Wednesday, November 30, 2005

a late afternoon picnic



we had some great weather yesterday - a good thing for Nicole and Karen. apparently the water was forecasted to be warmer than the air.

with the nice weather, we decided to take a late afternoon excursion with nicole and karen over to the encuentro area. we packed up a cooler with some beverages and brought some snacks. we went to a spot that is in front of the hideaway beach resort. the view here is really great - you can see the palm tree lined coast, the crashing waves, and some surfers.

usually there are never many people out there. turns out though that we ran into a C21 colleague, spencer, who was out enjoying the late afternoon with new his (grown) dog. he's from england and moved here in the summer with his wife and daughter. he joined us for a bit and told us some tales about being in the English army stationed in various places in the world during his 22 years of service.

the ocean is a bit rough along here except for this particular spot where there is a small bay suitable for swimming. so, it's nice to hang out here, take in the view of the virgin coastline, and take a swim. we got there at about 4:15, so we had about 2 hours of sunlight out there.

here are some pictures from our afternoon.



Monday, November 28, 2005

The arrival of The Dutch


Saturday evening Nicole and Karen arrived from Amsterdam, after a 14 hour flight via Cuba. It has not been the best of weather here with a lot of rain the last few days, but much better than Holland. Holland had a very unusual snow storm on Saturday, which caused a record amount of traffic delays and accidents. People were in traffic for 8 straight hours and emergency shelters had to be set up for people who couldn't get home. And that in a country which is so small, you could walk from one end to the other in three days!
We are happy the girls are here and celebrated that the evening they arrived, at Lax. Sunday was a bit of a rainy day, but this morning the skies are blue, so this should be a good beach day! Friday we are all off to Las Terrenas for some good food and white beaches.

the price of pringles



yesterday i was in a shop in cabarete buying pringles. an american couple was also having the same craving and eyeing the pringles as well. trouble for them was they were not sure of the price. the label on the pringles said $65. so they went up to the woman at the cash register and asked "is this in dollars or pesos?" ok, come on now, i know it's strange that the dominicans sometimes use the $ symbol with their pricing, but did these people really think the pringles could cost $65 US dollars? that would be like $1 a chip!

Saturday, November 26, 2005

another roadtrip

yesterday we took another trip to santiago. this time we took a different route though, as namibia, another C21 realtor, offered to show us some contacts along the way that might be beneficial for our business idea. another mountain road, this one is reached by heading towards puerto plata and then hanging a left at some point. the picture is of a truck on the main road heading towards puerto plata and before we got to the mountain road. look closely to see the workmen enjoying some beers (at 11:30am) on their "job". forget open container laws or safety concerns of riding on the back of an 18 wheeler.



there were many picture taking opportunities along the mountain road, but we couldn't stop as we were following namibia. there were some quintessential fruit stands and dominican villages that would have been good to have captured on the camera. oh well, we'll just have to take that route again. the road, by the way, was in terrible condition. at some points, they were working to fix where it was literally sliding away down the mountain. another interesting thing was that the road had a ditch along it for water drainage. over the years, they have been digging dirt etc. from runoff out of the ditch and dumping it on to the road next to the ditch. grass & weeds have grown in many portions of it, so the road is literally slowly becoming less wide. guess there's no money from the gov't to come along and haul away the stuff taken out of the ditches....

we also went to see a furniture maker outside santiago. we were happily surprised by the quality of his work and the size of his operation. the owner spent some time talking to us and showed us the workshop where the furniture is made. he works mostly in rattan and other types of material like that, which is typical for here. he spoke some english, so we didn't have to work at a conversation in spanish.

i think veronica was reminiscing back to the time when she worked in bill bancroft's workshop. here's a shot of his "factory". it was really great to see how many people he employed and how beneficial his business was to the community.



it's been raining here the last 3 and half days. so a lot of yesterday's drive was in the rain. it's hard enough already avoiding the usual potholes, insane drivers passing at the wrong time, stupid people sitting on the road, and the no use of turn signals, nevermind adding rain to the mix. we were pretty tired when we got back, so we just BBQ'ed and hung in.

nicole and karen arrive tonight from amsterdam. we'll be picking them up at the airport. hope the weather improves for their sake!

