Tool Board

The tools on my porch are finally organized!

Kids in the street

It is the dry season and is raining. It hasn’t rained in a long time, maybe a week or two. I am sitting in the house, working, listening to the rain and enjoying the smell of rain on dry ground. A group of kids is giddily singing outside in the street. It sounds like gibberish but the tune is familiar. I think it must be some rhyme from childhood until I listen closer and hear that the children are shouting Michael Jackson’s “Beat It.” They don’t know English so the syllables are just syllables and not English words, but the tune and the beat and a letter or two here and there are right on.

Dias de Fiesta (navidades)

A few nights ago, I went out to buy plastic cups. I stopped and talked to Blas (who you met in the post about the farm) for a while. I tried to buy plastic cups from his mother, who runs Abaceria Sen, close to the house. She didn’t have any but pointed me to another store, close to a green car. She meant the store with the kittens inside but I went past it to the green car and peaked inside. There were dresses. I went to return to the store with the kittens but the two women outside engaged me in conversation. They asked what I was looking for and I told them, plastic cups but I thought I had been directed to the store next door. They asked where I was from and we started talking. One woman owns the store, Candi and one woman, Juanita, owns a bar nearby. They offered me a beer so I sat and talked to them a while. After about an hour, and a few more beers, Juanita says, “come with me, you have something to buy?” I said “ yes, plastic cups.” And she said. “ok come with me, I will show you my house.” So I did. We first dropped off candles with her relatives – the power was out. Then we went to the store next to the grocery store. It was closed, but she caused a scene with a man outside who was insisting that it was closed but was not affiliated with the store. The men inside recognized her and opened the doors. She asked if they had plastic cups, I asked how much they were and bought them. Before we returned to the steps outside of Candi’s clothing store, we stopped at the supermarket so I could buy beer. When I told her it was for them she said, no no I’ll take you somewhere cheaper. We stopped at her bar, where I promised to take my students when they arrive, and she said to drink whatever I wanted, she would pay. I took the same cheap beer we had been drinking outside of Candi’s clothing store. She disappeared for a long time and finally came to collect me. She took me to some new construction where she had a long argument with one of the workers. She, and the construction supervisor, wanted him to stop and continue the next morning in the light. He did not want to work the next day (Christmas eve). I’m not sure why she brought me in for that conversation – maybe I was her exit strategy. Just before we left, she said I have to take this girl home (but in Spanish she said niña, which is like little girl, or daughter). She said I have hair like her mulatto daughter. We returned to Candi and her clothing store with the candles lighting it. Candi’s husband bought the next round but I had to bow out and Juanita walked me home. At the house we met the electrician who I have promised to pay for the air conditioners tomorrow. She told my watchman (who only speaks French) in Spanish to take good care of me. Then I baked chicken.

Farming in EG

A week or so ago I took a trip to visit a farm. This farm is an old cacao plantation. The family that owns it is planning to reactivate it as a farm. It was last operational during the Spanish colonial period. One family that worked for the Spaniards who then owned the farm has stayed on the land and are now employed by the EG family that is trying to make the farm profitable. Thier plan is to start by selling off the wood on the land and use the money from that wood to finance other projects. First on the list is fixing up the buildings and roads. They also have plans to do some processing of cacao beans on the farm. Other plans include aquaculture and growing a variety of other crops. We also ate a delicous lunch at Cuatro Ases in Luba, which may also be called Hotel Jones and went to the beach.

Southern Beaches Waterfall

City Adventures

Chicken in the Dean’s Office
I spend a lot of time waiting for E to sign things. One day I waited for quite a while – long enough to get bored. I talked to one of the secretaries for a while and tried to finish some reports on my laptop. At one point I looked out the door and saw a chicken poking around in the grass, looking for food. I watched the chicken for a while. Eventually it decided to investigate the office. For almost five minutes it stood in the doorway looking into the office and lifting one leg as if it was going to step inside and then putting it down again. Eventually it wandered back to the grass. And yes, this is my second post about chickens. They are everywhere.

Trip to the police station
I went with GB to the police station to get his fingerprints put on his residencia. C came along to speed the process. The outside of the police station is being refurbished. There is scaffolding all over the front and sides of the station. The entrance is cool and dark. The floor and walls are made of stone. I think its is an old Spanish colonial building. We walked down a narrow dark hallway off the foyer. To the right was a man at a typewriter behind a desk. With him in the office were three or four other men sitting and standing on the other side of the desk. On the left, windows into a dark office. After the man at the typewriter, the hallway opened onto a courtyard, but only on the right side of the hallway. On the other side of the courtyard were arms and legs pushed through metal bars. I did see some faces at the window as well. We turned to the right and walked into a long dark office. There were two computers, several typewriters and leaning stacks of yellowing paper taller than me. There were some file cabinets. There was barely enough room to pass behind the line of people to get to the fingerprinting station. There were stacks of passports laying around on desks and ID cards floating around everywhere. I think there was air-conditioning but I don’t think it was effective.

My students have left so I may have time to catch up on the blog a bit. I'm hoping to write more about the market and my picante buying adventure. But that will be another post.

Southern Beaches