I've got a Mule to catch!

It has been a long time since I wrote any blog, so first I’d like to start with a quick overview of the last couple months and what is to come:

Lots of dirty work clothes
Really sweaty – there definitely IS a summer here
Delicious water by the pipefull
Swim in a river…
Jump in a boat – it’s our birthday – the 4rth
Puppies?¡¡¡¡!!!!?¿¡¡#¡
Huge party – dead cow, Inauguration (Am I president?)
Grab a mule and ride up the mountain – more work and more fun to come.

If you understood some of that or if you need to go to the bathroom, stop reading, because I’m about to rant and ramble on about the same things much less concisely, and it is past my bedtime -- this only makes for worse writing.

As work on the water system came closer and closer to an end, I only became busier despite promising any number of friends, coworkers, family, institutions, and other very important gente that I was just about to become much less busy. Just about every time I went to the hardware store, I see Dominican plumbers (their tight, rhinestone pants still somehow sagging down in the back) making purchases for jobs they are working on. They usually were buying five or six pieces and fittings for a single job. Meanwhile I was loading greasy galvanized iron parts to install water taps in 70 homes into my basket. To actually install all of the taps I had lots of wonderful and talented helpers, but I was still responsible for purchasing everything and making sure that everything necessary was available each morning. It was fun, but it’s sort of scary when the girls at the check out of both major hardware stores (think Home Depot and Lowe’s) in a city of thousands of people know your name and look up your account as you walk up (Is it Brayan, Bryan, Rian, oohhh, it’s Ryan – always forget). Anyways, during May, June, and July that is what we have been up to – installing indoor or outdoor taps in every home in the project as well as the school, clinic, and government office. We also have had to make lots of simple but time consuming repairs over the last month, as all of the problems with the pipeline (mostly manufacturing defects in the PVC pipes) surface quickly once the water system is operating at full pressure (in some cases 70 meters of head). It is all worthwhile though, as I now have a beautiful red handled faucet perched over my kitchen sink that can gush clean, potable water in quantities that a fireman would envy. I like to open the valve and just let the water flow for a few seconds and smile.

All of this work happened during what has to be one of the hottest two summers recorded in the Dominican Republic since I got here. For a few weeks in June I woke up feeling hungover every morning. This made me pretty mad because I wasn’t even drinking. Then I noticed my pee seemed to have the consistency and color of melted butter and decided I was probably dehydrated. Things have been better since then since melted butter is selling for a high price and I have been drinking a lot more water – especially from that cool tap in my kitchen sink. Anyways, at home I don’t think I ever would have had the experience of sweating through my pants and then them getting covered in dirt (becoming mud on contact). Dad, it’s really good that you got those extra Carhart`s for me, as I cycled through a lot of smelly clothing.

Enough about laundry, a good while ago the Water Committee of Middle Big River, as I refer to my peoples, scheduled an Inauguración. They wanted to have it on July 3rd, but I told them that July 4rth was mother’s day in my country (cultural exchange is important in Peace Corps) and I wanted to be with german surfers and be harassed by Haitian prostitutes on that special day. So we set the Inauguración for a week later – July 9th. This gave us some more much needed time for planning the big event and getting all that water to go where it needed to. It also gave me time for the following two adventures:

