24 hours later...

Our Room!

Current Playlist: “Pretty Boy”  Danity Kane and "I Gotta Feeling" Black-Eyed Peas

Current Kitchen Contents: Nutella, Crackers, Gatorade

Newest Vocab: Tazones (bowls), llaves (keys), Pasto (pasture/grass)

 

Bienvenidos a las vidas de B y SB!!  As the title states, this is the story of our first 24 hours of our livin’ la vida loca in the Republica Dominicana (RD…DR…depending on your language preference).  I’m sure you are wondering what in the world we have been doing, and you guessed it, we are going to tell you.  

Our journey all began on a cloudy Miami day when SB and B met at E8 of Miami International.  It is a good thing I got there, because B had spent 3 hours of her layover sitting at gate E5 heading to Tegucigalpa, Honduras (ask us about the song when we get back).  The airport was great, boarding was normal, but it’s never a good thing when

1.     1. Your pilot comes on and says due to weather you will be waiting on the runway for at least 30 minutes and it will probably be a bumpy ride when we take off.

2.     2. When it is so bumpy that SaraBeth has a near panic attack and Bianca is suddenly upgraded to Business Class to calm her down. 

However, the good news is we made it as did our luggage!

We have a very eclectic group of volunteers.  For starters, the majority of the volunteers here are from BYU or the Northeast.  We are daily learning more and more about the Mormon faith.  We have Aneka who is from Germany and 2 years ago moved to Billings, MT.  Freddie aka Fe Fe (pronounced Feh Feh), Nicco, and Marco (unable to pronounce his actual name) who are all from the Dominican and speak un poco ingles … meaning they can say “yes,” “how are you?” and “Oh my gosh.”  Gillian was born in Scotland and moved to the US when she was 5.  The list goes on….

If you’re worried about our safety and wellbeing in the DR, you don’t need to be.  We have very strict rules.  No alcohol at The Hummingbird (our hotel), no motorcycle taxis, and we must stay in pairs.  We do talk to strangers though.  They highly encourage us to get to know the local people.  We also have a watch dog here at the Hummingbird.  Her name is Princessa.  She does a lot of sleeping, has fleas, and barks at any and everything that walks by the hotel.  She is no special breed, just a mutt who we are growing to love more and more even with her 4 am howling. 

 

Other Brilliant Ideas/Thoughts

1.    1. Spanish Nights – Bianca and I will only converse in Spanish.  Mas o menos.

2.    2.  Facebook video post  (pending internet situation) – be watching for them

3.    3. Spanish Movie nights – Such as Transformers 2 … yeah that’s right they have it here in the DR.  We could have bought the pirated version tonight as we ate our ice cream. 

4.     4. Spanish words of the day – We post new words we learn on the door.

5.     5. START A BLOG!!!  - SB randomly created this sight so now we have to post

6.     6. Find Supermercado de Janet before we leave

Living the Dream (Project) 

SB and B

P.S. – We skype, facebook message, iChat… all as we carry our computers across the pool area.  If you do happen to reach us, we will have some great conversations!  There is a strong possibility we will be investing in local business in the form of the internet café this weekend.  And Brian Hey!  Yes, the pool was refreshing!

Coming Soon… Local Dishes, Beach Ratings, Local Nightlife, Survival Guide, and we will actually throw in some life changing moments!  Caution …. Spanish will be implemented the longer we are here.