Un dia al campo y una noche de baila

Driving up the rocky mountain to al campo de Senor (alternative name), we did not know what to expect. I looked out my window at blurred visions of sugar cane and pastures of farms with cows and horses roaming free. I knew that Senor's home would be a farm, but I still had never been on a farm and the experience is something that I cannot expect. The bright tall jungle of different greens, mixed with the dark maroon red earth reminded me of a kind of Christmas in July... or June. It was tranquil and peaceful, like how everyone sits around doing nothing after having a holiday meal.

Senor's home was open and friendly with no doors, and the windows allowed for a breeze to cool our necks as we greeted his wife, brother, and parents who all live there. In the small backyard was the kitchen, which was an open flamed stove cooking under a tin roof where pork was being prepared for us. The aroma smelt like Pascha, when the lamb is on the spit and the coal fills the air all the way up the block. The animals must have liked the smell too because on the floor was a cat and her two baby kittens feeding and sprawling out on the tar by the stove.

As we sat and had community time under a tree, we watched turkeys and chickens roaming free. Senor caught a chicken and taught me how to hold it and calm it by grabbing with two hands around the feathers so that the chicken cant fly away. It was very exciting! There was no ritual sacrifice of cutting off the chicken's head for lunch or anything like that, because la Senora was already cooking something delicious. I'm sort of relieved that I didn't have to watch any animals die... but it probably would have been a really cool experience.

Unfortunately the cows were not ready to be milked while we were there, which Senor apologized for. I'm pretty sure all of Sosua knew how excited I was to possibly milk a cow. Instead, however, Senor's brother and he set us up for some horseback riding on their neighbor's horse. When I mounted el caballo I channeled my 12 year-old-self after a week of horseback riding daycamp, and I told Senor's brother, "No, esta bien. se puedo montar." I grabbed the reigns and took off. haha It was a lot of fun, I felt like a little kid trotting out of sight. Unfortunately my turn on the horse lasted about 10 minutes, and I had to share. But maybe... just maybe, I've discovered my childhood dream. I even felt the urge to clean the hoofs after.

Our lunch was a perfect Dominican meal. There were two different kinds of rice, pork and chicken falling off the bone, platanas fritas, ensalata papa, and ensalata regular.  Definitely one of the most amazing home cooked meals I've eaten in a long time.

After lunch we walked to Senor's neighbors house, the same neighbor who's horse we borrowed. This man was known as kind of a local loco. He was painting his house bright green, while wearing bright sky blue crocks and revealing boxers. Though the man was loco, like most locos, he was also sweet and full of life and energy. He radiated happiness. Normally, his job was as a Bachata instructor and so Senor told him that he should teach us all a lesson in Bachata. (For those of you who don't know Bachata, it is a dance like Merengue or Salsa that originated in the DR.) Before we knew it, we were outside and all of a sudden music began blairing from inside the house and Senor told us to come in and dance. We were all pretty good at dancing already. El Loco even said, "Why did you give me these girls, they can already dance!" (in Spanish). A mini fiesta broke out for an hour and the neighborhood kids joined in the dancing with me! They were so cute with their braids and shy faces, as soon as we gave them attention their guards went down and they were partying up.

Unfortunately the day ended shortly thereafter and it was time to go home and sleep. We did a lot of activities in a short amount of time and everyone was tired because of it.

When the day ended I didn't mind that I didn't get to milk a cow. I played with chickens and turkeys, rode a horse, danced Bachata, and had a home cooked meal. I'd say thats a pretty full and wonderful day.

The dancing didn't end there though... two of my groupmates and I decided that there was far more dancing to be done. So we tore up Sosua's dancefloor from 12-5am.

While out, I truly experienced life here. A young man offered to us "whatever we need." He was about 17 and was very explicitly offering sex, drugs, and "whatever else we wanted." He was annoying, inappropriate, and invasive. He also took it upon himself to call me his girlfriend at which point I snapped, "nigga I aint your girlfriend. Pull up your pants and go home to your padres." As he continued to speak inappropriately I continued to call him names like joven, or hijo, or nino, because he wouldn't leave us alone and I wanted him to know that we thought he was a child. We continued to ask him what he wanted to be when he grows up and he said "a hustler" and when my group member asked him what he would hustle.. the boy hesitated to answer and I said, "drugos." The boy said yeah, he wants to be a hustler of everything, drugs, sex, everything. It was a very sad and realistic 20 minute conversation, and even more sadly, it's very normal and typical of nightlife here in Sosua.

Soon after our conversation we turned around from where the boy was leading us, and we went to a discoteca where, even though the place was flooded with sex workers, we were able to dance the night away. At one point my roommates and I were getting the attention of some other tourists, and a sex worker swooped in and started grinding on them. It's funny that she thought we could be a threat to her business. Puta got in the way of my groove. The night went on like that. We danced American, Bachata, Salsa, and it was perfect. The sex workers stared at us doing our thing and being in our own dance world. When the club closed at 4am we left to get some chimmi churries and then go to the next club. At the other club there was a cover charge that we didn't have the energy to pay or go into so we turned around and went back to bed. We'll do that another day.

Only one more weekend here! We've got to make it count!

El Loco, Senor, y La Senora... are obviously not their real names, but were used for the sake of privacy.