A1 – Another volunteer desperately needed emergency help to pour a ferrocement floor in one half of someone’s house in her community. I was up for the challenge. I braved the risk of perishing on the Dominican Dia del Corpo (it’s a Thursday in June, religious holiday – can someone explain?). I was at risk of dying on this day, because no one works on this day, it is prohibited, unless of course your job involves selling rum, selling rice, working at a mall or restaurant in the city, selling lottery numbers, or running a reliable transportation business. My bad luck was that I needed to use some public transportation that was known for not being reliable – and, my cell phone had stopped working a few days prior. I set out for Magee’s site in the province of Moca that Thursday morning with a borrowed cellphone from a neighbor, the knowledge that she probably lived in a small village to the North of the town of Moca, and the hope that we would get in contact before I got stranded somewhere. The plan worked perfectly. We made cell phone contact, I needed to get to Los Bueyes (the oxen).. Only catch was that there would be no more buses to Los Bueyes that day, even though everyone was going there to swim in the river for the holiday. Once I got to Moca on a little bus that moved way slower than necessary, I debated with moto-taxi guys how to get to Los bueyes. Their only solution of course was that I overpay them a ton to get to Villa Trina on a motorcycle before paying a ton more to take another moto to Los Bueyes. PC Volunteers keep each other informed, and I knew this wasn’t the best option. I needed a public car to Villa Trina or an attractive woman to pass the time with while waiting for a better option. I GOT BOTH! A college girl asked if I was going to Villa Trina and then said to just wait a minute as a car was coming along. She was going there too of course. Once the car arrived we got in and chatted while waiting for four more passengers to fill the Toyota Corolla. My new friend was going to her aunt’s house in Villa Trina and of course I could come over and hang out if I wasn’t in a hurry. She also wanted some help studying English. We studied English in the car on the way up the mountain squished in the backseat with two Doña’s and their grandkid on the way to a funeral (this is status quo). When we arrived at the girl’s house, the driver got out to open the door and calmly stated that we had a flat tire. I thought, this is destiny o somepin’, and got out as well. Figuring we’d be a while, I sat on the porch with Adeline and her aunt and chatted. Probably was about to get offered some lemonade, when I realized that the taxi driver was already finishing changing the tire. Dominicans are way more efficient and calm about changing tires than American as they have to do it all the time. Still, I think he could have been more considerate of me and taken longer. I got back in the car grudgingly but at least with a phone number and stretched legs.

In Villa Trina I quickly found a motorcycle willing to take me to Los Bueyes for $300 pesos. A 12 dollar moto ride is really expensive and a good indication that I was in for a long trip. It was. Also a really great abdominal work out trying to hold on to the motorcycle with a backpack on for an hour over a cobblestone, dirt, and rock road. It was a pretty ride, but I was happy when it ended. Maggee’s house was perched on a mountain ridge in the middle of nowhere, so I sensed it would be a relaxing place to spend a couple of days. That night we went to a community meeting about a water system construction project. It was a very heated debate, but was quite fun for me as I just gave my much appreciated expert opinion at some point and just sat and smiled inside, knowing that my community already had all of this struggle behind them. The next morning was the real treat though, I got to pour a very flat slab of cement-sand mortar over squares of chickenwire in a house. I was just there helping and being helped by a friendly Dominican mason and a couple Haitian guys who were quiet and didn’t complain. It was work, but methodical and relaxing – like vacuuming or washing dishes. You don’t get respect for vacuuming though.

Eventually Magee’s boyfriend, José, showed up. This was great, because he is not only an American PCV but also a Mexican, so we immediately made plans to drink a couple beers after work and then make pizza and drink wine for dinner. It was great, almost as great as concrete floors. The next morning I knew why masons are always so cranky as I could feel every muscle in my lower back. Nonetheless, José and I decided that I should go see one of the rivers before leaving. It was a long hike down the mountain but well worth it, as the blue water gushing over waterfalls and pools could not be described with words or pictures (so I use neither). It was beautiful and refreshing and I’m going back some day – enough said. After lunch I was lucky to hitch a ride back up to Villa Trina with a truck driver. As I wasn’t in any hurry, I figured I might as well call my new friend in Villa Trina before getting all the way there. After she remembered who I was, we agreed to meet in the park (I could find the park, right?). We got some coca cola and went over to her house. Was I hungry? I said I had already had lunch? Apparently this meant I wanted more. I wasn’t hungry, but the second lunch was delicious and it would have been really stupid to refuse. We sat around talking, this girl, her mom, and other random relatives or friends in their living room for at least three hours until we reluctantly both decided we had places to go. I headed back to Santiago with an invitation to get together the next time I was in Moca. This is a great idea, except that Moca isn’t on the way to anywhere besides cement floors in Los Bueyes. Also, still really don’t like the stupid ride between Santiago and Moca – short but painful. I’ll probably go back.
When I got back to Santiago (Saturday evening) I called up a friend for a place to stay and went to Burger King for free WiFi while waiting for him to finish grocery shopping. It’s really hard to explain, but it is really funny to sit in Burger King and watch really rich Dominicans park their SUVs and parade their kids in (90% of rich Dominican boys have a bowl-cut hair doo) to the VIP event area of Burger King for their birthday party. The menu includes extremely overpriced kids meals and…. A male clown in a orange hunting cap singing that song that Shakira made for the South Africa World Cup. I was speechless. The weekend still had more adventure in it, but I’ll skip that and move on to Chapter A2 – that is, Adventure #2.