Friday, November 25, 2005

thanksgiving in cabarete




we celebrated thanksgiving with a bunch of friends next door at the windsurf hotel. our friend and the owner of the hotel, gordon, arranged for some butterballs and did the cooking himself. the food was very good - they even gave a good shot at a pumpkin pie (not much pumpkin here).

there were 12 of us in all. just 3 americans - rich, sarah from michigan, and me - for whom the holiday had meaning. the rest of the table was made up of spaniards, dominicans, a swede, a bulgarian, a canadian, and v of course representing the dutch.

we did manage to get in the tradition of watching a bit of the Macy's day parade that morning. for some reason, i always feel i need to see that. we didn't watch any football though. we actually worked during the day - veronica had a shift at the sosua office, and i joined here there for some that.

the pictures are of the group celebrating thanksgiving; german and rich with their brown striped shirts; and gordon hamming it up in his chef hat.

it has started to be a bit cooler in the evenings now. this means it was like 72 degrees or something versus when it used to be like 88-90 and humid as hell at night. you can see that some of us are wearing long sleeved shirts. even still, we're sitting in an open air space - a bit different for a thanksgiving for sure.

Wednesday, November 23, 2005

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 GarcĂ­a; 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!

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

sealing the deal and tying up loose ends


so today we had lots of real estate things to deal with.

first up was trying to convince this guy, ray, from NYC to reconsider this home in the hills that he and his wife really liked. they had been pretty gung-ho on this house, but they wanted to find out how it would be to rent it out when not using it. veronica had referred them to a prop mgmt/rental company that C21 recommends. well, during the course of this conversation with this company, they were told that they had to essentially fire the caretaker (and his family) who lives on the property and takes care of it. oh, and by the way, that they would need to pay these people's pensions, as they had worked for XXX amount of time for the owners of the house.

well, turns out that this was how they had interpreted the information, but that in fact much of this info was tainted with reasons as to why they should use that prop mgmt/rental company versus keeping the caretaker employed. ray's wife had a serious moral issue with displacing this family and thus had ruled out the house. ray and she were now going to put an offer in on an oceanfront condo instead (not through C21).

veronica figured out the real story, which was that the current owner would have to be the one to finish out the "contract" with this caretaker, pay his pension etc. then, the new owner could essentially rehire the same caretaker under a new contract. v got back on the phone with ray and pushed them back on to considering the home.

we'll see what happens. hopefully they didn't get too wedded to the oceanfront condo after obtaining this tainted info. :-(

next up was to deal with the developer who had been encroaching on v's land on her plot in perla marina. last week we figured out that this developer, who is building a spec home on the adjacent lot, was building about 70cm beyond his property line and onto v's land - both with a stone wall and with ditches being dug for the home's septic system. he's an architect from chile who has lived here for many years and has a small hotel in the same community. doesn't speak any english, or well, i think more conveniently doesn't speak english at opportune times. his partner, a kind of surfer like kind of dude and an architect as well, speaks spanish and english. he was also present during the original conversation regarding this issue.

actually though this whole issue was resolved very smoothly. it went like this:

  • chilean architect (in spanish) -"how about i just leave the wall?"
  • v - "no, i don't think so. besides i want to sell the land and don't want any discrepancies."
  • surfer dude architect - "ok, well, how do we know whether it's us encroaching or if it's the home's lot on the other side of you?"
  • v - "i measured the width of your stone wall, and it's too large for your allotment, according to this plot plan i have of perla marina from C21. C21 were the ones who orginally divided up the land."
  • surfer dude architect - "oh ok. well, maybe we want to buy your land. how much do you want for the land?"
  • v - "$57 per sq meter."
  • chilean architect (in spanish) -"oooh, no, no. that's too expensive. we have to think about it."
  • susie - "lots in this community in less desirable locations than this are going for $59 per sq meter. anyway, if you buy the land, there's no problem with your wall etc. being on our land. if you don't buy the land, you need to resolve this. so how will you resolve this?"
  • surfer architect dude - "we'll think about the price. in the meantime, we'll get the surveyor out here to resolve it. maybe you can ask Pablo at C21 to do that."
  • v - "no, i don't think so. i think it's your responsibility to arrange all of that.
  • surfer dude architect - "ok, then we'll do it."
  • v - "ok."

