Zafra

It's harvest season. La zafra. Sugar cane fields throughout the eastern region of the DR are being set ablaze and backbreaking manual labor is all the rage.

For the past few months I’ve been able to look across the endless, llano plains covered in cane and see orange glows in the distance. Faraway cane fields being burned. The glow is actually quite breathtaking. The deeper into harvest season we get, the more glows that can be seen each night. I am staring at one right now that is at least one mile away but seems to be engulfing the entire batey. The ash falls like a light snow and leaves everything covered in a layer of cachispa that the children catch like snowflakes and shove into their mouth (claiming it tastes like boiled eggs).

The cane is lit on fire to burn away any dead or excess leaves and to scare away any critters, vermin or snakes calling the cane fields home. After being burned, the cane is manually cut by able-bodied men (primarily Haitian immigrants) wielding machetes, collected into large trucks and driven to the nearest processing plant.

In the past week I’ve gotten to see the cane cutting first hand. The sugar cane around Cachena was burned and the picadores got to work. The cutters often work shifts of 12+ hours (in the baking Caribbean sun) and are able to cut between 3-4 tons each day. At the moment, they are paid approximately 150 pesos ($3.80) per ton. Somewhere around 13 dollars a day for impossibly difficult physical labor. Meanwhile the sugar cane companies make bank by exploiting people living in abject poverty. A large number of bateyes are owned by the sugar cane companies themselves and only cane cutters and their families are allowed to live there. It is the closest example to indentured servitude I know of.

The landscape looks much different when not covered by seas of 10-foot tall sugar cane. Nearby communities are visible for the first time in a year and mountains can be seen in the distance. It’s an interesting time to be in the batey.

Already, new sugar cane is growing like a weed where it was harvested just weeks ago. The cycles begin again. One of the growing and harvesting of a crop. One of human rights violations. Both of which will continue long into the foreseeable future.

Flames rising over rooftops.

Taking in the show.

Graduation Day

Saturday was Graduation Day for my Engineers Club. We started meeting back in January, doing a different science activity/experiment each week and I told them way back when that we would graduate in 12 weeks. They didn't forget.

In Dominican culture it is very important to have these graduations, ceremonies, etc, to recognize the work one does. There must always be an end goal. Very little doing something for something's sake. So although we still have many experiments left to do and will continue meeting weekly, a graduation was to be had.

In was a simple ceremony in which we discussed the work we have done. My boys who went to Engineers Camp talked about their experience in the mountains of Jarabacoa. We did an example of an experiment (Lava Lamps) for the audience of invited parents, siblings and random community members. Certificates were given to the graduates and we had the obligatory brindis, which is a small snack (in this case soda and cookies) for all attendees.

It was a fun day and the boys enjoyed being recognized for their work (and the cookies).

The graduates and invited guests.

A select few showing off multi-colored 'Lava Lamps'

With their certificates.

International Women's Day

March 8^th marked the 100^th anniversary of International Women’s Day. In recognition of that milestone, volunteers around the DR put together numerous activities to celebrate the big day.

Here in the Eastern region of the DR, we waited until the 28^th of March to celebrate but better late than never. Two female volunteers organized an extremely interesting event in which girls from 7 different volunteer’s communities would take photos of women in their lives and put them on display.

Our youth rarely get the opportunity to express themselves in an artistic manner and have certainly never been to a museum, art gallery or art exhibit of any kind. The photos the girls took were hung on display in a community center, along with a caption explaining the photo, for all to see and enjoy.

Along with the photo exhibit, volunteers facilitated a writing workshop in which the girls learned about prose, poetry and letter writing. The girls wrote their own original pieces and shared their writing and/or their photos with the group.

This is not an easy country in which to be a woman. No country is I suppose. If it were easy we wouldn’t need days like International Women’s Day in order to recognize the achievements of women and examine the gender inequality that continues to exist in the world. That said, the DR is tough for females. It is always very encouraging and empowering to see young girls come together in this country and get the opportunity to have fun, be unique, learn new skills and do the things we so take for granted in the US of A.