A2 – 4rth of July, Mother’s Day, you know. Only a week after A1, I was a bit strapped for cash and really not up for the long travel to the beautiful Samaná Peninsula that so many volunteers were going to for the 4rth. There was just way too much stress in that last week and a half before the Inauguracion and I needed some real relaxation, not a long bus ride and a hundred drunk gringos. So, I got up at five thirty AM on the 4rth and hitched a ride with my host dad on his truck out to the main highway early in the morning. I smiled to see that besides bananas and washed clothing, he was also bringing 5 gallon bottles of water from our water system to family members living in the big city of Santiago (if only they had it so good as we do – water that is better than bottled and tastes like juice). Enough of that though, I was headed to Cabarete to meet up with just a few drunk gringos. Cabarete is only an hour and a half from where I live and is one of the most well known windsurfing beach towns in the world. I had never actually stopped there – so touristy! It was a good choice. Once I found my friends, we started our American holiday by going to a French Canadian run restaurant to eat some breakfast burritos. Well, that was after sardines and cinnamon rolls, mmmm. The big goals for the day were to drink, sit on the beach, and rent a sailboat. We began with the French Canadian bloody marys – avoid these. Arriving at the beach, things improved with a case of warm Brahma light beer. This is the absolute worst beer you could drink in a country with bad beer in general, but the quantity and price made up for that.
The beer was so warm we had to drink it fairly quick. After we’d finished enough to lighten the load we moved down the beach and convinced the renter of the hobie-cat that despite all the empty bottles, we were still sober enough to sail. I was designated captain. We did a great job, especially since it was the first time I had actually ever captained a boat while relatively drunk. I’m glad it wasn’t my boat! We wreaked havoc on novice windsurfer traffic as we cruised about sipping whiskey in good Canadian pirate fashion. The owner even let us go for an extra half an hour for free, so I must not have scared him much.

I arranged a good price for renting a windsurfer from a nice European lady in some future visit to Cabarete and then we headed back up the beach for lunch. We went to lunch at a place called Mojitos. The owner is Italian. She brought us some really great food, and the Mojitos were 2 for 1. Needed to take advantage of the deal we enjoyed the mojitos a lot. Verifying the bill, she said ‘Dieciseis Mojitos’ . We all said ‘ 16 Mojitos’, Ohhh. Of course, we Did drink 16 mojitos! Three for each of us plus one to share. Excellent. The evening continued with pizza, goofy clubs on the beach, and a drink special that we somehow managed to turn into a round of red, white, and blue shots.
Tuesday morning I woke up a bit later and pretty crummy feeling but headed right out back to Rio Grande for one last crazy week of work. I will warn you, public transportation in a tropical climate with a hangover is not fun at all, but might be worth it.


About the dog: My dog, a purebred Viralata named Loki or Loquita became romantic a month or so ago. If you ever get a dog in Latin America, avoid the females unless you like to suffer. For a couple weeks every male dog around was all about following Loki, or in some cases, me around. The corner of my porch became the preferred place to lift the leg. Although I have given Loki, well, birth control shots, these don’t prevent her from going into heat but hopefully prevent pregnancy. Anyways, while in heat she pretty much tore any dog’s head off that was sniffing around until she eventually found one she liked. The Dominican men said it only figured that she ignored her best friend, a small, brown playful dog completely, and decided to mate with a bigger, white dog (the only white one around) that had never been nice to her. Apparently this reminded them of what women do, however, I mentioned that male dogs are probably more easily compared to how Dominican men act regarding relationships. So… apparently some bigger dogs were about to kill the white one one day when Loki strayed from home. A neighbor saved him, but weeks later he still has a leg that appears to be broken or badly infected. The price of Love, I guess. Over the last couple weeks, neighbors, volunteers, and I have debated whether or not Loki is pregnant. I hope I don’t have to deal with puppies, but lately I have been content that there are no longer dogs whining at me and peeing on my house.

