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If God can't do something, how is he still omnipotent?

2011-03-10T08:07:00.000-08:00

Hello!

I’ve recently had debates or talks with people about how we can say that God “can’t” do something, and yet he still remains omnipotent. Examples that you might have heard are questions like “Can God die?” or “Can God make a rock so big he himself can’t lift it?”, etc. You've likely heard them.

In fact, I’d argue that there is quite a list of things which God cannot do. These include:

God cannot die

God can’t contradict himself

God cannot be deceived

God cannot improve himself

God cannot bend a paperclip into a square circle

God cannot lie

God cannot stop loving

God cannot be surprised

God cannot create a world with morally free creatures which cannot independently choose evil

There is much more to this list, but you get the idea. In short – there is quite a bit that we would be logical to state that God cannot do.

In fact, in some cases to say that God cannot do something is reflective of God’s perfection. For instance, because you and I can lie, and God cannot, that doesn't mean that this is a limitation of God or his power. We would say it is a good thing for God to never lie – the fact that we can do something which God cannot does not make that a limiting factor for God’s omnipotence!

So, that brings us to the original question – If God can’t do something is he still omnipotent? As you may have guessed, my answer is yes! He can be omnipotent. It all comes down to the definition of the word. (Doesn’t it seem that many issues do?)

If you just say that Omnipotent means "all-powerful," that definition isn't specific enough.

If you say that Omnipotent means "the ability to do anything you want," that's closer but still not correct. Even if God wanted to make a square circle out of a paper clip, he couldn't.

Here’s a definition we might be able to use: Omnipotence is having all the power one needs to do anything which power can do.

The example I just gave above about the square circle is an example of this. Making a square circle isn’t in the realm of “power” – it doesn’t matter how strong you are, this doesn’t lie within the realm of what power can do.

This clearly has implications on free will, and is part of the answer of “If God is all-powerful, why is there evil in the world?” If God wants to let us freely choose, then he has to allow for the possibility for us to choose evil – that’s just how a world with morally free creatures works.

Anyway, hope this makes some sense! I had talked about it enough recently that I felt it warranted a post of its own. Any thoughts? Let me know!

The Shack, Mark Driscoll and the Trinity

2011-02-12T16:08:00.000-08:00

Hello!

It’s been a while since I wrote here, but I want to get back on the train of blogging here and there. Lots going on in my life, which I’ll save for another day. Today, the topic is a book that many of you have probably read at some point – The Shack by William Paul Young.

Specifically, I came across a YouTube video of local Seattle pastor Mark Driscoll very pointedly telling his flock to not read the book if they hadn’t already. Let’s just say he’s very strong in his opinion of the book – and I want to give this blog post in response to his thoughts. If you haven’t seen the video yet, here’s a link to his book review given at Mars Hill Church.

His main thesis is that “the book is about the Trinity”. All of Driscoll’s points then follow from this theme – that this book is specifically about the Trinity and is attempting to help us understand its inner workings. If you’ve read The Shack, that really isn’t true. Sure, there are parts of it which are about the Trinity and represent the author’s own take on the Trinity. But at its very core this book isn’t bout the Trinity and isn’t a 250 page essay building a theology about the Trinity. That isn’t the purpose at all. The Shack is a book about relationship, God’s love for us, forgiveness, reconciliation and compassion. It’s about a God that loves us enough to die for us – and wants Him to be our everything and depend wholly on him in a beautiful, reconciled relationship. This book is much, much more than “about the Trinity”.

But, for the sake of argument, let’s grant Driscoll’s position that this book is about the Trinity, or at least that the portion which is about the Trinity is enough to warrant a strict warning against reading. Driscoll gives four arguments, and I’ll cover each one as presented.

Argument #1 – This book violated the Second Commandment to not make a graven image of God

In other words, “You shall have no other gods before me” (Exodus 20:3). Does The Shack violate this? I really don’t buy this argument from Driscoll. To defend his point, he states that the book takes God and makes him part of creation; that it takes the invisible God and makes him visible, and quotes a verse in Romans which states that we shouldn’t serve created things.

In all honesty, this argument just doesn’t hold much weight. The book is not making God into a created being – it constantly upholds that God is strictly not part of creation! Never does it suggest that God was created. The verse in Romans that Driscoll quotes is irrelevant. As for taking an invisible God and making him visible (in order to create something to worship), that simply isn’t what the book is doing. The Shack isn’t giving us a new god to worship, and isn’t making a graven image or idol in any way shape or form.

Driscoll argues at the end of this point that we can display God only as displayed in the Bible - as Jesus, or as a dove, per the New Testament. This argument also doesn’t hold much weight. That God can’t choose to represent himself however he wants (a burning bush, a thunder/lightning cloud, a pillar of fire, etc), including as a woman or a man, isn’t an argument I buy. Even if it was inadvisable to represent God (physically) as something other than what we see in Scripture, God portrayed in The Shack isn’t a graven image.

Argument #2 – The Shack promotes goddess worship

This argument is the weakest of the four that Driscoll brings up. He essentially says that, since God is shown as a woman, the book becomes one about goddess worship. He doesn’t go very far in trying to defend this position, and it’s not worth going very deeply into this. I think the best case I can make against this argument is to let The Shack speak for itself. Here are two quotes which directly address this issue, and show why this doesn’t approach goddess worship:

“Mackenzie, I am neither male nor female, even though both genders are derived from my nature. If I choose to appear to you as a man or a woman, it’s because I love you. For me to appear to you as a woman and suggest that you call me ‘Papa’ is simply to mix metaphors, to help you keep from falling so easily back into our religious conditioning.” (p. 95)

“The man standing next to [Mack] looked a bit like Papa; dignified, older, wiry and taller than Mack… ‘This morning you’re going to need a father.’” (p. 220-221)

This really sums up the argument – The Shack isn’t about goddess worship. In it, God decides to take on a form to break religious stereotypes about how He looks. I don’t see an issue in that, and I rather liked how this book decided to portray God.

Argument #3 – The Shack espouses the theology of modalism

In short, modalism is “the belief that the Heavenly Father, Resurrected Son and Holy Spirit are different modes or aspects of one God, as perceived by the believer, rather than three distinct persons in God Himself.” (Wikipedia is wonderful!)

In short, that God took on the form of Jesus and died for our sins, that God takes on the form of the Holy Spirit, and takes on the aspect of being God as well. The Trinity isn’t three distinct parts in modalism, and that is where the heresy lies.

So, does The Shack promote modalism? This argument was perplexing to me. In honesty, I wonder how Driscoll got this idea out of this book. I’m not going to judge if he read it or not – there are some unclear parts - but this seems to be tough to read into the book if you look at it as a whole.

Here is a quote which specifically addresses – and refutes – modalism within The Shack:

“‘There are three of you, and you are all one God? Did I say that right?’

–‘We are not three gods, and we are not talking about one god with three attitudes, like a man who is a husband, a father and a worker. I am one God and I am three persons, and each of the three is full and entirely the one” (p. 103)

Put simply, this book doesn’t espouse modalism. Yes, I agree that this book does have issues where sometimes it is ambiguous and there may even be some places where it approaches modalism. This is unfortunate, but is not a sign that this book is modalistic – page 103 specifically addresses that. I can write an entire blog post on how this book represents the Trinity and its values and shortcomings, but that isn’t for this space. The Shack isn’t modalistic, and that’s enough for argument #3.

Argument #4 – The Shack denies hierarchy within the Trinity

This is, I think, the strongest argument that Driscoll brings up in contest of The Shack. Much of Young’s book does emphasize that there is no hierarchy within the Trinity. He lays this out specifically here:

“Mackenzie, we [the Trinity] have no concept of final authority among us, only unity. We are in a circle of relationship, not a chain of command…What you’re seeing here is relationship without any overlay of power…Hierarchy would make no sense among us” (p. 124).

Well, that’s a pretty clear point that Young is making. So, does this mean that The Shack is something we should disregard and not read, as Driscoll suggests?

Driscoll argues that Jesus stated a chain of command when he says the Father sent him here (John 5:37, 6:57) and that he could only do what the Father does (John 5:19-20).

This argument made me pause for a second to think. It does seem that there are several instances where Jesus prays to God, asks God for his blessing, and even asks to not die on the night He is betrayed. At first glance, this does seem to be a strong Scriptural theme which negates Young’s view of the Trinity in The Shack. How can this be reconciled?

The one weakness I see in this argument is that, after some research, it seems that there is quite the debate among various Christian theologians and thinkers regarding a hierarchy or structure within the Trinity. There are arguments on both sides and this is far from settled.

For the side which would side with Young’s interpretation, all the verses which refer to a hierarchy are from Jesus while he was living as a human in our world. This hierarchy can be explained as a temporary situation which existed while Jesus was limited here on Earth. Jesus was limited in other ways – he had a physical body, he needed to eat, drink, etc – and this could be a different manifestation of the limitations which Jesus took on coming to be with us.

There are books written about this topic – I only want to argue that this point is in contention, and it’s OK to disagree on this point. Each side does have good arguments and it’s something I want to look into further after reading this book. This isn’t as settled as Driscoll presents in his talk, and this weakens the argument.

Perhaps you have some thoughts? Are there an other scriptures which seem to suggest a hierarchy within the Trinity? Let me know - as I said I want to find out more about this and perhaps you can point me in the right direction!

------------------

So, there are the four arguments which Driscoll presents if this book is specifically about the Trinity. Numbers 1-3 do not seem to be valid complaints against the book, and number four is, at best, under contention.

On top of all of this, as I stated at the beginning, this book is not “about the Trinity” as Driscoll states. It’s about much, much more than that. In light of that, there is no really good reason to recommend against reading this book – even the arguments specifically about the Trinity don’t hold up too strongly.

This book is one which I highly recommend reading. It’s doing a wonderful work between God and I, helping me see him as less monolithic. I have felt for a long time that praying to God was like praying to my bedpost – I struggle with the relationship feeling personal. This book is one more way that I feel a few of the mental bricks in the wall between God and I are getting chipped away. And if that’s what the book accomplishes for you, it’s worth the read – even if there are a few theological holes or ambiguities on the pages.

More thoughts to follow on whatever else is on my mind – this was a long post but it deserved that!

-Nate

Would Jesus wash Osama Bin Laden's feet?

2010-03-15T22:04:00.000-07:00

You see the above painting? It is an image which portrays Jesus washing the feet of several world leaders in the year it was made. These include Tony Blair, Kofi Annan, Bush, a former prime minister of India, and perhaps most strikingly, Osama Bin Laden. This man certainly stands out in this painting – not only due to his white robe, but also to his image as one of the most hated men in the world (at least by most Americans).

This was a news story a few years ago in the Seattle area. A Christian conference organization named Heavenly Sanctuary was going to have a get-together discussing the character of God, and they hired the Justinen Creative Group to create a poster- and this is what the artist came up with. The captions for it included “Follow the Leader”, “God IS Great”, and “Jesus- Still Too Radical?” The last one is my favorite. To make a long story short, the Christian community in the Seattle area went up in arms about this poster, and pressured the malls where it was put up to take it down. The offended Christians succeeded, and soon this thought-provoking piece of art was removed.

Why am I bringing up something from a few years ago to write about? In short, I feel the need to address this issue quite directly. Would Jesus wash Osama Bin Laden’s feet? My answer is this: unequivocally yes. In my view, the answer to this question needs to get discussed, since clearly there is difference of opinion of the appropriateness of the image.

To clarify the topic being discussed here, this isn’t a discussion of questions such as “Does Jesus forgive Osama?” or “Will Osama go to heaven?”, nor is it a discussion of anything regarding the relationship between the United States and Osama.

I want us to focus in on this: Does Jesus love Osama? Did Jesus die for Osama bin Laden just as much as he died for you and I? Wouldn’t Jesus wash Osama’s feet?

Scripture is clear.

Jesus would.

This is one of the steps of loving our neighbor, of loving our enemies. Jesus directly tells us to do both. We need to see the worth in others, the worth in those that we might think don’t even deserve to live. We need to love those people, just as Christ loved us. Jesus died for everyone, even if not everyone chooses Jesus.

So, why the backlash against this painting? Where is the offense? How is this painting not representing Jesus? I see it as one of the most succinct and powerful images of Christ I have ever seen. It makes me sad that some found it offensive, rather than inspiring. It should serve as a reminder to love and serve everyone, including your enemy. Instead, it became a news story for Christians offended by a beautifully symbolic work of art.

Take another look at the painting. It’s beautiful.

-Nate

Bringing ideas to the developing world

2009-09-04T19:13:00.000-07:00

Hola todos –

I hope you’re all doing fine. I am finally back in Seattle and it’s so nice to be home! I’ve only been home for a little bit, but I had a few more thoughts to put up as I begin decompressing from my summer abroad. The photos you see above are some beautiful shots from the last weekend trip I took in Samana. That waterfall was absolutely gorgeous - it's called the Salto de Limon.

This post is about a subject which nearly all of my development classes at UW have touched. To what extent should “the West” – white people – approach development as bringing solutions to the poor, and to what extent should it be us listening to the poor about what they need and letting them determine what we bring them? I’ve had some UW classes emphasize that we need to err (or even depend solely) on the poor to determine what they need and what solutions to bring. After my summer in the Dominican, I’m starting to think that sometimes, there truly are ideas and thoughts (and technology) which haven’t reached the backcountry of the developing world which will provide solutions the poor haven’t come across – and may be a better solution than what the poor themselves would come up with.

Let me clarify first of all, that this will be different in each country, and even each region of a country. These critical specifics will affect what solutions may be introduced, and what options are already known by those living there. It is vitally important that this be done or aided by people who are extremely experienced/grew up in the country or region. I cannot say how important experience is. How do you expect to know what to do if you haven’t been somewhere very long?

