Sundays for Samil

**NoTe** i wrote this post on sunday... then we lost power -- and internet connection... our electricity came back, but the internet did not... so as not to wait a whole week to post, just pretend that today is sunday.

i've been a pretty sporadic poster lately. i started this blog as a way to continue my communication with friends and family in the states - mostly because i'm really bad at email. when i was in the church, i would send out updates and occasionally after amalio and i got married i sent them out. life in another country is new. not always exciting but often interesting.
all that said, i started the blog to continue the updates without clogging in-boxes. i'm sure all of my faithful readers (who i think include at least one more person than my brother and parents) are interested in the new things - but i know that at the very least two of those faithful readers who i call mom and dad are more interested in pictures and news about samil. so, i have decided that sundays are for samil. pictures, videos and news. that's not saying samil isn't going to make more appearances on the page. i'm just saying that i'm going to make a conscious effort to post every sunday. so if the week gets busy and i can't get around to blogger.com i can assure some treat to begin the week.
so. here. we. go.

Samil loves oranges. Usually we put them in his little sucker-thing, but he uncle Isaias didn't know that, popped out the seeds and we all enjoyed watching samil go to town.

samil loves crackers. when he's not feeling well he loves the bobo. he was teething the day we took this picture and just couldn't decide which he wanted more - the crackers or the pacifier.

one for all...

my high school french teacher was a bit of an armchair psychologist. eccentric, weird... and the complete opposite of the type of language teacher i tend to think i am. if i learned anything about teaching from him, it was what not to do. at the very least i learned to read and write cohesively in french... understandable in speaking, but my most recent haitian teachers have done way more for my accent and my fluency than i ever thought possible.

however, i did learn a lot from Mr. Joseph. we made fun of him a lot, complained about him. he tried to get me kicked out of the japanese exchange program for cutting his class. tried. unsucessfully. i went to japan - but i learned my lesson, i never cut again.

joseph would tell stories. over. and over. and over. i can still retell them. well, a lot of them. he would tell us of a time he was in france and two american women tourists entered a parisian restaurant. it must have been their first night in paris, and we in awe of everything they saw. and as most of us tend to do in foreign situations, they began to make generalizations. i don't remember the specifics of the generalizations they made, but it had to do something with the ice and how it was shaved ice and perhaps being used to keep the salad chilled. the details aren't important, the fact is that the women - quite loudly according to joseph - were declaring how quaint the french were with their cute food habits. my teacher had never seen this ice-trick before - in paris nor any other french city, country or town.

on thursday night, we traveled to santo domingo. amalio had an appointment for a non-immigrant visa and samil was going to social security for his own number. (it's on its way jackie, but who knows how long it will take!) since we're not permitted to take anything into the consulate with us, we traveled in the clothes we would be wearing the next day and had thrown some light pijamas in samil's diaper bag. we were pretty dressed up - dress slacks and a button-front shirt and shoes for amalio and me in a skirt and top. we arrived at the bus station early, so we crossed the street to Pollo Victorina where a huge group of american high school seniors were eating. they were on some sort of bizarre mission trip and were stopped in santiago between bus routes.

we ordered our food, amalio sat down with samil while i paid and wiggled through the americans. and then their teacher. yah, their teacher, says:
"look how cute. dominican people get dressed up for fast food. what a treat for them to be able to eat out. see kids, you don't realize how lucky you are, they probably had to save up for a month for this little family outing."

their teacher, obviously, never had culture lessons from my teacher. it took everything in me to just smile and laugh.

assumptions and generalizations are... well, just that. and we all know what assuming does. if you're traveling abroad, be careful when you speak english, you never know who understands - or who you might offend.

staying at home.

i received another call from a bilingual school the other day. a few months ago, the first school i worked at here after getting married was calling because they needed a social studies teacher. for the life of me, i couldn't explain - or make them understand - that i want to stay home with my baby. it was pretty frustrating, especially when the director told amalio that i would soon tire of being at home and be chomping at the bit to take their job. his cockiness pissed me off. sure, there are days i wish i was working - surrounded by adults, having conversations about things other than samil. but my life is varied enough that i'm just not bored.

