Part IV - My Only Three Gripes
Part IV
My Only Three Gripes
First of all, I must say, for me to have only three gripes with a trip that lasted for over a week is pretty good. So this is not a serious complaint, just a necessary part of my POV (point of view).
Well before the trip, I ask P if there’s anything I need to know before we go down there. Anything I can do to better prepare myself for this trip. He says naa. Just make sure you bring lots of shorts because it’s so hot down there. I’m thinking, “Oh, good advice” - because I was ready to bring a few shorts and mostly jeans…
He later tells me (the night of the trip) to bring a dressy outfit and shoes. I usually do this anyway for trips, but what if I didn’t???
BARELY WORE SHORTS
NEVER WORE DRESS CLOTHES
The first day after we woke up, he’s like, “Oh yeah, get used to cold showers. We don’t have any hot water down here.” I’m like, “right on.”
True. How could I prepare for that? So it’s understandable, why I wasn’t told. But when he said cold, HE MEANT COLD. I felt like I was having hypothermia everytime that I went under the water. I literally had to hold my breath and brace myself.
You can call me whatever, but if you do, you gotta call P that too. He told me that he did the same thing before I’d even mentioned it to him. lol.
…
Also, if anyone remembers the early 90s in Philly. We used to loose power in certain areas of the city every now and then. Not so often anymore… But N E Way, it happens often down there. When I say often, I mean at least once a day it seemed. They said sometimes it even lasts for 2-3 hours. I can’t remember it happening more than once in a day, or lasting over a half hour maybe 45 minutes. We were lucky I guess. I do remember it happening at very random times though. Like at night, the morning, and the afternoon.
For some reason it didn’t seem too bad to me. But if I lived there I could see that getting really annoying…
Could you imagine working on some homework and your computer just shutting off?
Lastly, I could’ve sworn P told me that most people spoke English too. Which in the main city Santo Domingo, it seemed that way. And maybe he didn’t realize we’d be out of the main city soo much. But I felt so disadvantaged by my speech impediments… okay, lack of vocab and understanding. I actually felt slow. Thinking “this must be how people of less intelligence feel.” Like I could understand some stuff, and they could understand some stuff I said. But communication was horrible. It’s weird being an adult around kids that can speak better than you.
So I really needed a Spanish-English dictionary. Now, before we get there P is like “there will be places to exchange our dollars to pesos everywhere.” I didn’t see one place until we got to Santo Domingo (DAY 4). N E Way, I couldn’t find a Spa.Eng. dictionary, but I did find the perfect souvenir for my grandmom (day 3) and P’s like “Don’t get it now. When we get to S.D. there will be a lot more souvenirs you can buy.” I’m like, “okay” since I couldn’t find a place to get money, and I wasn’t going to ask his pop to get it for me. He’d done so much for us already without us asking.
NEVER FOUND A BETTER ONE.
The places we went to (when I actually had money in peso form) had stuff, but not too many things that I thought were good quality. Oh well…
Considering all the things that we got lucky with, those things aren’t so bad. Nevertheless, I had to write about them.
In case you’re wondering, Yes, I did list more than three problems… For some reason it’s easy to focus on negative things, isn’t it?
Part V coming soon!
My Only Three Gripes
First of all, I must say, for me to have only three gripes with a trip that lasted for over a week is pretty good. So this is not a serious complaint, just a necessary part of my POV (point of view).
Well before the trip, I ask P if there’s anything I need to know before we go down there. Anything I can do to better prepare myself for this trip. He says naa. Just make sure you bring lots of shorts because it’s so hot down there. I’m thinking, “Oh, good advice” - because I was ready to bring a few shorts and mostly jeans…
He later tells me (the night of the trip) to bring a dressy outfit and shoes. I usually do this anyway for trips, but what if I didn’t???
BARELY WORE SHORTS
NEVER WORE DRESS CLOTHES
The first day after we woke up, he’s like, “Oh yeah, get used to cold showers. We don’t have any hot water down here.” I’m like, “right on.”
True. How could I prepare for that? So it’s understandable, why I wasn’t told. But when he said cold, HE MEANT COLD. I felt like I was having hypothermia everytime that I went under the water. I literally had to hold my breath and brace myself.
You can call me whatever, but if you do, you gotta call P that too. He told me that he did the same thing before I’d even mentioned it to him. lol.
…
Also, if anyone remembers the early 90s in Philly. We used to loose power in certain areas of the city every now and then. Not so often anymore… But N E Way, it happens often down there. When I say often, I mean at least once a day it seemed. They said sometimes it even lasts for 2-3 hours. I can’t remember it happening more than once in a day, or lasting over a half hour maybe 45 minutes. We were lucky I guess. I do remember it happening at very random times though. Like at night, the morning, and the afternoon.
For some reason it didn’t seem too bad to me. But if I lived there I could see that getting really annoying…
Could you imagine working on some homework and your computer just shutting off?
Lastly, I could’ve sworn P told me that most people spoke English too. Which in the main city Santo Domingo, it seemed that way. And maybe he didn’t realize we’d be out of the main city soo much. But I felt so disadvantaged by my speech impediments… okay, lack of vocab and understanding. I actually felt slow. Thinking “this must be how people of less intelligence feel.” Like I could understand some stuff, and they could understand some stuff I said. But communication was horrible. It’s weird being an adult around kids that can speak better than you.
So I really needed a Spanish-English dictionary. Now, before we get there P is like “there will be places to exchange our dollars to pesos everywhere.” I didn’t see one place until we got to Santo Domingo (DAY 4). N E Way, I couldn’t find a Spa.Eng. dictionary, but I did find the perfect souvenir for my grandmom (day 3) and P’s like “Don’t get it now. When we get to S.D. there will be a lot more souvenirs you can buy.” I’m like, “okay” since I couldn’t find a place to get money, and I wasn’t going to ask his pop to get it for me. He’d done so much for us already without us asking.
NEVER FOUND A BETTER ONE.
The places we went to (when I actually had money in peso form) had stuff, but not too many things that I thought were good quality. Oh well…
Considering all the things that we got lucky with, those things aren’t so bad. Nevertheless, I had to write about them.
In case you’re wondering, Yes, I did list more than three problems… For some reason it’s easy to focus on negative things, isn’t it?
Part V coming soon!