It has only been a pittance of days in Las Terrenas and it feels like a lifetime. Between battling roosters that live in my back yard and on the roof (yes, the roof) who squack all night, keeping Ingrid and I awake, and the sheer lack of communication with the outside world (sometimes the internet works; sometimes it does not and NO ONE from the states seems to be able to reach me on my Dominican phone)-- I feel as if I have been cast into another dimension; a planet formerly undiscovered. The language barrier is so great, despite my grasp of Spanish (Dominicans speak a frenzied, mumbled and jumbled kind of Spanish that is hard to interpret, at it's best) that culture shock is beginning to set in and it is crippling. Part of the day I find myself smiling and energized; the rest of it I am crying secretly and trying desperately to reach loved ones. The one outlet I thought would tether me to my own "real world", teaching, has become, in these first two sessions, practice in self-torture. The children cannot speak English, I cannot understand their Spanish. They make fun of mine, asking me if I am retarded (I speak too slow, too "estupido", they say). The state these kids arrive in-- half-starved, some of them, covered in sores and bruises; ciggarrette burns, administered most certainly, by parents or caregivers-- is astonishing. Their eyes are still bright but they have a deeply seeded anger that explodes at the slightest provocation and it is apparent that their innocence itself is teetering on abyss. Their curiosity, however, is still intact. They touch me all over-- they want to smell my hair, touch my lips ("mas pequenas", they say), the color on my toenails, the moles on my back. They cannot read, most of them, though they love to hold books and be read to. They do not know how to swing or use a teeter-totter, two things that were recently installed at Biblioteca. They are loud and loving and friendly and they make very happy and intensely sad.
But what doesn't make me sad these days? Culture shock is a term I'd heard thrown around by friends who have lived all over, but I never thought I would experience it. I figured that since I am extensively traveled; I know the culture here, somewhat at least, and have a tenacious grasp of the language-- I would be fine in the face of such enormous change. Fuck, was I wrong. Let me say, though, that I am not homesick-- I miss my family and friends, certainly, and I long for my idyllic time with Thor in St. John every day (he has become a rock of sorts for me, a place to find solace and a person who knows the exact words to say no matter what my erratic mood; a stable mind to match my crazy heart)-- I am not longing for McDonald's or Walmart or the ability to flush toilet paper (none of that here or HUGE repurcussions await). I am fine with being crusted in street shit and layers upon layers of bug dope. I can live with the roosters; the cockroaches, the smelly water and the diarrhea. I acknowledge the prostitution and turn away from it. I have learned to deal with the men-- I gird myself every morning against the onslaught, though the men in my neighborhood have recently stopped hissing and now refer to me simply as "La Princessa Rubia" (the hair again). I am ok with these things and more. What is hard is the lack of communication with the outside and available world. I am a woman who needs to be able to talk; to say directly how I feel, what I need; my goals and dreams and wishes---I cannot, to anyone except my lovely housemates, girls whom I judged too quickly because of their age but WOMEN who are teaching me what sorority is all about. Not being able to communicate, in English to those I love (at least not regularly) and not in Spanish, at least confidently, to those I barely know, has rendered me a stranger unto myself. I am a woman without words and no words es igual de muchos tristes y cansadas para mi. I am sad and tired, almost all day, every day. Jose and Annette, the couple who run FMG, are saints if they are anything, and they offer hugs and patience; food; dictionaries and kind words. They tell me to wait and let this world open itself to me. To try new things, but not too many at once, and to value my own strength above all else. This, I am trying to do. But my trying sometimes leaves me yet more sad and yet more tired. This is my biggest challenge in life to date. And if I know one thing, it is this: I am a woman capable of anything. I have faced innumerable difficulties and I always come through yet more strong, more educated; more capable and more understanding than before. Nothing has ever stopped me and this, I am sure, won't either. It it what I longed for-- the chance to extend my boundaries beyond anything I thought previously possible; to ask myself to take what I know, and what I don't and synthesize them into some recognizable whole. I think I'm on my way, but right now the way is dark and confusing. How I wish I could see so much more. Thank the gods for writing, as it is now (as it ALWAYS has been, my whole life) the only tie to a self and a life I once knew.
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