This was one of the encouraging and empowering days.

The Cachena group doing the Aplauso del Pelotero

Prose Writing Activity

My Girls with their Photos

Soy Ingeniero

I just made it back from a 4-day camp with 3 muchachos from my Engineering Club. Twelve volunteers and 32 boys aged 11-14ish spent a Thursday to Sunday high up in the mountains teaching, learning, swimming, playing and feeling colder than any of these boys had in their entire life.

The Engineers Camp, Soy Ingeniero, was held in Armando Bermudez National Park in La Cienaga, Jarabacoa. La Cienaga is among the highest towns in the Dominincan Republic (and the Caribbean) and the primary set off point for hikers heading to Pico Duarte, the highest mountain in the Caribbean. It is an entirely different world than what most of our kids are used to with thick, green forests, ice cold rivers and very chilly nights.

We spent the week doing interesting science experiments like building mousetrap cars, building boats of recycled materials, doing density and chemistry experiments, learning about robotics and more. They also did numerous teambuilding activities including having to climb a 10-foot wall as a team and pass through a “spider web” that volunteers put together in trees. There were campfires with s’mores, dips in an ice-cold river, HIV/AIDS activities and intense competition amongst the 4 teams of boys.

I have now been to around 10 youth camps and conferences and Soy Ingeniero definitely stands out above the rest. The boys were able to experience a place they never have before and, for many of them, a place they’ll never experience again. The boys were well behaved and engaged in the activities before them. The volunteers facilitated fun and interesting activities and the kids ate up the material.

It was among the few camps in which at the end of the weekend, the boys are sad to be going home and the volunteers aren’t burnt out and ready leave. Everything went well and my 3 Engineers are eager to share the new experiments with the club.

*Pictures forthcoming

Congressional Delegation

A kind of big thing happened last week. A congressional delegation visited a neighboring batey and the community of a Super Volunteer friend of mine.

This year marks the 50^th anniversary of the Peace Corps. As part of the commemoration of that milestone, a congressional delegation, led by Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont, visited the DR to learn more about Peace Corps and the work we do here. Other members of the delegation included Senator Kent Conrad of North Dakota, Senator Kay Hagan of North Carolina, Representative Peter Welch of Vermont and Representative Xavier Becerra of California. The senators and congressmen were accompanied by their spouses, assistants, security teams and the entourage one would expect of such a visit. The delegation was also accompanied by Aaron Williams, the International Director of Peace Corps (and a former PCV in the DR) and the US Ambassador to the DR, Raúl Yzaguirre. A fairly distinguished group of people to say the least.

Immediately after their plane landed, the delegation was driven to Batey Experimental (10km down the road from me) in order to visit a Peace Corps community and learn about a volunteer project. Peace Corps Volunteers from each Senator or Congressman’s home state accompanied them on the bus ride to the batey and talked all things Peace Corps.

Upon arrival in Experimental, the delegation was met by members of the community and Peace Corps personnel, myself included, and sat for a short presentation led by the Volunteer who lives in the batey, Kerri. Kerri, her host mom/community leader Victoria and USAID reps spoke briefly about their work in the batey. Then a number of Kerri’s youth participated in a Deportes para la Vida activity against volunteers from the delegation. Senators Leahy, Conrad & Hagan, Director Williams and others joined the Dominican youth in playing a game called Encuentre la Pelota (Find the Ball), which teaches that you can’t tell simply by looking at someone if they have HIV/AIDS. The members of the delegation seemed to really enjoy the game and participating alongside young Dominicans.

