Time to move on to our next stop

Once back to the city we still had 6 more days until we could check into our condo on the beach. It did not take long for the lack of AC, mosquito attacks and that dang spider that I could never catch to take its toll on us all. The nights were so hot and miserable that baby R cried way too much. His crying episodes sent all the women in the house into a frenzy. Each one had an opinion as to why he was crying. Maybe he was hot (duh), maybe he was tired, maybe he did not like his sling, maybe he was starving, maybe he was bit by a mosquito, maybe his diaper was wet, maybe he needed water, maybe my breasts were not making enough milk, maybe I was holding him too tight….At 10pm, after over 2 hours of baby Rio crying, I couldn’t take it anymore. Not even caring what time it was, I called the cell of the woman who handled the rental. She said that the condo was not yet professionally cleaned. I told her I did not care and begged to allow us to check in the very next morning without it being cleaned. She could have told me that the daily rate was 3 million dollars and that I needed to give up a body part, and I would have figured out a way to come up with it just to get to AC.
I was very grateful to our host family, don’t get me wrong. They were wonderful and very accommodating to the party of 7 that took over their house. If it had just been me, I could have stuck it out, but I could not handle my kids’ discomfort. It was just too much. That very next morning, the taxi was called up for his final drive with us.
It took about an hour to get there. I was very nervous because I had found the condo online and really only had 5 pictures of the place and what the lady on the phone told me. I had also paid in full for the 2 months, against the advice of Mr. B. When paying for the 2 months, the lady asked me to make the deposit directly into her account and since I was traveling so close to the reservation date, it needed to be paid in full. Of course, that sent up red flags, but what the heck was I to do. I needed a place and since I had never been there before, I just had to hope and pray that the place was not a scam and that it was a decent place. So the entire time we were driving I was in prayer overload hoping that I do not have to hear the words-I told you so- come out of Mr. B’s mouth.
We pulled up to the gate and were met by a guard and another man. Senora X told them that we were renting there and the other man told us that he had no idea about the arrangements. My stomach turned. To make a long story short, I had to call back to the woman who made the arrangements and she explained to the guard that her husband was going to meet us there to give us the key to the condo. The guard opened the big iron gate and let us in. OH MY GOODNESS! I could not believe what my eyes were seeing. My family and I had just pulled into a slice of heaven. It was so beautiful. I could not have even dreamed up a more amazing place.
The cleaning lady had just started to clean and I wasted no time telling the girls to put on their swimsuits. In less than 5 minutes of arrival I was in the swimming pool with all my kids. Refreshing was an understatement. There was no doubt that the next 2 months were going to be just what the doctor ordered!

