Yellow

We painted the outside of the house yellow! What vibrancy and life yellow brings. It’s perfect, because the sunflowers that I planted in the garden and along the driveway wall just started to bloom, and we realized that the flowers in front of the house that are budding are yellow, too. Plus, I’ve got a couple of other different kinds of yellow-and-orange-combo flowers in the garden, along with the orange oyama (squash) blossoms. We just picked our first huge oyama and boiled up a section of it for dinner! Yum. Yellow is a color of excitement and surprise, which life has been bringing lately in even the littlest of ways.

At the same time that things around house, home, and relationships are flourishing, at times I get a little down with how little I seem to have achieved working at the office of public health. I have to remember that while it all may look meager, I have to look at the big picture. I did encourage people in their personal walks of life and work, and I was most definitely challenged and stretched to work in a totally different environment than what you’d ever find in the US. What were my professional and educational goals, anyway, in being here? To put to use my social work skills and gain more experience in a health setting in order to figure out how I should focus my graduate studies. I ended up deciding to apply to public health school, and these experiences have confirmed that I would like to continue my social work studies with a focus on health. Now, I am very aware of how the health system works – or rather doesn’t work – here in the DR, and all the patience and determination that it takes to get even the littlest of things done. I have learned first hand how to work with HIV/AIDS patients, with those who are the poorest of the poor, and with those who have such a different lifestyle, upbringing and ideology than mine. I have to admit, I’d never worked with anybody before who thought tetanus was brought about through a curse of witchcraft, or with an adult who had never learned the alphabet.

Right now, everything around here is wrapped up in politics. It’s seems like more progress is made in painting the house than sitting in an office like a dodo. I feel like nothing is getting done as far as public health is concerned, because all funding is going to the presidential campaign and we have zilch resources to work with. It’s normal to have few resources in a government run office in a developing nation, but now it’s to the extreme. They’re even paying students to vote for the re-election of the PLD. Talk about abuse of funds.

One of the kittens is playing with my feet. All five of them romping around are such a little joy! They especially like to play with and sit in my shoes. Thank the Lord for such a fun little gift to perk up my spirits any time I’m feeling down.

Huelga!

I was so happy that today there was a nation-wide strike against the PLD! Not only because I don’t particularly like the government party currently in office (anybody hear the word corruption?), but especially because it meant “DAY OFF!” By the time I arrived at the English institute yesterday, the secretary still didn’t know if we’d be open during strike day or not. Sometimes there are bombs especially for those businesses who decide to stay open, people throwing nails in the street to pop tires so people can’t get to work, etc… so they tell me. Mao, thank goodness, has always remained a quiet little place in the political world. Yet, you never know how it’ll go and don’t necessarily want to chance it by sending your kids off to school that day. So, when my English kids asked if we’d be having class today, I figured heck, let’s all just enjoy a free day! Everyone was happy, as expected. It turned out that nobody had school and most didn’t have to work, so I went with Marxengels, his mom, brother and extended family to Rio Mao for a 7-hour picnic: complete with cooking rice, beans and chicken over an open fire! The river was gorgeous and clear, with a big enough current that you had to lodge your feet against rocks and lean your body so you wouldn’t be carried away. It was wonderful! I have never had to get out of a river before because the local herd of cows decided to trot on down and have a cool drink. Later, when it was sunset and time for all the cows to go from their grazing lands to their place of rest, I saw a shepherd carrying across a calf that had been born the day before!


It was funny but unfortunate that the truck had a flat on the way to the river. Funny, because it seems as though whenever there is a combination of me, the family, and the white pick-up, it always has issues. (Here's a picture of Jualmarxkh, Marxengel's brother, trying to fix the tire. We had to document this one!)

I really needed the day off, because the last week and a half was crazy busy. I have been running around so much inside and out that I’m literally the tannest and most freckled I’ve ever been in my life.

Last Sunday, a nurse I know through public health brought me to her home and showed me the tallest and thickest banana tree grove I’ve seen in my life growing in her back yard. The funny thing is that they bear baby bananas! (The kind you like, Dad!) She took me in a round-about tour to another piece of property her church gave her to farm, where corn, yucca, bananas, pineapples, chinola, fancy lettuce and random other varieties of fruits and vegetables are growing in and around the deserted concrete frame of a house that was never finished. She also took me to her church property, another small property of hers with an absolutely gorgeous view of the mountains, and some friends’ homes to check out more plants and meet some important people in her life.

During the week, I worked at full speed giving piano lessons and English classes, and being at the public health office and in the community each and every day. One of the highlights was finally getting the attention of someone (I was trying for 1 1/2 months!) to look further into the case of a 6-year-old girl who I met while making home visits on a public health mission at the end of February. When I first met this girl, she was preparing food for lunch and just about to fry plantains… while acting as the babysitter to three tiny children younger than she was! Obviously, this is a horribly unsafe situation, and I was so glad that I was finally able to contact the local child welfare department. It looks like before, I was trying to get the other child welfare organization to hear about this case, and they just didn’t care enough to tell me that they didn’t want to do anything about it, but rather completely avoid me, and pretend that they are just too busy trying to save all the kids in the world to call me back. Humph. Some kind of child welfare. Anyway, this particular day, the “good” child welfare department was horrified that the “bad” organization didn’t jump on the case and that it had been so long for help to arrive. They decided to go right away as they didn’t have anything more pressing at the moment. We walked out the door, took public transportation, and had a really good interview with the family who fortunately were all at home this time. It was lunchtime, when most people migrate home from work or school to share the main meal of the day. I was so happy and encouraged to work alongside two women who are good at what they do for a change. Thank goodness for people who actually care about the people they’re serving!

This past Sunday, SESPAS and some other pharmaceutical and medical Leonel fans put together a free clinic in a community building to make the PLD look real good. I went for the people, not the politics. Of course, it was rather unorganized and I’m glad that there wasn’t more of a turn-out, because we wouldn’t have been able to handle any more people. It was cute that some local military dudes participated by setting up in a corner, giving free haircuts to a bunch of little boys.

So, with a tan and a good, full week behind me, I was really glad to call off class and take complete advantage of this strike day. And how glad I was that I did!