El Carnaval!!!!

The parade on Saturday...fun! Lots of different groups, this was one of them with twin dolls....and of course they had to do inappropriate things with their twin dolls...hahaha.(top right)

These costumes were the coolest!! (up) they were attatched to people's arms and legs, so when the people walked, it looked like the big skeleton thing was walking...i have a video and i tried to put it up but there was an error...and i have lots more but they take alot of time so i'll put them up some other time..

Los Indios :)

a blue diablo

yes, those are guys...the pic explains it all. :)

Ramona and me...with a skeleton :) haha that was a sweet costume

haha you almost can't see him...but this costume it made out of strips of plastic pasted onto clothing...pretty sweet :)

yes that's a guy.

Los Brujos!!! the witches..they were in the parade, and their float won..it was pretty sweet. except he's smoking a cigar...eew.

I've got alot more pics and videos for later!!!!! =D

Helloo! Ok, so yesterday was the Carnaval for little kids. The Carnaval is a celebration in all of Febuary, where people dress up crazy, like devils or dragons or monsters, and go out into the streets whipping the ground and going in parades.. Yesterday I went to the one for kids that they had here in San Juan in one of the parks.. There were lots of kids with random costumes, masks, spider man suites, and everything.. It was funny. And of course there were lots of little boys playing with whips.. Which isnt really very safe.. Especially in crowded areas. And there´s lots of teenage boys running around with these hard balloon-like things on the ends of strings, hitting girls in their butts and backs..and yes they hit me about four times! And hard, too! And when they don´t stop, you have to run. This Friday, the 27th, is the normal Carnaval..which should be even bigger and better. But I´ll probably get hit more.. Haha. The Carnaval in La Vega, a city in the northern part of the D.R., is known to be the best in all the Carribbean, with huge parades and fairs and everything.

Sheila and me yesterday in the Carnaval for kids
Ramona, Carolina, and me..

The San Juan capital building..

El Carnaval! A typical costume.

Haha, when I try and take a picture of one person

everyone crowds in!

El Carnaval for kids, in Duarte Park

Kids playing with whips..fun!....

La Avenida - a big avenue on the north side of town

and it´s really long and has alot of these apartments

that all look the same on both sides

A rice factory!

In the campo! It´s extremely pretty there.

Normal houses in a village in the campo

It´s really pretty!

Antony, Andrina, Sahony, Jairo, Cristal

Riding in the truck on the way to the campo

From left to right Cheina, Sahony, Andrina, Jairo,

Ramona, and Cristal

Sheila, Orquidea, and me

Orquidea, Norman, and Me

Manuela and Julissa in the truck

My class! From left to right they are Norman, me, Jairo

Caroline, Ernesto, Erik, Daniel, Ramona, Cristal (in the middle)

Sahony, Emely, Cristofer, Jaciel, and Yomalsy

KC and our friends from Thailand in the AFS camp

Ramona and her house

KC and me in the camp

I got black highlights..