Given this, I’m going to apply what I have learned in the Dominican (over only a short period of two months) to this principle and show why we shouldn’t necessarily be scared to bring in and share some of these ideas, thoughts and technology. I know this directly contradicts what I put above – but we were starting to see trends emerging which would (or maybe will) lead to changes in how Esperanza works in the Dominican. At the least it provides evidence that if you live somewhere long enough, you can start to think of solutions which are applicable to the people there.

So, what exactly do I mean by “solutions”? That’s quite a general word, but let me try to give some examples so you know what I might be thinking about.

Remember that post I had a few weeks ago about microfinance? That’s the first type of help that can come. It can be:

Helping someone to think of new business opportunities

Technical training to get new skills

Advertising training

Customer relations training

Help with goal setting

On a slightly different line of thinking, one of the other interns in the Dominican had a fantastic thought she brought up with us. What if we were able to do a trade show for various successful small business owners in an area who could come together, share various ideas on how to achieve such a success? The solution wouldn’t stop here – these leaders would then be charged with going into their communities and teaching others of how to make their businesses more successful.

A similar twist on this would be for workers who have contact with many associates to pool together “stories of success” and make them into a format shareable to other borrowers in the field. For instance, the branch office I worked at in Samaná could put together a couple sheets of paper which could be read aloud to the illiterate borrowers about different business strategies which have created success where usually there is stagnancy. This would be much easier to put together than a trade show – but it highlights what I think is one of the most critical elements necessary for those in the Dominican to create better businesses: information and ideas sharing/communication. I feel like if people were given more ideas of how they could run their business in a way which would help them feed their family and improve their living situation, they wouldn’t take the advice lightly for the most part (though of course, some would).

Another type of help which could come to those in the Dominican would be help with is money management. This is most obviously present when at the meeting directly previous to a new loan dispersal. The loan officers will typically ask an associate “how much money do you earn monthly as a household?” This question is usually met by blank stares, and then a guess which is usually taken out of thin air. They then are asked to guess their expenditures, which is again guessed. The thing is - many times they guess expenditures which are several times over their income. This doesn’t suggest anything other than the fact that many have very little idea what their money flow is.

This has several obvious and major implications, such as unknowingly running out of money or food, having no savings, not being able to support the business, not paying back their loans and more. The simple fact is that there could be many benefits to giving some money management training to associates. These include stability, future planning, better business growth, and more money available for the family.

These examples are just a few thoughts that support that there are some thoughts and ideas which would benefit those in the developing world. They need to be introduced in a humble, sensitive manner and by people who have lived in the country or have worked there for a long time. It must be done intelligently, compassionately and lovingly. It cannot be done with pride or a sense of superiority, but rather with a servant’s heart. I think this passage in Philippians 2:5-8 sums up what I’m trying to say the best:

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:

Who, being in very nature God,

did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,

but made himself nothing,

taking the very nature of a servant,

being made in human likeness.

And being found in appearance as a man,

he humbled himself

and became obedient to death—

even death on a cross!

That’s the description of what mindset a development worker should have.

-Nate

A little peek into my possible future

2009-08-26T05:26:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone –

I want to first give a notice that this post is mostly me processing through and putting on paper some of the thoughts that have been developing in my head the past few months. You may or may not find it interesting, but I figured it wouldn’t hurt to post this.

Everything here in the Dominican is wrapping up for me. I’m just starting my final full work week right now, and that’s a little weird to think about. These past two and a half months have certainly flown by – and I’ve had a blast. To say I’ve grown or changed while being here would be an understatement. I’m quite certain that I’ll find out what I learned as time goes on – I tend to leave a long trip with this sense that things are different, except I never have the ability to say how.

At the very least, this summer has been very eye-opening and valuable to me because I believe it will go a long way in determining where I am next year after graduating. I have obviously been thinking about more than this, but future planning has been the most concrete idea to come thus far. The rest will follow with time as I said above.

I am quite certain after this summer that I want to live abroad after graduating, working in a similar capacity to how I am now. While I am not going to limit myself to only searching for an international job, that will be my first choice. I absolutely love speaking Spanish and I’ve found in my travels that I am independent and flexible enough to enjoy an extended stay in a foreign country. I feel confident that an extended stay (one or two years) working for a non-profit and bringing in a fairly low income would be a job I could handle – and would probably love. I have a growing passion for applying these personal interests and skills, my studies and my faith into a career in international development.

The next step for me is to figure out what I want to do in international development. This may take another year or two (or perhaps much longer). My journey to even getting to this conclusion has taken a long time – starting with my first international trip to Spain in 2004. Each international trip I have taken, no matter the length, has given me some very valuable lesson guiding my next step. I can sum up the way my future plans have changed after each trip as follows:

Chapter 1: Spain 2004 - Missions trip with high school youth group. This is where my passion for Spanish began. I became enrapt with the language. This is also where I decided that I wanted to do something internationally. I didn’t know what – just that my future would involve international work.

Chapter 2: Dominican Republic 2007 - This 10 day missions trip was with my college youth group came to the very poor southwest of the Dominican. Here was my first run in with extreme poverty – and here is where my desire for doing international development began.

Chapter 3: Argentina Summer 2008 - In the 6 weeks I spent here, I had my first semi-extended international stay. I realized that living abroad was a blast, especially in a situation where I used Spanish more than English. I also learned that I love Latin America. Especially the Argentine people.

Chapter 4: Spain Fall 2008 - For four months I lived in southern Spain, and I learned a couple things: First, four months is a very short amount of time. It was over before I knew it. Secondly, I learned I really don’t care much for Europe, at least in terms of wanting to live or work there. I didn’t feel the same passion and excitement I had visiting the Dominican and Argentina. I see Europe, especially Western Europe, as a place I can visit later in life. It is much more accessible and easy to travel for those older than their 20s than is Latin America. Europe will have its place and time for me. Right now, it isn’t where my heart is.

Chapter 5: Dominican Summer 2009 - As I said, this trip has given me a direction for how I want to work – internationally and with development. It has also helped me develop a short term plan for my next step.

I am going to graduate from UW this June with a double degree, and then hopefully have a place in the world to go work for the next year or two to gain experience. I am then planning on using that international experience to write the next chapter of my life, which will be grad school. It has become increasingly obvious to me this summer that I need to get an advanced degree. What degree am I going to get? Well, I am hoping that if I get a year or two of work experience, that will help direct the direction my studies will take.

Basically, the degree is going to need to be something specific. Undergrad studies are designed to be general so you can figure out what you’re interested in – which is exactly what they did for me. Grad school, for what I’m trying to do, is where you find a specialty niche and focus, focus, focus. The more specific my degree, it seems the better that will help me find valuable work in something I love to do. Call it my Chapter 6.

So, there you have it. My three-four(ish) year idea of what my life might look like. I am completely open to this changing if circumstances come out differently. If I end up living in Seattle for the next 3 years and never go abroad and somehow grad school doesn’t come so rapidly, I’m not going to throw a fit because my life didn’t turn out how I envisioned it. I want to “go with the flow” and see where the flow takes me – though it seems to me the flow is taking me in the direction I have visualized.

I’ll be back in Seattle in about a week – I'm looking forward to seeing you then!

-Nate

Are expensive short-term mission trips worth the cost?

2009-08-24T05:28:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone –

I want to give a post about something a bit off topic from what I’ve been posting lately, but I feel it warrants some thoughts – especially for those of you who have gone on short term mission trips. I had some talks with other fellows early on in the summer regarding the value of spending a fairly large amount of money to go somewhere for just ten days. This may be a little repetitive for any of them reading this, but I felt this needed a blog post.

The question is: why spend $1600-2000 on a international trip where you are working for a week and then just coming back to the US? Are you really making any sort of long-lasting difference? Are you doing enough to justify spending that $1600 – 2000 on a trip and plane tickets, rather than just sending it in full to a development organization that could immediately put the money to work?

All are difficult questions – and ones I’ve had to wrestle with after going on two such trips. In fact, the last night I had in Santo Domingo in 2007 with my spring break missions trip team was partly spent exploring that question. Quite frankly – I didn’t have an answer back then to these questions. Not having sufficient answers made me begin to question if the cons didn’t actually outweigh the pros of an international mission trip.

Two years later, I finally feel that I have a couple answers which to me make the pros of short term mission trips (or other service projects) outweigh the cons.

First: Any time people want to bring the ultimate message of Love and Hope to others, I think this is great. While this alone isn’t enough to answer the questions I posed above, especially since there are PLENTY of people in the US who need this message, it certainly is a plus which occurs with a mission trip.

Second:I feel like there is some amount of long lasting impact with some projects. The most obvious ones are buildings or other physical projects which some trips undertake. In the case of my trip to the Dominican, most of us didn’t have such a project. We were with children the entire day, playing sports, doing Bible lessons (sort of), and mostly just being with them when no one else was around. As you might guess, it was very hard to point to something and say “look, we made a difference”. Instead, it felt like we were just another group of white gringos to come through, give a few hugs and piggyback rides, only to get back on our bus and fly back to our comfortable beds in the States.

I argue that we are not “just another group”. These kids remember the people who come through. This was proven to me when a couple people who had visited the villages a couple years before came back. The kids remembered their names and even still had the nametags and drawings given to them two or three years before. This was absolutely surprising to me. The kids specifically remember the guys and girls who played with them for just a few days a couple years ago. This proved to me that there is at least some sort of long lasting effect on lives which may not be apparent upon leaving back home.

As you can guess, these two reasons alone are not enough to convince me of the value of short term mission and service trips. Which brings me to the strongest point:

Third: Mission and service trips change the lives of the people who go – and sometimes direct them to dedicating their life to service. I now consider these sorts of trips as an investment. The $2000 spent is well worth it when you consider how life changing this experience is for some. True, some people go home after a trip, say “well, that was a nice experience. I have some good memories and friends now” and don’t really give international service another thought.

On the other hand, many people find their first experience with international poverty to be striking, and can have a spectrum of reactions. This may be from being more aware of spending and finding ways to give to charities or serving the poor in their own community more, all the way to people who decide that serving internationally may be the career for them.

As you may have guessed, I fit into this latter category. My 10 day trips to Spain and the Dominican Republic were fundamental in my career development. I’m gong to explore this more in a future blog post, but suffice it to say that the roughly $3200 I spent (or rather, my parents spent…) was an investment in who I am today, thinking about living internationally.

I have seen plenty of friends impacted on various levels along this spectrum by a short term service or mission trip. This alone is what answered those questions I posed at the beginning. If this was all just about a 10 day spree costing $1600 with relatively minimal impact in the community and no impact on the people involved, well then I’d say that money could be spent in a better manner. For the reasons above, I see this as money well spent.

Think about it.

-Nate

Microfinance thoughts

2009-08-18T14:23:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone –

I wanted to share some thoughts about microfinance in the Dominican which haven’t been apparent to me until recently through observation and conversations with other interns. I see two major issues which are preventing microfinance measures from being as effective as they otherwise would be. First of all, I see a distinct lack of specific, well-thought out goal setting by associates. Quite simply: many cannot tell me why they got a loan, beyond saying “I want to grow my business”. The answer to the follow-up question “And why do you want to grow your business?” draws empty stares more often than not. Secondly, I see an oversaturation of certain businesses. Many borrowers settle for selling new and used clothing, making a colmado (small corner store which has various small food items, drinks and other goods). Let me develop these thoughts a little bit more.

First of all, I am extremely troubled by the lack of goal setting that many associates demonstrate. All of us working and who read about microfinance hear about its ability to assault poverty by allowing people to work their way into a healthier income, better housing situation, more food and education for their children. I have my qualms with some of these claims, especially with how great the affect is, but we’ll leave that to the side for now for the sake of argument. It just worries me that these borrowers don’t have a clear idea of why they are taking out a loan. I have to give very leading questions, referring to their children or capital improvements to their homes, in order to get any sort of long-term picture. Even then, the answer is somewhat forced and it seems the women and men are asking in their heads “why is this question being asked to me? I don’t understand why this is so important.”

Given, some of this may be due to a language barrier, and I may perhaps be asking the questions incorrectly, but I don’t feel that’s the case. I think its more likely that people either a) haven’t thought about the question or (more likely) b) have future goals, they just haven’t fully articulated them. I see this as a problem. There is a need for people to have a well-articulated idea of how exactly they want to apply this loan to their life and family.

Why is this important? I am still attempting to articulate this fully, but I feel there is an inherent value in having a specific goal in mind when undertaking a project as serious as starting a business. A goal will allow the women and men here to seek encouragement when looking at their business. It gives them a concrete example of how a growing business is helping their family. They can point to the extra food on the table, their child taking university classes, or their brand new concrete floor and use this as motivation to continue seeking to grow their business. This is my only concrete idea to answer this question – in reality, I’m struggling to articulate why I find this so important. I may have more ideas about this in the future. For now, I wanted to at least put this thought out there, and let you know that more will be settling with time.

Feel free to comment something about this! I’d love to hear any of your thoughts. I’d love to know, also, if you think this isn’t something important. Thanks!

Secondly, I want to address the oversaturation of business choices of the associates here in the Dominican. I have a much more concrete idea of this issue, and this one is quite concerning. Microfinance allows the borrowers to choose their own business – and much of the theory is built upon the idea that borrowers inherently know their community, and know what sorts of businesses would be most successful. After all, nearly all have lived in one area their entire life, they know their neighbors, and therefore know what items are in demand, what sells well, etc.

Unfortunately, in the Dominican we aren’t seeing this put unto practice with any real regularity. Many women settle for just two types of businesses: colmados and new and used clothing. This has caused what seems to be an oversaturation of these businesses. In a single bank of 20 women living in a small neighborhood already full of such stores, quite easily 10 or more of them will start such a business. This simply cannot be good for sales.

