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| Living in Dominica | |||
| It's difficult to explain the nuances of living somewhere other than where you were born and reared. There are many differences that one tends to forget after the newness has evaporated, subtleties that are difficult to explain at all much less to someone who has never lived outside the US. For me, explaining would be impossible without pictures. It may be impossible with pictures as well. Nonetheless, I hope this gives an accurate portrayal of the subtleties of the Dominican experience without being too burdened by minutae. | |||
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I lived on the 2nd floor, last door to the left of this apartment complex during first semester. Called "CIC Georgetown", it has an arched ironwork sign over the entrance that says "Ebenezer Janac". I have yet to discover to whom or to what that refers. There is also a restaurant on top. In one "room" there are 3 separate bedrooms, each with its own locking door; a communal kitchen and (very small) living room, 2 showers, a toilet and a sink. Usually, landlords will include perks such as maid service, air conditioning (which I didn't have), and cable as part of the rent. Water and electricity was included in the rent, though in many apartments, water and electricity are separate bills. There are many national houses around the base of the apartment, and I learned here that Dominicans like to let the whole neighborhood listen to the music that they're listening to. |
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Now I've moved downtown (to a place with a lower rent), called "Douglas Guest House". I don't have a picture of the front of it yet, but I do have pictures looking north and south from the balcony. It's a hotel with a restaurant at the bottom. I'm the only student living there now; various vacationers come and go. It's a bit, um, noisier here than at CIC: the movie theater is right next door, the nationals still like to share their music, and the truck with the band on it parked right under my balcony during Carnival. Needless to say, I've learned to study at school. According to most students, Douglas is the pit of despair, but I like it. It's a bit shabby, but Christine, the maid, cleans every day. It's also noisy, but I like feeling as though I'm in the middle of whatever happens to be going on in town. I also like being able to leave whatever is going on in town, so I guess I have the best of both worlds. Besides, they have great ice cream downstairs. |
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| A feel for the land... I have taken various pictures along the way, but I have more on the roll of film that is sitting in my desk waiting to be sent to Casey to be developed. Here's what I have so far. Getting to school is a 25 minute walk/10 minute bike ride/15 minute bus ride from where I live now. A note about the buses: we would call them minivans. They call them transports, but a transport stops at a bus stop. What they call a van we would call a bus. Go fig. It takes longer to get to school on a transport because I can take shortcuts on my bike and because the bus stops several times for passengers to embark and depart. If you want a transport to stop for you, you wave your arm at them, and hopefully they see you in time to stop. If you want to get off, you say "stopping". A ride from the school to Portsmouth, vice versa, or anywhere in between will cost you a dollar EC. A ride to Roseau will be 7.50EC either way. (1EC=2.67US, but for heaven's sake don't divide the EC by 2.67. Just multiply by .4 and you'll arrive at a round figure that's about 10% high.) |
 Prince Rupert Bay/Portsmouth, from the south. If you'll look closely, you'll see that some of those ships near the edge of the water seem to be at odd angles. They are. They're beached there from the last hurricane... around 1970 I think. I'm sure they'll get around to salvaging them someday. |
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 Looking east down the street in Glanvillia, a "suburb" of Portsmouth. The Indian River separates the two areas. The sign over the end of the street says "Michael Douglas Boulevard: Statesman 1950-1979". Yes, he's related to the same Douglas who runs Douglas Guest House. |
 The Glanvillia bus stop with the soccer/cricket field in the background. Cricket is a passion around here, as it is in most of the former British colonies. I think it's the funniest thing I've ever seen - of course, I don't believe they think much of American football, so we're even |
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 Morne Aux Diables to the north, taken from the main road in front of the school. If you can't see the mountains, you're going to get rained on in about 5 minutes. |
 Old abandoned machines in several places along the road. |
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 The Lizard trail behind the school. They aren't kidding about the lizards either. Snakes too. There's nothing on Dominica that is very poisonous though, except for centipedes. |
 I believe this may be part of an old sugar mill (Lizard Trail). |
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 Speaking of lizards, I once saw a 3 foot iguana among these ruins. That's a small one. |
 "The Hood" where several of my friends live. |
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 View west from the bus square below my house. The buses often run from Portsmouth to Roseau several times a day, and bus drivers sit in the square and honk their horns and yell "Roseau, Roseau, right away!" until they have enough people to make a profit. Their "right away" often lasts 20 minutes or more. Time to head to school to study... |
 The "shacks" right outside the main gate, on the road. Most students get their meals here. The individual shacks are known among the students by either the proprietor's name or a characteristic of their food. Examples: "fried chicken lady", "indian lady", "Shaka", "left chinese" and "right chinese". What do you get at the shacks for the most part? Chicken and rice variations. The guys start to get a wild look in their eyes around the middle of the semester from beef withdrawl. These shacks were later replaced by a much more sanitary and less dangerously located food court below the school. |
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 More shacks. These were torn down just a few days ago and the proprietors moved to a new "food court" that Ross U just finished. Now they have electricity and running water, a big plus for student health. |
 Just inside the main gate of the school. Basketball courts to the right, first semester building straight ahead, and library ahead and to the right. |
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 A sidewalk along one of the buildings. Exciting, isn't it. |
 The docks where farmers bring their bananas and other produce to ship to other Caribbean islands. Dominica is a very agricultural island, and its produce ends up as far away as Europe. |
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