Thursday, December 27, 2007

La Noche Buena

The next day, Christmas Eve, is the big celebration day, not Christmas day. At about 10 am my project partner came to get me so that I could eat some of the pork that they had roasted the day before. So I get a big hunk of pork on a plate that he basically just tore right off the pig. They serve it with pan de casabe, which is sort of like a cracker/wafer, similar to Wasa Crackers, if you know what those are. Oh yeah, and no utensils. So I stuffed my face until I was ready to explode. After that is when I began drinking, switching off between rum and scotch, because that’s how they do things here. At about 12 came lunch when I had to eat more, even though I was full.

Then at about 2:30 I had to go home because the pork that my family cooked was ready, yeah more eating. After that I had to take a nap so I slept til about 5. I woke up, showered, drank some more and at 7 was dinner with the whole family. It consisted of pork, a potato salad type dish, salad, rice/beans, pan de casabe, apples and grapes and probably other stuff which I’m forgetting. I swear I was about ready to vomit all over the table from all that food.

At 8:30 we left, I thought to go to a party, but no, it was to a family friend’s house to eat yet another dinner. When we got there I saw that the table was all set and I thought it was some sort of joke, but it wasn’t. I barely ate a thing or I definitely would have vomited all over the place. They seemed kind of upset with me since I wasn’t eating and I got some dirty looks…but that’s how they roll here.

After that we went to drink some more, at first outside under some tents, and at about 12am we went back to the friend’s house where we partied it up til 3:30 or so. Before we left we all got served more food, which at that point I was hungry again because it had been about 6 hours or so, and I was used to eating ever other hour. No wonder they call the night before Christmas, “La Noche Buena,” or the good night, because it was very good.

The next morning I woke up around 10:30 or so, ate breakfast and went to a cockfight with my host dad. After watching the pig get slaughtered, this didn’t even phase me. I have a video of it and I’m trying to figure out how to upload it, as it is too big to upload to the blog.

Pig Slaughter and Roast

On Sunday, two days prior to Christmas was the day for slaughtering pigs. All throughout the day cries of pigs dying could be heard. I witnessed one pig being put to death, the one that I would be eating the following day. It is very graphic and I don't wish to watch another one die. They take a large knife and stab it and wait for it to bleed to death. After that they put it on a slab where they pour boiling water on it to loosen the hairs so that it is easier to remove the hair. Well, the one I watched hadn't yet died before they began to pour water on it. It was not very pleasurable to watch this occur.

Later that same day I got to try mondongo, which is the intestines of the pig. Needless to say, I did not like it, as they do taste like there had been poo in them a few hours earlier. Unfortunately, it was the first time I had to tell my Dona that I didn't like something.

Even later that same day they began the pig roast, which is a tradition for them every year. Nine pigs were lined up in a row all on their sticks, roasting from about 7 pm til about 4 or 5 am the next morning. This was all taking place about 20 feet outside my bedroom door, so now everything in my room smells like smoke, but it was definitely worth it to see that many pigs roasting at one time...definitely not like Christmas back in the states.

Below are 2 videos of the pigs being slaughtered, if you have a week stomach please do not press play as you will probably vomit. They are very graphic. Enjoy...there are also some still photos that I uploaded to my photos.






Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Tropical Storm Olga

So it's been 3 months and I'm already on my second tropical storm. Not too good of odds so far. Peace Corps consolidated us, so right now all the volunteers in my region are staying at a nice hotel in Santiago, complete with hot showers, air conditioning, wireless internet and cable TV with English channels. There is even WGN news from Chicago!

This region of the DR got hit pretty bad by the storm. The big problem was that last night during the night, the government opened the floodgates to prevent a dam from overtopping, and they did not give any warning to the people in the area, so 7 people died that should not have, had there been a warning. They said about 5,000 cubic meters per second was flowing from the floodgates...that's a lot of water.

Not much to report on otherwise. Things are going well at my site and I'll probably be going back tomorrow after we get the go ahead from PC.

Vaya con Dios! (Everyone here says that when you're leaving, it means, "Go with God."

Saturday, December 1, 2007

One Week Down...and Plenty More To Go

So I´ve been at my site for a week and things could not be going any better. Life is pretty boring for the time being. Here´s what my typical day looks like:

9am - Wake Up, Eat Breakfast (some sort of bread and milk drink), Bucket Bathe

10 or 10:30 - Read or go visit people and talk until lunchtime

12pm - Lunch (usually rice, beans, meat and some sort of salad)

1pm - More reading or going to talk to people until dinner time

6 or 7 - Dinnertime - Usually plantains or yucca, some fried salami

Then I either play cards or watch TV until about 10 or 11 and then go to bed.

Some interesting stuff that has happened in the past week:

I witnessed a motorcycle crash last night in front of my house. Everyone was ok. The passenger probably slid 10 or 15 feet from where it crashed. After everyone knew the people were ok they were basically just laughing about it. Interesting.

I went to a double header baseball game in the town of Altamira. If any of you are into baseball, Bartolo Colon is from the town of Altamira here and he built a huge stadium, bigger than necessary for the town. Anyways, both of my host brothers are on a team and they had a double header. For as much as I think baseball is boring I still had a great time and am actually going to another double header tomorrow.

I went to Puerto Plata yesterday. There are some Riu resorts there, which I know they are a pretty reputable chain of resorts. So if you want to live it up tourist style you can go there and you are only about 40 minutes away from me.

Tonight there is some big party in my town as a benefit for the old people. It starts at 8 and then goes til the wee hours of the morning.

I still haven´t taken any pictures, but when I do I promise I´ll post them.

Thanksgiving was glorious. Tons of foods and dessert. Three magnificent hot showers...it practically burned my skin off.

Ok...this internet is really slow and I don´t feel like typing anymore. I´m going to try to get into Santiago in the coming weeks and the internet is supposed to be faster, so I´ll be able to upload pictures and what not.