Again, I may be totally off-base and ignorant in this observation. I allow for the thought that these women truly do know what they are doing, and that another 10 colmados in a neighborhood is one of the most profitable businesses they can get into. However, I am certainly not convinced of this. I would be surprised if someone were to show me that the colmados formed are equally or more profitable than rarer businesses.

The thought myself and some other interns have is that the women, instead of choosing the most profitable business for their family, are going the route of least resistance. It is far more comfortable to start up a business such as a colmado or clothes sales when those are stores they see everywhere, and they see their friends in that market. They might know less about other businesses, and therefore instead of looking into that other type, follow their friends.

Regardless of the reasons for starting colmados or clothing businesses, it seems fairly clear that there is an oversaturation of these businesses. I would love to someday see someone go and collect data regarding these businesses and their profitability. If it turns out these businesses are not receiving the type of profit that other businesses are, I’d argue that Esperanza should considering helping associates think of alternative businesses. I have met some women who recognized this oversaturation and chose less-common businesses, such as working as town veterinarians and selling cleaning supplies, and are currently very successful.

I am not arguing that Esperanza somehow force people to choose other businesses; I don’t agree with that at all. Instead, I think it would be valuable for the associates to see that their family may perhaps benefit more from a different type of business, and then choose between all the options. In some cases, surely a colmado is the best choice; and in some it may not be. I see no harm and potentially a lot of good (and profits!) if the associates begin to choose from a greater selection of businesses.

That’s really all I have to write for now. Sorry if it seems somewhat scattered – I have a lot of thoughts bouncing in my head and I just wanted to get them on paper to help me process them.

Please do let me know if you have any thoughts about any of this – I’d love to hear from any of you.

Mil gracias!

-Nate

Waterfalls and success stories

2009-08-13T12:29:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone!

I wanted to give you a quick update about what’s been going on in the Dominican – I have been having QUITE the adventure as of late. I won’t share all the intimate details of each day, but I had the most amazing outdoors weekend here in the Dominican. I went to a city called Jarabacoa with six others. This is basically the outdoors center of the Dominican, as it is up in the mountains, has a slightly different climate, and has all sorts of outdoor activities to partake in.

Sunday was spent doing what is called “canyoning”. What exactly is that? Basically, there is a little canyon carved by a river and what I got to do was go down a certain section of it – which included repelling down waterfalls. It was AMAZING. There were 3 separate waterfalls which we repelled down with the first two being around 6 meters high and 10 meters high. The last one? 35 meters high. That’s over 110 feet. It was absolutely incredible! And also the craziest thing I’ve ever done. If I didn’t know what an adrenaline rush was before, this definitely confirmed that my body can produce it. I’ve never been one for going down completely horizontal to the ground from such heights, but I can say that this was a great experience for me. It helped me get out of my “I don’t like taking risks” shell a bit, in a safe environment. I wish I had pictures of the trip, but sadly we didn’t have a camera. Here’s a photo of the tall waterfall we repelled down so you can see it though:

Along with this repelling, we got to swim down the river, slide down various rapids on our (now bruised) behinds, and we even got to zip line (!!) down one. Basically, the experience was awesome.

Saturday, Sunday and Monday nights were all spent at an American boarding school which is in Jarabacoa. One of the interns spent two years there, and they were nice enough to rent out to us their guest house. We were able to make s’mores, cook our own chicken and curry dinners, and more. It was very relaxing and a great place to go back to.

On Monday, we went to what is called the 27 Waterfalls (27 charcos), which was described to us as one of the coolest things you can do in the entire country. Basically, there is this river up in the mountains where a river has cut out 27 waterfalls in close succession, ranging from 2 meters high to up to 8-10 meters. Some waterfalls are better to slide down, as they have carved paths where you can go down, and most are better for jumping. It was ABSOLUTELY AMAZING. I have a couple photos here of our trip, and you can see how beautiful the scenery was. We just spent 3 hours in this beautiful setting, enjoying the feeling of jumping from rocks and good friends. I can’t think of a better afternoon to have. Enjoy the following photos! I highly recommend that you do this if you are ever in the Dominican. It only costs $14 and is an unforgettable experience.

I wanted to end off by showing you a copy of a ”Journal” which I did for Kiva recently. Basically, when a loan which is funded through Kiva ends, there is a follow up which needs to happen so that those who loaned are able to hear how the busineses are going, how the borrower’s situation has improved/worsened, etc. I was able to talk to one amazing woman named Inocencia. Her story is fantastic. I just copy and pasted the Kiva journal I wrote so you can see it here, followed with her picture.

Dear lender,

My name is Nate Sooter, and I am working with Esperanza International this summer here in the Dominican Republic. One of my opportunities is to catch up with borrowers who have taken out a loan with Kiva and Esperanza, in order to tell you, the lenders, how they are doing after the loan. I had the immense pleasure to speak with Inocencia Ortiz just yesterday, one of the La Amistad group members you lent to. I wanted to pass along an update to you about how her business is doing today, how your loan had a direct impact in her life and a few other updates.

Inocencia is happy to let you know she successfully finished paying her loan back a couple months ago. Her business is to hand-make, from her home, curtains, sheets and blankets for beds, tablecloths and more. She buys the thread and materials directly, and then uses machines in a room of her house to customize the orders she receives from those in her neighborhood. She also rides on a motorcycle with her son to other towns here on the Samaná peninsula to increase her sales possibilities. Though – she added with a laugh – she sometimes finds herself caught in an unpredictable tropical rainstorm. She is able to shrug this off with a good sense of humor and try to travel on only sunny days.

In fact, in these other towns, Inocencia is so well known and she is such a good businesswoman, she is able to sell on credit, and collects payments form those who cannot pay for their purchase immediately. This allows her to not only sell more, but allows her to help those who might not otherwise be able to save up for new bed sheets or a tablecloth.

After finishing the loan you gave her, she has currently been able to take out another loan with Esperanza – her eighth cycle. Inocencia is proud to state how she has never been behind on a payment in her nearly four years with Esperanza – including your loan through Kiva. With each loan, she tells me that her business has been growing. She is able to buy more varied materials and fabric. She is excited for the future of her business, and is very thankful for your support.

Inocencia also related to me how concrete of a difference your loan has made in her life. Through the microfinance process, Inocencia obtained enough profits to purchase the motorcycle I mentioned. This investment has allowed her to continue to expand her sales beyond just where she can reach on foot. The photo I included with this journal is of her on this motorcycle.

More importantly, while she was repaying back the loan you offered her, Inocencia was able to come to the aid of her son, who had a construction work-related accident. At 25, José was using a hammer and had an accident which seriously injured his eye. However, due to the extra profits Inocencia has received through investing in her business with the loan of you and others, she was able to get hospital care immediately for her son, medical tests, and eventually a surgery which saved the sight in José’s left eye. Many entrepreneurs I have spoken to in the Dominican have had a similar situation to Inocencia – the money goes to cover emergency medical expenses which otherwise would go untreated or would cause some to resort to receiving loans from moneylenders who demand upwards of 100-120% interest. This story alone can help you rest assured that your loan had a direct impact on lives here in the Dominican – José today can see out of his left eye in part due to your investment in Inocencia’s business.

In the future, Inocencia is hoping to save up money to continue upgrading her home. She hopes to fix the roof – which is currently just made of tin and can rust when the rainy season arrives – and hopes to construct some walls out of concrete blocks, rather than just wood.

Again, thank you very much for your loan to Inocencia and the others in La Amistad. Though I am only able to relate this story from one of the 15 members you lent to, you can be certain that your loan had an impact on each and every individual life of the borrowers. These loans through Kiva have a concrete and direct effect on the lives of women and men living here in the Dominican Republic, and I encourage you to continue lending on Kiva.

Now that this loan has been successfully paid back, consider giving to another Esperanza loan. For a list of all the Esperanza International loans currently seeking funding through Kiva here in the Dominican Republic, please click here: Currently Fundraising Esperanza Loans

Muchas gracias de todos aquí en la República Dominicana por tu préstamo a Inocencia!

Until next time,

Nate

The luxury of being on-time

2009-08-04T06:05:00.000-07:00

Good morning all –

While in this post I am not going to speak much about what’s happening here in the Dominican, you can rest assured that all is going well. I spent the most recent weekend away in an apartment near Cabarete on the north coast. Here are a couple photos I took there. It’s quite beautiful:

Now, on to the topic. If you have ever travelled to a developing country, or talked to someone who has travelled to one, you may have heard a reference to a “slower pace” of life, or how things don’t revolve around time. That is, many will hear of how hectic the US lifestyle is, and how it seems people in the US are so clock-oriented that they stress themselves out.

This much is true: America, Europe and other developed areas of the world do tend to live a life where more things happen during the day (appointments, activities, etc). The pace of life in developing countries such as here in the Dominican Republic is slower. I want to share with you a thought I had about this difference between these two lifestyles.

Quite simply, I see the ability of being “on time”, or planning one’s day around a schedule, to be a luxury available only in developed countries. I finally came to that realization just recently. Let me describe.

Here in the Dominican, an easy example of this is transportation. When one doesn’t have a vehicle of their own – which would be a majority of people here – they must depend on public or semiprivate transportation. In the Dominican, that comes in the form of gua guas which I mentioned in a previous blog. They are overly packed contracted vehicles which run on set routes and pick up and drop off people at random. They do not leave until the driver feels he has a sufficient amount of people on board, and they will constantly be stopping along the road to pick up new people and drop others off as they arrive at their destinations. Needless to say, they go SLOW. The driver has no incentive to really go fast – his incentive is to go slow enough to get as many people on board as he can.

This past Sunday, I had to get from Cabarete back here to Samaná. That’s roughly 180km, which isn’t necessarily a long way. It would be a trip of less than two hours if I had my own vehicle. How long did it take me? 5 1/2 hours and 4 separate gua guas. I averaged a speed of around 32 km/h on this road. My whole Sunday disappeared. This sort of event prevents me from planning anything beyond “I’ll be back Sunday evening sometime”.

Another example is that entering into a bank, post office or other service will also not be timely. I spent nearly an hour in a bank in Haiti (which was air conditioned, organized and seemingly well-run), and that is just to be expected. Cars also break down more commonly as they are poorly maintained, causing delays. There are no efficient trains or public busses which run on a set schedule here or in many other developing countries.

In short, people here cannot afford to tightly pack their schedules with activities, errands and other plans. It isn’t possible for someone to say when they will arrive somewhere unless it is an incredibly close location. You cannot go to a meeting and return on a set schedule – life just doesn’t work like that, especially in more rural areas. Santo Domingo is an exception in the Dominican, as many times you can access nearby amenities with some certainty of when you will get there and return – then again, this city is more developed than the rest of the country.

So, I return to my main point: being on time is a luxury of developed countries (and more developed areas of countries like the Dominican). We can create such a tightly packed schedule in the United States, Europe and other places because we have the luxury of knowing how long it will take to get there, how long the scheduled event will last, and how long it will take to get back. Many people can afford to have their own vehicles, and when they don’t, the bus, train and other public transportation systems are fairly reliable and on-time. This makes the day much more predictable, and this allows us the luxury of planning an intricately busy day if we so desire.

Next time you find yourself commenting on how people in the US are so busy and don’t seem to stop, just realize this – schedules are a luxury. It helps you be more productive than you otherwise might be. Most people around the world don’t have the ability to make that schedule.

Just some food for thought.

-Nate

The Adventure that was: Haiti

2009-07-29T12:47:00.000-07:00

(Thank you Jon Oleson for the photos!)

Hi everyone!

I wanted to write you an update on my recent trip to Haiti! While I didn’t have a camera on me, I stole these pictures from a couple other interns as examples of what we saw. Ready for some stories?

Haiti is quite an interesting country, and you can’t expect to go there and not have plans go somewhat awry. You just learn to be flexible and allow the trip to determine what happens at some points.

So, after a little bit of a payment debacle in Santo Domingo to get a ticket to Haiti – you need $45 USD cash to pay at the borders, which none of us have since, well, we have PESOS – we got onto a 9am bus to Cap Haiten. After many hours of bus riding and waiting at the Haitian border, we finally arrived in town around 5pm local time.

We were met by another Esperanza staff member Obed, who is a Haitian-American, and speaks both Creole and English perfectly. He lived in the south part of Haiti for several years when he was younger, and then has lived in the United States since, including going to college in Rhode Island. He was gracious enough to be our guide for Haiti, set up our hotel, transportation, and other activities.

This will be a thread throughout this story, but the hotel we wanted to stay at – the Roi Cristophe – told us they were “full”. And then sent us to another hotel which they said was connected, just in a different area of town. This hotel was under construction to say the least, had no main desk, very bare rooms, and many other amenities missing from the main hotel (such as well-functioning AC, towel and linen service, drinkable water, swimming pool, the list can go on). Why did I put “full” into quotations? You’ll hear the rest of this story later in my blog. Trust me, it’s interesting.

Anyway, Friday we had hashed out to spend the day at the Esperanza office in Trou-du-Nord, which is about 30 minutes away from Cap Haiten. Unfortunately, we were not able to spend any time in the field going to any repayment meetings – the main boss at the branch was at a meeting in the Dominican, so we had no transportation. However, we DID have a wonderful lunch at a home nearby, which you can see in this photo:

It was VERY tasty. In the afternoon, a couple of the fellows were able to go interview a couple associates to hear of the successes of their businesses. In Haiti, Esperanza and microfinance is certainly making an impact on lives.

