Day 15

I am writing this on the next day, day 16. Today has started out poorly. I went to Cyril’s to connect to his network for 5 minutes to send some sketches out. When I put my arrow on the LINKSYS name and entered my password, and got a “you are not entered on this network” notification. I know that I have to be entered via Cyril, which he did when I first got the password from him. I’m not sure what has changed, but I’m panicking. I think that something has happened – I’ve been using the network too much, I pissed Cyril off in the soccer game Monday night, I have been fingered as unworthy of his generosity by some unknown Las Galeras entity – that has me kicked off the network. The truth is probably that his network had to be re-set, or something like that, and I have to go back and have my computer entered into his network again. In the meantime, I have to go to backups, which involve CDs and the verizon store, and doesn’t leave a lot of room for power outages, crowded computers at the verizon store, or general breakdowns in the system. Ugh.

Day 15, though, was full. I went with our friend Arturo and his friend who has a motocoacho to Santiago to pick up Selma, Amy’s mom. I was a little tentative – Arturo speaks little English, me little Spanish – but it was the best fit for all, as Amy was better suited to be here with the kids - they had their first day in the local Dominican school.

A note on Arturo – we met Arturo at the Club Bonita on our visit to Las Galeras last year. He worked in the restaurant with his wife, Anna Maria. We talked with him a lot – actually Amy talked with him, as he speaks little English – and we liked him. He was very friendly to the kids and very helpful for us around Las Galeras. After last year’s visit, Amy and I fantasized about starting Arturo up in business here, as we had talked with him about our desire for a local restaurant that serves Dominican meals and he spoke about his desire to own his own local restaurant. His wife, Anna Maria, is an excellent cook, and we thought the two of them would do well. They also impressed us as having every tool except startup cash. We wrote them from Maine a couple times, and when we got down here we looked them up. Since we were last here the Club Bonita closed, putting the majority of the staff out of work. We see many of them in various locations this year – hanging out at certain restaurants, working at others – and Arturo and Anna Maria are both unemployed. We have spoken to them much since we’ve been here. Maria has cooked us a meal. Arturo has brought over bananas and plaintains and, today, coconuts from his yard. Arturo has told us he’s applying for jobs at a couple of the local hotels, and we wrote a letter of recommendation for him.

On the way out things were fine – I felt a little bad for Arturo, as he was putting in a lot of energy trying to talk with me, and we did an English / Spanish wrestling of conversation, where one of us would throw out a mix of Spanish / English, and then we would both try to figure out what was said, and then we would both try to figure out a response, and then we would try to express the response, and then we would sit back, me wondering if we both agreed with what we thought was said, Arturo thinking I know not what. Arturo’s friend never acknowledged me. He would say something to Arturo occasionally, which Arturo would pass on to me, (he said at one point that my Spanish was very good, so he was obviously an intelligent man) and, when we stopped to eat on the way out, he stood away from Arturo and me at the counter.

We arrived at the airport in plenty of time, waited for the flight to land and Selma to pass through baggage and customs, and headed out, both couples – Arturo and his friend, Selma and me - having conversations in our preferred languages. At one point, a little over halfway through, Arturo turned and asked me something which I couldn’t make out. We tried for a few minutes, and I thought he was asking if we minded if we stopped to visit friends of his in San Francisco de Marcoris, and stayed for an hour. He kept asking “no problemo?” and I was saying “si, problemo,” thinking he wanted to stop for awhile. After some more verbal wrestling, it dawned on me that he was asking if we minded if they picked up friends of theirs to ride back to Samana with us. Once I realized this I did not mind at all, and told Arturo so. We soon slowed down to pick up two young girls at a bus stop. After that we stopped at a comedor, where we got some food, and Arturo, his friend and the girls got beers. When we got back in the car, Arturo switched seats so that he was sitting with one of the girls and the other girl was in the passenger’s seat, next to his friend the driver.

This last move was a bit disturbing to me. Arturo has become a friend down here, and to know his story and have so much respect for him and to see him start acting so immature and unprofessional was hard. I found myself rooting for him to do the mature thing. Just goof around with your friends, Arturo, don’t flirt with that girl, don‘t lean on her shoulder, don’t put your head in her lap ---- nuts. I find myself thinking maybe it’s a Dominican thing, this action that wouldn’t be too cool in my world. Maybe I can blame it on culture.

I’ve met this young man named Thomas. He’s very easy to spot – a thin white guy with dreadlocks. He gives off the air of cool traveler. I had seen him about town our first week here, and then the first night I was playing soccer I saw him on the other team. We were in the same part of the field, and he was one of the few people I spoke the same language as, so we were able to quip during the game. I’ve run into him a couple times since, and he’s fun to chat with. The other day I went into the verizon place late in the afternoon, and he was on the computer and chatting with Aron and Richard. We all talked awhile – Thomas speaks pretty decent Spanish – and did our computer things. After, we met on the steps outside, and I had my first substantial talk with Thomas. He’s from Scotland, moved here in response to a job offer he got over the internet, got fired, and now finds himself hanging around Las Galeras. He told me he is renting a room in a whorehouse on the outside of town for 100 pesos a night. Recently he’s started to have dreams about his friends and family hanging themselves. These dreams were spread out over several nights. He mentioned it to one of the people in the house, and they told him one of the girls that worked there had hung herself about a month ago in that same room.