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After 27 months in the Peace Corps in the Dominican Republic, my service finally came to an end on November 20th, 2009. It was by far the most incredible experience of my life. Getting to know another culture on such an intimate level has helped me realize so much more about my life, and about life in general.

Sorry for not updating more often, but after a year or so in country, many things just didn't seem blogworthy anymore.

One thing that I don't know how I forgot to post about, but just realized now, was the inauguration of the rural community water supply system. We inaugurated on July 11th, 2009. The aqueduct serves 60 families who now have potable, running water in their homes. In total, the system cost $15,000 US. You can check out some pictures at picasaweb.google.com/kebmodee

Thanks to my family and friends for supporting me throughout this adventure. I could not have done it without you.

To follow me during my current trip in South America I have started a new blog:

Kevin's South American Adventures

I'll update as often as I can.

Peace.

The Ants Go Marching One by One

Disclaimer: Lisa, do not read this until after your visit.

I don’t know what it is lately, but the ants around here have been completely out of control.

One day, I went to put on my pants, which were hanging on a hook on the wall (and by hook I mean a nail), and they were completely covered in ants. Luckily, I had another clean pair to wear, so I just had to shake the ants out of the dirty ones and give them to Doña to make sure any remaining ants would be dead before I wore them again. Needless to say, I didn’t want ants in my pants.

If there’s one thing I hate more than ants in my pants, it’s when ants (and other creepy crawlers) go to the one place where they know they should not. You may have already guessed where this place is, since it’s the only place that is covered with a protective barrier, warning impending doom to whatever passes through. So yes, ants were in my bed. Now these weren’t just any ants, but ants that bite. Their sting isn’t too bad, a little worse than mosquitoes, but not as long lasting. I would have preferred that a big spider were in my bed rather than ants because spiders are more easily removed. Also, there is no other choice but to kill the ants.

This all occurred when I went down to my room to go to bed. I walked in to my room, and noticed a large, brown, moving mass on my mosquito net. I walked over and saw a ton of ants not only on the mosquito net, but also on the sheets, traipsing along as if it were their territory that I was trespassing on. It seems as though ants are just the right size to fit through the holes in the netting. I would have taken a picture, but this was a serious situation that required immediate attention. There was no time to fiddle around with a camera.

To begin the removal, I needed to think of a way that wouldn’t involve killing the ants one by one with the tip of my finger. Immediately I thought of mosquito repellant. I figured that if mosquito repellant repels mosquitoes, it might also deter ants. At once, I began spraying the ants. They slowed down but they didn’t seem as bothered by the repellant as mosquitoes. Time to think of a new solution.

I had seen a friend do this before, not to kill ants though. This solution would also require mosquito repellant, in addition to a flame. It just so happens that mosquito repellant is highly flammable. These ants had no idea what they were in for by invading my sleeping quarters.

It just so happened that the ants were entering my mosquito net and bed through a light fixture that is closely placed to my bed. There is a small gap between the ceiling and the fixture through which they were passing. I had to deal with this area first, to reduce the amount of ants that were coming in. While using my makeshift torch on this light fixture, I had to be careful not to come to close to the netting, as it is very flammable. In sequence, I would do a torching, then a sweeping. In this process, some of the ants would just be knocked out for a little bit, and in the sweeping stage I would be bitten. After getting rid of the ants on the light fixture, I covered the gap with duct tape (use number 142 I have found for duct tape here). Ant problem solved.

However, there were still some ants on the mosquito net and bed. Not as many as before, but still plenty. This would require the one by one smashing with my finger. After the situation was all clear, I went to sleep, only being bitten by 4 or 5 rogue ants throughout the night.

So even though most of you guys think I’m living the life here, I still have to deal with some pretty nasty shit.

Pictures from the Race

This was before the race:

And significantly sweatier/dirtier after:

I even got a medal!

10K

Yesterday I did a 10k, without having practiced or anything. I cannot use the verb "run," because there was little of that going on. Just to prove to everyone that I actually did it, here is the results page:

http://www.allsportcentral.com/results/results.cfm?EventID=21821

If you scroll down way to the bottom, I'm number 1546...yay!!!

