Daughter's "Trip Report"

[Gregg]

just a little "trip report" written by my 13 year old daughter in the context of a thank you letter to her aunt and uncle in Toronto. some interesting observations from her teen viewpoint. all typos and errors left in (she usually proofs these first).

we spent 22 days in the DR with a view to emigrating. saw mostly North Coast and Santiago/Jarabacoa.

please don't tell her i posted this...she'll kill me!



Thank you very much for the Outcast Cd. I love it! Now I don’t always have to listen to the radio. I hope you had a great summer! Well it is a little late to say that.
It has gotten soo cold! I like the winter sports but I hate the winter. I think I would like it better if we were in an warmer house. At the farm we only have the fire place in the kitchen so we all stay in there for the winter. We only leave the kitchen when we need something or are going to bed. So in the winter we have a very social life because we are all in the kitchen. Im actually surprised we get along so well in one room all winter. When we were in the Dominican Republic for 3 weeks, by the 2nd week we couldn’t stand each other all in one tiny hotel room. I think we get along in the winter because we know someone will have to leave the kitchen and its so cold we just put up with each other.
Anyway our trip was great! It was soo warm. Before we left my parents fegured that every girl in the Dominican Republic wore dresses and they didn’t wear pants. So mom and I went shopping to get some dresses, we found 2 dresses and a pair of capress, which we fegured would be fine. I don’t like dress! So it didn’t worked out for me. When we arrived we fegured out girls wear capress and jeans or other types of pants. Luckly I brought down one pair of jeans and the capress I bought. Those jeans and capress were worn so many times! Like I said I don’t like dresses so I avoided wearing them. Those dresses are still in my closet waiting to be worn. I promised that I would wear them to a family dinner or a wedding. Unfortuanaly when we bought the dresses when it was final sale, but we only got two so mom isn’t to upset. The one dress we made sure fit her aswell and it did. We both liked it but she cant blame me, she didn’t wear it either.
Anyway we all enjoyed the trip. At first I was not willling to even remotly move to the D.R. After the trip lets just say I was the most willing to leave. The trip went well. We traveled from the busy cities (like Toronto), to the mountains in large towns back up north by all the prettiest beaches in the D.R. The first place we visited was where we flew into, a large city (like Toronto but a little smaller), named Santiago. We only stayed there for a day because we had to wait for our rental car to come in. We left the day we got our car to a different town. Santiago was just to big and the first time you arrive it is just so hard to get used to it that we wanted to leave to a smaller town. We decided to go up to Jarabacoa (har-a-bic-o-a), in the mountains. It was only a 45min drive. When we arrived it was nice but I couldn’t get over the poverty. It was so sad to look at. Jarabacoa was different. I didn’t know how at first. I couldn’t stand it! I wanted so badly to go somewhere similar to Canada where I could talk to people. There their was no one the same skin colour. Of course we were as pale as can be! We didn’t have a tan or anything.
After a few days we left to the beaches. After we traveled more I got used to the language more so and could speak with a better accent than the tape at home taught me. I got more accustomed to their way of living not the Canadian way and started to fell more comfortable there.
I started to relize (to my surprise) that I loved Jarabacoa. I have no clue why. I justgot accustomed to living there. Eventually I only wanted to go back there and just stay. I even started to compliment it here and there when I saw the differences and liked Jarabacoa’s better. I think I was just nervous, I don’t think I wanted to like it there. As I said I liked Jarabacoa for some reason the first 3 days after we left I was already convincing them it was the best town. Whatever I had said it seemed to have worked. We all started to refuese every place but Jarabacoa. After a week of traveling we came to Cabarette (Cab-ar-et-ay). We didn’t like this town either it was all tourists. The locals only lived there to sell to the tourists/rip them off (only because it is very easy) or to try and get money weither or not they were poor or not (the tourists don’t know that). It was awful. We did fit in though. The next day was my birthday. So after doing research (before we left) Dad found a website that you could chat with people from different place that have moved to the D.R. He had discovered the close by their was a restant, in Sosua you could go to get world famous ribs(my favorite food). So we went.when we arrived Dad met the owner who was also on the website. He had told us almost everything he knew about Sosua (the place we were at eating the ribs). We started to like the things he said about it and decided to stay. In total we probably sayed for 5 days. We went to Rockies (the world famous ribs place) almost everyday not just for ribs. My parents went to the get togethers Rockies was holding, and tried a bar that they were told had losts of gatherings from people that have moved from Canada. They had met so many people. After awhile we started to enjoy Sosua almost as much as Jarabacoa. We like it because people there spoke english and because their were lots of water sports.They had snokling, surfing ect. It was what we called picture perfect place(looked like what you would get on a postcard).Then we went back to Jarabocoa for 3 days before we left for home. We dicovered that it was not as busy. It was not as busy because in the summer people from all around the island come up there to spend the summer (at their summer homes) just like we go up to our cottages. It was also busy because a lot of people from N.Y go there to visit (a lot of Dominican’s, over millions move to N.Y and come back in the summer to visit). It was still a nice place, just a little quieter than we were used to. We also relized how laid back it was there ( the Dominican’s ride around mostly on scooters). In Jarabacoa people my age (13) can get away with it because the police are more laid back. Plus you can ride without helmets.
You may think without a helmets is more dangerous, like we did. It is proven to be safe without! Studies have proven that you cant hear nearly as well with a helmet on and you don’t see as much because the helmets block your eyesight. Aswell when you don’t have a helmet you don’t drive as fast because the faster you go stuff gets in your eyes and you don’t need to go to fast the get a thrill during the ride, with helmets nothing gets in your eyes and you need to go 2 or 3 times as fast to get a thrill ride. When they did have a helmet law their were more accedents for those reasons, when there was no law on helmets there were less accedents. So now for some reason there is a law that only the driver needs to be wearing a helmet. Thought they didn’t state what type of helmet so now where the police care the drivers have cheap horse riding helmets or less safe helmets. Either that or the drivers drive with them under their arm until they see a police then they put it on.
So in Jarabacoa that law in not cared for as much as in Sosua.
After our trip we decided that we were going to move to Sosua to learn the language and have fun at the beaches. Then when we speak fluently and get sick of the beaches we will move to Jarabacoa (a year or two). So when we sell the farm and the house on Troy Street we rented out, Dad will go down to Sosua to look for a house to rent. We have also decided to be home schooled. So that we will not have to worry about not speaking tha language. Though there are International schools they are very expensive and not worht it. So for home schooling these are our plans:
Math- Dad will teach from Canadian teacher ciriculum
Art-we can make jewlery in Moms studio
Music- Max will play the guitar again and I will play my violin
Gym- we can take up a lesson like surfing or horseback riding
English- we will keep learning our english ciriculum which will be important if we want a job in Canada or come back for University or Colledge.
French- we wont learn French we will get Spanish lessons until we are fluent after that we may learn French or anyother language (our choice). Like Itallian, which is very similar and easy to learn if you know Spanish.
You probably get the idea. My parents were talking to one girl in Jarbacoa who was soon leaving for University in one of the top medical schools in the U.S. So they began to think differently and decided if we would like or when they cant take teaching us anymore we can go to school in Jarabacoa.
So thanks again for the Outcast CD! I hope Addie and Lily are enjoying school. Hope to see all of you soon!
Love,