so a few days later, they offered v a price for the land that she didn't accept. then they called yesterday and said that the surveyor was coming that day. so today, we went to see if the land had indeed been marked out..... it had, and the workers were busy knocking down the stone wall and moving the ditches back on to their land. problem solved. BUT good thing we were here to see & deal with it. otherwise, there went a small chunk of v's land. i must say though that in the end, resolving this went pretty smoothly. it could have been a nightmare, but the 2 developers did the right thing and expeditiously. 2 things that don't always happen here.

third item of the day was to finish out a sale with a client on one of the C21 pre-construction condos. a couple from NJ had decided to buy one of The Victorian units. they also decided to hire the big gun lawyer in town to handle their transaction. no surprise, the big gun lawyer has lots on his plate and is not expeditiously (i like that word) getting the necessary paperwork in to veronica. so, v had to do a lot of back and forth emailing and calling to get this lawyer dude to get going. maybe we're there, maybe not. nothing is easy in this country, except kicking people off your land! ;-)

Monday, November 21, 2005

after work swim

i was IM'ing with sheila at 5:20ish our time, when i mentioned that v and i were going for a swim after work. she said it was dark back in boston. suddenly, i realized, hey, yeah, it's november. normally at this time of year, i start to dread it getting dark so early. we're helped here a bit by the fact that we are an hour ahead now. the DR doesn't observe daylight savings and is on Atlantic time.

here's a shot of us after our swim tonight. we'd spent a few minutes taking some self photos of ourselves, before a guy came along and offered to take a pic of us. so here we are on november 21 at 6:10pm.



here's cabarete beach at that time:

Sunday, November 20, 2005

thought of the day

yesterday out at the surf contest, i saw a few women walking around with these tiny dogs in their arms & thinking they are Paris Hilton.

it's one thing to accessorize with a bag. it's another thing to accessorize with a dog!

i mean, come on people. get a life!

Saturday, November 19, 2005

more pics from encuentro

some more shots from today....

begona, sara, and german taking in the action and showing off the hip eyewear



veronica making friends with begona's dog - Paco



the scenery....

encuentro surf competition

here are some pics from the surf competition we went to this afternoon. we dashed down there after our spanish lesson. christin, a fellow C21 realtor, also happens to be one of the organizers of the event. she greeted us with some cold brahmas.

this was the place to be today. the weather was fantastic. we watched the surfers for a bit, but mostly just enjoyed the scene with a bunch of our friends. daniel, the local german butcher, was bbq'ing up some great food. christin had hired some Gen Y type band to play, so we all pounded our heads a bit while chowing on our lunch.

we also took a walk down the beach here and went for a swim. we both really like it out at this beach. we always say we should go out there more often. when nicole and karen come next week from NL, we should take them out there with a cooler, some lunch, and hang for the day. same goes for sheila, jessie, and willow. it's nice because there are no vendors as well.



Friday, November 18, 2005

Santiago road trip


we took a trip to Santiago today to go to some shops. it takes about an hour and half to get there. a good portion of the trip is up, over, and back down the mountains. along the way you get a chance to see life in the country side.

i am not sure how these people make a living. many, i think, are small time farmers. as you pass through each village, you see people sitting in their wooden shack homes, kids playing along the road, and women handwashing their laundry and hanging it on the barbed wire fences marking off the different plots of farmland. every now and then you come upon the occassional tiny store (colmado) or makeshift stand. here you can buy things like fruit that they picked nearby, sugar cane sticks, gasoline in milk cartons or beer bottles, and meat that is hanging there for all the dirt of the road to be kicked up on to it. some people still ride around on horses and donkeys here. you see a lot of farmers walking along in boots and holding on to machetes.

one of my favorite sites is of the dominican women with curlers in their hair walking up the road. they're getting gussied up for the night (WHERE would they be going?) but can't let that stop them from getting out of the house. they obviously feel no embarrassment walking around in their curlers.

in most dominican villages, everyone lives along the one road that goes through it. there is barely a shoulder of any kind. so basically their home is almost right up on the road. this makes it very easy to see right into the home as you drive by. it also means that you have people spilling out on to the road, as it is essentially the only place they go outside their home. unless they were to go out the backside of the house, but that wouldn't be very social, since everyone seems to want to be by the road where they can see all the action. the road is THE ENTERTAINMENT for them.