After some gift giving to local youth and obligatory photo ops, the delegation went for a tour around the batey to see first-hand the living conditions of the local people and to also see the living conditions of the volunteer, who lives in her own house. We volunteers translated for the members of the delegation as they asked questions to the people of Experimental and answered questions about the daily life of a PCV. As the batey is quite small, population 350ish, the tour was short-lived and the delegation hopped on buses to Santo Domingo where they had an evening reception at the US Embassy with invited Peace Corps Volunteers and other Peace Corps personnel. The following day the delegation visited Haiti before returning to the US of A.

It was an extremely unique opportunity to see a congressional delegation visit a neighboring batey and to meet the Senators, Congressmen, Director, Ambassador, etc. A very small number of volunteers were able to participate in the day’s events, making it a cool honor to be able to participate. It was also very humbling to see such distinguished individuals sincerely interested in the work that we do here.

As some of you may know, national service organizations like Peace Corps and Americorps have taken a hit in their funding since the new congress took over. Americorps faces huge cuts and possible extinction. The Peace Corps, which received a large funding increase in 2009 following Obama’s election, has also had their funding cut. These visits by congressional delegations hopefully show to the powers that be how valuable these service organizations can be. If we can pay billions of dollars to bomb countries like Libya and trillions to fight wars in the Middle East, we can certainly afford to fund Peace Corps, Americorps, Teach for America and similar organizations and try to make America and the world a better place.

Official Peace Corps News Release of the Visit

Video of the Visit Produced by Senator Leahy's 'People'

Save Americorps

Medical Mission

From time to time teams of medical professionals come from the US to the DR to offer their services free of charge to Dominicans in need. From time to time these teams of medical professionals ask for Peace Corps Volunteers to assist them as translators. A few weeks back I was on of those volunteers.

A group of surgeons, nurses and OR technicians from Albany, New York, make the trip to the DR once each year and offer numerous types of plastic surgery. They aim to do work on children with cleft lips, cleft palates or other deformities. I, along with 3 other Peace Corps volunteers, assisted them with their mission in early March.

For the past few years (and this year too) the group has done their work at the Hospital Dr. Antonio Musa in San Pedro de Macoris. The Musa, as it is known, is located just 20km down the road from my site and is where people from my own site go when they are ill. The doctors arrived from snowy Albany on a Saturday and on Sunday we did intake for potential patients. Scores of people showed up with afflictions ranging from full body scars to small, almost unnoticeable scars and everything in between. There were fewer children and less cleft lips or palates than the doctors were accustomed to seeing, but a lot of people in need. Surgeries and operations were scheduled for the week and began on Monday.

From Monday to Thursday, more than 40 patients were worked on. Our primary role as volunteers was to translate for the doctors and to chat with patients and try to put them a bit more at ease before surgery. We got to meet a lot of interesting Dominicans and a number of patients were from communities near to my own. It was great to be able to make a personal connection, as small as it might have been, with someone living in a batey just up the road or in a nearby city. The small bits of familiarity went a long way to the Dominicans surrounded by strange white people.

Translating brought us into the OR itself as we talked patients through the anesthesia process. After they were asleep, we became spectators in the arena that is the OR. It was a mildly intimidating place at first. No one wanted to be the asshole American kid who passed out at the first sight of blood and then needed surgery himself. After seeing a thumb reconstruction on Monday morning, I had no fear and loved being in the OR and in the thick of it whenever possible.

The patients we saw came from all walks of life. There were children born wither proper fingers or toes. Adults who had scars from acid burns. An infant born without an opening to her vagina. Three different people who had had their ears bitten off (Tyson/Holyfield-style) in fights. People with scars from machete fights. And much, much more.

I had never realized before the medical mission that throwing battery acid on another human being is a common form of vengeance here in the DR. Machete fights yes, malicious acid attacks no. We saw multiple cases of people covered by large scars from acid thrown on them by angry friends of jealous lovers. We also saw a man whose wife, after learning of her husband’s infidelity, doused him in gasoline and threw a match. His entire upper body was covered in scars and the skin of his forearm and bicep had fused together. The doctors unattached it so that he had further arm motion.