It´s easy to find random farm animals walking in the

streets of San Juan

the street outside Ramona´s house..to the right is

the fence to the stadium

Ah, so I was going to post pictures today but i accidentally brought the cord for my zune instead of the one for my camera. ugh. So I guess I´ll just write more.
In school, the juniors have two classes, 3ero A and 3ero B, I´m in 3ero A, and our classrooms are right next to eachother and they´re separated by walls that can be lifted up to make one big classroom. Our two grades have been arguing and we´ve kind´ve been enemies since the beginning of the year, because we wanted different class names and we wanted to do separate class activities. So today, for our last two classes, we opened the wall and had this big presentation thing, because today´s student day, and so that we could all make up the problems and be one big class again. And it started out with people reading stuff about students, what students are, and friendship, then people read poems, and then Julissa and Sheila sang a song together (they are really good singers! and they have guts to sing alone in front of about 70 people...), then more people presented and sang, two people sang the song that goes..turn around bright eyes, every single time i fall apart, (or something like that...not sure what it´s called) but in spanish..in spanish its different..mira mis ojos...yeah...and that was really good. There´s this girl Carolina in my class who´s hilarious, she was one of the ones singing it, and it was funny... Then this other girl from 3ero B sang and danced to the song Hey Now, this is what dreams are made of, in English from that Lizzie Mcguire movie hahaha and it was funny..everyone was singing along.. and every time someone finished everyone would scream and cheer as loud as they could, haha, so that was fun...
So what else can I talk about.. Oh! I learned how to drive a motorcycle. It was awesome! I´m not very good at it..but it was really fun. Kinda scary too.
Yesterday I went to Ramona´s house with Sheila and Scarley, and then we went to this restaurantish place close to there to eat...and woww, we ate soo much. It was funny..afterwards we could barely walk.
Here everyone watches soap operas (including me!..sometimes) There´s this one called Doña Barbara that I like to watch..It´s about this lady called Barbara and she owns this hacienda, and then this guy called Santos comes and moves into town, and they fall in love, but he doesnt know that Barbara´s a evil lady who kills people to get her way...and then I´m not sure what happens because i haven´t seen all of it..but this girl Maricela who lives on a hacienda, is Barbara´s daughter..because Barbara had gotten raped by the police chief, and she´s their daughter...and then somehow Santos falls in love with Maricela, and she falls in love with him (he´s like 40 and she´s 18)..and Barbara is all jealous...but Santos still stays with Barbara...but then he finds out about her lying and murdering and stuff...so he leaves her, then she´s even more mad...and Santos tries to get with Maricela, but she doesnt want to cuz before he was with her mom..and yeah it goes on from there like a soap opera..but i think its gonna end soon. Haha, my friend Ramona watches them about every night (they´re called telenovelas).
So there are lots of good Spanish rock bands...from the D.R., from Spain, from Colombia..and other parts of Latin America... I know that some people in Homer have heard of Enrique Iglesias, he sings the ping pong song...and there´s a version in Spanish too..
So i went to a basketball game the other day in the stadium. It was fun..like a normal basketball game.
Oh, so here in the D.R. the Spanish they use is alot different that in other Spanish speaking countries...for example, they take out the letter s from alot of words...like when they´re saying ´the doors´ they say la puerta instead of las puertas...and they like to add -isimo onto the ends of words..so when they´re saying ´that´s way cool!´they say ¨jevisimo!¨. and for the word thing they dont say cosa they say baina (i´m not sure how to spell it but that´s the way it sounds)
And i´m running out of time on the comp so i´ll post pics next time!

Hello!!! Wow, i can´t believe i´m already more than half way through! I´ve got alot to cover. So school started that Monday, and it´s been going pretty well. I´m understanding almost everything that goes on in my classes now. So some people were asking me about the school here... It starts at 8:00 but we all have to get there at 7:45 to line up and sing the Dominican Hymn Song as they raise the flag. Then we all go to class, we have three classes without a break, then at 10:30 we have 20 minutes to eat breakfast from the cafeteria, then we go back to class and have three more classes without breaks, then we get out at 1:15... Happy Valentines Day! ...let´s see...i´m not sure where to start. so this last weekend for valentines day almost my whole class piled in the back of a truck and drove about 20 minutes out to the campo (country side farm land) of one of the kids in my classs, in the morning at about 10. When we got there, we all put on swim suites and swam in this river. And of course everyone thought it was cold :) but it was nothing compared to swimming in Kachemak Bay. And it was super fun, and we hung out almost all day swimming and talking. For lunch, everyone brought one thing...rice and beans (moro), chicken, spaghetti, bread. pretty much what we eat every day :p And we went home and now i have a really big sunburn!
So the other weekend, i went to my friend Cristal´s 15th birthday party (she´s in my class, and she´s only 15!!!) and almost my whole class went. And i went with my friends Ramona, Julissa, and Sheila, and we got there early so we were walking around outside, and Julissa looked up at the moon and it looked cool so she told us to look at it, and right then a lunar eclipse started!!!! Which is like...amazingly good timing. The moon was only about a quarter full, but it was still really awesome to see. Then we went back to Cristal´s house...and the party was really fun. Everyone danced (including me!) regeton and merengue and techno..and they had a big cake and dinner and everything. The thing i really like about here is that people aren´t afraid to dance and talk to people who aren´t in their little group of friends, and people are open!! And what else.. oh, right, i went to another AFS camp in a little town called Bayaguana, about an hour out of Santo Domingo. It was two weeks ago..And I was going to leave on a Friday morning at 10, but at 9:45 when i went to leave my house, the gate was closed with the lock outside, so i was locked in. And my host parents were at work and didn´t answer their phones...so i ended up having to find a key to the garage and go out and get the key...
Oh and i got my packages!!!!!! finalllyyyyy!!! Thank you all so much for sending me them, they made me very happy :) ok, so i´ll have to finish this with pictures later when i have more time..
i have to go to this math practice thing for my school...there´s these math olympics in a few weeks that my math teacher invited me to haha..
Miss you all! Hope everything has been going well.

