there's a what in that bag?

i'm sitting here, trying to catch up on this blog - and the internet is being ridiculous. fun.

i've been taking pictures like crazy. i'm sure people on public transit think i'm a nut case with my phone out, snapping pictures away of things that, for us, are normal. they're all saved in my phone, and because it's such a pain to take my phone apart to get to the memory chip, they've been sitting there for awhile.

i laughed when i pulled these pictures up, and it took me a minute to realize what it was. a little blurry, and completely unrecognizable to anyone who wasn't there. in a car. smashed in the backseat with three others. this guy gets in, carrying a bunch of sacks. 4 fabric sacks and one rice sack make from plastic. and they're moving. it's not the first time i've encountered this - mostly though, it's on a bus and not in the back of a toyota corolla.

they're cocks in those bags, and the guy was headed to the gallera to, i assume, fight them. the plastic sack had two (if my memory serves) hens in it.

luckily, we weren't in the car for two long with the birds. we got out about a block after they got in - they were well behaved and had it not been for the wiggling, or the hilarious conversation with the driver, i might not have even noticed.

traffic-jam-up.

there is all kinds of construction going on in santiago - there are roads torn up everywhere, buildings going up, drainage pipes lining avenues - it's a little overkill.

 it usually takes 25 minutes to and from work, except during rush hour. today, i sat in a car for an hour. and the driver took tons of detours to avoid the insane traffic. i can't even imagine the route without traffic-avoiding short cuts without smoke coming out of my ears.

santiago needs this construction. the roads have been a mess and forget about getting anywhere when it rains. main thoroughfares turn into rivers - probably rivers deeper and longer than the real river Yaque that runs in the city.

but this construction can not be more poorly planned than it has been. the workers start at morning rush hour, take breaks and continue at the mid-day rush and then again in the evening. and i don't even want to get started on the ridiculous "engineer-worker" ratio. it seems there are always too many chefs in the kitchen when it comes to road construction here.

in november, they re-asphalted a pretty important stretch of road, under the "underpass" and in front of some big businesses. it took days of horrid tapones, traffic-jams that backed up traffic for way more time than necessary. same problems - work at the horas picas when everyone is in transit and either not enough workers, or too many engineers.

notice how they're all just standing on the corner. one guy has a shovel.
please don't misread this - i know that this is construction everywhere. but it's frustrating nonetheless.

sometimes people think that we don't have heavy equipment for construction. it exists. really.

look how close that car is to the roller. they almost crashed - mostly it was the car's fault for being too far into the construction lane.

these guys stood on the corner for a good 25 minutes. seriously. like there wasn't any work to be done, or traffic tied up for DAYS.

on why we don´t have internet.

we moved about two years ago. from a nice apartment in a cute complex, with absolutely horrible problem · we almost never had running water. when we made lists of the pros and cons, the list for the pros was incredibly long · good neighbors, safe place, solid construction, convenient location. but that one con (there were others, but they´re trivial) was so big that we needed to get out.

one of the things that went with the apartment was a constant, lovely internet connection.
our neighbors had opened their connection to us, and we had a nice setup going on.
but, i spent a lot of time on the internet. time that could be better spent doing things like spending time with my family, planning classes, going places, forming real relationships. amalio also really liked the internet. and sometimes we fought over the laptop.

that was not cool.

so, when we moved, we discussed what to do. we decided not to get an internet connection in the house for awhile. we didn´t really rule it out forever, but we weren´t making any commitments yet. in the fall, we revisited the internet idea. we need to change our cable company (they´ve gotten rid of all of the channels we originally signed on for · and i know that sounds ridiculous, but i need to find english for my kids where i can get it) and we looked into bundle packages.

but, we sat down and talked about it and for so many reasons we´ve decided not to do it. not yet. because i have internet at work (usually it´s constant, but recently there have been some problems, hence my absence on this blog!) and amalio does as well. we have a set up to get internet in the house when we need it. (3G connections are sublime)

we´ve decided that this year we´re going to be more intentional about the time we spend together · we´re both working a lot and so the time we have with the kids needs to be quality. it needs to be not consumed by surfing the internet and playing on facebook. because, if we actually used the internet for something useful, we´d have internet already.

