And After All That, Estoy Tranquilo

April 1, 2013. I have to say, the worst nerves I've felt thus far in this country, I felt today. Strange to think when I've already gone through all the firsts that I would experience today. But the bus trip here was an overwhelming ride. Once we turned off of that familiar highway in the city, there was no turning back. We went from city, to pueblos, to campos, to mountains, to flatlands with skinny cows, to homes made of concrete and beautiful colors, to ones made of wood and falling apart at the seams. I watched as the scenery changed but the signs for Monte Plata kept flying by. Only an hour and a half later, we arrived at our training center-a sports complex. Our training room is literally a box above a baseball field. It's pretty neat though quite a change from our center in the city (part of the ceiling already fell and nearly hit a few of us today). We debriefed there for only about ten minutes and we were off again to meet our new host families and have lunch. My host mother was there right away and I was the first to leave the bus of familiar faces. Her name is Clarita and she introduced herself as my nueva madre :). She is an older woman but with a ton of spunk and I'm in love already. She had a young neighborhood boy grab my bag and carry it to her house because the paved road ended quickly and her house was on the other side of a pretty big crack in the dirt and gravel street. The poor thing; my bag was heavy. She showed me my room which is huge with two double beds, a closet, a nightstand, and a curtain for a door. There's stuff that looks like wood shavings on my beds that weren't there when I first arrived so I must have termites or something. Good thing I have my mosquitera to protect me from falling sawdust at night too! The walls don't go all the way up so I'll need to take calls from home probably earlier. Though we'll see when my Dona goes to bed tonight.. We have a toilet that flushes! Haha not my own but that's totally fine. The sink doesn't run though so there's a giant bucket with water to use. The shower was cold but I was hot today so it felt wonderful. I think I can manage bucket showers and I don't use too much water (I don't think)!
After my tour, she put tons of food on the table and said, whatever I need, whatever I want to do, whatever I want to eat, I can do so. :) As long as I feel good, then she's happy. Ah!! We chatted and I learned that she has 8 children and 23 grandchildren! I mentioned how tranquilo it is here and much more peaceful than the city. She absolutely agreed and said she lived in the city for a while but loves it here too much. Ugh, love her. She talks slow and clearly. I've really only missed a few things! What a good feeling. She's had a volunteer before so when I apologized for my Spanish not being that great, she laughed and said no problem! The last one she had didn't know anything and would always ask, "What's this?" And "What's that?" When she ate. Perfect! Haha I don't have to worry about high expectations! Oh! And she has a dog named Donkey. A little tiny thing lol. Lunch was rice, beans, grilled (?) chicken with peppers and onions, and a vegetable salad. Delicious!
Afterwards, we watched an infomercial about a non stick cooking set for about a half hour. We laughed at how much food they tried, how expensive the set is and how unnecessary it is :) We then watched a soap opera called, Rosa Diamante (Diamond Rose). So much drama haha. Loved it.
At 2pm, it was time for the scavenger hunt with the volunteers! Our PCVL split us into groups and we had a list of things that we needed to find around Monte Plata and take a picture of them with us in them. We had 2 hours to complete it and we had to be back to the sports center no later than 4! It was a blast! We ended up having a bunch of girls with us and they helped a ton! I held a rooster for a picture!! Ah! The people here are so kind. They still stare but goodness me, it's so different from Pantoja (come to think of it, I didn't hear any hissing today!). There's plant life everywhere (didn't realize I missed green grass), mountains in the background and at the sports complex, people were playing volleyball!! And the center is open to us as volunteers! We totally started planning games for on the weekends and such :D. Why is everything working out so well..
Also, apparently there may not be Internet at the center... But we saw a few places with Internet for like $25/hour. That's not too bad. Just wish I hadn't told my family I'd have it like I did before. I also need a calling card. Hm...
So after sharing our photos (we lost the game despite having help, btw), we walked back to our barrio. It's nice that we all live relatively close to each other. My host mother was in the kitchen preparing dinner. She asked if I had had yuca yet, which I haven't! I hung my mosquitera, took my bucket shower (quite successfully, thank you), and dinner was ready. I had yucca, something else that reminded me of the consistency of gnocchi, platanos, and fried cheese with onions. Yup! The cheese was like a rectangular mozzarella stick haha and it was soooo good. Such a horribly balanced meal but the cheese was amazing and I got Coke (excuse me, I got "Cola Real" pronounced Rey-Al hahaha). After, we watched some more television (new goal for the next five weeks: watch these soap operas and understand everything that's going on), a guy probably my age (Alfredo) came over and watched with us, and a neighbor child escaped to my Dona to try and get out of being beaten. He was unsuccessful. Finally I said I needed to head to bed, today was a long day and tomorrow will be another one.
What a crazy experience but boy have I been lucky thus far. I literally looked around my room before climbing under my net and just smiled. It's perfect. My nerves were silly but hey, I can't be completely brave after just one month (but I'm gonna keep workin on that!). The streets are peaceful. I do wish I had a fan but the crickets outside make it feel a little like home and provide that drone that will hopefully lull me to sleep. Buenas noches.