one thing i always think about when i drive in the mountains here is when, if ever, will these people have access to the internet? they barely have electricity, and i'm not sure if they have landline phones (doubtful). they definitely do not have washer machines! maybe they won't ever need the internet..... still, it just makes you think how the disparity between the rich and the poor will only continue to grow larger with the poor being that much further behind already.

back to the road trip....once you get down the mountains, you come to Moca, which is the place to buy a new car here. there are loads of car dealers in Moca. Santiago & Moca are in the Cibao valley, which is the heart of the agricultural center of the country. the Cibao valley is incredibly fertile and produces coffee, tobacco, sugar, fruit, vegetables, etc., as well as poultry and beef. this is the main area of the country where fresh produce is grown. Santiago was actually a (relatively) wealthier city than Santo Domingo at one time because all of this. i think it still does have a higher class and wealthier set of people than Santo Domingo, as this is where people made money in this country (not so much in Santo Domingo). so, this is where people have money and thus can afford to buy cars. thus, you have lots of car dealers....

Santiago is a fairly sizable city (800,000 residents), but there is not a heck of a lot to see there as a tourist. one mainly goes there for shopping, as they have real stores like PriceSmart (like a Sam's Club). they also have movies theaters, but we've never been - besides i think the movies are all dubbed in spanish. if you need a McD's or BK fix, they have it in Santiago too.

a big draw shopping wise in Santiago is Ochoa. this is like a Home Depot. everyone who is building anything here (houses, condos, etc.) makes many trips to Ochoa to pick out their tiles, bathroom fixtures, etc. unlike at Home Depot though, what you see is what you get there. meaning whatever is available on the showroom floor is what is available. don't expect to go back and see the same tiles that you wanted the previous time. in general, that's how it works in every store here.

so, the ride back from Santiago is usually with many shopping bags. when we return to Cabarete from there, i always feel like, wow, i live in a tiny place here in this beach town. but then i also think, geez, this doesn't feel so much like an island after having driven for 1.5 hours and having been in an actual city. when you're in santiago, you'd never think you were in the tropics. that's why it's quite nice to return to Cabarete.

(i "borrowed" this photo, as i didn't get many get any good shots today.)

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

waves, man!

we just got back from some fun in the surf. it's been stormy here the past few days, so the surf is UP! we took a stroll down cabarete beach and then decided to jump in the water. wow! the waves were probably 6 feet or perhaps more. it was deceiving from the shore, as they did'nt look as big as they were. we got tossed around a few times and had to dive under the waves to avoid being pummeled. we both looked at each other at one point, smiled, and said "this is kinda scary actually." we then kinda chickened out a bit and moved back in towards shore.

there were a few other guys out there doing the same as us but being more daring. alongside of us were a bunch of surfers. normally people don't surf on cabarete beach itself as it is not known for its surf. instead they go to encuentro beach which is about 3 miles down the road. if you see surfers on cabarete beach, it means the surf must be really high out at encuentro. next weekend is a surfing championship out there. should be fun to see that!

Monday, November 14, 2005

weather report obsession


back in boston, you are bombarded by the weather report. what, every 7 minutes or something, on the TV, you can get the weather - "weather on the 7s". same for the radio, it seems. there is a weather obsession there.

well, here in cabarete, i really have no idea what the weather will be on any given day. this is because there is no DR TV station that gives a report on the weather for cabarete. well, there probably is a TV station out of santo domingo, but that would be in spanish of course. i don't tend to watch that station. there's only one english speaking radio station here, but we never listen to that.

now the wind report is another matter. people here are obsessed with the wind report. they need to know if they can go out kitessurfing or windsurfing. there are many internet sites here that provide detailed wind reports.

our only means for getting the weather report is the internet, with the closest location on weather.com being puerto plata. now we all know that weather reports are never very accurate, but i find the internet ones to be the worst of them all.

somehow though it feels liberating to not have to feel like i need to know the forecast. i guess you can do this here because the weather really does not affect what i would wear, like it would in boston. it's like 85 every day. no need to know if i need to bring a sweater or jacket. if it rains, i'll dry off pretty quickly after....

Sunday, November 13, 2005

Mind work

Cabarete really is a speck on a map with one road and without movie theaters, shopping areas or interesting (non Dominican)galleries. So for instance the grand opening of a new store turns into a social gathering that people look forward to. Of course the rest of the time the expats of Cabarete socialize at Lax.