i work two days in a language institute - 6 hours a week. and at the end of every class, i thank heavens that i get a break before the next one. i love teaching kids. and i think i'm pretty good at it. but i have them an hour and a half, twice a week. no behavior issues. and they're genuinely happy to be in class. but, i set a precedent when i started to be the "energetic" and "creative" teacher... and most of my classes include tons of "total physical response" methods. tons of jumping, bouncing, running, skipping, crawling. its tiring. i couldn't do it everyday. in the evenings, amalio takes the baby and i have a mini-institute in the house. i have 27 students - some kids, some teenagers and some adults that study english with me. i teach everyday, sometimes with samil is tow - mostly hanging out in his walker or crawling around. thankfully he is well behaved and my students love him. plus, they understand that i have a kid that is my first priority. thats why i don't charge them a ton of money.

so when the school called today, while i was quite flattered that my reputation caused them to seek me out, i was a little frustrated having to explain myself and our family situation. someday, i told them, i'd be back in work. but right now, i need to make sure samil is good.

i like my time with samil. i like the freedom of being (mostly)self employed. i have friday off. we walk everywhere. we go to museums, stores, to visit friends. i can pay my bills and put some money in the bank every month.

i might get bored. permanently. but it hasn't happened yet, so we're going to keep on keeping on. sorry, bilingual school, but i can't come work for you. i'll give you a call in a few years.

procastination...

i can't say that i missed a week of blogging because i'm been so busy. it's just not true. i had a lot of things happening this past week, but nothing out of the ordinary or beyond normal capacity. i guess it just wasn't anything to write home about - taking care of samil, clearning, teaching. i did have a really long meeting with my boss on thursday that in the end helped me feel a lot better about staying in the language center at least until june. then we'll see what happens.

since we moved into our apartment i've wan ted to paint the crownmolding but i never got around to it. last night i pulled out the paintbrushes and did the living room and hallway. i've got to touch it up and this week paint the dirtydirty walls, but i think it looks nice. its hard to diy here because we don't have many tools - well, really we've got some screwdrivers and a drill, so we can do some stuff, but we don't

samil and i just got home from the most boring "family day" ever where we left amalio because he was "working"... i had an interesting conversation with his co-worker that began like this:
"i'd like to marry a foreigner"
"ummm... ok."
"well, yah, i need a man who respects me for being independent"
"ummmmm... OK"
"i mean, i've never livedby myself, i live with my parents. and i still follow their rules. but i'm really independent."

right.

samil's super sunday.

samil has been slithering around for awhile now but he's so in love with the camera that i never really can capture him. as soon as he sees the lense, he forgets everything else and starts cheesin'... finally today, after lots of prodding we were able to get this short little video.

in january my friend cara and i began advertising for our english classes. this past week we had to open two more classes because of the demand. my dream is to someday have a learning center here in santiago that offers english classes, pre-school or day-care, homework center, tutoring and some other things. the classes that we're offering in our homes is like a test-run. i'm really excited about how popular they are and how much response we're getting. we only advertised in 2 areas and seriously hung up maybe 25 posters total.

samil and i went to a softball game yesterday to cheer on Papa Disla who was playing with a team of teachers against the team from the teachers hospital where samil was born. it was an exciting match, and we even got invited to the team dinner afterward.

so, thursday has come and gone - samil obviously wasn't feeling good at all. he didn't even have any energy to cry. he just kind of whimpered. he even fell asleep on top of his toys on the walker.

today we've got our baby back. he's smiling and laughing... and going to town on that cracker.
his tooth popped through and doesn't seem to be bothering him at all.

long day.

i work in an english institute on tuesdays and thursday. i've been working there for two years now and i love my job. when samil was born, i was going to leave because i didn't have anyone to take care of him for me. so, we made an agreement that he could go to class with me. he has a playpen and my students - mostly teenage girls, but even my three boys LOVE him - he mostly plays and sleeps... and before and between classes he gets a lot of love.

some parents were concerned that he'd be a distraction - maybe he was in the beginning but the kids are used to him now. they were also concerned that i'd miss a lot of class due to samil's non-consumption of baby formula and because he doesn't have a permanent babysitter.

today.is.the.first.day. that i will miss class because of samil. i'm both proud of myself and sad for my baby. proud that we've made it to school every class since he was 1 month old (i didn't really take maternity leave) and sad that my baby is not feeling good.

it'll be over soon, hopefully.
afterall, it is just his first tooth.