Rough Guide to Dominican Living

Dear Readers,

On this starry night, I am sitting on my balcony, overlooking fields, a newly constructed apartment building, and—a passionate, evangelist tent revival. Hallelujah! I believe in praising the Lord, but at this late hour—9:30 in the PM—I’m looking for a little peace… but alas, that is the Republica, mucha buya (lots of noise) everywhere.

In this crowded and busy pueblo, the scene behind my balcony is my escape, in that much of the land is still “untouched.” I sit here many nights, thinking, reading, looking at the stars, or waiting for the luz.

Since I’ve recently moved, I’ve learned a lot about Dominican living. It’s hard, and many things take a LOT of time to do. No modern conveniences here. So to give you a taste of my daily Dominican homemaker life, I’ve prepared this “rough guide” on how to survive Dominican domesticity.

Know your vecinos (neighbors). By far, they are your best resource. They know everything that is going on in your ‘hood, and they can usually help you out. My neighbors have been great so far. They gave me an ice cold Pepsi when I came home tired one evening (oh, just what I needed! It was magical.). They helped me find water when I had none (more on that later), and on my first night here, when my house was dark because there was no electricity, they called out to me and offered me a candle. They’re my protectors and they watch over my house constantly.

Make sure you have an extra cubo (basically a big plastic trash can) of water. Water is not so easy in this country. Many people don’t have running water on a daily basis, so they have to save up water when it actually does come por la calle (i.e., when the pueblo sends it down the hill from the small aquaduct it has). The more “modern,” luxurious houses, like mine, have tanacos which are basically big water tanks that are usually on the roofs. When there is electricity (and there is water por la calle), you turn on your pump, which sends the water up to the tank. In case you run out of water in your tank, you need to have an extra cubo of water in your bathroom. So yeah, water is not easy.

Aprovechar la luz (Take advantage of the electricity) when you have it! We get electricity maybe an average of 10 hours a day. It comes and goes at random. You can’t plan for it. Therefore, when there is luz, you plug in your chargers, and you do any tasks that require electricity at that moment. I’ve been spending the last couple nights sitting on my balcony, staring at the streetlight waiting for it to turn on. It is a real problem here, and people complain about it constantly, but of course, nothing has been done to fix it.

Cook in the morning, work in the afternoon. I still haven’t done this yet, but once my work slows down, I would like to start living by this schedule. As far as food goes, I’ve been Dominicanized. I look forward to my Dominican lunch every day, and since I’ve moved out of my doña’s house, I’ve been missing my big midday meal. Once in a while I visit her, and she feeds me, but I’ve got to learn to cook for myself. Therefore, to set myself right again, I’m going to start cooking beans, rice, and chicken every other day. It takes a few hours to cook, so I’ll have to spend my mornings at home, doing household tasks and afternoons at the center. That’s how a modern Dominican woman does it.

Go food shopping EVERYDAY. With the shotty luz situation, you can’t rely on your fridge to keep food fresh and cold. So, I’ve learned that I can only buy small amounts of dairy products, and if I want meat, I have to buy it and cook it THAT day. The days of leftovers are over!

Sweep, mop with Chlorox, then mop again with a fragrant floor cleaner. This is an old doña trick. You gotta make sure you disinfect your lovely tile floors and then to counteract the bleach smell, you mop with a fragrant cleaner that keeps your house smelling fresh. Oh yeah, sea breeze!

Wash your clothes by hand. We don’t have modern washing machines here. Instead, we have lavadoras which only do part of the washing process. There’s no spin cycle, and for part of the process, you have to hand scrub some things. I don’t completely understand how they work, but the point is, because this domesticated young lady doesn’t have a lavadora, she will be washing her clothes by hand and line drying them. My doña said soon enough, I will have rough hands like her. It’s true… I already have calluses from sweeping.