But in order to keep our minds busy when we are not working on grasping the art of selling real estate, Susie and I have started a few new activities. We of course have our Spanish lessons twice a week with our friend Begonia, which involves homework and practice. And practice we do while walking on the beach with a cheat sheet, quizzing each other. I have also started doing an online course at the Boston Architectural Center (BAC) on Sustainable Design. Great to be learning about how energy, in all shapes and forms, is used in buildings and how this can be optimalized by using new technologies and intelligent design. It involves a lot of reading and homework which I mostly do early in the mornings, while sitting on the deck with a cup of coffee when the temperature is perfect.

Susie and I are also seriously contemplating a new business idea of which I will not yet give the details. I will reveal that this plan does not involve building anything. We are currently in the investigative phase and are figuring out all the pieces of the puzzle before we actually decide to do this. It is all about project management and logistics, and if we can make it work in this country, where schedules are non existent, then it will be quite an achievement. We will keep you posted.

food cravings


there are a few foods that i really miss:
  • strawberries and blueberries - supposedly we maybe can get strawberries here in december when they are harvested in the mountain town of constanza. but boy, i would love one of PLV's blueberry muffins for breakfast today.
  • bagels - speaking of breakfast, i miss everything bagels with sun dried tomato cream cheese. sometimes sandi has bagels at her restaurant, which she gets from a guy who has a shop in santo domingo (3.5 hours away). that helps the fix a little, but it's not the same as a fresh bagel.
  • fresh juice - for some reason they don't do a lot of fresh juice here. i mean it just seems like a no-brainer to have fresh juice on a tropical island. someone send a Fresh Samanatha rep here to start up a business.
  • sushi - i would not order sushi here even if you held a gun to my head, except at Bobo's in santo domingo, but that's a helluva a drive for a sushi roll. Jae's rocks! i miss Jae's!
  • oysters - another item that you can actually get here but i would pass on. i saw guys selling them on the beach in the early summer. they walk around with palm tree leaves that they shaped into a holder for the oysters and ice. pretty clever contraption. but still, i like my oysters a little bit colder than that and who knows when they plucked them out of the sea. mollie is having an oyster party at the end of this month at her house in annapolis. wish we could be there for that! or to be able to just pop into East Coast Grill for a few!
  • turkey - don't think they raise a lot of turkeys here in the DR. they have turkey at the grocery store, but it's like $50 a pound or something nuts like that. it seems crazy to spend that much, just for turkey. perhaps i'll make a roast chicken for thanksgiving instead.
  • stinky blue cheese - we've been able to enjoy some dutch cheese that veronica's parents brought over, but that is running out. as for stinky blue cheese, have not seen much of any of that here.

Friday, November 11, 2005

anyone have any stickers?


here i am on our new scooter. well, it ain't very new as you can tell. almost all the scooters here are the same - beat-up, often not functioning for some reason, and costing about $200. that's what we paid for it. we bought it off another C21 realtor.

scooters rapidly change hands here - you can imagine that there is a significant amount of turnover with kitesurf instructors, surf instructors, etc. who all use scooters to get around. though many just rely on the motoconcho (small motorcycle taxi) that costs 10 pesos (30 cents) to take from one end of town to the other,

this scooter is for when we're too lazy to walk from one side of town to the other, or if we're really adventurous to take out to kite beach or encuentro beach.

we need some stickers for it or to paint it rasta colors or something. anyone who comes to visit, bring us a cool sticker and we'll put it on it! then, we'll think off you everytime we use it. ;-)

current things not working on the scooter:

  • front headlight - that's ok because we'd be out of minds to drive it at night
  • "start" button - we just kick-start it instead
  • brakes - well, um, they're working but they act strangely when trying to back up the scooter
  • the lock - i fully expect every time i go to use it, that it will be stolen. but it hasn't been yet.

Wednesday, November 09, 2005

christmas decorating


the picture here was taken yesterday - november 8. look closely and you'll see that this woman is decorating a christmas tree! christmas is 46 days away!

apparently, the dominicans get very excited about christmas. when we were in santo domingo in early october, they were putting up a christmas tree in a store. now that is absurd.

perhaps this is like when you live in boston and take your summer clothes out in april. you're excited for summer, but it's a long ways off!

