First few days

Hello everyone. I arrived to Santiago late Tuesday night and finally have time for the first update. The trip here was fairly uneventful. We flew from Omaha to Dallas and had a three hour delay. So, to pass the time, a group of us rode the entire loop of the Dallas airport train. It was a good way to pass the time and actually pretty fun. After that we arrived in Miami, welcomed by plenty of rain, which delayed our flight for two hours. Eventually, our flight landed in Santo Domingo and the ILAC staff was waiting for the group to arrive and drive us two hours to arrive at the the ILAC Center in Santiago. When we arrived we were warmly welcomed and enjoyed our first taste of Dominican food. It was excellent, and was then followed by a small concert by some local musicians, and a celebration for two people's birthdays.
Today (June 26) we had our second day of Spanish class, preparing us for what we'll experience in the campo. It's a good way of getting to know everybody involved with the program and make sure that we can communicate effectively when the time comes to work in the clinics.
Afterwards, we had lunch and then everyone split up into groups and visited different places around the city. I went on the trip to Batey Libertad, which is a community where Haitians who have come to the Dominican Repubic in search of work live. When they first arrived, there was plenty of work because the sugar cane crop was excellent. When the crop was better, most Haitian workers would come for the harvest and then return to Haiti. When the conditions worsened, the Batey become more of a permanet residence and the workers became stuck. Now, with the help of ILAC and other similar organizations, the situation in the bateys is slowly improving.
When we were at Batey Libertad we were given a tour of the area and told its history. The entire time we were walking around, all the kids were following us around. After the tour, and during, we played soccer with them. It was very fun, but also exhausting.
That's all for now! I'll update again when I can. We leave for the Campos on Monday and will be there for two weeks

*****Sorry for taking so long to post an update, when I originally wrote this I thought I had lost the draft, because the computer I was on didn't post it.

Since I left off, we had our first chance to go out into the city as a group. On Friday, we all went out dancing at 4 different locations in the area after getting a breif dance lesson on how to dance Merengue and Bachata. It was very fun and it was neat to see the city.

Saturday, we went on a scavenger hunt through the city of Santiago. We were given a sheet of paper with tasks to complete and sent on our way. We had to catch the guagua into the city, which is one of the most efficient public transport methods here. A guagua is pretty much any vehicle (van or suv) that is modified with extra seats to fit as many people as possible. When we caught our guagua into the city, we crammed about 25 people into what is normally a 9 passenger van. And it's only 15 pesos to get to where you need to go. When we got into the city we headed off towards our first destination to start our hunt. It was really fun walking around the city, asking for directions and seeing a large part of the city. One of our tasks was to find a street vendor and barter for the best possible price on a pineapple. Other tasks included asking a shoeshine boy how much it cost, and if we wanted, to get our shoes shined. The hunt was long and tiring, but it was a lot of fun to get out and see the city.

That night, we went out bowling and then afterwards some people went out dancing. It was a good night and the last free night before packing and preparing to leave.

Today, we had a mass in the morning followed by some last minute prepartions and reflections. For dinner, we had a barbecue and dance celebrating the beginning of our time in the campo, and an early Fourth of July cookout since we will be missing it in the States. After dinner we were free for the rest of the night to do laundry and pack up for the campo.

I'm all packed and ready to go. We leave tomorrow morning at 9a.m. and won't be back for two weeks. Then, we will spend the weekend at the ILAC Center and prepare for the second two week session of clinic. I won't have internet in the campo, so I will not be able to update again until we return. I will update with my experiences when I return. Thanks for reading!

Miguel