it´s hard. there are so many times that i want to sit down at the computer and plan my classes, download stuff for the kids, find activities, read gossip, catch up with friends. but in the end, this is about living life today and not wasting time with things suck so much time away from me.

i´ll be back on here more regularly as soon as they fix the problem on the work computers, with pictures and anecdotes and tons of fun. miss you.


on a side note, i´m looking for people to skype with my students · we´d send you a list of questions beforehand, and just open up the conversation about living where you live, lifestyle and employment stuff. let me know if that´s something that´s interesting and we´ll see if we can work it out!

hold your horses, gregory!

i'm still in internet limbo, friends.

i'll be up and running (hopefully) next week!

traffic jam part II

remember when i wrote about the traffic jam a few weeks ago - where i sat in a car for hours? well, the situation hasn't really been rectified, so i've just resorted to taking a different public car home everyday (which, when streets aren't being torn up, is actually longer for me, but now is much shorter). i drove by the culpable construction the other day - and this is what i saw - a whole, major intersection torn up - for days and days.

drive time.

i was coasting along in the mini-van today, kids all snuggled safely in their carseats, rocking out to something on the radio. then, i realized i was like falling asleep. not dangerous falling asleep, don't get me wrong. but, it was like i didn't even need to pay attention to what was going on. what?

when we first got to the states three weeks ago, i stopped at every single stop sign and waited. to make sure that nobody was going to blow their stop sign and hit me. and i hesitated at every new green light, just in case someone didn't accelerate to beat the yellow. i was aggressive and defensive.

but, in philadelphia so many people follow the rules. almost all of them. if there's a stop sign, they stop. a yellow light? slow down. and i think this is why americans have such a hard time adapting to driving in developing countries.

it's not that there aren't any rules, it's just that there are so many rule-breakers. so, yes, in santiago, we have stop signs but sometimes they seem almost optional. and there are certain traffic lights that are more like a precautionary warning.

once i got used to it, i felt safer driving than i do in philly. why? because i'm alert and on the ball. all.of.the.time. i can't be day dreaming at the wheel because who knows what that guy next to me is going to try to do next. i don't talk on the phone or rock out to my music. (besides, it's way easier to rock out to hip hop or rock than it is to rock out to merengue... that's more like hip wigglin' music).

so, on my way to the store to pick up a cheapy backpack for our travels (we're headed home tomorrow), i felt like a passive driver. and ironically i didn't feel safer driving with all of the rules and regulations of the road.

i think it's a sign that i'm ready to head back to the sun and warmth. and sometimes chaos.

we leave philly at noon and arrive in santiago around 830 tomorrow night. luckily i'm not hitting the ground running (i originally thought we were leaving thursday) and work doesn't start until friday morning (classes on monday). i'll probably be a.w.o.l. from the blog for a week or so, miss me!

new year @ home

i was determined to be asleep early on new years eve. we got early dinner (and by early i mean, like senior citizen early). and i was going to put on a movie for the kids.

but my dear friend jaime called and she was around with her kids. so we went and played for awhile. then, i went home and was going to bed.

me and jaime grew up together - from like the day i was born. her grandparents lived across the street from us, and her and her sister were there a lot. and chuck and judy were just like my grandparents, too. back in the good old days when people actually knew their neighbors and everyone looked out for everyone else's kids. 

we walked the wall next door, played tag and wall ball and got in trouble. 

so at 11, jaime came over and we rang in the new year, old school style. her kids came out with pots and pans and ran up and down the street like crazies. then we sat around making fun of the drunkies walking up the street barefoot (because we live on a hill and stupid people decide to go partying at the bottom wearing stilettos... it's amazing that there aren't more broken necks on party days).

so, bed at 4am when i had planned an early escape!

here we are standing in the middle of the street under the street light trying to get a picture. i've got a blanket wrapped around me because it wasn't really cold enough for a coat. but i'm too carribean now to brave it out.

we've got just a two days left in philly and then we're headed home. i'm doing magic tricks to get all of this stuff packed into suitcases and ready to go. (cross your fingers that i can figure it out)