Tuesday, November 08, 2005

happy birthday, begona!




last night we went to a surprise birthday party for begona. begona is a friend who is also our spanish teacher. (we've been taking spanish lessons for a couple of weeks now.) she is from madrid and is also the sister of sara, who we went out to las terrenas with. the top picture is of begona and her husband gordon. they own the windsurf resort, which is where sheila, jessie, and willow will be staying when they come down from boston in december.

the party was held at "open shirt mike"s house. mike is a photographer from canada, who actually was not at the party but generously offered the place where he lives as a spot for the party. this place was so cool. the property is made up of several homes on a large plot of land in the dominican section of town - el callejon. it feels like worlds away from that surrounding neighborhood though, as the property is quite large and spread out. the party was held at one of the homes, which was a bit rustic but had a very cool courtyard, pool, and BBQ area. the courtyard where we hung out included a great thinly shaped, long rectangular pool that was bordered by a high terra cotta colored wall. it was like an oasis in the middle of this part of town - and one of the coolest spaces i have been in since i have been here.

i met and talked to some new people - carolyn who used to run amber coast adventures but moved to NYC recently. (WOW! that's a bit of a change!) she used to live in the apartment near el magnifico that we admired when we were here on vacation.

talked to daniel whom i had met before but had not spoken much to before. he is building some condos out in the vista del caribe neighborhood. veronica and i plan to go out to check those out and get them listed for him with C21 when ready.

met a guy named joe, who was from greece but lives in germany, and had been visiting john for a month.

talked to bernhard a bit about living at maquey. learned some interesting tidbits there.

all in all had a good time and very much enjoyed the ambiance of the party's location.

Monday, November 07, 2005

things are different here!


living here in the DR has given me some perspective on some of the US laws, customs, and behaviors. here are just a few that come to mind.
  • car inspections - so in the DR, i don't think there is any kind of inspection for cars. if there is, i'm not sure what would result in an inspection failure. many cars here look like they somehow missed the turnoff to the junkyard. on several occassions i have seen cars driving without entire windshields. i have seen cars that look like they are driving sideways as opposed to straight, as clearly the car was in an accident. i have seen trucks without doors driving around. most used cars here have been in an accident. this is no surprise given how the dominicans drive. but i also believe that many cars get shipped here from places like the US where they were one step away from the junkyard. it's like the pile of t-shirts that are never sold at the salvation army. they pack 'em up and ship 'em here!
  • driver's education - NO dominican has taken anything close to a driver's ed class. here's my favorite move of the typical dominican driver: when you go to take a left turn (and indicator is on), they actually go and PASS you on the left!!! SCARY.
  • lying/sitting on the road - didn't everyone's mother teach you to not sit on the road - like a highway type of road. you will often see people sitting on the road here where cars are driving by at like 60 miles an hour. in one spot near las canas, there is this one guy who i always get amusement out of (or am freaked out by) because he is always in this one same spot, lying on the side of the road! i think he is actually sleeping there, i'm not kidding. what the #$%^&*!!! besides how insane that is, what up with wanting to lie on a HOT road? it's like 90 degrees out, i think i'll go and lie down on the asphalt! DOH!
  • fire codes - there is a reason why you build a road that is at least wide enough to accommodate fire trucks. the haitian village near to where we live nearly burned down about a month ago when they had a fire in one of the homes. the dirt road to the village was not wide enough to accommodate a fire truck getting to it. bordered on 2 sides by concrete walls, this road was a potential hazard to the hundreds who live in that village. after this experience, the haitians took it upon themselves to solve this problem. solution: 50 haitians decide to knock down one of the walls, starting after 4am when the fire was still smouldering. that made for an interesting night as this wall is close to our apartment.
  • taxes - ok, so like all those taxes we pay in the US do result in a few benefits. namely - paved and lighted roads, trash pickup, active police, safe(ish) drinking water, etc. the picture in this blog is of burning trash because well, what else do you do with the trash if no one comes to pick it up and cart it off to the dump.
  • vending permits/licenses - in the US, you can't legally just set up a fruit stand on the street corner and start selling without a permit. nor can you walk around and try to sell things without a permit. (of course this does happen in the US, i know, it's just not very prevalent. mainly you see this in places like the subway or outside the ballpark with people selling illegal t-shirts etc.) well here in the DR, people sell everything and anything EVERYWHERE and certainly do not have permits. if you are a gringo, these vendors see you as a prime target for purchasing something. this gets VERY annoying, as many times throughout the day, you are offered items to buy - CDs, jewelry, fruit, motoconcho rides, shoeshines, etc.
  • men cat calling, whistling, air kissing - ahhh, this topic deserves its whole own entry. the latin machismo thing is BEYOND annoying. in the US, it seems that unless you are on a construction site (and maybe that is not even the case anymore), you just don't get this kind of unwanted attention anymre. or maybe latin men find me more attractive than americans... ;-) could be the deep, dark, tropical tan. maybe not.

