6-1-10 21:50

Please excuse me if this sounds like a long rant, it certainly is. I have been reading a lot of David Sedaris as you can see in my new Blog sidebar "Books I've Read Since I've Been in the DR…" and I find him so hilarious and utterly truthful that I am inspired to write a blog post in his style. I don't think I will do it justice but at least I could drop his name in my blog and encourage you to read one of his books. My fav so far is "When You Are Engulfed In Flames." Do it!

So far my stay in the Dr has been bittersweet. I've been here a total of 3 months and it kind of feels like 1 year already. There are definitely some days where I am better off than others and I can definitely say that my patience gets tested everyday and I may have failed a couple of times but then something brings me back to why I'm here and I see all the positive things about the DR and I feel blessed. 

For instance, things that are annoying me now are all the mosquitos and flies and strange enormous bugs that haunt me everyday. But then I think about all the time I share with my siblings killing and chasing after the bugs. Here's a better one. My doña seriously bugs me by the amount of times she says my name everyday. I think one day I should just count it. I bet I would get around 400-500 times. I don't even know why she says it so much, we will be the only two people in the room and I am staring straight at her and she will still say "Ay Sabrina look at all the flies, Sabrina." It's like why do you have to say my name? Maybe she likes it or maybe I am starting to develop this abnormal tick about very miniscule things but sometimes I wish my name was harder to pronounce so she couldn't pronounce it correctly and never say my name. So part from the annoying unnecessary name calling my doña is absolutely sweet. She cooks everything so delicious and her beans are amazing! Haha, I think they're better than my pops at home and thats saying a lot. So you see, there are good things and bad things everyday and I am working on all the bad things that I can control (I got a fly swatter and bug spray for the things I can't). A big bummer is the lack of lug my town gets, its absolutely ridiculous. The electricity goes out everyday randomly and lasts for hours at a time. The other day it was gone pretty much the entire day until it came around 11pm when I was already in bed. But the upside is that I have plenty of water. I can shower whenever I need to and wash my clothes when I deem it necessary which is a huge blessing when compared to having electricity. I would much rather be clean and bored than sweaty with the lights on. Candles and flashlights are treating me well.

I started working last week as well, I passed out about 100 surveys at the high school (50 in the morning school and 50 in the afternoon school) and the results are as follows:

Morning Session: Crazy About ICT

Has basic knowledge of Windows and the Internet

Want to learn more about Microsoft Office and advanced programs like Photoshop and Dreamweaver 

Want to start youth groups about ICT and Business

Afternoon Session: Crazy About Everything BUT ICT

Also has basic knowledge of Windows and the Internet

Want to learn more about the Internet and Office

Want to start youth groups about Sexual Education

Interesting… Doubt this is interesting for you all but right now this is my life...

What I found from both groups is that they want to start a youth group on how to start your own business and they also both want to learn how to swim. So I am hoping to start developing curriculum to start doing both soon.

One thing that I haven't gotten used to is the money system here in the DR. So for every American dollar you get around 35-37 pesos depending on the currency rate of the day. So for things like guagua rides from one place to another for 20 pesos, you are basically spending $0.55. Ok good deal, right sweet. Then there's deals where things like peanut butter are $100 pesos. Then I think whoa, 100, that should mean a lot but it basically is around $2.75. So then again I am like okay thats not so bad. But the there is a huge jump for things and stuff like tops and clothes are around 500-700 pesos. I think hmmm just 5 x 100 peso bills shouldn't be so much and it turns out to be around $13-20. And it's like whoa $20 bucks what happened? From 500 to 700 pesos theres a huge leap of 7 dollars. It's making me so confused I just can't find the true value of things over here anymore. Should I buy this apple for 30 pesos or should I hop on the next guagua ride to see a cool part of the city? Should I buy this shirt for $1,000 or should I save it to pay for a weeks stay at the local hostel in the city? Money seriously doesn't last here.  

P.S. So I recently just saw this commercial here about some pads for women's menstruation cycles and it was amazing. It's called "Nosotros Dobles" and it's a pad that has two pads in one. You just peel off the top layer and voila you have a new can pad. I was very glad I don't use pads and also very amazed at the marketing genius that came up with this one. WTF.