After a fun night hanging in the hotel while talking and listening to music, we had a sight-seeing day on Saturday. We went to this place named The Citadel (Citadelle Laferrière), which is a huge palace and fort built back in the early 1800s by Henri Cristophe, a Haitian leader during their slave uprising. They built this fortress and 365 cannons to ward off any attempts by the French to take the island over again – and never had to use them, since there are lots and lots of cannons still left on top of the fortress. The following photos are from that trip, including a view of the grand palace (which is different than the citadel) and the cannon balls in the actual citadel

Saturday night, the whole hotel situation hits the fan. What happened is this: Some random employee had said that it’s $120/night between the 5 of us at the hotel. He wasn’t the boss there, just some kid who quoted a number, and said the sorts of facilities they had. As I listed above, the facilities were terrible. Being experienced travelers, we figured the price should have been closer to $50 per night. When we approached the employee who had been around all week about this (via Obed translating), he said, “Ok, fine – I’ll just charge you $350 instead of the $360.” Our response: ARE YOU JOKING?, that’s $3/night off. Ridiculous. After allowing Obed to translate this, the kid called his boss to tell him to come.

This is when it gets real interesting. The boss enters, and doesn’t act anything like a reasonable owner of a hotel at all. Instead of acting as he should have (weighing our complaints about the hotel to figure out a fair price for us to pay), he was extremely aggressive. He entered and immediately began accusing us of being unjust customers, stating angrily “Who do you think you are, coming into MY hotel and telling ME what to charge you?”, and otherwise changing the subject from the faults of his hotel to show why we deserved to pay the $120/night. David, one of the other fellows, did a good job of attempting to keep the conversation focused on the issue at hand – we cannot and would not pay that much, for the very understandable reasons we laid out. We were misled into believing this hotel was of higher quality than it really is. Perhaps someday it’d be that valuable, for now, it was on the same level (if not lower) than a Motel 6.

At some point in the night, several of us started to pick up that we may have started to bring ourselves (or Obed), into physical danger by agitating this man. He certainly was very wealthy, and we assumed he had friends in high places who he could call to deal with the issue of five pesky Americans. We were finally offered $260 for the three nights, and accepted it. Though this price was too high, it seemed to us that we needed to get away from this man.

We went to withdraw extra money from the main Roi Cristophe hotel to give to this man. At the Roi Cristophe, we learn an amazing fact: we had been part of an employee who was committing fraud. The man at the desk on Thursday who said that it was “full” was a friend of our not-so-friendly manager, and would send potentially wealthy people (i.e. anyone white) to the other hotel, which was no where near the same quality. In fact – the other hotel wasn’t even related! It was all a ploy to make us think we were somehow going to a legit place, which wasn’t legit at all.

In the end, the Roi Cristophe offered us rooms to stay the night at their hotel that night as a recompense for dealing with the fraud. We gladly accepted and quickly packed up from the other hotel and moved into a (MUCH) nicer and safer hotel for the last night.

And so ended the adventures in Haiti, as we left the next morning back to the Dominican. The Dominican now seems so much more developed than Haiti. It almost felt like I was going back home, to a 1st world country. The stark difference between the two is extreme. I am still processing through the adventure, but I was glad to see some of the 2nd biggest city in Haiti.

There are many more stories, but this post is already far too long. If you want to know more, just contact me and I’d be happy to talk about this – and even more I would love to hear about how YOU are doing too!

Survive that heat Seattle! You can do it.

-Nate

A culture of infidelity

2009-07-21T07:18:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone –

This blog is less an update on what is happening with me, and more about some observations about the Dominican culture of infidelity which many of us here have observed and discussed.

(As a slight sidenote, I’m writing this on my balcony overlooking the Bay of Samaná as a thunderstorm rolls in to my right...what a nice blog writing ambiance).

Before I get started, I just wanted to let you know that I’ll be spending this Thursday-Sunday in Haiti with 4 other fellows in Cap Haiten and Trou-du-Nord. We’re going to visit the Esperanza office in Haiti and perhaps hear some stories from Haitians who have been able to benefit from the microfinance loans they have received. I’m quite excited to go – it’ll be a somewhat expensive trip, but well worth it.

Most anyone who has been to the Dominican (outside of just being in a resort in Punta Cana…) quickly becomes aware of how infidelity is completely engrained in the culture. Nearly everyone in the Dominican is aware that their significant other probably has a different significant other. The infidelity goes both ways. Wives know their husbands are cheating and vice versa – and the amazing thing is that people would rather not talk about it than confront the issue. There was a Dominican staff member here at Esperanza named Analin who is just a couple years older than I, and she allowed us interns to pick her brain about the practice of infidelity. She ventured to guess that 90% of Dominicans in a relationship are cheating with someone else. And yet, even though everyone knows this is happening, they would rather ignore it (and have their affair), rather than challenge their partner. To challenge their partner would mean having to admit their own guilt of infidelity. Hence, the cycle just continues, with both parties guilty.

Beyond this, when the spouse knows the name of the other person in the affair, they will not seek a divorce. Analin told us a story about a woman who she knew that was recently given a new car by her husband. She then said she wanted to go drive by this one particular store, in order to show off to the mistress the new car she had been bought! This blew me away – she not only was living with an adulterous husband, but she wanted to show off her husband’s gift to the mistress in order to create a sense of jealousy!

I combine these new stories with my previous experience here in the Dominican in 2007. I came on a missions trip to the local bateyes, which are essentially Haitian refugee camps which the Dominicans created to get cheap labor for sugar cane harvesting. In Barahona, located in the southwest near the Haitian border, these bateyes are extremely poor, as they are throughout much of the country. When I arrived there I was completely taken aback – there were almost zero males in the entire village between the ages of 17 and 70. It was completely full of women with 8, 12, 14 children. It broke my heart. These children were almost all from different fathers, and the boys had no concept of a father figure in their lives. They were all aware that their brothers and sisters were not from the same father. When myself and other guys arrived into the town, the boys immediately clung to us. They just wanted a guy to throw them around, to give them piggy back rides, to give them a hug, to throw a baseball. Anything. It tore me up to see that these boys were “growing up” without a father to help them see how to be a man. And the cycle will continue when they become 20 years old and move out and father children from place to place. The one thing these boys need to set an example is a man – a father – and that’s exactly who is not present.

With no use of contraception and a lack of the males seeing any need to stick around, the women were left, in absolutely destitution, to try and feed a dozen hungry mouths. The culture of infidelity – of men not staying with the women and vice versa – is prevalent in every corner of this country. In fact, in most major towns and along major highways, there are cabañas, which really means “commit adultery here!” These are essentially motel rooms, but are not necessarily designed for stays overnight. Each room has its own garage so that your car is not visible from the street (and, hence, someone can’t know you’re in there due to recognizing your car). You pay for 4-hour blocks of time. The payment method is completely anonymous – there is a spot in the wall where a hand will appear, you give the correct amount of money, and the hand goes away.

In the end, one feels quite powerless to do anything here. Something needs to fundamentally change here, so that young boys and girls have fathers, mothers, mentors and leaders who can show them how to grow into men and women who are faithful to each other in a relationship and respect the other enough to not have affairs on the side. It’s something for you to pray for. I wanted to write this blog to make you aware of an extremely strong cultural subcurrent here – and with the hope that someday it may change.

I’m planning on writing a blog about microfinance soon – of some of the pros which I came in expecting to see, and then what the reality of it is like here in the Dominican. I have some thoughts which have developed through observation and conversations with others here in the Dominican, and I want to share them with you at some point. If I don’t get them up before I leave to Haiti, please pray for us there – and for those living here on the island of Hispanola. A lot of people need Jesus.

-Nate

El Cumpleaños fuera del país

2009-07-14T07:13:00.000-07:00

Saludos!

The photos you see above are from the recent weekend trip I made to Playa Rincón and an island named Cayo Levantado this past weekend. It was pretty awesome! And yes, that is a Piña Colada we are all drinking, and, yes, they were amazing.

I hope all of you have had a great past week! I recently spent my second consecutive birthday out of the US. I’ll be honest though – it was quite possibly my most uneventful birthday ever. It happened on a Thursday, and the only thing different about the day was I got a happy birthday phone call from my parents. It was great to talk to them – but after that, the day was quite “blah”. I did my normal work, went home, read a book, and fell asleep.

Exciting fiesta for one’s birthday, eh? Thankfully, this past weekend, some other interns came up here to Samaná, and we had a fantastic weekend hanging out at local beaches and towns on the peninsula. We actually were lucky enough to find a driver who took us place to place all weekend (for a price of course), but in the end it really didn’t cost us much. The beach we went to (Playa Rincón) is so secluded that you really either need to take a boat there from where we stayed the night, or you need to hire a taxi driver who stays with you all day and then drives you home when you’re ready to go. We opted for the latter option – and it really only cost about $8 a person. Gotta love the prices here!

The weekend was a great time to just unwind. I work quite a bit here (in the office from 8am to 6pm daily), and the weekends are a chance to “cargar las pilas” (recharge the batteries). It’s quite convenient that there are some of the most beautiful beaches within an hour drive of my house here!

Changing subjects, my friend Triller offered me his ukulele to borrow while I’m here in the DR, and I’ve taken full advantage of it. I love playing it at my house, and it provides entertainment while we are taking weekend trips. I’m learning a few songs on it, and I hope to have a larger repertoire by the time I head out of the Dominican. In fact, it’s one of the best ice-breakers that I have when going into the field. I bring it with me into the field to the loan repayment meetings, and it usually sparks some conversation with people there. I don’t even have to play it – people just have never seen a ukulele before. They call it “la guitarrita”, which is just “the little guitar”. Several people have offered to buy it from me – and I always ask them for a million dollars. No one’s taken me up on the offer yet.

Oh another point: please, please please know exactly what your shirt says when wearing it around, especially if it’s in another language. I absolutely died of laughing when I saw a shirt that a 60-ish year old Dominican man was wearing. In big print it said “Pornstar. Get some”. I was unfortunately not around any other Americans who could appreciate how funny this was – and I struggled mightily to try and translate “get some” into Spanish so that everyone else could know why I was laughing so hard. At the very least, I let them know that they should be aware of what their shirt says before wearing it outside, lest you be the source of some hearty laughter from someone who understands the language.

I am also planning on perhaps going to Haiti in 2 weekends. There are a few people going there, and I think that the opportunity is so unique – and the group so small – that I need to take advantage of it and just go. I really want to visit Haiti, and we wouldn’t be staying in a nice hotel somewhere far away from the poverty. I’d possibly be staying with one of the Esperanza workers who lives in a “small apartment with an outdoor bathroom”. We’ll just say that I won’t be in a touristy area of town. We’d be staying in Cap Haiten from Thursday-Sunday, and hopefully we’ll have the chance to attend a repayment meeting on Friday with some of the loan officers in Haiti. I’d love to have an opportunity to see how microfinance is working in Haiti. Unfortunately, the language barrier will prevent me from having conversations with individuals there like I do here in the Dominican, but it would still be a valuable experience. I feel a strong need to go to see Haiti, especially when I am on the same island for a period of 2 ½ months.

I’ll add another post this week with some thoughts I have regarding microfinance, the Dominican culture, and about my office here in Samaná. We’ll just say that where I am is in turmoil – largely the result of mismanagement. There are some fairly major legal issues here, and I’ll forward some information to you, though I want to first see what I can and can’t post on this public forum. Regardless, the next post should have some interesting thoughts! Keep posted.

Again, I hope you all have a wonderful week – it looks to me like at least Seattle will have some wonderful weather!! Check back in for a blog in a few days.

-Nate

Ps – YES I am allowed to wear shorts in the office now. The heat has become infinitely more bearable now that I can wear shorts. :)

A Dominican 4th of July

2009-07-06T12:11:00.000-07:00

Saludos!

I hope that all of you had a wonderful 4th of July, and all the wonderfulness that encompasses that holiday (save for potential burns, house fires and the occasional hospital visit…). I wanted to give a little update for how all is going down here in the Dominican.

I spent the most recent weekend and holiday in Santo Domingo, the country’s capital. Quite a few of us interns made the journey to the city, to unwind and generally enjoy the fact that there is no work on the weekend. Since the main office is in Santo Domingo, we were able to hang out with some of the others who did our training and are part of the staff. There is an apartment-ish place (which is more likened to a zoo based on the number of dogs, cats, birds and children) where a few of the interns live, and we hung out there a couple times over the weekend. Mostly, we just had a blast going out at night with everyone. On Friday night, we found an awesome colmado (translation: convenience store mostly filled with alcohol and sodas) next to a university and hung out there, and met random people from all over the place – including a crazy guy from Finland (he was a little…different…), and a really nice guy from Cuba. Sidenote: have you seen the movie Bedazzled? If so, remember when Brendan Fraser becomes the basketball player with bleached hair that sweats a ridiculous amount? That’s basically the same look this Finnish guy had.

Friday night, we all went out to this amazing outdoor terrace bar, which also had a dance floor. There was music all night to dance salsa, merengue and bachata, and it was such a blast. I hadn’t been able to dance since getting here, and that was easily my favorite night of the trip thus far. It was so much fun. Though I did feel quite a few eyes on me when the tall white guy with a backward hat was up dancing salsa amidst the Dominicanos…

Saturday night (during the day nothing happened at all: great success!), we all had a goodbye party for a couple of the Esperanza staff who are leaving to go study. Funny enough, both are going to UW, so it wasn’t really a goodbye for me, since I’ll be seeing them around Seattle come September! We just hung out on a balcony that is at the apartment building where the other staff lives, and then went dancing again at night. Not too bad of a way to spend the 4th of July! Nothing necessarily “American” happened (save the fact that we ate Pizza Hut ordered to the apartment…), but that was fine.

We actually tried to call the embassy to see if they had any sort of party for the local Americans…but it turns out their party/fireworks were on FRIDAY night, not Saturday. Leave it up to the American Embassy to celebrate the “3rd of July”. Due to this, we clearly missed the party, since we missed the memo of Independence Day occurring a day early this year.