[mkohn]

Kids can be so open-minded. Congratulations!
mkohn

[CyaBye3015]

Perhaps the best trip report I've read in a long time, thanks

Joe

[Escott]

Thanks for posting it.

I won't tell.

[rendul]

Great perceptions from the mouths of babes.

[Hillbilly]

I think they young lady did an outstanding job. While you can't tell her I said so, please know that Dominican girls do NOT wear dresses!! They wear jean, jean and more jeans. At my university, out of the 100 kids I'll see tomorrow morning there will be 95 in jeans or some guys in khakis...the other five will have something very instyle. I think I''ll take a count just FYI..

As far as university goes, make sure that your girl knows what she wants to study..

I am very curious about that person in Jarabacoa that is going toa a med school in the States?? Something is not ringing true. Can you PM me about this.?? Med schools in the states do not normally take DR students. Colleges will take DR students into Pre-Med,,,,at $30-35,000 per year!!! Which makes no sense since you can study medicine here for as little as $1000 per year, tuition and fees.

Again, congratulations on a very sensible young lady....oh yes, she can study French here in Santiago at the Aliance Francais..on Saturdays...

HB

[Keith&Cris]

Originally Posted by mkohn

Kids can be so open-minded. Congratulations!
mkohn

It was fascinating to read the gradual change in her opinion from "first (bad) impression" to a more open-minded acceptance of her surroundings. She sounds like a very perceptive child... one to be proud of.
Travelling the world is the best form of education. Thanks for taking the time to post this letter.

[Camden Tom]

That was a really fun post. Thanks for sharing.

[URock]

Originally Posted by Gregg

After a week of traveling we came to Cabarette (Cab-ar-et-ay). We didn’t like this town either it was all tourists.

Great post Gregg. I did find this line humorous though. Already she thinks she's a local. That's great. lol