Also, I'll be back in Chicago for 3 weeks on June 3rd...only 16 days left!

A Whirlwind Week

This past week has been quite an experience. It was jam-packed, and one of the best weeks I've had in a really long time.

It all started with Semana Santa, or Holy Week. I ate at least a gallon of habichuelas con dulce. Unfortunately I had to leave my community during the heart of the celebrations, in order to help my friend with a Builders Beyond Borders group who was coming to his site to work. On the bright side, my Dona filled my nalgene up with habichuelas so I got a bunch to go. I stayed at my friend's site helping out from Friday till Monday and we had a lot of fun.

On Monday morning my friend and I got a bola down to my site. I had to change out some things from my backpack in order to prepare for a water conference in the capital. After spending about 1 hour unpacking and packing (and another glass of habichuelas), I was off to the capital.

When I got to the capital we finished editing our presentation that we would be giving the following day. The conference was headed by an NGO called Water for People. They are looking to start work in this country, and they wanted to have a little conference with all the other organizations that work in similar fields in order to get an idea of work that is going on this country. The best thing about this conference: we got a free, 2-night stay at the Hilton. We checked in at about 4, and already took advantage of the pool and hot showers by like 5. Oh yeah, and it wasn't some room on a lower level looking over the parking lot, it was on the 11th floor overlooking the ocean. The room itself was pretty small, but they were some of the nicest accomodations I have ever been in. The evening we checked in there was a meet and greet with all the people who would be attending. Cocktails and appetizers were served. And not just any appetizers...there were fried coconut shrimp, caviar, shishkebobs, and lots of other great things.

The next day was spent listening to presentations by other organizations, talking about their work being done in this country. It was a great experience overall...especially the hot showers. And the group of us 4 Peace Corps Volunteers won US$2000 for our projects. Since two of us there had all our funding, the remaining two volunteers are going to split those funds.

Unfortunately, at 12 on Thursday our time at the Hilton had to come to an end. It was really sad to leave, but we definitely took advantage of everything it had to offer.

On Thursday, I was planning on going back to my community, but when I got to the office, they were taking down names for people who wanted to go to a meet and greet with Hillary Clinton at the United States Embassy. As I'm sure you guessed, I decided I would stay in the capital one more night. The Secretary of State kept us waiting for quite awhile, but it was worth the wait. I was probably about 15 feet away from her while she was giving her speech. She gave a little shout out to the Peace Corps, and then walked around and shook hands. And yes, I got to shake her hand and say nice to meet you. It was very surreal. I think that is the only famous person I have ever had an encounter with.

And as usual, all good things must come to an end. Today I'm heading back up to Santiago, where I will be for the weekend for a little get together with some friends I haven't seen in awhile.

As far as the project goes, we're just doing some final touches, and then we should be done. Projected inauguration date: May 23rd.

Peace and Hugs!

Aqueduct Udpate

It´s been about 2 months since I last posted an update...sorry about that. The reason is that we´ve been working really hard and we´re almost finished with everything. We did a test in one part of the community the other day and water is successfully arriving. Since we had to turn it off, so as not to be favoring one part of the community over the other, people were filling all their buckets and tanks in order to have water until the next time we could turn it on.

Within a few weeks we should be done, and we should be inaugurating in the middle of May. Everyone is welcome to come. There should be enough beds for everyone. I´ll give more information as it comes to me.

In the meantime, check out some of my construction pictures.

picasaweb.google.com/kebmodee

Inauguration

The presidential inauguration has brought me to Santiago once again. A group of about 20 volunteers came to watch it. I was debating whether or not to come because it is a work day, bit since tomorrow is a holiday, I decided I'd leave work early and let my community do their thing without me. Hopefully they don't screw things up.

Once again I'm going to keep things short because my computer is still being repaired and I'm writing this on my iPod touch. I hope everyone enjoyed and took to heart the inauguration speech.

Peace.