Friday, November 04, 2005

rich and sandi


here's a picture of rich and sandi, two friends of ours here. they're married and have lived in the DR for many years. i think rich has been here for about 10 years and sandi 7 years. she's from germany, and he is from upstate NY.

sandi runs a restaurant called claro, which is a great place to have breakfast in cabarete. veronica and i go there often to enjoy her company and great food. the picture is taken at the restaurant which is just a short walk from where we live. sandi and rich also happen to live at the same condo complex as we do, along with their 2 dogs. that's how we met them.

rich owns a company here called Trips, Tours, Treks, and Travel that organizes and runs adventure and educational tours, as well as community services programs. a company or a school for instance, back in the US or wherever, would use his company to organize a trip here within the DR. he can customize the trip to whatever the customer wants to do here. things like: hiking the Caribbean's highest peak Pico Duarte (10,000 ft), snorkeling in Punta Rusia/Cayo Paradise, discovering the Colonial Zone in Santo Domingo, helping to rebuild a school here, etc.

having lived here for many years, he knows the country inside and out. the DR is the type of place where you have to know where to go to find the cool stuff - it's not always marked or written about in the guidebooks. in essence, there are many hidden gems here. rich knows where they are and is happy to help out when we are lost as newbies here, looking for something cool to do.

check out his company:
http://www.4tdomrep.com

Wednesday, November 02, 2005

los ninos


ok, so the shoeshine boys are quite cute though. 2 of these boys are brothers and the other a friend. their favorite spot to solicit their trade is at dick's panaderia, the local bakery run by a german guy. dick's is the place to get coffee, sit outside and hang out, and shoe away the shoeshine boys (or take their picture), the merengue CD sellers, the belt/hat sellers.

tech support!

ok, i knew i would have to fight with the blog at some point. somehow our profile, links, and archives section of our blog is out of place and is now way down at the bottom of this page. WHA' HAPPEND?

it's probably some piece of html or something somewhere. or perhaps it is a defect in blogger. ??? any ideas anyone on how to fix this?

i think it happened either after i posted the halloween entry and all its photos, or after i posted a link that was extremely long, and blogger did not wrap the text appropriately but instead strewed the link out across the page.

it's driving me crazy!

Tuesday, November 01, 2005

oh no, theo!

what's up with the sox and theo epstein parting ways? :-(

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/

i think david ortiz summarized it best:

''We were in the playoffs every year. He put the pieces together. They should iron things out with Theo. He's the man, bro."

theo, you are the man, bro! thanks for signing david ortiz, trading nomar, and providing me with the opportunity at last to run like a kid down bolyston street during that victory parade last october!

some more halloween



more halloween pics

halloween in cabarete!






so they do celebrate halloween outside the US! we only found out over the weekend that a woman we know here, michelle, was throwing a halloween party at her house. so we had to scramble to come up with costumes. there is afterall no salvation army or costume shop here. what we brought with us here to the island certainly did not give us much to work. we pulled something off though. veronica was "on safari" and i was an injured marathon runner.

the party moved from michelle's house to lax, everyone's favorite bar on the beach, where there were a lot of people in costume. i was surprised by how good some of the costumes were. i kept thinking "wow, you brought THAT in one of your 2 allowed suitcases on your flight here!"

wondering how tunnelbanna was? waiting to see some pics. sheila, rich, and corinne (and eve) sent us photos of themselves last night prior to going to the party. sheila, great idea on the hargo gates! r+v+e - very cool that you dressed eve up too!

susie