The team from Albany Plasticare was great to work with. They did a lot of incredible work in a very short time period. When not at the hospital we got to know the doctors and nurses at the hotel we all shared. It was interesting and inspiring to see the work they did. As a PCV, so much of my work is educating youth and preparing them to make healthy decisions in the future. We very rarely see the immediate impact of our work and often struggle to quantify the work we do. The doctors on the other hand could change lives for the better in a matter of hours. They could see the benefits of their work in no time whatsoever.

Being part of a medical mission and spending time in an actual operating room was certainly a highlight of my Peace Corps service.

Best looking fake doctors in the DR

Voluntourism

My batey and others like it throughout the Dominican Republic are well accustomed to having groups of foreigners (almost exclusively Americans and Canadians) drop in for visits. It is almost always a Christian group on a service trip or from time to time a group taking a day trip from their all-inclusive Caribbean vacation to see how the other half lives. The visitors usually make a loop around the batey, snap a few pictures with children, hand out some new toys or used clothes and promptly return to their beachfront hotel feeling very good about themselves and the momentary impact they have made on people living in poverty.

I have very mixed feelings on these frequent visits. While these visits can potentially be positive cultural exchanges, there is rarely an actual exchange that takes place. The visitors rarely speak Spanish. They are only here for an hour or two, an insufficient amount of time to exchange names and phone numbers, let alone culture. The visits often amount to nothing more than a group of white people dumping off loads of used stuff and coming dangerously close to what I would define as exploitation.

A good (and admittedly cliché) way to look at Peace Corps service and an overused Chinese Proverb says:

“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day,

Teach a man to fish and you teach him for a lifetime.”

I have two years of Peace Corps service in which to share some culture, drop some knowledge and, with some luck, make an impact on a number or individuals or (with lots of luck) an entire community. Whether it is through basic literacy, sex education, gender empowerment, volleyball skills, proper marshmallow roasting or English language curse words, I’m trying to teach something and create sustainable projects and knowledge that will continue long after I’m gone.

Few things can be more undermining to that process than for a busload of Americans to pull into my site every two weeks and hand out free fish of all shapes, sizes and shiny colors. I can’t compete with that. I have no fish to give away. And I don’t blame the people here for preferring free fish to the hard earned kind. Life is already hard. Why complicate it by learning new skills when someone is going to give you what you need? After tourism, the second highest form of income in the Dominican Republic is receiving remittances from friends, family and myriad baseball players in the U.S. and other countries. This is a culture well accustomed to and very comfortable with waiting for help from outside and not always willing to fix problems from within.

This past Friday I had a chance to host and plan a productive visit in my community with a group of study abroad students from Virginia Tech. The students are spending the semester in the DR and, as part of a course on agriculture and economics, they wanted to visit a batey / small agricultural community and see and hear first hand how difficult the life of a cane cutter or of people living in bateyes can be.

Having an opportunity to actually plan the activities and arrange for community members with intimate knowledge of local agriculture and cane cutting to lead and participate in activities made for an excellent opportunity for experiential learning. My superstar youth and community leaders gave a tour of the batey while I translated. We visited a nearby parcel of land where the community members communally grow all different kinds of crops and food. We walked through sugar cane and later had a productive discussion about the life of a cane cutter, life in the batey and life in America. Later that afternoon the students visited the batey of a neighboring volunteer and learned even more.

It was an extremely positive experience and showed me how productive these visits by gringos can be under the right set of circumstances and with some guidance. It hurts to know that after this productive visit, it is just a matter of weeks before a new group of white people shows up and puts us a step back after a large step forward. So it goes.

Peace Corps as an organization has 3 simple goals:

1. Helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.
2. Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.
3. Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.

The visit by the Virginia Tech students succeeded in fulfilling both Goals 2 & 3. All in all a successful day in the life of a Volunteer.

Tour of Batey Cachena

Community leader Wilfrido showing off guandules (pigeon peas) and discussing local agriculture.