Back to the main story – the dog thing has been an issue in the background for a while now. The inauguration was scheduled for the Saturday after the 4rth of July. This is the really big, expensive ceremony where the community goes all out to celebrate the completion and good function of their new gravity fed water system. A month before, invitations had been sent out across the country to volunteers, other communities, project funders, government leaders, and community groups. Early in the week, we finished preparing award certificates for community members that were particularly helpful during the project. Only a few days before the event, a cow was finally located. Canela (cinnamon), as I heard her referred to cost $15,000 pesos and was estimated to have 300+ pounds of meat. I mostly spent that last week running around the community with plumbers finishing everything we could on the water system. On Friday, the community slaughtered and butchered the cow, cleaned two hundred pound sacks of rice, and boiled hundreds of pounds of potatoes, carrots, and beets for salad. I had been so busy all week that I ended up making notes for my speech the next day on an ATM receipt while waiting for a haircut.

When Saturday morning came, I had no idea if things would turn out well, but I was already happy and calm, knowing this was all coming to an end one way or another. After cleaning my house with the help of some wonderful neighbors and taking my usual bath in the stream, I put on my new clothes and headed down the hill to the party.

I spent the morning chatting with all kinds of people I had met from different rural communities but who I didn’t remember that well. I thought I would have had more time to elaborate my speech which was still written on that ATM slip; I didn’t. We started late, in usual form around 11:30, and things went pretty well. They should have spent more time preparing the program and speakers, but really, people are there to clap, then eat a bunch, and then dance. We had speeches by the water committee, peace corps director, me, the mayor, and Banco ADEMI – a Dominican project contributor.

We thanked the Dominican supporters of the project (local government, Banco Ademi, cooperativa de rio grande, and of course the community itself)

Community members also thanked support from the US including friends and family (of Ryan) who donated to the PCPP grant and the Club Rotario de Ludington, Michigan. (Thanks a lot!)


Then I helped give out awards – which were great except that the guy who made them for us made a couple of duplicates and forgot other people to be recognized. Fixing this is still causing a bit of stress. Over all though, it went well, and I think people liked my speech because it was fairly funny and I wasn’t nervous about speaking, since I knew everyone was pretty happy with me that day. The mayor said they would make a monument to my work if it were possible. I thought this ridiculous, but it was the general tone of the event. After eating and greeting a bunch more people, the fun party started as four consecutive merengue and bachata bands played and the bar sold ridiculous amounts of beer and rum. The high point for the Americans was probably when I brought out a cold six pack of microbrews from home to share amongst about twenty people. Despite the ridiculous heat and humidity I did manage to dance to five or six songs which is pretty good for an afternoon. Dominicans and Americans alike agreed that it was a successful event.

The fun continued in the morning with a pancake and hot chocolate breakfast for visiting volunteers. Sunday afternoon when everyone started leaving my house I couldn’t have been much happier with how things had gone over the weekend and couldn’t remember the last Sunday I had actually been so relaxed.

Work with the water committee and water system will continue until I leave (when?). Being around after initial completion of construction is considered to be pretty helpful for the sustainability of a water system and its committee. For instance, today we went around informing project members who are not up to date with monthly payments that the next visit will be to lock their taps if not paid. In a culture very much founded in giving to your neighbors (and lack of accountability) it is not easy to begin to turn off friends and relatives’ water service – they need a cold hearted American who everyone loves anyways to help them get used to being a little mean when necessary.

Tomorrow (Saturday) I am traveling through the mountains on mule with a group of friends from my community to attend another water project inauguration in La Descubierta on top of the mountains and overlooking the Caribbean Sea. I’m excited to go to another inauguration at which I will have no responsibility. The mule trip should be entertaining too and it is a bit cooler up there than where I live.

From here on out I am also digging into research for the completion of my master’s degree at Michigan Tech. As I do so, I’ll also be helping out a bunch of other volunteers with projects, visiting different parts of the country, and trying to catch some good concerts and beaches while here.


I hope you all are having a fine summer – Cojelo suave! (take it easy)

Ryan