Monday Evening, June 09, 2003
Last night Anyely and I went out to dinner after church. (The church is quite contemporary worship including hands raised in the air, an hour of praise and worship singing before the sermon, making it a two hour long service. One good thing about it is that we sing the praise songs (in Spanish) over and over so many times that by the end I can actually sing along!)
Anyway, after church we went and picked up her roommate, Gladys, and the three of us road on the pasola (a pasola is a moped that is hand controlled, vs. a motor is a moped that is foot controlled and the women tend to drive the pasolas and the men the motors, although that is not always the case.) which was a bit of a challenge, as it is typically a one person pasola.
So, the three of us road into town on the pasola, to go to the new pizza place in town that just opened up last week. Until now there has been no good pizza in town, but this place is excelente! It is so excelente that it is totally packed out, and a bit crazy.
Anyway, we got our pizza (we had ordered a “Carnes” pizza (meat lovers) but instead got an “Especial” because that was done first!)it was good, even including the corn on top! After lingering for quite a while over our dinner, we got on the pasola (harder to fit now that we had added some extra weight!) and drove to the parque for some helado (ice cream).
My Media Site continues to go well. We are almost done with our project of getting photo and video documentation of all the sites, as well as putting together support newsletters for two of the staff members whose English is not good enough for them to write them themselves, and putting together a video for one of the missionary families here (NateâEUR(tm)s family) to send to their supporters.
I got to visit Los Corrales today, the village where I worked three years ago when I was here. I got to see more of the children that I worked with. It was really fun because they remembered me and were excited to see me. I think a big part of that was that I had sent them pictures that I had taken, so they had those pictures to remember me by. It made me realize how much of an impact something simple like sending pictures had on them. That is one thing that I am continually amazed by here–what we might take for granted, or think of as almost insignificant, can make such a huge impact.
My Spanish also continues to go well. It is amazing how much you can pick up, when immersed in it again. I am also remembering more of the Dominican slang such as:
Cachi bachi–sort of means junk “clear all that cachi bachi off the table so we can eat dinner!”
Un chin–a little bit, “por favor, pour me un chin de cafe”
Guagua–a van or pickup truck, “get in the guagua so we can leave.”
Bola–a ride, “can you give me a bola to town?”
Concon(cone-cone)–the rice that is burned on the bottom of the pan, which is considered a delicacy, “can I have some more concon, por favor?”
Chichis(chee-chees)–love handles, “if you keep eating you will get chichis grandes!”
Gripe(gree-pay)–sickness, like a cold, “Are you sick? Yes, it is gripe.”
Well, I am writing this while sitting outside on the patio and I am getting eaten alive by the mosquitoes, so I think that might be my sign to call it an evening!
edunny.wordpress.com 