I’m now at the office, about to finish up my first day in the (quite stormy) city of Samaná – I woke up several times last night due to the incredible lighting/thunder/rain/wind storm that blew all night. I got rained on while sleeping quite a bit, and generally sleep wasn’t easy because the wind would howl through the shutters that I have. I don’t have any windows, just these blinds, which don’t necessarily do a 100% job at keeping water and wind out.

Anyway, that’s all for now – I’ll write another update sometime soon!

-Nate

Beaches, microloans, and gua-guas, oh my!

2009-07-01T13:52:00.000-07:00

(the above photos are from my recent trip to Las Terrenas, which you can read about below!)

Hello!

It’s been a week since my last post, and I wanted to update all of you with some more photos and stories from the life in the upper 80’s with 90% humidity Dominican Republic. (As you can see, the sticky heat and I have a very close friendship). Basically, as I work in this office, I am “required” to wear jeans and a collared shirt. I put quotations around required, because I haven’t yet built up the courage to ask if I can wear a nice pair of shorts to work with the collared shirt. I made sure I brought some (what I consider), nice looking shorts which would go a long way to cooling me down AND keeping me looking somewhat professional. At least, I don’t know if that last part is true with my office manager Audilin yet – but we’ll find that out soon enough. Hopefully my slowly improving Spanish skills can woo my employer into allowing the pobre Americano to have some respite from the heat. Audilin I think would at least be somewhat sympathetic – he constantly looks in when its around 3pm and I’m sweating and laughs while he says “Ahhh Americano- tienes brillo!” The rough translation of this would be ”Hey American, you’re shiny! Sucks to be you hahaha”.

This last weekend, I was able to get a little mini-vacation in a beach town about 30 minutes to the northwest of me. Myself and 8 others who are interns or work for Esperanza went to Las Terrenas, which was a wonderful time to charge the batteries, relax, and go to the beach at least three times a day. We stayed at a wonderful little house-style hotel/hostel, and enjoyed the area. The water was absolutely clear, and blue, although the photos I took didn’t necessarily capture the colors involved. The clouds in the sky didn’t help it, but don’t worry, it was pretty beautiful.

With that trip comes a note about travelling city to city here on the Peninsula of Samaná. Basically, there are informal “gua guas” (9 seater vans), and the backs of pickup trucks. Everyone knows of the local spot where the rides originate from based on the town you stop in, and you just hop into a van or the bed of a truck after agreeing on a price to take the half hour ride to a city. One note about the vans: I may have said 9 seater van. That’s being somewhat generous. They are more similar to a VW bus in size and shape, and the one I was in held 24 people. It wasn’t comfy – 4 across in 3 different rows, with me sitting 3 across in a row facing the back, 2 behind me squeezed between the driver and myself, 4 in the front row, the driver, and then 2 “cobradores”, or kids who stand outside the van on the sliding door, collecting money as people get off. Let’s just say it was somewhat crowded.

I am also learning to enjoy my time in the field – though a few of the frustrations are starting to poke their heads up, too. Basically, for me to be able to do what I need to do to put a profile on Kiva, I need the full 5 woman group present at a bank meeting. At a bank meeting (a Bank of Hope), the meeting can range from 2 groups of 5 women, all the way to 8 groups of 5 women, with the cap at 40. Usually the meetings have between 3-5 groups. For me to get a profile up, I need a photo of the complete 5 member group. The frustration is that this happens only somewhat sporadically. Some bank loan officers are better at getting their associates to attend meetings than others, and unfortunately this week I’ve been going out with an asesora (loan officer), who has less than stellar attendance of her associates. Hopefully with time this changes – Audilin is trying to put some pressure on them to change the discipline of the borrowers, and I try to hint that full attendance will help not only me, but the borrowers. They have to attend meetings in order to get loans in the future! If that isn’t an incentive, I don’t know what is.

Anyway, I am absolutely enjoying most of the times when I am able to talk with the women out in the field. I met with an absolutely wonderful woman named Altagracia. She has such a heart for others, and as the leader of her bank, I could tell she is loved by everyone. She had the warmest eyes, and talking with her about her business (selling gasoline, parts for motorcycle repair, and baked goodies and sweets) was an absolute pleasure. She’s on her 7th loan cycle, and has been improving her business since day one. She’s a great success story, and to me, is the exact type of person microfinance is designed to reach. She deserves every single penny that her business brings in, and I’m thankful to be part of the process which has helped her along her way to escaping poverty. These sorts of stories and conversations are absolutely wonderful to hear as part of my day at “work”.

I’ll put another update up soon, perhaps after this weekend – I’m headed to Santo Domingo to celebrate the 4th of July with some of the other Americans here in the DR. It should be fun!

Have a safe and wonderful rest of your week, and a great 4th of July everyone!

-Nate

Microlending in the Dominican (What I'm doing!)

2009-06-23T12:13:00.001-07:00

Hey everyone!

As you see above, I’m living in quite the beautiful location – I took all these pictures from my house here in the DR. It’s on this beautiful near the ocean and its gorgeous. Although the house lacks some amenities – such as a faucet upstairs, air conditioning, and power in the afternoon (the power turns off between 8am and 5pm) – it makes up for it in location. It’s a beautiful place to wake up to.

I wanted to give a little bit of an update regarding what type of work I’m doing here. I’m working with a Microfinance institituion, or an MFI. Microfinance, for those who might not know exactly what that is, is essentially the giving of credit to very poor people who don’t have access to the standard credit markets in their area. This is usually due to a lack of collateral, which banks demand in case of default. Muhammad Yunus came up with the concept in Bangladesh a couple decades ago, starting the Grameen Bank, and recently was awarded the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts. If you want more information regarding microfinance, and its history, his book Banker for the Poor is his explanation and history of the concept. It’s interesting to note that the fear of default is something which MFIs don’t deal with – at the Grameen Bank, between 93-97% of loans are repaid. That’s a pretty incredible statistic, especially to those who might not be as familiar with microcredit!

I am working with a group named Esperanza International, which is a partner of Hope International, here in the Dominican Republic. Esperanza was founded by Dave Valle, a former Mariner’s catcher, here in the Dominican in the late 1990s. They are now in various cities around the DR, and have recently opened some offices in Haiti.

Within Esperanza, my internship calls me to help the organization with its relationship with www.Kiva.org. Kiva is essentially a peer-to-peer lending service, which connects borrowers in countries all over the world, to people who want to help support their entrepreneurial activities. That is, you can go to www.kiva.org, find a borrower whom you want to support, and then give anything from $25 on up to the full amount of the loan. Usually, many people end up giving to the same borrower until the full loan is paid. It’s a fantastic idea, and those who give money receive it back as the loan is paid off by the borrowers. That is, you are giving a loan, and you’ll receive the full amount back (the interest from the loan doesn’t go to you – you don’t earn any profit from being on Kiva).

So, with Esperanza, my job is to set up these profiles on Kiva for groups of borrowers, so that they are connected with those who want to help support the little businesses they run. I am going to, and have already begun, to interview groups of five women (every loan comes for a group of 5), about what they are doing with their loan, why they chose that specific type of business, what they hope for the future from the profits from their new business, etc. I just get to sit and hear stories from the most interesting people, attempting to escape from the poverty around them. It really is very inspiring. One woman I talked to yesterday got the biggest smile on her face when she was talking about how eventually she can have a home of her own for herself and her 8 month old child if her business continues to succeed.

That’s much of what I’ll be doing this summer – going with bank loan officers from the office her to go and interview those who will be receiving loans. It’s all in Spanish, and my study abroad trips of a year ago are really paying off now. It’s very rewarding to be a part of this process, and I’ll forward some of my favorite stories to all of you as I hear them!

I’ll try to get a link up on the blog sometime soon so you can see the profiles of the people that I interview, as I put them up. I also encourage you to go check out www.kiva.org, and see if you want to be a part of that community too! It really is an integral way in which people, mostly women, are finding a way to have a consistent income to support their family.

Thanks!

The first fin de semana in Samana (weekend in Samana)

2009-06-22T15:16:00.002-07:00

Hey everyone!

I’ve just finished staying my first weekend here in Samaná, and its been a blast. My host family is wonderful. I’m living with a woman named Sara, her 4 children (3 boys and a girl), and granddaughter. This part of the country is absolutely BEAUTIFUL, and the photos you see above are actually from the porch right outside my room, and from the back porch. We live on a little dirt road off the main road, on a hill a few kilometers out of town. It’s very, very beautiful just sitting in the home reading a book or looking at a storm come in from the bay.

The neighborhood here is like one big family, and everyone gathers under a tree in the shade on a hot day to talk or play dominoes. Playing dominoes is something everyone here does every day – it’s a very Dominican thing to do, as I saw many people playing dominoes when I was here a couple years ago.

I’m still getting used to the pace of life here – let’s just say that its sloooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooow. You don’t really go anywhere in the day. Or do anything. This leaves lots of time to rest or read or whatever else. Books certainly help a lot, especially since there is no internet in the house. I’m getting to know the neighborhood a bit more, and soon I may perhaps feel comfortable enough to take a place under the tree outside…for now, it’s somewhat daunting to join that sort of group who have known each other all their lives.

There is a beach about 15 minutes walking away from here, but really, it isn’t very nice. Henry and I walked down there and it was a little underwhelming. We are hoping in the future to go to other beaches perhaps a little father away and nicer on other weekends.

One last thing to note, which I find very interesting around here, is that there are no taxis in Samaná. Rather, you take what is called a “motoconcho”. Essentially, everyone here has a motorcycle with two seats on it (essentially, an extended back seat). For about a dollar, you can wave down anyone on the road, and you hop on the back of their motocycle and they’ll take you into town, or to the beach, or wherever else. I usually ask them to go a little slower than they usually do, just for safety reasons, but it’s really a very convenient way to get around town.

Today, I start my first day of work, and I’m excited to begin working in the villages. I’ll write a post in a couple days describing to you exactly what I’m doing – I’m writing up profiles for groups of women who want loans to post on www.kiva.org. This is a peer-to-peer sharing website where people can loan money to anyone around the world who is seeking a microloan to start a business. It’s a very novel idea, and it’s exciting for me to be part of this.

I’ll describe it more in detail, and perhaps a couple of stories, when I finish my first few days of work!

In the DR!

2009-06-19T11:42:00.000-07:00

Hey all!

I have now been in the Dominican since Tuesday, and I wanted to give a quick update of what’s been going on. I’m currently in my last night here in Santo Domingo (the capital of the DR), and the last couple days have been filled with training for us new interns. We’ve been going over some of what our jobs are here in the DR, and it’s finally becoming a bit more clear on what exactly I’ll be doing. I’ll be in the city of Samaná, which is in the northern part of the country, on a peninsula. Look it up – it’s gorgeous! I’ll have an update after the weekend talking about the city. For now, it’s time to move cross-country (for the DR that means a 3 hour bus) and get myself established in a new place of the world!

Off to the DR in a few hours!

2009-06-15T17:17:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone -

This will be the place to look at my blog while I have an internship down here in the Dominican. I have committed myself to having a better blog, with more updates. I am extremely excited for what is going to happen in the DR this summer, and I'll let you all know what's happening.

For those who might not know, I am interning for Esperanza International, a microfinance NGO. I'll be in the city of Samana (in the north coast - you can look it up on Google Earth). It should be BEAUTIFUL. They haven't given me specific tasks yet, and I'll let you know how I'll be aiding in the distribution of credit to the impoverished when I find out more!

Talk to you upon arrival!

-Nate

Sevilla!

2008-10-14T11:45:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone!

The travelling group to Sevilla!

I have three posts to put up in the next few days – I have taken trips to Sevilla (to see a bullfight), to Italy (Pisa and Florence!) and to Portugal. I’ll try to put up posts/pictures from those three trips over the next day or so….get ready!

So…Sevilla. The location of the big bull fight. We got up EARLY this morning (and had about 2 hours of sleep the night before…) and took a train over to the city to explore a bit before the 6pm bullfight. It was beautiful and sunny in Cádiz when we left…and absolutely pouring in Sevilla when we arrived. And it wasn’t stopping – it was one of those rains that you see in Seattle which is heavy but you can just tell that it is a long-term type of rain. So what’s a group of tired Seattleites to do on a rainy cold day in an urban city? Go to Starbucks of course! As you can see from the photo, we successfully found a Starbucks and sat there for a while hoping the rain would abate…

Unfortunately it didn’t. We walked over to the cathedral in Sevilla and took a tour of that building – it was pretty beautiful as well (and happened to be “World Tourism Day” which means we got in everywhere for free!!). Here’s a photo from inside the cathedral – I will never get tired of looking inside cathedrals here, every single one is unique and beautiful in its own way. It was at this point, about noon or one pm, that we ate lunch and started to consider the possibility that the bullfight MIGHT be rained out. We weren’t sure. But the thought was creeping into our heads.

We found a beautiful garden area in the city to spend some more time in, and I think that around 4pm we hit one of our low points of the trip. We were all completely soaked, it had been raining non-stop since we arrived at 10am, and the bullfight was in 2 hours. We had already gone to the bullfight ring, an dthey said the decision is made essentially at the beginning time. Anyway, we were in this cave inside the park, which was dry, listening to the relentless pounding of the rain, when we pretty much gave up going to the bullfight – we were thinking it’d be cancelled. We were planning out perhaps even getting a warm hotel room for the night and then heading back to Cádiz in the morning.

