Week "You just have to tell it like it is"

I want to tell you about my weekend but I’m pretty sure you are going to think that I’m on vacation and not actually in the Peace Corps. I promise you that I’m also doing plenty of work. It is just not very interesting most of the time. One of my tasks was to get permission from the government to have a monument built for reunion. I have spent 5 weeks writing letters, calling to follow up on the letters, sending new letters, delivering letters and being told to call non-working extensions. I gave a status update at a meeting last week and it was decided that we will just build a monument without getting permission.

On Friday I went into town and stopped at a new restaurant with a group of other PCVs. I don’t cook meat here because it seems too hard (you have to clean the meat yourself) so I was thrilled to order a hamburger. The menu had both ham burgers and beef burgers. When I asked what the difference was the cashier told me the beef burger was “bare” so I ordered the ham burger assuming it had lettuce, tomato, onion, etc. on it. Imagine my surprise when the ham burger came and it was a normal hamburger with a piece of fried boloney on it.

Later that night I was working at the Reunion Fundraising Bar when a Dominican friend came to hang out. Our conversation veered into opinions about homosexuality (his argument involved nature and holes in our bodies). It progressed into a long discussion about biblical law, interracial marriage and the separation of church and state. One of his friends walked up to join us and my friend introduced this young man as his “bum partner” (which sounds more like “bum pardna” and means your closest friend). I laughed a little bit and asked him to repeat himself. Sure enough he repeated that this is one of his three “bum partners”. When people make homophobic comments from now on I’m going to remember that they probably have a couple “bum partners”.

Saturday night I went to a Calypso show with one of the other PCVs (Arianne) and her host family. The show was wonderful and I really enjoy her host family. Dominicans don’t seem to pee very often. I’ve never seen any of the teachers use the bathroom at school. People will spend all night at the Reunion bar (4+ hours) drinking and never go to the bathroom. It was no surprise that for the 400 people at the show there was one port-a-potty. What did surprise me was that when we walked up to use the port-a-potty there was a line- to pee outside the port-a-potty. I went into the port-a-potty and it was pristine but stepping into it was treacherous as upwards of 30 people had been using the port-a-potty as a blocker to use the bathroom.

The show was a competition in which the audience decides the winner. There were 10 performers and at the end they had us cheer to decide the winner. Two of the performers were clearly in the lead but as Arianne’s host sister told us, “you have to tell it like it is.” Eight performers were loudly booed and screamed “NOO” at. It was nothing like America where everyone would just receive various levels positive applause.

Sunday we went to the West Indies v. India cricket test match. I didn’t realize how much I’ve missed watching competitive sports. It was awesome. A test match lasts 5 full days. They start playing at 9:30 am, play until lunch time at 1:00 pm, pick up again at around 1:30 pm, play until tea time(!) at 3:30 pm and then play until the light gets bad. I can’t imagine standing in the sun for 5 days in a row. A lot of the players wear zinc all over their faces to protect them from the sun.

The game ended at around 5 pm because the captains decided that it would most likely end in a draw so they may as well just stop playing; “it’s a gentleman’s game.”