and Sister Brigid will be leaving for the United States this Saturday and I will be down two English speakers.

Now, for the mission center. Sister Valdiar is also a Brazilian sister and she runs the place. She speaks Portuguese and Spanish with a nice thick Portuguese accent. Her English pretty much includes, “good morning”, but beyond that, if I don´t understand her she will simply hold onto my wrist and lead me to were I need to go. The next three are Dominicans. Martha has taken her final vows like Sister Valdiar, but her English vocabulary is easily three times that of Sister Valdiar´s.  Mercedes is an aspirant (someone who aspires to be a nun but hasn´t taken any vows yet) and she speaks Spanish. Jennifer has taken temporary vows (the last step before taking final vows) and knows the most English out of all of the nuns. She studied English at the University that she is currently attending. She has a basic grasp on the English language and she tries to use it when she can.

Carlos is not a nun nor does he live with nuns. He is a college student that helps the nuns with computers and even teaches a computer class at the mission center. He might have better grammar than most Americans, but he is still working on pronunciation and certain colloquialisms. He will be my English lifeline after Pat and Brigid leave.

Most everyone else here only speaks Spanish, except for the people trying to sell things to tourists.

I hope that that answers your question in a lengthier way than you had originally hoped.

A Note on Some of My Photos January 17, 2009

When you see the photos that I posted I hope that you can appreciate the beauty of this country. I also hope that you do not get a skewed view (which I suppuse is likely). I haven´t taken (and therefore haven´t posted) any pictures that really capture the poverty that I am seeing here and there are few reasons for that.

Firstly, I am trying to blend in. Yea, I know. I don´t really look or sound very Dominican (though I do think that my tan is coming in rather nicely). I already have a couple of strikes against me and in a country were the most popular religion, next to Catholicism, is baseball I should be careful with two strikes against me. I don´t need to advertise that I´m not from around here by waiving a camera around. When I commute in the morning, I want to be like everyone else trying to get to where they need to be.

Secondly, if I am busy taking pictures I will be missing out on a bunch of things.

Thirdly and perhaps most importantly, I want to respect the dignity of the people here. I wouldn´t necesarily want a stranger taking pictures of my house in order to report on the things that I don´t have. I already feel like I am intruding.

This being said… or rather typed, I will be taking more pictures and some of them will probably show some of the poorer conditions here. I think that educating people about poverty is important and pictures are good tools for educating people. I will also try to take and use these pictures while upholding the dignity of the people whom I am living and working with here in Santo Domingo.

Traveling the Streets of Santo Domingo January 16, 2009

Imagine, if you will, a taxi.  There is already somone in the the front passenger seat of this taxi and you and your friend get in. This taxi travels only from point A to point B, like a bus, but it is a car. It isn´t yellow with a special sign on the roof, nor is there a man inside that asks you a series of trivia questions for money. It is just a run of the mill run down car. I hope that your imagination is keeping up so far beacause we aren´t done yet. So, now there are four people in the taxi (the driver, the passanger, you and your friend). You pay the driver 13 pesos and you are off. You travel a block then stop. ¿did I mention that the driver has his hand out the window trying to flag down more passengers? No, well, he is doing just that and he is successful. Three more passengers get in the Taxi. You must be thinking that someone must have gotten out or that this taxi is a van. No and no. It is a regular four door sedan and yes, there are now seven people in this taxi (the driver and six passengers). Now these six passengers are all full grown men Please imagine how we are all packed in this car. There are four of us in the back seat and two men sharing the front passenger´s seat. The idea of personal space is different in the Dominican. Anyway, we are off again. Seven men in a car cruising down the busy streets of Santo Domingo, using the horn instead of a turn signal and using those lines that they paint on the roads as… um, well we weren´t really using those lines for anything at all, but they are still there. (Steve, your driving might never scare me again.) 

I thank you and your imagination for sharing the  adventure of the my afternoon commute. Not every taxi ride is quite that crowded, but that is how they do things here and you know what they say, “when in Rome”.

Life Here is “Tough” January 11, 2009