However- it stopped raining around 5 and the sun (kinda) came out, and it seemed like we would be able to see it after all! Everyone was going to the ring, the TV reporters were showing video of men working on the ground inside the ring, and the seats were filling up. We all took our seats and got ready for the bullfight…

Only to see a person walk around the ring with a sign saying that… the bullfight was cancelled. Yeah, that’s right – we all got into the stadium, but the matadors came out and decided it was too dangerous to fight on some slick ground (understandable. But still). Anyway that was a HUGE letdown to a day that was full of ups and downs. We arrive full of hope, then had the rains dash it, only to have the rains stop and us have lots of hope entering the stadium, only to have a dude with a sign ruin it all. No one else was very happy – you can see in a photo below all the seat coushins that people threw into the ring in disgust when they cancelled it. I put a few other photos of the ring down below … overall, it was a fun day but it was super disappointing to not see the bullfight after all.

I’ll update about Italy next!

A trip to the Pueblos Blancos

2008-09-29T02:54:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone! I finally have a moment to breathe and tell you about my adventures a week ago travelling around Spain in a rented van with six friends! Get ready for some good stories :)
As a bit of context, myself and six others were planning a roadtrip through the south of Spain from a Friday to a Monday to see what are called Pueblos Blancos, or little villages of all white buildings built into the Spanish countryside. All have either a castle or a church around which they were built, and which serve as the cornerstone of the pueblo.

My travelling buddies!

It took us about an hour to drive the van out of the parking lot (getting it into reverse was not intuitive…we eventually had to ask the desk how to do it). After picking everyone up, we were off to a small pueblo named Cartajima, just outside a famous (and very big) pueblo named Ronda. Our plan was to stay the night in Cartajima and then go to Ronda in the day. Well, long story short, it took 4 hours to drive what should have been 2 hours. We missed a turnoff and drove north to almost SEVILLA (that’s a good hour north of Cadiz) before figuring out we needed to go west from Cádiz. Eventually we arrived in Ronda to an English hostal owner who cooked us dinner (for a cost, of course). This guy was quite the character – long hair, very sociable, alcoholic, and pot-growing. About that last trait? He invited all of us up onto his roof what what he called "talking, drinking and smoking a doobie". No, I did not smoke, but he wasn’t lying when he said he grew his own stuff up there.

The next day we visited Ronda, which was beautiful but rather unimpressive after everything we had heard from host families. The picture I’ve attached is probably the best place we went in the city – this bridge is absolutely beautiful. We hiked down here to take a picture from below. After visiting Ronda, we went on a cave tour of this amazing place a little ways out of Ronda. It had been used by people for over 40,000 years, with drawings dating back to that time. No, I couldn’t take any pictures while in there. Yes, I did take pictures anyway. Below is the photo of the "castle" as they call it, and this is the picture where the tour guide saw my flash, stopped the group and told me either he or the police would delete my photo for me. He didn’t follow through with this threat – I think in large part because I was joking and talking with him in Spanish the entire tour - but did pull me aside after and tell me that taking photos of national monuments in Spain is a big deal and that I should never do it again or I really would get in trouble with the police.

Anyway, we spent that next night "camping", which in Spain means have a grassy field, plant some trees, put up some posts with numbers and have a dirt circle for cars. This wasn’t "camping" by any American standard. We slept on a tarp on the ground, with nothing covering us…and wouldn’t you know, it rains at 6am. So we dashed into the van and slept (7 of us!) in a van for 4 more hours. Sleep wasn’t too good for those hours, needless to say.

The next day we visited a couple more beautiful pueblos – Zahara and Grazalema – which had absolutely amazing views. The photo below is from the top of a castle in Zahara – the vista was breathtaking. Sleeping yet again involved sleeping on a tarp in essentially a "camping field", but this time we put a tarp over our heads so when it rained we didn’t have many issues with rain.
As a side note, I did finally get to drive a car in Europe – the stick shift was different in this van, but I got used to it. I also almost got pulled over (gulp), but thankfully the guy driving in front of me got pulled over, not myself. We weren’t going too much over the speed limit, but the cop tailgated me for a while which was quite unnerving before finally going to pull over the guy in front of me. I was a little more careful driving after that little incident.

The view from the castle in Zahara

The pueblo of Grazalema

I’ll be posting in the next couple days about an (attempt) at seeing a bullfight in Sevilla, along with a couple pics from that trip…and then I am off to ITALY on Thursday! Yes! I’ll be gone until Tuesday on that trip to Pisa and Florence. I’ll be sure to take lots of photos, don’t worry :)

Hasta más tarde!

Off for the weekend - update and pictures to come after!

2008-09-19T07:20:00.000-07:00

So, I am off on a roadtrip adventure this weekend within Andalucia (the area of Spain where Cadiz is located), and will be gone until Monday afternoon. I am travelling with 6 friends in a minivan to various towns called Pueblos Blancos (White Villages). They are all within the forests and hillsides of Spain and are very beautiful. We have no school on Monday and are taking advantage of this for a 4 day trip! I shall put up pictures and an update about the trip when I get back, along with a little bit about what my daily life in Cadiz entails...including the whole "study" part of study abroad (boooooo). But really the classes aren't that bad.

Adios until Monday!

A (long) overdue post about Spain!

2008-09-15T02:06:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone! I REALLY apologize for the long amount of time between my posts, I had shaky internet service until my arrival here in Cadiz, and plus I did so much that I didn’t take time to write a blog about everything! So, prepare yourselves, this is going to be a blitz of the most interesting things to happen to me while in Spain so far.

After sightseeing in Barcelona, which was amazing, my friends and I travelled down to Valencia (via one night in a small town called Terragona), where we were in an AMAZING hotel, which was also very cheap. Cheaper than our hostal in Barcelona, and yet so very fancy, with its own kitchen and 3 balconies, everything. Our main goal of being in Valencia: The Tomatina in Buñol! This is the famous tomato fight, which is the largest in the world – 40,000 people, 113 TONS of tomatoes and 2 hours of fighting mayhem. I can tell you all more about it later on if you wish – the photo you see here is of the aftermath of our adventure at the Tomatina. And, yes, I wore my basketball mask because I didn’t want to get my nose smashed by a tomato and yes, it paid off for I was hit several times right in the nose part. I think people liked aiming at me since I was taller than everyone AND wore a mask. But hey, that’s part of the fun! I had an absolute blast. I think I was taking tomatoes out of my ears and hair for several days following, as were all my friends.

An interesting story out of Valencia – I almost had essentially all my important possessions on this trip stolen in one swoop. I was sitting in the train station with Molly, waiting for our train to our next city, while the other 4 members of the group went off into the city for an hour. It was around midnight at this time. A man approached me and asked me to help him out with the coke machine to my left (strange), although I didn’t think much of it at the time because Molly was there and I felt like, since the place was empty, there wasn’t much risk of anything happening. As I’m helping this guy out, about 30 seconds later, I hear Molly ask behind me, "Nate, is that guy walking off with your laptop bag?" And, sure enough, after turning around and staring at where my bag used to be, someone had it in their hand. Contained in the laptop bag:

Laptop
Passport
Wallet (Credit cards, cash, drivers license)
iPod
Camera with all my photos from the trip so far

Essentially, if I lose this bag I lose a heck of a lot. So, therefore, I absolutely book it towards the entryway where the man went, which is to the left about 10 meters or so. This man must have heard me running at him (my flip flops were kind of loud…), and dropped my laptop bag, because it was sitting right in the entry way. Nothing was broken or stolen (thankfully!), although the guy did try to get the computer – the zipper was about half open. Anyway, I’m a little more wary of people after that experience and more careful with my stuff.

So, I finally arrived in Cádiz, a city on the southwestern corner of Spain (the Atlantic side), and it is an absolutely beautiful, beautiful city. The beaches are gigantic (kilometers of beach), it is sunny and 85-90 every day, little to no humidity, and warm water. It is absolutely wonderful.

I live with a family of 4, mother father and 2 sons who are 21 and 17. They are all very nice people and take good care of me. I’ll let you all know in a later post a bit more (really, I’ll post in the next couple days!) about the life in general here. For now, below are a couple pictures from the city, one of the sunset on my first night here, and the other from the top of a tower from which you can see all the city. In that photo you can see the big cathedral here, along with the beaches stretching out of the photo to the left. From those beaches we watched an airshow yesterday, and in the final photo you can see the planes making a Spanish flag in the sky with smoke, the finale of the show. 230,000 (!) people attended the airshow on the beach.

I’ll finish off with this picture of some delicious octopus (pulpo) which I ate in Barcelona one day. Take my word for it: It was good. Try it sometime :)

That’s all for now, sorry again for a long post and such a delay between posts, and I'll post again soon!

I have arrived in Spain..Barcelona is amazing!

2008-08-22T10:21:00.000-07:00

Hey! I just wanted to let you all know that I have safely arrived in Barcelona and am having a BLAST. I absolutely love this city. It has a vibe to it that makes me already want to plan a return trip and I still have 2-3 days left here. I´ve successfully met up with 3 of my friends, and we are awaiting the arrival of the 5th to our hostal this evening (it´s currently 6pm).

I´m learning all about the hostal life which exists here in Europe. You have 7 other random roommates crammed into a tiny place, and could find all sorts of negatives about it if you wanted, but all of us are looking at all the positives. You meet people from all around the world who are also college age and are also travelling. In my room right now, the other 4 people (not including us) are fage in the world except Spanish. The people here don´t even speak spanish - the language Catalan is spoken very commonly (it´s a mix of french and spanish), and all the signs and postings here are in that language. I am loving my time here but it feels like I´m in a very international setting - not necessarily in a spanish speaking country. It has a very different vibe from Argentina where I was immersed from minute one.rom Norway, Belgium and Canada. We went out on the town last night with people from Canada, LA, Scotland, England and Germany. It´s just really fun to meet people from all over the world.

The only negative is that I´ve heard minimal spanish around here. We are in a VERY good location (when it comes to things to do), we are right in the center of the city, but really it´s quite the tourist area and you hear every language BUT spanish. Even locally, a language called Catalan is spoken, which is a mix between french and spanish. All the signs and menus are in this language, which is readable but certainly not pure spanish. This makes it have a very different vibe from Argentina, where I was immersed in the culture and language the moment I arrived. There will be more time for Spanish when we go to places less touristy, but for now I´m enjoying seeing the sights.

I´ll let you all know more about my adventures a little later. I don´t have much internet access in this hostal (and no wireless), and have to wait in a line to get on to one of the TWO functioning computers here, so I will be spotty on my posts. But I´ll do my best!

Once again, I hope all of your summers are going amazingly!

-Nate

Chillin´ out in Chile

2008-07-28T07:56:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone - I was hoping to be writing this to you from Seattle a few hours from now but...unfortunately...my first flight in my 3 step journey was delayed, which meant that I missed my other two connections back to the states. Therefore, I am currently typing this from a hotel in Chile. To tell a long story short, I had 3 flights to get back to the US - one on Aerolineas Argentinas to Santiago, Chile, and then two more on Delta to Atlanta and then to Seattle.

Unfortunately, Aerolineas was just bought by the state (Argentina), and is going through a WHOLE bunch of turmoil. This means flights really aren´t that on time. The organization isn´t there. As well, this weekend happened to be the start of the winter vacation for all of Argentina, so everyone, their kids and their pet cocker spaniels were travelling (no seriously, cocker spaniels too).

So, needless to say, after waiting for 2 hours to go to the check in, and a 2 hour wait to even GO to security, and then an hour wait at the gate, I missed my connecting flight to Atlanta. This whole time, Aerolineas was saying that Delta should be the ones to help us, and Delta obviously said that it´s Aerolineas´fault for everything (and delta was right), so there was alot of back and forth. When we finally took off to Santiago, I was preparing to really fight for accommodations from Aerolineas for the night, since we were missing our next flight.

However, in the end, we got off the plane and someone was waiting for us with a slip of paper which is a voucher for a hotel here (literally across the street from the airport), for dinner last night and breakfast and lunch today, and our tickets already bought for Delta´s next flight tonight.

This is all a long winded way of saying that I have a new stamp on my passport (Chile!), and I get to stick the area until my flight tonight at 9pm. So, 10 hours to go until I´m in the air, on my way to Atlanta and then Seattle.

I´ll post some final thoughts and pictures once I get there! Thanks for reading my blog while I was in Argentina!!

One week and a day left

2008-07-19T07:38:00.002-07:00

Hey everyone! I apologize for the long period of time between this post and my last one...the main reason that I haven't written anything is that I've unfortunately been sick this week. This means that any time I might have otherwise used to put a post here went to extra sleep in an effort to get better. I was hit earlier this week with a fever, body aches and a chest cold, which wasn't too nice of a surprise. I'm just getting over it now, thankfully.

This past week, therefore, hasn't been stellarly exciting. There is one story to tell from some other people in the group which, unfortunately, isn't necessarily good news. We all had a Tango Show night on Wednesday night in a neighborhood here in Buenos Aires which is called La Boca. And, if you talk to anyone here at all, that is NOT a place you want to be during really any time during the day by yourself as a tourist. There is one part of this neighborhood that has a bunch of brightly colored buildings that is somewhat touristy, but the rest of the area is very dangerous. And, unfortunately, none of us really knew it was that dangerous of an area ahead of time (it certainly was new news to me when I heard people mention this on Wednesday night). Well, 4 members of our group were walking through Boca at about 5 pm (I was not with them - I was sleeping), and one of the girls in the group was robbed at knifepoint by 4 guys about 19-21 years old, who took her purse and everything in it. One of the 4 guys then chased my other 3 friends with a knife, in an apparent effort to separate them from the girl being robbed. In the end, only her purse was stolen (camera, student ID, some money), and everyone was ok. But, really, in the end it shows that all of us just have to be a little more conscious of where exactly we are in such a large foreign city. The combination of unfamiliarity and being a tourist can sometimes be a bad combination.