Monte Cristi and Santiago

With 2 day trips down with minimal drama, we decided it was time for our first overnight trip. It required a 4 hour air conditioned bus trip with several stops along the way. Monte Cristi was our destination. It is the home town of Mr. B’s father. It is where Mr. B spent many summers as a child up in the mango trees. Mr. B owns a home there. Our purpose was to check on the house and collect the rent for the last year. We also visited friends of the family. The town of Monte Cristi is small and resembles my birth town of Miami, Arizona. Some streets were paved, many were not. Old homes and people walking the streets and high sidewalks. We were picked up from the bus station by a friend Mr. Nicola that drove a little pickup truck. There was no time to be picky about our transportation and no time to fuss about safety, so in the 2 passenger pickup we went. 4 in the bed of the truck and 4 in the front. Mr. Nicola is an older man with a quiet personality. He sells seafood out of the back of his house- crab, fish, octopus and lambi (not sure what it is, but that is what they called it). There house was small yet cozy. Just like in the city there were no windows. They had chickens running around in the back yard that the girls enjoyed chasing. The humidity and heat did not take long to start wearing us all down and after we could not take it anymore, we checked ourselves into the only hotel we could find with air conditioning. The hotel also happened to be on the beach which was so refreshing. Monte Cristi is in the upper north west of the country and from our hotel room you could see the island of Cuba. We spent the rest of the day at the beach. That night was the first night that I can actually say that I was cold. The air conditioning worked a little too good, but how dare I complain! The next morning we packed up and went back to the bus station for our trip back to the city. On the way back we stopped in the town of Santiago. Santiago is where Senora A’s 99 year old sister lives. Without much time to waste in order to make it back to the city before dark, we only spent about 1 hour at her sister’s house. It was so awesome to meet her and her family. There were more than welcoming, as everyone has been along the way. Also like all the other homes we have visited, the moment we walk in the door, food and coffee starts coming out of the kitchen. You are not allowed to say ‘no’ to either one. Avocados are served like chips and salsa are served in AZ. I love avocados and can’t get enough of them here. There must have been over 20 people in the house that we were in and the whole house was about the size of my front room. There is not much in the home, but they have what they need. A table, a few chairs and beds. The floors and walls are concrete and once again, no windows. I was fascinated to see the only photo on their wall. It was a picture of Senora A’s father. I have the same exact photo hanging in my living room. For the first time in my Dominican travels there was a man, not a woman, doing all of the cooking and serving. He was most attentive and I wanted to scoop him up and put him in my pocket and bring him home. Hehe! Anyhow, I had a wonderful visit and really wished we had more time to stay, but we really needed to get going.
The break in the long bus trip was welcomed by all. The idea of only 2 more hours was much more bearable. For the most part my kiddos did well. There was more room on the bus going back allowing us to spread out a bit more, but I would have been foolish to think we could make it back without incident. Of course it was about the last hour that things went down hill. First there was a woman who started having contractions on the bus. She was traveling alone and was being helped by different people on the bus. She was clearly in a lot of pain and while pacing the narrow aisle she would stop to allow the contraction to pass. I started to get real nervous since I knew we had a while to go before the city. Since I consider myself an expert on the subject of child birth, I started to mentally prepare for what could happen and if I could be of assistance. After playing the game ”what would you do?” in my head for a few minutes and assessing all the assistance she was already receiving, I came to the conclusion that since I did not speak enough Spanish, I would be better off praying for a safe delivery and letting the other people help her. An ambulance was called to meet us at the next stop and I got my camcorder ready just in case the show started. Thankfully, we made it for her to get off and head to the hospital. Let’s just say the bus was mighty quiet during that whole time. With that excitement over my kids took their cue and started their show. With one screaming for more candy, another one needed to use the bathroom. As I shifted all of my belongings on my lap, she proceeded to tell me that she just pooped in her underwear (name withheld to prevent future embarrassment). Oh my gosh, what do I do now? We still had about 15 more minutes. With nowhere to go, she had no choice but to lean over on the seat, butt up until we got there. I felt so bad for her. With the beautiful aroma filling the air, I just sat there rubbing her back, telling her it was okay. She was so sad about it. Finally we arrived. We addressed the stinky situation and made our way back to our quarters in the city. We survived another outing!

399 stairs too many

With one successful sightseeing day down, we went for another. We piled into the small car again the next day for a tour of Tres Ojos. Tres Ojos is an underground cave with 3 lakes inside. We realized after about 5 stairs that Senora X and my chubby Miss O were not going to make it, and up they went to wait for the rest of us. With Baby R strapped tight, Miss M, Miss P and Senora A made our way down the 200 stairs to the bottom. It was not as cool as I had hoped and the bats that were flying around were freaking the girls out. Senora A’s vision is not too good and the guide had to help her most of the way since it was rather dark. Once again the girls really did awesome and we made it to the bottom. We caught a little boat that took us across one of the lakes and looked around the other side. This time I wished I had paid more attention in science as the guide told us about stalagmites and stalag-something else. I guess like with most caves, there is only one way in and one way out. So back up another 200 stairs to get out we went. I was starting to get flashbacks of my high school Grand Canyon trip where I almost did not make it out of the Canyon. I had to resort to my military mind frame, suck it up and focus on getting up the stairs with Baby Rio starting to get beyond sweaty. Slowly but surely we all made it, and that is one cave I will not be back to visit.

Spiders and mosquitoes

The first day that we arrived, we placed our luggage in a closet. Miss M jumped back and said that she saw a spider. I looked and looked and did not find anything and told her to quit joking about those kind of things. (She is quite a jokester) Spiders were the last thing I wanted to worry about as the mosquitoes were plenty bothersome. That night, I went in the room to grab a diaper and right there on the closet was the biggest spider ever. She really had seen one. I bent over to get my shoe off to kill it and when I stood back up, it was gone. Oh My! I did not ever tell Miss M that I had saw it, instead I spent most of the nights praying that it did not crawl on my face or the kids. I never saw it again. Thank God!
What I did see plenty of were mosquitoes. It is absolutely incredible how such a small little thing can cause so much grief. They love all of us except Senora A and Baby R. The poor girls scratch the bites until they bleed. We have tried so many different types of sprays and creams. We have yet to find anything that keeps them away, instead we have only found a great cream for the aftermath.