The big catholic church in the middle of town


(down) Orquidea and me after the wedding

christmas eve dinner! lots of food!






the aguinaldo at about 7 in the morning in my school

one of the two cafeterias in my school, in a time when it´s not full...imagine about 30 people standing around it, about half yelling ´morena! dame un tostada!´ and about five banging on the walls or throwing rocks on the roof...hahahahah. that happens alot.

my guitar!

the other side of my school

a kid from my class riding a mini motorcycle. everywhere you go here there´s sure to be a motorcycle or motorscooter, it´s rare for people to have cars

a normal street..the green place on the right is a colmado, which is a little store where you can buy food, phone cards, and much more, and they are everywhere! ok, i´m trying to gather pictures from around my town, of the parks and everything, but i dont have very many pics yet.

My street (my house is just to the right)

My house

Happy New Year! Wow, my time here is going so fast! On the 22nd of January I´ll have been here for 5 months already! that´s halfway. wow. ok, so i´ll start off where i left off...
So the weekend before examens i visited my friend KC in Azua, a town a little bigger than San Juan that´s pretty close to here and on the southern coast. We pretty much hung out in her house the whole weekend, it was fun, one night we went to the discotech with her aunt (whose pretty cool and knows english really well). It was ok i guess..extremely loud music (mostly bachata, merengue, and reggeton) and people dancing. Me and KC were like the only ones who didnt dance haha.
Examens weren´t easy..I didnt have to take my french exam (i dont know why, i guess i had a good enough grade not to but there was only one other kid in my class who didnt have to take it) and there was a group of kids who had good grades in biology, so our teacher (my host mom) made another test for us so that we wouldnt have to take the normal exam...agh. haha. and the test to get out of the normal test was just as hard as the normal test. haha. but noone who took the test had to take the other one. so exams here arent as closely monitored as they are in homer high...theres lots of people cheating off other people and whispering and passing notes...some people even took a picture of my friend julissa´s math test with their phones (that they were supposedly using as calculators) then copying it.. but thats not what happened in some classes..some teachers are really strict. oh, and we only had two examens every day, sometimes one, so we would take the exam in the morning, then afterwards we could leave the school at like 10:30 or whenever we got finished. we ended up going to Ilda´s, the bakery-sweetery, and eating cake and sweets alot. one time we went to the parque duarte, where there were lots of kids from lots of different schools, all in their different uniforms. it´s fun because every school has their diff. uniform and you can tell where someone goes to school just by looking at them.. one school has a peach colored skirt and white shirt for girls...some have plaid skirts..and some just pants. in my school we used to have skirts but they got banned because girls started wearing them really short..and there are alot of immature boys in our school..anyways, the examens ended on a thursday and that night my class had a chocolate (a get together in the street where they make hot chocolate and have a fire and stuff) and i went with Ramona and Sheila and Scarlett and Julissa (not Julissa from my class but Ramona´s cousin) and it was boring at first because it was supposed to start at 7, we got there at 8 and there was barely anyone there (hehe typical dominican timing :p ) then at 9 ish there was alot of people, and alot of them werent from our class, but seniors and the other junior class, and then 10:30 ish they started making hot chocolate, and it finally ended at 11:30ish. oh, hot chocolate is made differently here...people put lots of spices and cinnamon in it so it tastes different. it´s pretty good, but i miss the type we make in homer.

