Cien Fuegos

Yesterday was enthralling, but then again, I get the feeling that will be my response to life everyday here. Still, it has taken me a full 24 hours to fully process all that I saw. That being said, I have a caveat for my audience: The things and experiences I have here in the DR are incredibly hard to describe. In some ways, I feel I cannot give justice to the Dominicans, to my readers, or even to myself when it comes to defining the way of life, the poverty, and the culture I am experiencing. While I will do my best, I am nothing but a humble observer trying to understand the lifestyle here the best that I can. If what I write is confusing, disturbing, or beautiful, it is likely I have only captured a small part of it in the sentences I string together here. That being said, I will do my best to explain to you the slums of Cien Fuegos we traveled yesterday.

Hopping onto the ILAC bus with Alfe, one of the first things our Encuentro group noticed was something that had been absent from our lives for a few days now: air conditioning! At ILAC, we live without it, which has been an adjustment for all of us, especially with the sticky humidity. Laughing and enjoying the air, it was not long before our chatter turned more serious. It took only a few minutes of driving to the poor area of Cien Fuegos to realize how spoiled we are to have ever even experienced the quality of life that allows for something like air conditioning.

Likely to the disdain of my bus partner, as we approached the slums of Cien Fuegos, I became very quiet. Lucky to have a window seat, I became engrossed in what I saw. Cien Fuegos is an area that is essentially surrounded by and built upon a garbage dump. The main source of income for the people there is through scavenging the mounds of trash and then selling what they find. As a whole, the streets of Cien Fuegos are littered with trash. Walking outside, you'll see bottles in the gutters, rotting food on the sidewalks and streets, and broken or twisted objects pile the corners. However, in Cien Fuegos, the amount of waste exceeds that of any I have ever seen.

Passing shanty after shanty, I noticed that many were built upon trash themselves. People sat on chairs outside the shacks, which were constructed within inches of each other. While I have seen such slums in movies, documentaries, and even television advertisements, seeing them in person brings on an entirely new emotion. While in some ways, I felt the area to be familiar to the places I had seen on television, it was simultaneously different and new to anything I had ever witnessed or pictured.

Outside of the shacks, people sat on chairs, talking or just watching the dirt blow on the unpaved roads. One family was cooking something over a fire in their front yard, which was littered with pieces of metal and mechanical parts. Nearby, a naked boy around the age of three ran around, playing in the trash that overwhelmed his home. People walked to their local colmados, hung their clothes to dry on string behind their shacks, and some even waved at us as we passed. Looking in the eyes of a small girl I would later be surprised to encounter again, I thought to myself: She could be anyone. She looked no different than any American child I might see, yet she lived a life so different than any child I had ever known.

Pulling up in front of the school at Cien Fuegos, we were greeted by dozens and dozens of children. As they bartered to buy sweets from vendors on the other side of the school's barbed-wire fence, they squealed with excitement at our arrival. This was their recess and chaotic does not even begin to describe the scene. Everywhere we looked, we had small children pulling us in different directions, jumping on us, and asking us questions in Spanish. Some of the girls were fascinated by my eyeliner and kept laughing as I tried to communicate with them in my broken Spanish.

Out of the crowd that surrounded us, a little boy ran up to me and grabbed my hand. Placing a folded piece of notebook paper that was to serve as an envelope for a note inside, the makeshift envelope read: "Para bien den" which I roughly translated to "For a good gift." Opening the little paper inside, I was delighted to find a hand drawn heart with a flower in its center. As I looked up to thank the little boy, I realized he was gone and with the crowds of children jumping in every direction, I realized I'd never identify the little artist.

As classes resumed and recess was over, children ran, crawled, and pushed each other into the overcrowded classrooms. There is one teacher for each grade and there are tons of children per class. I don't have an estimate for the number at this time, but will try to find that information later. As the principal of the school gave us a tour of each grade, we noticed there were still children running around. As she yelled at them to get to class, we couldn't help but laugh.

Our tour here was quite short as we didn't want to interrupt their classes. All of the children were of elementary age. In the DR, this age goes to school in the morning and the older children come in the afternoon, as mandated by the government.

Leaving the Cien Fuegos school, we saw several children still out in the yard eating unripened fruit and chasing each other. At this point, class had been back in session for awhile and at first, we wondered aloud why they were not in their classrooms. It was not long before we learned that, because of the overwhelming class sizes, teachers cannot pay attention to students on an individual level. To attain an education is then, essentially, at the hands of the child as to whether or not they participate during the day or wander around the yard.

Traveling a few streets away, we made our next stop at a place called Caritas. Caritas is a before and after school program for the children of Cien Fuegos. When they are not at school, they can come to Caritas to eat and play games. The services are run by nuns and are free to the public.


At Caritas, we introduced ourselves to a group of children, whose numbers fluctuated throughout our stay as more came and some left. When it came time for me to introduce myself, I stood up and greeted the kids with a smile:

"Hola! Me llamo Hannah!"
"Ayyyyyyyyyyy!!!!!! Hannah Montana!!!!!" one girl screeched in the back of the room.