Getting adjusted

After a couple days just reenergizing and getting adjusted to the 3 hour time difference, it was time to head into town for our first sightseeing trip. A personal taxi driver was called up and all 7 of us loaded into the little car. I have yet to see a child in a seatbelt and since finding a minivan that would hold us all was pretty much impossible, I had no choice but to join the masses and cram all 4 kiddos, myself and Senora X in the back seat. Senora A was in the front with the driver. We turned a 5 passenger car into an 8.
Driving in the D.R. is kinda like NASCAR mixed with the old game Frogger. The object of the game here is to drive as fast as you can, while barely missing the hundreds of MotoConcho (motorcycle taxis). There really is no specific lane for traffic, just however you can get to where you are going is the lane you go in. I find myself holding my breath a lot, but the taxi driver noted that you rarely see accidents. He is right, I have not seen one yet, but just the idea that all my little ones are without seatbelts still freaks me out.
Our first stop was downtown Santo Domingo (the capitol). Like most town centers that I have come across in my world travels, this one had many of the same components. A large church, lots of people sitting around on benches, big statues, and tons of pigeons. How do pigeons know that they are supposed to crowd the town center around the world and poop all over the place? Spain, Italy, Bosnia and now D.R.-pigeons. I personally do not like them. Ok, enough about the birds and back to the real amazing sight- Christopher Columbus’s first and second house. It is fascinating to imagine how old the houses are and wish that I had paid more attention to my history teachers. Our guide did a great job of giving lots of info and dates, and after paying him, all that I can really remember is that there were a lot of really old buildings and a great history in that area. The buildings are big, and the walls that protect them are high. The girls were such troopers walking all over the place and baby R is happy as can be as long as he is wrapped tightly to my body. After a long day of walking and sweating, we picked up some Domino’s Pizza and went back to the house.

And we are off- August 21

The time had come for a much needed break from reality and opportunity poked its head out and I took it. The next thing I knew, I was on a plane with Senora X, Senora A and my crew of 4. During the last hour of the almost 8 hour flight (split with a lay over in Atlanta) it actually hit me that I am officially crazy. My kids could not take it anymore and it was pure madness for every second of the last hour. I guess I should be thankful that the first 7 hours went so well, but it was hard to remember those 7 hours when 3 of the 4 were crying.
As the plane doors opened and I was holding back tears of relief, I was met with a layer of humidity that almost knocked me over. I felt like someone threw a blanket over me. I had no time to dwell too much on the new weather as my only focus was to get the hell off the plane.
A driver had been arranged to pick us up, but unfortunately we did not see the sign and caught a cab. He said he had A/C which was something Senora X asked before we got in. Sure he had A/C, but the van died 3 times before we got to the freeway making it impossible to run it. Each time he jumped out, lifted the hood, wiggled something, came back in the van and revved the engine and went again. By this time, we are all dripping sweat, including my poor baby R who was strapped to me in a sling. What the heck have I done, was running through my mind. Eventually we got going and it was actually cooler to just roll the damn windows down.
We were welcomed to our home for the next week by Senora X’s nina. A simple home in the capitol of Santo Domingo. I could tell by our surroundings that we certainly were not in the worst neighborhood, yet we were also not in the best, but that was the way it was going to be. Each home has plenty of gates to enclose it and obviously to protect it. We went through 3 layers of gates just to get into the home. Each one with a pad lock on it and a different key. Besides the layers of gates, the next thing I noticed was that the home had no windows, but shutters of sorts that acted as windows. It was right about then, that I was greeted by what has become my worst enemy, mosquitoes. Right on the arm, it moved so fast I couldn’t kill it. Mr. Mosquito had only just his quest of torture. We had finally arrived to the Dominican Republic.

Something great about the city is that local vendors come to you. Each morning, you hear the calls of the avocado man, the coconut man, the live chicken man, the vegetable man. They pedal down the street in their vendor carts. You don't even have to leave your front gates. I love that. The other thing that we had to get used to was bathroom policy. There was no hot water so we had to boil water and do an old school shower. Miss O was the only one who loved to bathe this way. The sewer system has different rules as well. Toilet paper does not go in the toilet, it goes in the trash. That was mighty hard for us to get used to. Our host eventually put up a sign to help us remember.

With no windows on the house, the nights were mighty noisy. Cars speeding by, loud music from different homes, people talking (which is done at very high levels) babies crying and dogs barking. Being such a light sleeper, I did not get much sleep that first night.