Then, that Saturday morning i woke up at 3:30 and went to my school with my host parents for an aguinaldo, which is this get together for the highschool kids, and everyone meets at 3:30 in the morning to pile into the backs of trucks, then they go driving through the town yelling and singing and waking people up and having fun (and some people drinking like always), haha, and agh, we got there at 4:00 and everyone had already left the school! so my friend Ramona and i didnt get to go. which pretty much sucked..we woke up at 3:30 for nothing :p and then when the trucks started arriving at the school, at about 6:30 ish, they made hot chocolate and had a bonfire. And there were alot of people there hanging out and talking so it was o.k., not extremely boring. then we left the school at about 7:30, went home, and i went to sleep.

Then came the vacation! Wow! i spent the first few days in my house sitting around and doing nothing, because there was nothing to do but watch tv or sleep. Then on christmas eve, family started arriving, and by about 6 there were about 40 people in my house, and everyone was either watching kids, helping prepare the dinner, watching tv, or trying to escape the house. and the adult guys were outside playing dominoes for a while. then, the dinner was finally ready at about 8:30, and we all went up to the roof, then lined up and ate, there was chicken, turkey, steak, pastelitoes, soda, lots of different types of pastas and salads, and lots more. and it was all really good, and it reminded me of thanksgiving at home, where all the family gets together and eats alot. haha, it was fun, and there were some cousins my age that i got to hang out with. After eating we did a gift exchange. Then almost everyone left at like 12 and went to Elias Piña, a small town closer to the Haitian border.

Christmas day I didnt do anything more than sit around and watch tv, because all the family had gone. Then, that weekend i went to Orquidea´s house to hang out and i ended up staying there until yesterday! It was fun, and Orquidea´s family is extremely nice and i´m really thankful that they invited me to their house for so long. It´s cool because her dad is from Italy, and we always talk about Alaska and Italy and stuff. Then on New Years Eve, I went to the park with Orquidea to see her friend Baldemar who is from here but lives in New York and knows English, and hung out there for a while but it was kinda boring so we went back to her house to get ready to go to her church. We went at about 10:30 and stayed until 12:30, and i felt a little awkward because i´m not religious, but it was a cool experience. During the countdown to midnight everyone was on their knees praying, then the preacher looked at his watch and said ït´s 2009! and everyone gets up and starts hugging eachother and saying ¨felicidades! feliz año nuevo!¨Afterwards we all went to Orquidea´s grandpa´s house and hung out there for a bit talking, oh, and the first thing i ate in 2009 was a piece of fried chicken, just so you all know :) . Then, at about 3 in the morning we all headed to Orquidea´s house, where we ate our dinner (because we didnt eat before), which was pizza and cookies and banana bread(which i had made with a recipe from home) and more cookies that Orquidea and her mom made, and fruit, and cider, and i´m not really sure but i think it was fruit cake..haha...it´s called panettone in Spanish..and it was good. And we ate alot! Then we went to bed. Haha, almost the whole time i was in Orquidea´s house we went to bed at about 3 in the morning then woke up at 11:30 or 12. We went to the park in the night alot, because in the Christmas time here there´s always alot of people hanging out in the park listening to loud music (there are lots of cars here that have huge microphones in the way back, like you see on t.v., haha, that drive by with the way back door open and music extremely loud) Then this last Sunday there was a wedding reception in Orquidea´s restaurant outside around the pool, and i helped serving sodas and food and stuff, and helped prepare these little shishkabobs (is that how you spell that?) with fruit, then we stuck them into whole pineapples for decoration, haha. And the wedding lasted until about 1:30, and we got lots of good wedding cake :)

Then, today was the day that school was supposed to start, but, just like all my friends told me, nobody from my grade went except for me and Orquidea. Ha. So i ended up just being in school for about a half hour, then walking home. And I´m guessing it´s going to be the same tomorrow and the next day, because everyone´s planning on going to school on Monday.

Well, that about covers it! I hope everyone had a good holiday season, and Happy 2009!
Please comment! I miss everyone!