I went to the tango show later that night (the people involved in the robbery did not come, they just went home), and that was interesting to watch, but there definitely was a little damper on the night from knowing about a robbery occuring involving our friends in that same neighborhood a few hours earlier. The photo you see here is from a little skit-thing that the people did before we went to the tango show itself. This whole thing was kind of touristy, which bothered some of us (yet again), but it at least was an interesting night out.

The story I will dubb "The Mostly Funny" story of the week involved me on Wednesday. In the morning, instead of going to class, my teacher took us all on a walking tour of the life of Eva Peron in downtown Buenos Aires. I went to her grave and mentioned her in my last post. Anyway, after that tour, I was walking back to the train stop and a bird decided it'd be funny to poop on me. And, by the way, I'm not talking about a little poop. I'm talking about a supersoakering of bright-green and runny poop. All over my back and laptop case. I counted at least 15 distinct splotches of lime green bird poop. I remember walking and felt wet all of a sudden on my back, and after reaching back there my hand was all green. Disgusting. Everyone in this park saw it, and they were all laughing, and this one lady offered me a napkin in vain, because there was no way I was cleaning this mess up. Apparently, though, a bird pooping on your is good luck? Everyone in the park kept telling me that. "Que suerte!!" I'm pretty sure the only reason that's said is because, one day, someone was walking down the street, got pooped on, got angry, and then turned to his friends, who are currently laughing at him, and went "Hey! I know! Getting pooped on is good luck! Take that you suckers this means I have good luck!"

It was just a bitter outburst that became something people say now. I'm pretty sure that's how it went down.

Anyway, this is my final full weekend here, I head out next Sunday, but at least for now, I am going to enjoy the weekend, at least as much as I can with the amount of homework I have. Tomorrow is "Friend's Day" here in Argentina. It's kinda like Father's Day and Mother's Day, except for friends. So everyone makes a point to go out and see their friends. It always happens on July 20th, every year. Very interesting. So anyway, I'll be going out with Tomas and his friends tonight to someone's house to hang out and enjoy Friend's Day. It should be fun.

I'll update a couple more times most likely, and then it'll be time to head home! My trip here is nearing its end.

Over halfway done...

2008-07-12T08:23:00.001-07:00

A few days ago, I marked the halfway point in my study abroad trip down here to Argentina. I leave the country two weeks from now - and it actually makes me a bit sad to think about that. I was talking with Marta last night at dinner, and she was describing to me how, once you travel enough, you no longer have a single place you feel you belong and call "home". Essentially, once you travel, when you're in one place, you want to be somewhere else, but once you're at that new place, you want to be where you were before. I can see that happening to me too - I am going to miss Argentina when I get back to the states.

Anyway, since my last blog I had my first birthday in a foreign country. I turned 21 on July 9, which also happens to be a national holiday in Argentina (Independence Day). There are many streets with July 9 as the name, as you can see in this picture. I think that's pretty cool. So, I went out with some Argentine friends for dinner to a place in Palermo, which is the "cool" part of town for college students to go, apparently. We were all joined up by the other people from the UW program, another of whom had the same birthday. After dinner, we all tried to go to a local nightclub that one of the Argentines had a connection at. However, that didn't quite pan out - the girls got in really easily (and for free?!), but us guys didn't have such luck. So we gave up on that and ended up going home. Moral of the story that all of us guys learned: You can't get into a club easily in Argentina unless you have boobs.

Birthday-day there was no school so we all hung out at my house here first, and then later at Mark's, for some good food and cake and all the wonderfulness that comes with birthdays. It was a relaxing day. One of the host brothers here had an American football, which we played with, but he ended up impaling it on top of a pointy fence at a neighboring house due to a bad throw, thus ending the life of the only American football in this entire country. We all mourn the loss of this football.

The pictures you see below are from a recent trip to the Recoleta - which is essentially a gigantic collection of family/individual tombs in downtown Buenos Aires. They are absolutely gigantic, and I could have spent much longer looking at everything than the hour I had there. The picture of the black tomb with flowers on it is of Eva Peron, an Argentine political hero who was the first lady to President Juan Peron from the mid-40s to the early 50s. Essentially, she is somewhat analogous to Princess Diana in terms of popularity here, and also had an early(ish) and sudden death. Anyway, lots of people go to her tomb every day to pay respects, and this was easily the most busy place in the entire Recoleta while I was there.

A Uruguayan 4th of July

2008-07-08T10:25:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone!

I hope that all of you had a wonderful Fourth of July with friends or family this past weekend. This was the first 4th which I have missed attending, but in the end I had a great weekend, as well. I went to Uruguay with 10 other people from the study program here to get away from the city and just relax. We took a 3 hour long ferry over to a little city called Colonia and just took a couple days off - Friday and Saturday. The weekend consisted of walking around town, taking pictures, eating long meals and other restful, tranquil activities. We slept in a house which a woman rents out as a hostal, and the whole thing ended up being (ferry and all) about $70-80 USD. Not too bad in my book.

Saturday was an absolute gift of a day down here. It's the dead of winter, but it just happened to be an 82 degree day, which they apparently have every once in a while here. So, we ended up spending nearly all the day at the beach (who wouldn't do that?). We are all missing the summer up in Seattle, so to have at least one summer-like day was absolutely wonderful. We took full advantage of a Uruguayan beach we found here and relaxed. There was even some karate going on, as you can see from the picture below...do note the fact that I still have some mad hops:

The end of the day consisted in a pretty amazing sunset, a picture of which you can also see here, with a lighthouse in the foreground. Pretty neat.

My birthday is coming up tomorrow (the big 2-1...except that really doesn't matter down here?), along with Mark's (another guy in the program), so we are all trying to plan some things to do tonight and tomorrow. Tomorrow is also the Independence Day for Argentina, so there is no school and the country basically shuts down. There aren't fireworks or big family get togethers - as one person put it, everyone "just sleeps". It's kinda boring, but we are having pizza at my house for lunch, and then empanadas at Mark's house in the evening. I'm quite looking forward to that.

I finally made my way to a protestant in-Spanish church service Sunday evening, and I really enjoyed it. It was sparsely attended (as it seems most protestant churches are here), but it had a guest speaker from Colombia who did the sermon and I loved what he had to say. It was on the passage of the rich man who asks Jesus how to get to Heaven, and the speaker had a great grasp on exactly what that passage was saying. He was very knowledgable. I was also able to understand about 90% of what he said, so I was very pleased with being able to follow the sermon. My Spanish had kind of hit a plateau in terms of improvement the past week, but I feel like I'm starting to learn again. It was kind of odd how I hit that wall - but with more Spanish saturation I feel like the more nuanced complexities of the language are finally starting to seep into my speaking ability. It's so much more fun to speak a language when you can actually articulate what you want to say.

I'll end off with this photo of the lighthouse in Uruguay - a bunch of pigeons were flying around it, so I thought it was a pretty cool picture. Once again, I hope all of your summers are going fantastically!

I have to wake up in 4 hours....

2008-07-03T22:01:00.000-07:00

But even though that's true, I'll still write up a quick update of this past week. :)

I haven't had any stellarly exciting events that have happened, but I just realized that I've failed to mention that my trip here to Argentina has involved weekly lessons for Tango dancing. Yes, I know you probably think that's hilarious, but myself and a few other people from the UW program have classes every Wednesday night, and we've had two so far (with 3 more to go!). It's just a fun side thing to do, and is something Argentina is famous for. I won't be anything near a proficient dancer by the time I get back but I do enjoy the lessons. It's also kind of nice that they are 15 pesos ($5).

most everything is cheap here. I went to the theater today to see Get Smart (in Spanish it's Super Agente 86) and it only cost me 10 pesos (which is roughly, and keep in mind this is a complete guesstimation, $3.33333333333333). That's not too bad of a cost if you ask me. the exchange rate is fantastic down here. You have have a huge meal for under $5-6 easy. It's gonna be tough getting used to US prices when I get back, for certain, and even more back breaking when I head to Spain in the fall. The Euro and the dollar don't have the best exchange rate for US citizens at the moment.

This weekend (i.e. in 4 hours as I mentioned in the title), I am heading to Uruguay with some friends from the program. We'll be there from tomorrow until Saturday night, so that'll be a fun excursion. I'll take pictures and let you know how it went when I return!

Stay up until 6am? Sure!

2008-06-29T18:28:00.000-07:00

I realized that I haven't put up too many things about the unique pieces of Argentinean culture that I've discovered over the past week and a half. This post will attempt to make amends of this.

We'll start with food (what, did you expect anything different? Of course not). The first edible commodity which I haven't talked about is my favorite. It's called Dulce de Leche (Literally translated, Sweet of Milk). Essentially, it's very similar to caramel...except better. It's creamier than caramel, and they use it on a whole bunch of stuff here. Toast, fruit, desserts, ice cream, whatever you might choose. It is multi-purposed and has become a large part of daily eating here. Mom and dad...this will be one of things I bring home with me to the US. Complete with written instructions on how to make it :)

Don't worry, mom; I'll be helping in the creation process.

Argentineans really enjoy their meat here. Therefore, I've had many foods such as milonaysa (I am pretty sure I wrote that down correctly but I'm not entirely sure...), which is made out of cow meat and is essentially filleted and then deep fried. They love their deep frying here. It's good; but then again, most deep-fried foods are. As well, a food I've gotten to know are called empanadas. These are essentially bread covering different types of vegetables, meat, and whatever else you might put into the middle. They aren't too big, about the size of a medium croissants, but are quite delectable.

Another cultural difference is something I suggested in the title of this blog: the night starts LATE here. When you go out, you leave at midnight, and if you want to go to a bar, many OPEN around 1 or 2 am. If you want to go anywhere before midnight, you're gonna be waiting to enter for a long time. And, if you just get going around 2am, that means you're not going to bed until LATE. I have had a couple very late nights, and all you do is sleep in the next day until 2 or 3pm and you're set. I don't think I could do that for a long period of time, but its not too bad once a week. Especially when all I have is a bit of homework, and not a whole lot of responsibilities. Of course, I can be responsible even when I don't have responsibilities, as those have two entirely different meanings here, but I think that'd be a bit boring to go over :)

Another difference is the atmosphere of collegiate sports. Many people here really don't have a concept of college sports. Heck, their concept of sports is lightyears away from our concept in the US. We have a bevy of sports from which to choose teams, but here their choices are more limited. It's soccer or rugby, really. There is some basketball, polo or golf, but those are pretty scattered. And no one really seems to root for a college team. I have shown pictures of Husky Stadium to Tomas and other people around here and they are blown away by the size of American collegiate stadiums. They have stadiums that big, but that's only for big-time professional teams. To have a 75,000 person stadium solely used by a university is unheard of.

That's all for the cultural differences that I can think of right now; I'll write up more later on when they come to mind. This past Friday my UW group went to an estancia (essentially, a ranch), but really it ended up being kinda touristy. The ride there was supposed to be 1 1/2 hours, but it ended up being 3+ due to a nasty fog that caused many road closures here (apparently fog is so rare here that they feel the need to close down highways...?). There were a whole bunch of English-speaking tourists there along with us, and it kinda felt like an act to me. At the least, it was interesting watching an old gaucho game where they take this little mini stick and try to ride a horse and put the stick through a ring dangling over the track. You can see a picture of that below. Along with it is just a picture of the landscape. We also got to ride horses that day, so that was fun. But, again, I came away from it feeling like it was a little touristy and that it was more act than anything.

Friday night was my late night; I went to a concert with some UW friends and friends of Tomas, and then to a bar where we just sat and talked and danced and had a great hang-out night. The funniest part about that night was that we were the only ones who knew some of the English-language songs, so when we'd do something the song said (for those of you who know the applebottom jeans song, there's that low part), and everyone would kinda look at us funny. Of course, then the Spanish-language hip hop song would come on and we'd have no idea what you were supposed to do. We had to act like unknowledgeable americans when that happened and follow everyone else as best we could.

Today, I attempted to go to a church service (in spanish this time!), but it turns out that the service was at 730, not at 600 like I was told last week, and I had promised Tomas and others that I'd go to a Catholic mass with them at the cathedral near my house. That started at 830, so I had to skip the church service to go to the mass. I had never been to a mass before, and it was interesting attending one in Spanish, in a gigantic cathedral. The setting inside was gorgeous, and the cathedral is wonderful looking. I'll show you pictures of it when I get around to it. I live maybe 2 minutes walking away from it, so it's definitely close. I just followed everyone when they sat and stood, stood and sat, and then sat and stood some more.

I apologize for the length of this post - there was just alot to say! For now, I gotta wrap up some homework and head off to class at 900. I am looking at a weather report which says its 89 degrees in Seattle (at 7pm?!), and I am just slightly jealous of that. Although- it's been upper 60s here for the last few days, so I'm not getting terrible weather. Still, I'd kill for a few more hours of daylight and 10-15 more degrees of warmth. Send some my way next time you get a chance.

Hey, you gotta be a tourist sometime, right?

2008-06-26T14:15:00.000-07:00

While one of my goals here certainly was to be part of the Argentinian culture and not be a permanent tourist, I of course have had a few times of going out and being touristy. Today, that involved going to downtown Buenos Aires in order to see the march of the "Madres de la Plaza de Mayo", in, of course, La Plaza de Mayo. These are the mothers of what are called the Desaparecidos (Disappeared), people who were never heard of again during the Argentinian Dirty War in the late 70s-early 80s. Without going into too many details, there was a military-run government during this time, and in order to quell subversion, there were 30,000 people or so who "disappeared", never to be heard of again. Here is a picture of some of these moms of the desaparecidos, who march every Thursday in the Plaza de Mayo, as you can see, still holding a picture of their missing loved one. The women are symbolized by the white scarf you can see some of them wearing on their head.

