Always specify “good water” from “Water you buy from the store”

Why should you do this? Well. Let me explain. Through out the week, The local brothers and sisters are extremely hospitable. “please, come and eat with us, we’ll cook you rice and beans, and we’ll chop up a chicken (they’ referring to a live chicken mind you)..You need to eat more Eric…your to skinny, 10 more pounds you need! Ect.ect. Anyways, the ones that we eat most with generally understand, that as extranjeros, we have strict dietary restrictions of purified water only. This means NO rain water for drinking. So the terminology that we’ve come to understand, is agua bueno(good water for the language impaired) for the purified drinking water. This was not the case with today. They finally had me over (scheduling has been tricky this month). Rice, beans, Lettuce and fish! I think it was mackerel. As is the custom, no water till you finish a soiled plate of rice and all the fixings. The amount of rice the give you is incredible, you eat and eat and eat, yet you still have a full plate of rice in front you that just how high they pile it! The domicans often go through two of such plates, but to me, every meal with a Dominican feels like I’ve been unwilling entered a twisted competition eating contest where if I lose, I feel very guilty for not finishing…anyways. So The brother asks me. “¿Quiera agua?”,
Sí. Claro, but is the water, good water? For as you know, as foreigner I have to be careful.”
“Oh of course its good water.”
“Great!” I’m parched!”
“ooh. It has a bit of a citrus flavor to it…”
“that’s the lime we put in, do you like it?
“oh yeah its tasty”
Yeah, its good to for your health, it kills all the things in the water”
“really.”
“yeah, see the water comes down over there, from the roof, through the gutter, and into that rusty barrel over there….and even though its clean and fresh water, we put the lime in just in case. “

“oh.”



Needless to say I entered the realm of the semisolids today. We’ll keep an eye on that.


LESSON. Always double check using the most descriptive language possible. Or better yet, stop at a colmado and pick up some soda and bring that. Not only is it a welcomed treat for your hosts, you never have to wonder if your digestive tract will Commence rebellion against you and careless ingestion tactics.






As a matter of weather is concerned, The past week or two have been just great. Not too much rain at all, and the heat has been more or less tolerable. Early fall weather in Nuevo Ingleterra. This has been very helpful with all the roads and trails we end up traveling in a day. But, all good things must come to an end, and yesterdays service was a wet one.
As it often does it rained early in the morning and stopped, right at sunup. So I figured it would be dry.. nope! As soon as we headed out of the hall on our walk to the territory it started coming down hard. Fortunately, umbrellas a customary thing here, if for nothing else it offers protection from the sun(Interestingly the word the use here is not the one I learned for umbrella, the word used here is “sombra”, which translates to shade) any ways, two people to a sombra and off we went. One Picture I do wish I had managed to capture was off two of the older sisters who I suppose didn’t want to have their hair get wet, so the managed to get hold of small plastic bags(the mini trash bags they use at the colmados for groceries) and carefully placed them of their hair. It actually looked ok, but on the way back that morning I felt somewhat relieved that the others In the group got a kick out of it too. But I suppose a garbage bag over the head isn’t the oddest thing I’ve seen here.
One time, one of the studies (who lives on the other side of the river mind you) came with hair not done. Now I will be the first to tell you that I am probably the last person to notice if a women’s hair was not done. I just assume it was the style they were going for yeah know? But this sister’s state of hair readiness was readily apparent even to me. This is because here head was completely done up with curlers. Not just a little bit. She has big hair, which requires that many more. And They where the BIG curlers too! Just struts right in, not a worry on her face. I don’t understand this mindset at all, I would figure that instead of getting my hair just the way I wanted it, I would settle with something that was complete, but then again, my hair takes a whole 30 seconds to prepare, so who am I to say anything, but still. But, Just think for a moment, this women with a head full curlers, has no problem walking 30-35 minutes on the well travelled road to get where she’s going. Wow. That’s some guts in my book. Granted many a Dominican woman does this to, at least the meander around town in curlers. Cherry says that if they are going out that night, or even just going to the city..Its a big deal, so they do there hair. And walk around in the streets to socialize, looking silly the whole time. ¿Ironic no? Its a foreign concept to me, and I’ll prolly never understand.


Pushup Count: 2945/200000