gasoline rationing

because of katrina's effect on gasoline prices, we have had gas rationing here the past 2+ months. initially, this consisted of gas stations being closed all day on sundays and only open 8am-12pm on saturdays. about a month into the rationing, they eased this up a bit and allowed gas stations to be open saturdays and sundays from 8am-2pm.

for a country that relies on tourism as its main industry, it's not very smart to close gas stations all day on a sunday. envision a tourist or a well-off local wanting to go to the other side of the island for the weekend. if they forget to gas up on saturday, they may not be able to get back to their original destination on sunday because they could not buy gas!

during the point at which the ban was on for sundays, we went on a weekend trip out to Las Galeras with the whole gang from Century 21. Las Galeras is the most eastern point on the Samana Peninsula - about a 4 hour drive from Cabarete. Juan paid for this whole trip for everyone as a "thank you" for their hard work over the year. (very nice of him. sure beats a party at the billerica sheraton or wherever we went to for wildfire. but then again, we didn't work on commission at wildfire...)

veronica and i, being the planners that we are, said we would gas up on friday once we arrived in Las Galeras. that way we'd be sure to have enough gas to get back to Cabarete on sunday and for veronica to then take a client out that day too.

well, we drive through Samana, the last big town before Las Galeras and see some gas stations. we say, nah, we'll get gas in Las Galeras, as we were seeing big lines already forming for the gas here. perhaps out there, there will be less of a line.

we get to Las Galeras and guess what? never mind a line problem, there's NO gas station! ok people, how can this be? this is 25 minutes from Samana and there's no gas station on this most eastern point of the island? we think to ourselves, great, now we have to drive 50 minutes round trip to get our gas..... there has to be another solution.

sure enough, there was another solution. those beer bottles/water jugs on tables at makeshift stands we'd been seeing along the road were GAS! the black market, baby!

so we bought a few beer bottles worth. it was tough to tell quantities like this. so we asked for 4 bottles first, watched the gas gauge move, and then ordered 2 more. i didn't get a picture of this but wish i had.

this is another thing that is different here. there are no container requirements for transporting gasoline. you could walk up to the gas pump with your hands cupped and they'd fill them with gas, if you wanted it that way. so anything goes - water jugs, beer bottles, buckets, whatever.

apparently, they are going to be easing the rationing in the month of december. this was posted on the DR1 forum today:

"The "Diario Libre On Line" edition of today, Nov. 23rd, relates an announcement by the Secretary or Industry and Commerce, Francisco Javier García; because of the 34% reduction in fuel comsumption for the past month, the controls of the sales of fuels will be lifted in December so the Dominicans coming for Christmas will be able to travel to the interior without difficulties. He thanked the people for their cooperation."

but this is only for december. in the meantime, we'll have to continue to work around the system, as everyone does!