Yesterday we went on a little touristy boat ride into the delta of the Rio de la Plata (the huge wide river they have here in Buenos Aires). We had an hour-long boat ride through this really cool neighborhood where, in parts, there are no roads to any of the houses; they are all little islands and everyone has to get to their houses by boat. There is no potable water, so they have to bring water in from the mainland to drink/cook. It's essentially a summer house/weekend house place, and since we were here on a wednesday evening, there was no one at the houses. Discovery while riding this boat: Nothing in argentina is free. We took for granted that the water/cokes they handed out to us were free. Newsflash: They're not. My table (4 of us) ended up with a bill of roughly 68 pesos (22-23 USD). No fun. We're learning all sorts of things about how cultures work....and sometimes our pocketbook teaches us that lesson. The picture you see here is from our boat trip down this Delta.

I've also just finished my first week of classes - we don't have classes on friday! Hah! I am in a class studying Argentinian literature, and a class studying poetry, and it is NOT easy. I have a hard enough time figuring out symbolism in English poems and stories. Our class is either from 9 or 9:30 to 12:30. So, we have 3 straight hours of studying heavy duty literature in Spanish only. It's very hard to concentrate for that long; the positive thing is that I'll improve my vocabulary by having to look up every. other. word.

Right now I'm still trying to figure out my weekend plans; for now we have a group trip to an estancia (essentially a ranch?) tomorrow morning. We get to ride horses, see what life is like outside of the city...the downside? We have to wake up early on a day when we don't have school (d'oh!). It'll be fine, but a few of us were definitely looking forward to sleeping in on friday, only to find out we have a group trip.

That's all for now - I'll write in a couple days about my second weekend here in Buenos Aires...I definitely am enjoying myself, to say the least!

The first day of school...in June?

2008-06-23T13:25:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone!

I haven't written in a couple days but here's a little update on the (what I believe are) interesting things which have happened! I wanted to go to church on Sunday morning, so Marta called up an old friend who goes to a non-Catholic church (I wanted to attend a protestant church), and got the directions and time for it. I went and it was fine - except it was in English. I swear I happened upon the only English-speaking church in this entire city. I asked around and the good thing is that they have a service in Spanish at 6pm, so I'm gonna head off to that next sunday!

I also went downtown with a few people from the group and a couple host brothers, and took a few pictures. Here are some various pictures I took throughout the day:

This is a photo of part of the downtown skyline as
seen from a boardwalk in downtown Buenos Aires

This is called "La Casa Rosada" (The Pink House)
and is exactly like the White House in the U.S.,
except it's pink. Go figure.

A photo of that same clock tower that I took a
picture of a few days ago, except this is at night
and I just think it looks cooler :)

Fast-forward to this morning...and school started. That's right. In June, I have to face that word that children everywhere dread: school (Or, if you're bilingual..you might dread escuela...?). Anyway, I take the train to class, and the ride is only one stop, about 5 min once the train actually gets to my stop. I waited for I believe 30 min for the train before it finally came this morning, but hey that's ok. I'll start timing things better the longer I study here. We didn't really do much, we just had a little introduction to the university, a safety talk, campus tour and placement test in order to see which Spanish-level class we'd be placed in. Classes formally start tomorrow, so I'll see how that ends up going. Should be fun, I am really looking forward to having some other spanish stuff to fill the parts of the day when I'm not actually speaking it.

Interesting piece of information for the day: Tomas is a bartender on the weekends, for a company that goes to big weddings or fancy parties and does the bar. This coming weekend is a big wedding (only really rich people apparently can afford to hire the company Tomas works for), and I'm going to go help out! That is, yours truly, Nate Sooter, is going to be a bartender at an Argentinian wedding. And I am pretty excited to do so - it's more Spanish practice (in a super crowded environment...mixing drinks which I have never tried in my entire life seeing how I've only ever been to two bars), and I get to see what a wedding in Argentina is like. The main difference is that my job starts at 10....pm. And ends around 7am. Soooooo, we're gonna see how that goes. that's how they do weddings here - when i mention that weddings in the US start in the afternoon and end usually by 10-11-12, they were appalled, since that's when things are just getting going in Argentina.

I have tea and dinner left tonight, followed by getting coffee with some friends here in San Isidro....there are always things to eat here! Hope all of you are having a wonderful summer, wherever you might be at this moment!

It's like Thanksgiving...every single Saturday

2008-06-21T18:23:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned in my previous post, every single Saturday there is a gathering in Marta's house with all her children and grandchildren, and I got to be part of it today. I believe that about 30 people came, everyone ranging from probably their mid-50s to newly born. The closest thing I can compare it to is Thanksgiving, and yet they have this every single Saturday. It really was fun to be part of. I definitely had to work hard to hold my own among all the conversations, but after so much practice day after day I feel like I'm able to understand more than when I arrived, for certain. They explained to me that Argentinian family get togethers consist of "two hours at the table eating, two hours away from the table talking, two more hours at the table eating, etc, etc...". In my opinion, there's no better way to run a family function. Everyone's always happy when there's food on the table and conversations all around. I felt very welcomed by everyone and I was comfortable sitting in on conversations and joining in where I could. In the end, I probably spoke or listened to Spanish for 5 hours, and learned way more than one would get in a week of spanish class at UW. Like I tell all of them: Speaking Spanish around the dinnertable with everyone is my classroom, and who doesn't want to eat homemade breads and meats and salad and desserts while in class?! This is the MUCH better way to go about learning the language.

I am definitely running into trouble when trying to talk about politics or about religion or about economics..there are so many terms that are complicated that conversation soon gets lost in translation, so to speak. Those sorts of conversations will come easier in the future.

I had a very unique experience with languages today that I'd never had before. There are a couple women staying at the house tonight who are from Italy and just needed a place to stay tonight. The thing is, they don't speak English, and I don't speak Italian, and yet both of us speak Spanish, so we can communicate with each other through a secondary language. I think that is just so...for a lack of a better word....awesome. To be able to talk with someone from Italy about their country and customs through the medium of a shared language like Spanish was surreal. I definitely enjoyed that conversation.

One interesting thing that I haven't mentioned is that, in Argentina, you don't greet people with a handshake - you greet them with a kiss on the cheek. Now, like most Americans, I was taken aback by that at first. For instance, if you enter a room with 30 people, you don't just say "hi" and sit down. You go around to each person and say hello and kiss them on the cheek. It might be odd at first, but I think it's a very welcoming gesture. The people here are very friendly.

As a final point, as some people have asked me about it (in a joking fashion), no I do not drink very much down here (what a surprise!). I am on a completely "taste-only" regimen. That is to say, when I went to the bar and someone would offer me a drink, I'd taste it but I certainly do not drink a whole bunch, and I never drink enough to ever feel it. Tomas' friends have told me multiple times that "we will break you by the end of this, yankee" (they seem to enjoy calling me yankee...except they pronounce it yang-kee. it's kinda humorous), but do not fear. I don't really have a problem with peer pressure and I'm going to stick to my guns on this one. Drinking until one is drunk isn't attractive to me whatsoever.

The interesting thing about drinking in Argentina, as many people have told me, is that you're allowed to drink at a younger age (18), and so people have the whole "let's go get drunk with all our friends because now it's legal" experience at an earlier age. Therefore, when people get together to drink that are 20-21-22, it's not too big of a deal. There isn't really excessive alcohol consumption at this age, because they all did that when they were younger and it's lost its luster.

Take that for what it is, I thought that was an interesting point of conversation to come out of talking with some people I've met here who are my age.

And the weekend begins

2008-06-21T07:43:00.000-07:00

The only event which is actually worth talking about yesterday is that I went to a birthday party for one of Tomas' friends at his house in a (very) nice neighborhood in Buenos Aires that's called Tigre. The houses there were definitely very, very fancy. I was able to spend a second night speaking and listening to Spanish from different people, which was great. I now have set some certain goals out for myself for what I want to specifically do, and rolling my r's is one of them. Everyone here can roll their r's with ease, and I have trouble remembering to do it. I know I can do it, it's just difficult to think about it before the word is out of my mouth. As well there are some common words that I learned in high school that are not used here.

For instance, you say acá, instead of aquí, when you wish to say "here", and I'm terrible at that one. I have it so engrained to say aquí that it's really hard to switch over.

As well, in Argentina they speak with a different word for "you" than in any other country. Instead of addressing you with "tú", they say "vos". It's a 1-for-1 switch, and it includes a couple different spellings of words that I'm not used to. For instance, when you want to say "How are you?" everyone learns in Spanish class to say "Cómo estás tú?" (that is, if you even want to say the tú), but here you would hear, instead, "Cómo estás vos?". Or instead of "tú quieres" (which means you want), you say "vos querés". It's definitely distracting to near this word in a sentence where I am used to hearing another.

For those of you who speak Spanish, you might know why this is more confusing, because in Spain the word for "you all" or "all of you", which we do not have in English, is Vosotros. And, since vos is so close to vosotros, I continually think that the people here are referring to a plural "you", when in fact it means just me.

I apologize if that was confusing, but perhaps if it was confusing that's an even better way of showing that there are little complicated idiosyncrasies in any language based on where you speak it.

That's all for now - there's a big lunch starting soon with 30 people from Marta's family that come here every Saturday for lunch, so it's time to try and hold my own with a dozen conversations in Spanish from family members who speak very loudly and quickly to each other. I'll let you know if I survive....

A little walking, a pinch of speaking Spanish, and a torrential downpour

2008-06-19T22:02:00.000-07:00

It's the end of my second day here and I am definitely starting to get the hang of life here in Argentina. Life is definitely on a different schedule, espeically with regards to food. They think it's the weirdest thing ever that dinner in America is around 5-6 pm. Here is a typical food schedule for Argentinians:

Breakfast around 10

Lunch around 2

Tea around 4-5 (yes you eat food during tea)

Dinner around 11

They all wonder what I do between 5pm and bedtime with regards to food, and I actually question that very thing...this schedule seems to make more sense to me, in terms of breaking up the major meals. I definitely still snack, though, of course. There's a store for food about a block from this house which is great.

I won't bore you with the specifics, but most of this day involved walking. and walking. and walking. I went with Christy al Centro (downtown) in order to walk around, but basically it was raining way, way too hard. It rained all day. We just walked around for a bit and gave up. This is one of the only pictures that I took from that little adventure, of a gigantic clock near the main train station - I'll take more when there is sun.

After getting lost going home (i walked around for probably a good 45 minutes before finding the house), I was invited to go to a bar for dinner with Tomás (the 20 year old grandson that lives here) and his friends. So, we went to a bar in downtown Buenos Aires in order to eat, and I had so, so much fun. It was a little intimidating going to a noisy place with several people who speak Spanish quickly and try and hold a conversation, but eventually I got into the flow of it and really, really enjoyed myself. We stayed there for several hours talking about this and that, with me helping a couple of Tomás' friends with English and talking about sports and music and movies and the like. I really am feeling better about my Spanish-speaking abilities. Most people I have talked to say I speak very well for only being here two days, which is good for my confidence. It's tough to speak another language when you don't have confidence, and it's definitely nice to have native Spanish speakers affirming me when I speak.

I'll finish this off with a couple pictures from inside my house here, of my bedroom and the kitchen we have here:

I have arrived!

2008-06-18T15:13:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone!

I'm writing this from my house here in Buenos Aires, and I have been here for maybe 12 hours and yet am having an absolute blast. I won't bore you with the plane ride stories, but let's just say that no news is good news (as you can see in the photo..it was actually ON TIME. Miraculous).

Once I arrived in Buenos Aires, the most interesting thing which happened was that the car which picked me up broke down in the middle of their highway, and wouldn't start again. So I had to help push it through the toll booth (which you can see in the photo), and then another car came and picked me up, the one carrying Christy, who I travelled with the past day with down here to Argentina. Nothing like an introduction to Argentina like a broken car! The driver was very apologetic but I mostly just found it humorous and tried to help him where I could. I mostly felt bad that his car wasn't working anymore.

The rest of my day has been spending time at my new home with my host mother, who is absolutely fantastic. It's hit or miss when you're doing a homestay in another country, and I definitely think that I'll fit in here. She's very gracious and speaks slowly (thankfully!) and is very attentive to whatever needs I might have. We'll get along famously. This house is in a very fancier neighborhood here in Argentina, about 10-15 blocks from the Universidad, and there is a train station very close. I'll have some pictures of the area after I wake up and go for a walk tomorrow morning.

For now, I just really, really have to concentrate on every single conversation. I can't skate by in a conversation by half-listening in Spanish, so this trip will be a lesson in concentration, for certain. I'll have more to say tomorrow!

T-minus 3 days and counting

2008-06-14T17:38:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone! Welcome to my blog for the next 6 months or so, as I'll be posting pictures/stories while I study in Buenos Aires, Argentina and Cádiz, Spain. Thank you so much for taking the time to come and read this, I appreciate it so very much! It may not be too exciting sometimes but I'll do my best to make it interesting for you, a clearly committed friend, family member, acquaintaince or stalker of mine (I know you're out there....). I'd love to hear from any of you over the next six months, so feel free to comment here or send me an email or message on Facebook any time.

I'll be flying down to Argentina on this upcoming Tuesday (June 17), and will start attending classes at la Universidad de San Andrés (emblem shown above) and living with an Argentinian family on the outskirts of Buenos Aires. I don't know a whole bunch about the family, save some information from a couple emails we've sent...what I do know is that I am living with an older couple and their grandson, Tomás, who is also my age (20).

That's really all for now until I actually arrive in Buenos Aires, but be prepared for little anecdotes and stories about life in Argentina for the next 5 1/2 weeks. I come back to Seattle on July 28, and then sub sequentially leave to Spain on August 20th.

Adios for now!

-Nate