Looking in her direction, I realized that she was the child I had seen earlier on the streets as we entered Cien Fuegos. All of the children suddenly became enamored with excitement, yelling "Si! Si! Hannah Montana!" and giggling. Of course, I started saying "Si! Si!" and chuckling along with them. For the remainder of our stay, this girl would sometimes cry out "Si! Hannah Montana!" during songs and discussions, leaving me laughing the entire morning.

There was also a little boy that caught our attention at Caritas. He walked around in little sailor shoes blowing a yellow plastic horn and sucking his thumb when he decided to be quiet. Notice I write, when he decided to be quiet. Speaking of him later, our group was surprised that he had not been disciplined, as he trumpeted solos throughout our introductions and during a song that the children sang for us.

"Geoffrey!"the man in charge would boom in his strong accent.


Quickly looking up, Geoffrey would pull the trumpet away from his lips and insert his thumb. But only seconds later, he would again be blasting away on his tiny horn. This forced me into giggling at awkward times when it would become quiet, but I couldn't help it. The spirit of the children here is incredibly captivating.

Leaving Cien Fuegos, I had only one thought: I am fortunate enough beyond words to be in this country, to be exploring areas like the slums of Cien Fuegos, and to be interacting with the culture at its most basic levels. These experiences are ones I have always dreamed of having.

As we drove back toward Licey and therefore ILAC, I noticed something about the ILAC bus. Above Elfi hung a baseball in netting from his sunvisor. Looking to the right, a rosary was wrapped around the rearview mirror. Seeing these symbols, I thought of all of the baseball jerseys I had seen on the children wandering Cien Fuegos, not to mention the spirituality that can be felt walking in such an area of extreme poverty. To me, those two symbols displayed the commonalities shared by all of the Dominican people: Rich or poor, the people of the Dominican Republic share a strong faith in Catholicism and Baseball, a faith which unites them as a country and which is contagious to those of us beginning to explore the DR for ourselves, no matter one's preferences regarding religion or sports.

After our lunch, we traveled to a museum in Santiago which explained the history of the Dominican Republic. We learned of the natives, the Tainos, of the Spanish conquistadors who exploited the people of the country upon their arrival, and of the shipment of Africans who were brought here to work enslaved. As such, the Dominican people identify with their roots as Spanish and African. However, they in some ways shun and hide this African heritage because of the hardships their relatives faced, and instead are more open about their Spanish side when it comes to celebrating cultural heritage.

At the museum, we also saw different artwork by Dominicans and toured a cigar factory, where we watched workers hand-roll the tobacco and press the cigars. Some of us purchased cigars to try, and then we were headed back to ILAC for our Spanish Immersion classes.

During our Spanish classes, we have learned vocabulary surrounding Dominican culture. For example, the first day we learned how to play Dominoes in Spanish, which is an extremely significant part of Dominican life. Throughout the DR, Dominicans can be seen playing dominoes at local colmados long into the night.

Yesterday we learned different greetings and responses. We also learned how to Bachata, which is a music and dance that originated in the Dominican Republic. Later, Karie gave us dance lessons in Bachata and Merengue. She also explained the popular Reggaeton, but due to the sexual expression behind the dance, we were left to observe that in the discotecas at a later date ourselves.

Later that night, we traveled into the city for some helado at Helado Bon. I was extremely lucky in that I had to ride next to the open door of the guagua, so I had an incredible view of streetlife and the activity that defines Santiago city life. It felt strange to be so close to the outside as I am used to being in a closed vehicle back in the States. Yet, it seemed as if the openness of the guagua corresponds to the openness of the people. As life in America is more isolated, I could see that the guagua would be one of many differences that helped explain the unrestrained friendliness of many Dominicans I have met over the past few days.

Today, we have been in meetings to learn more about the mission of ILAC and its national role in the Dominican Republic. We have also been instructed on how to deal with culture shock and the different phases of adapting to life here that we may experience.

The most exciting part of our day has been the rain! Since we arrived, we have been curious as to what a Dominican storm would look like. Because all of the buildings are open, we wondered if the rooms would become wet. As the wind picked up and the clouds blew in, our anticipation grew. As the first drops hit the ground, we yipped with enthusiasm. Who knew rain could be so fun?! However, I think our fervor stemmed more from the relaxed life we are adapting to. Dominicans operate at a slower, more relaxed level than Americans. As such, we had the time to stop what we were doing and enjoy the storm, which is something I may not have done back at Creighton where I am always working on twenty things at once to keep up with the American pace of life. Check out my weather report below :)

  


I promise I wasn't the only one excited, although with Cody passed out in the background, it appears that I am! Hahaha :)


We found that the rain does not really come into the open rooms as we originally envisioned. The roof is built to protect the rain from entering the frame of the structures at ILAC. I hope to have pictures of ILAC up soon! Hasta la vista amigos!